I wrote a load of emails basically setting out all major issues then said they were verboten to talk about. She abided by this for a while then depending on context, mood etc she might drop in a pebble, relating to an issue and take her cue from there as to whether to talk about it. Say perhaps because I'd indirectly referenced it she would be like is that an indirect ref and is it because you want to talk about it today? In better therapy speak!

Also we once spent a number of sessions on me getting to trust her and making the leap of faith to trust so we also talked around the difficult issues by talking about the process.