T session Friday night: I went to see T. I made an appointment and actually got appointments made for all of Sept and the first part of October. I guess now that I've been going a year they decided they might put me on a sort of schedule. I was pretty psyched about that. It made me feel less anxious.


T came and got me. I sat in my usual chair. I waited for her for a couple of minutes, I assume she was going to the bathroom, but maybe she was taking a call or something, IDK. So I sat in the room by myself, looking at the art on the walls. Summoning the courage to tell her what I needed to tell her.


She came in and sat down. She asked me how I was. I told her it had been a tough week, particularly Tuesday and Wednesday. I had been very suicidal. All this I told to T. So she did a risk assessment, which I assumed would happen. She asked me if my friend needed to put the gun away so I didn't use it and I shook my head no. I was feeling better enough that I know I wouldn't use it to harm myself. She said, "Well you made it. You're here." I don't know if that was supposed to be encouraging, but it wasn't. I was still kind of suicidal but it wasn't the active part. I felt like the pain of the past couple of days was discounted. I described to her how I had done some self protective measures, spending time with friends, etc. I explained that there was a push and pull inside of me that was fighting for and against me. I did the things I didn't want to do (spend time with friends) because I knew it would be good for me. T was like, "Yeah but you were able to do those things." So I felt like because I didn't lay in bed and self harm and do poor choices that the pain wasn't taken seriously. I thought but did not say, I thought you were supposed to ask for help when you needed it. I told T that I had thought about going to the hospital but discounted the idea because I really didn't think they would help me. She said, "They will give you stiff sheets and rotten food, but you will be alive." That wasn't encouraging.


She wants to know what is so painful that I don't want to be here. It's hard because I don't really know. My depression is just like this sometimes. It falls into a very dark place and I have to try very hard to climb out of that dark place. She said, what emotions are you running from? I told her I didn't know. We talked about how I feel I'm bad. She doesn't think I am. She told me to tell her the bad things I've done. So I told her the things I did as a child that I would get in trouble for. I know intellectually these things aren't bad. But when you get in trouble 24/7 as a child, you tend to think you're bad. She asked me who else besides her thinks I'm good. I told her one of my friends. She said, "Is that all?" I said yep.


We talked about how I didn't self harm which she thought was a very good thing. I made a rational decision to not cut myself. I remembered what she said about gaining something by giving up self harm, and what I have figured out that I would gain was emotional stability. I told her it's hard to think that way when one is suicidal because one is not stable when one is suicidal but I thought that self harming on top of it would make me more unstable and I didn't want to be that way. T seemed to approve.


Something was missing in the session. I needed her to be more empathetic that I had been through some tough days. I mean, they were really tough for me. I wanted her to not dismiss my suicidal thoughts just because I was able to take care of myself but to address them besides just doing a risk assessment. I think the risk assessment was important but I just feel like the stress and stuff that I went through didn't count because I made good choices. It was almost like being punished for making good choices. Maybe its a difference in style. Former T would have said, I'm sorry you felt so bad. What can we do to help ensure that doesn't happen in the future? Former T would have said, "I wish you would have reached out to me in your moments of severe pain." But this T is not former T.


I need to journal to get my thoughts and emotions settled. I see T on the 19th which isn't that far away and I'd like to have something to read to her that expresses how I feel--once I figure out how I feel. I just feel like the session was perfunctory and not tailored to me. I just didn't get what I felt I needed from that T session. But part of me feels like I'm being overly sensitive. I feel like T doesn't care and I know that isn't true, or at least I believe that isn't true. She did get my name wrong again. This time calling me by my last name (which is sometimes a first name) instead of using my first name. I feel let down.