A good session with, again, tons of crying. She was crying at one point, too.

We had a good plan going in. She dressed less revealing. I looked at the floor. We gave hugs right away upon entering so that I wasn't looking at her whole body (normally I put my stuff down then walk back to her). We sat down at the same time. We both brought our blankets for the other person to hold and "recharge" them. We held hands the whole time. And we did a lot of breathing and tense and release. I was close to freeze at the beginning, but I didn't. I was even able to maintain eye contact for most of the session. Then we got up at the same time, I looked down, and we hugged. I left looking down.

I know the looking down might seem disrespectful, but she agreed in this case it was protective. I didn't get triggered by seeing her body. Which meant we could concentrate on the other things.

I did tell her I want to find joy before the end of it. She said I will, but first my parts need to be heard.

We did do parts work today: the part of me that wants in-person and the part of me that doesn't. Both parts are trying to protect my hurting parts, but they want different things. My part that doesn't want in-person feels alone against the multiple parts that do want in-person, so it's getting really loud. These parts just want coping to work: for the routines and rituals and skills to work. It's just trying to protect us from all the pain. And the in-person parts just want connection, love, reciprocation, and withness.

She said we should do my timeline again soon, so all of me can be known and heard and understood. And Tuesday's session, we'll work on my hopelessness part.

I so far feel today was helpful. Just having a productive session with no freeze was a positive. But finding what each side needed... It really does quiet the loudness. I feel a little better, more accepting about continuing in-person. And our plan worked to not be triggered, so that's a win, too.