stupid therapy! stupid session!

I'm just writing to see if I can figure out my session. Or maybe someone else can.

It's been a week between sessions (which I'm still getting used to) and both last week and this week I had 50 minutes sessions (I usually have 90). And we're in the middle of the hardest thing we've talked about.

When I got there, I gave T some cookies because I baked some for my boys today. He ate one right away and we talked about me not knowing where he was this weekend. He felt bad that I was holding so much anxiety. But it just was what it was, so there wasn't much to say about it.

For some reason, we started talking about concerts we'd been to, and one story led to another. We both knew we weren't doing therapy and kept saying it was the LAST STORY but then I'd be like "let me just tell you one more" and it was just funny and we were laughing and finally we had to consciously put that stuff aside. Although looking back, I'm not sure that was the right thing to do.

We talked about my son and high school and how that feels.

And then there we were, in the yuck. I mean, that's what's THERE right now. And I said a couple of things about how I've been triggered lately and got this feeling that T didn't want me to be talking about it, so I stopped. I told him "I don't think you want me to talk about this right now". He said something like everything is welcome in there. So I said "I think ONE of us doesn't want to talk about this"...because I guess it could be me.

The thing is, this topic is so hard and so sensitive that if I sense the teeniest tiniest thing being "off" I just shut down. And that's basically what happened. T asked questions and I didn't answer. AAAAAAAAAA!

So I said we should schedule more appts (even though it was the middle of session) and T asked if I wanted to do that at the end or right then? I said right then. So he got his book and sat with me and that's when I found out that he's gone all next week and I'm going to have two weeks between my session this Friday and my next session. So THAT sucked. He just had forgotten to tell me. Argh.

I finally said I wanted to leave (even though we had 15 minutes left), but I knew that shutting myself off from him was the wrong thing to do. So we sat there. I finally told him that I needed to know that we're still US, and that he still loves me. He said "done". And I added "THE MOST". He just smiled.

I told him I feel so yucky and I'm afraid if I keep telling him this stuff he won't love me anymore.

And we talked a little bit about how Friday will go. T said that he would be open and that if we talk about hard stuff we'll make sure there is time to get grounded and connected at the end before our big giant break.

When I left I just felt frustrated. It felt like one of those pointless sessions (although I know no session is *really* pointless). I left a message and said that the session felt so much like my real life right now. There is this me who is a mom and who wants to laugh and tell funny stories about concerts and then there is this me who has this crappy stuff from the past orbiting around and triggering me and we bump up against each other and it just sucks.

I feel all disconnected from T and from myself. I need something, but I don't know what it is. I so wish I did.

I find that so much of therapy is feeling attuned and that sometimes the conversations (concerts) that feel like "not therapy" can be the most valuable. And whenever I go into therapy with an agenda, it ends up going wrong. Perhaps your first instinct to just flow with the conversation was the best one? Also, the time to deal with interruptions in therapy scheduling, it seems to me, is when you feel confident and settled, not at the end of the session or when it's not something you can handle. Seems that topic might be worth exploring.
Anyway, stupid therapy, Stupid session is the best title for a thread yet and you will garner plenty of support from us on that one alone! Hugs! Hang in there! You're brave to be able to unspool all of this for yourself. And you're learning! MCL

I hate sessions like that ... it so takes time to look back on it to see where the value of the session is. hindsight = 20/20 ... blah. I so understand, treehouse.

THIS is so true. I don't *think* I went in with an agenda, but it does feel like there's this unspoken agenda right now. I think that being in the middle of this stuff is painful and I want to move through it...and I think T, in his countertransference-y (new word) way feels the same way. I don't even think it's conscious (although now it is, which will help).

It's fun to laugh with T. We probably should have just rolled with it. Ack. THERAPY. ARGH!!!!!!!!!!

Tree - that's not a comfortable place to be. Been there. I hope what you need shows up or dawns on you. Maybe you're learning how to treat yourself when you feel like that?? I don't know....I'm learning that a common thing in my therapy is that I have to go thru it, not around it or ignore it and then examine the feelings... Ignoring feelings is one of the things that brought me to the point of needing therapy...I'm not saying that's what you're doing. Guess I'm just thinking out loud. Anyway, I hope you feel better soon.

((((Tree)))) For some reason, your session reminds me a LOT of my own pattern with bringing forward the hard stuff. This is how I see my pattern -
1. Build enough courage and trust to bring up the issue.
2. Have session where we start on the hard issue.
3. Feel somewhat relieved that I have shared the hard thing.
4. Feel terror that T won't like me any more because of what I shared.
5. Subconsciously start to put up my emotions walls because of that fear - ie. I would rather be the one to emotionally shut down than let him hurt me.
6. Have next session where I NEED and WANT to finish the work on the hard stuff.
7. Sit in session and feel like T is far far away from me emotionally... Pick up on every single thing like if he crosses his arms and see that as rejection.
8. Try to bring up the topic but end up talking about other "things" that are not related in any way to the hard stuff.
9. Blame T for being the one to not address what I came into session to do.
10. Go home and cry a ton because I feel totally alone in the universe and feel confirmed that my telling T about the yucky stuff has made him not like me and that is why he pushed me emotionally away in session.
11. Do a ton of moping around and share on PC.
12. Go to the next session and talk about what happened with the last "bad" session.
13. Realize that I was the one shutting down due to my fear.
14. My T hugs me and I leave knowing he still cares and I can trust him again on the next big pile of yuck.

I think it is important for survivors to see how they process these things inside the walls of therapy. We respond to things because we have a need to protect ourselves. Now that I know I follow this pattern, I am starting to be able to suffer a whole lot less after the "bad" sessions. I think the day will come when I can just be in the "bad" session and address my resistance right then... hence turning it into yet another good session :-)

((((WePow))))

That's always been my pattern too. And I haven't done it in such a long time, that I can't tell if I'm stuck in the pattern again, or if it's something else.

Sometimes I don't know WHAT to do in therapy. I want to get through the hard stuff, but it's overwhelming and I hate it. But if I take a break from it, then it's still sitting here, waiting and triggering me. Oh, how I hate it.

I got angry on the way home that because this stuff was DONE TO ME, I can't just sit and enjoy a happy conversation about a concert. But of course, if it wasn't done to me, I wouldn't even know T.

Ugh. I don't know if I'm numb or sad or scared or angry or what.

Thank God I'm busy.

Tree, maybe T not leading you to where you wanted to go, where you expected to go, the session not being what you planned... felt like something done to you?

Tree ((((((((((((( hugs to you ))))))))))))))

I think you are numb, scared, sad, and all the rest. I sense how much this subject hurts because you are maybe trying to rush it - even if just to have it OVER and not hanging over yr head any more - but the process is slow, like the growth of a plant; it takes the time it takes. Maybe the fact that T is gone next week is a good thing, it's a breather for you and you didn't even have to ask for it?

Be busy; be alive. Tell funny stories to your boys, yr DH, yr friends; go places and do things. See if you can grant yourself a brief vacation - it will be over before you know it, and you may find yourself renewed for the harder work. Come post away, you know we love you and there's someone here most any time.

by the way I love this >> I gave T some cookies [...] He ate one right away
and this >> He said "done". And I added "THE MOST". He just smiled.