I had been talking about how my adoptive mother took my hand away from her whrn I was cuddling her once as a small child and told me never to do that again.
I was crushed. Felt I'd made a full of myself by thinking I had any right to cuddle her. Knowing they she wasn't my 'real mother' as she had pointed out to me.
So I fear getting relationships wrong. Fear being laughed at for crossing a boundary. Because that particularly relationship isn't meant for closeness.
So I asked T a question today about whether she had a good relationship with her mother.
She laughed, and then she said "why are you asking?"
It took me a great deal of courage to ask such a personal question and felt the sting of the rejection of the answer.
I immediately replied "it's a simple yes or no, I don't want details (though that's probably a lie)"
She replied "no she hadn't a good relationship weigh bet mother" but why did I ask?
I replied "I imagined you had, so why are you like you are and me like I am?!"
T said "is about degrees. My adoptive mother wasn't there for me at all"
As I drove home. I realised her laugh and my searing pain was connected.
She did reply to another email saying about how though she hadn't caught what was happening in the moment, this will lead to a deeper understanding of what was happening.

This isn't a thread for therapy bashing.