For those of you who read my previous post-- I am in the process of reading an article that MissCharlotte sent me. I found one particular part in which I could not think of a better way to describe what is going on with me:

"Acting out is a substitute for verbal expression. It is expressive, symbolic communication, but it is not reflective. The patient is acting rather than reflecting. Where acting out is, thought cannot be.

One feature of acting out is that the therapist is usually put under pressure to do something he would not otherwise do - to go after the patient in some way, e.g., to write to the patient or phone, to reveal something, to move, to change a session, to press the patient, to relent about a decision or take a firm line, even to lose his temper."

And I think that acting out definitely goes past the therapist. Children act out in order to put their parents under pressure to act a certain way. Individuals act out in relationshipsto put their partner under the same pressure. In my case, I feel like acting out, is not only so T is put under that "pressure," but so that the world around me is put under that same pressure of knowing how much I hurt-- meaning the "rules" should be changed so that I can express what is currently beyond my capacity of verbal expression.