Had nice, comfortable session with T today. Not boring. Not intense. Just fine.

T thinks the root of my recent anxiety is these negative interactions with my H--they make me anxious and upset, and then I can't handle other stuff well on top of this (such as how I might lose my job, problems with the kids, etc.). He says it sounds like I am taking on some of my H's feelings. I talk to H and sense his frustation and so I become frustrated and anxious and scared in reaction to his emotions. T says leave my H's feelings with him, don't take them on. If H is frustrated, just say calmly to him, "I can hear that you're frustrated, I'm doing the best I can, we can talk more later." And then say good-bye and hang up. But don't take his crap on. Be teflon, he said. Easier said than done.

We also talked about boundaries and how he isn't sure I have ever set a single boundary in my life. I think I may be one of the most boundaryless individuals he has worked with (he didn't say that). He says he wants me to hang up that phone and then swear at my H, flip him off, tell him to go f himself, whatever. He said it will help me to get out of this trauma response I go into--freeze or flight--and go into the fight mode, which helps process trauma. Yow, I am so not good at this stuff. I am always freeze (dissociate) or flight (leave, avoid). T says even if I don't feel like "fight" to just do it and see how it goes. (This is all not to my H's face, of course, but on my own, kind of like a mock intereraction--how I wished things had gone.) He modeled yelling things at my H for me, saying in raised voice stuff like "leave me alone"", "don't treat me like that!", "f**k off!" It was very intense for me to hear T yelling this stuff. I felt upset and almost started crying while he was doing this--I don't really know what I was feeling, just that it was something, and strong.

Then he said he looked up this course on the Internet that he highly recommends I take, that it could be very psychologically empowering for me, in all parts of my life. It is an intensive self-defense course, 2 days long, where women learn to fight off male attackers and incapacitate them. It is very, very physical. He said it is good not just for the self-defense aspect but the changes it can make in the psyche, and many abused women take it to help them triumph over their past.



Before I went to session today, I was thinking about something mckell asked me in another thread, about what my current goal in therapy is. I wasn't sure but decided it might be "to become more powerful again." (That is definitely a change for me from "to get a divorce.") I have really become a wimp through the course of my marriage and didn't use to be like that at all. I didn't tell T about my new "goal", but somehow the theme of our session was along the lines of helping me regain my power. (Can he read minds? Did I unconsciously steer the session that way?)

Reading back on this, the session doesn't sound "nice and comfortable" at all. I think I am having a delayed reaction to some of what we talked about....