After a few despairing emails back and forth yesterday, today we Skyped and it went okay, I think. At the start I said I felt very bad after last session. He said what kind of bad? I said I told you, shame. He asked did it feel like it was all about what happened in the session or did it feel historical? I said "I don't know. Well, actually even if I do know, I don't care. The purpose of this for me is to work out whether I want to come back. I don't want to get into those feelings now".

Then we were both very quiet. To the point where at times I was anxious he would think the screen had frozen. I was starting to think this was pointless.

I told him something that had happened in a group I attended after our session (transferencey stuff with an older man) and he didn't respond. I said "You're very quiet, T". He said he was aware that the purpose of this is for me to work out whether I want to come back, so he's torn about his response, but he had been thinking about how I go through a similar process with him, and he isn't sure whether we've gotten to the bottom of what that's all about. Then he said "not that we need to know".

I asked him about what he had said last session (I've briefly summarised what happened last session in a quote box above because I'm aware I haven't written about it. I haven't felt up to it). He said "Okay, if you want to go there..." I said "what does that mean?" he said "Just that it feels like thin ice" he went to continue and I said "You have choice, you have agency, you don't have to go there". He said "I feel like you are saying it would help you make a choice about whether to come back".

He went on to say that he had been anxious about the appropriateness of what he was saying (that he loves me) and had added the last bit to be really clear about what he was trying to express. Not, as I imagined, that he thought that either I thought he was in love with me, or that I wanted him to be. I was quiet and he said "now you're really quiet". I said "It's a lot to take in and process, but if that was thin ice, you navigated it well". He said "good".

He said he thought of our ongoing metaphor about being roped together climbing a mountain. He said he felt like I had fallen over, he had really steady footing and wanted to help me; I was getting my knife out to cut the rope and he was saying "No, don't cut the rope, I've got you". I liked that analogy. I sat quiet, taking it all in. I said I was wondering what the benefits are to continuing and what the benefits are to cutting the rope. He said it depends how I would feel about continuing alone. I said "Are you telling me there's no train back down the mountain?"He said "It's quite an amusing thought that we are fighting our way through this ice and snow, yet there's a train station round the corner".

I said I wasn't 100% sure I was ever not going to come on Wednesday. He said "You convinced me". I said I wasn't lying to you. I wish I hadn't said that because now you think I was being manipulative. He said he didn't think that at all. That it's how I was feeling at the time and I expressed that. He said he thinks he heard that I am coming on Wednesday and he is pleased about that.

My Amazon Echo randomly started speaking. I told him we must have said something that sounded like "Alexa". He looked a bit sheepish and I said "sorry I forgot you are scared of AI". He said "Not scared, just wary.". Then my cat went through the cat flap and he said "What's that? Is Alexa getting the hoover out?" I said "No! it's the cat. The cat flap is right behind me."

We came up to the hour. He asked if I was okay to end there. I said yes. We were quiet. I said it feels weird without the hug. He said He doesn't think there's a way to do that virtually. I found a little heart button and I pressed it and it sent a flashing heart to him. He sent one back to me. We said see you on Wednesday and hung up.