We wanted so badly to be able to connect with T today. She's been away.
We blabbed on and on about some stuff. T made comments here and there. We couldn't look at her. We wanted to be away from her.
We talked about the nothingness of growing up unloved, unwanted, rejected by those who were supposed to have rescued us from rejection. But instead just used that as a poisoned weapon, and as security against disclosure of their own atrocities.

T was there, T listened as we babbled on and on, but we couldn't see her and couldn't find her.

When time was almost up there was an overpowering grief inside us. The grief of missed connection. She offered to do our end-of-session grounding exercise with us. She offered to do a different one. She turned away from us and started, but it immediately triggered a traumatic memory. We managed to say "Do the other one." She did the other one. While she read through it we sat there frozen and terrified, stuck in flashback. We were supposed to do the exercises as she said them. She didn't notice, kept on reading through.

When she finished we stood up and left.