This is great!! I'm so glad you went in, and he was so kind to say he was glad to see you!

You see how not emailing brings progress? Being less dependent on T, you were able to garner the confidence, trust, and capability within yourself to do what you wanted to do. Fears of your Ts reaction did not determine your fate--you did what you wanted to do. Your sense of self has started to solidify already.

The cancellation stuff is just a phase. I wouldn't even worry and just go with it not against it. Seek to understand it, then mastering it will come naturally. What you speak of is related to the beauty of this therapy, about how it changes your structures, how your mind works. This therapy magnifies your conflicting mental processes--these used to be referred to as freud's id, ego, superego, but the concepts still apply to everyone.

• the instinctual part-fear, impulses, pleasure-seeking, sex, aggression, anger....
• the superego-the guilt, internalized parents, rules you created for yourself, the internal voices, self-hate, and the punishment
• your ego, which regulates everything; the part of you that reasons, plans, seeks to achieve and self-actualize etc.

Your mind, through defenses, has been repressing your impulses. Normally that happens because your parents rejected them (i.e. you weren't allowed to be angry or excited). Because your impulses come out in T, such as the angry feelings/aggression, your superego tries to keep you in check and guilts you. It used to bury your impulsive side and try to hide your true feelings. The hardest part is often related to dissolved defenses.

It takes a while, but what happens is your ego changes and starts to regulate all of this. It's just that your superego has dominated for so long, you likely never noticed it. Also because your ego was clouded by defenses. Now those defenses lift, you are left figuring out how to 'be' in the world. It's truly remarkable how your mind can still change after development.

Someday after working through this stuff, your mind will be content more often than not. Until then, all of these mental processes are magnified. Use this opportunity to understand them, to understand yourself and become more whole and balanced. This is a strong benefits of this therapy that is mostly unrelated to the relationship. Your mental structures change so that your ego regulates these mental processes.

Your thought about the punishment was really insightful. Growing up, did your parents reject you for being angry? Or maybe you felt you had to go away? Or if you couldnt make your father happy, you felt bad about yourself? Maybe because you were not accepted unless you were 'good"? Just thoughts..