Dear T,

Thank you. For pushing me. Gently. For encouraging me to share these insanely difficult things. I don't think I would share if you didn't gently encourage me. But you also see how hard it is. How insanely hard it is. And you praise me when I do well.

Sometimes that feels like you are feeding in to the parts of me that want to have problems here, but is that necessarily a bad thing? To feel heard, to feel seen, to feel understood? I don't know.

All I do know is that surely it must be working, because I have never shared with anyone what I shared with you today. I am seriously surprised that I did. A huge part of me didn't expect me to be able to, despite coming today with every intention of it.

I don't think I was totally present for a lot of the session today, except the bit at the end, the very end. I really really really struggled to access my rational mind, and noticed there was a lot of face pulling, a lot of cowering and a lot of that strange wry smile that seems to happen from nowhere when these other parts of me are present.

I'm sorry that I freaked out when you looked at me at the end. For the first time I actually turned towards you, to look at the picture 'with' you, and you happened to look at me at that moment. I think I actually screeched and put my hands up to my head. It's that that I think we need to do more of. It's that that I think will help us to feel more equal - working together. Creating something together. I'll give it some more thought and let you know.

And thank you for offering me to email next week when I can't come. Two weeks seems like a long time after sharing something like that, but maybe the two weeks is also a good thing. Who knows. I will try and email though, because I think it will be a good thing for me to do.

So yeah, thank you, for doing your best to help me. For staying consistent and being patient even though after over a year I really still don't feel safe in that room with you, talking about these things. I hope I'll get there one day.

Me