[therapyishelping777]

A while back they had a how do we end our session topic . I was thinking about how I begin sessions with T... thinking how awkward I am... self critic here.

But my T's clinic you open the door downstairs and his office is upstairs.. I always wait until he comes and tells me its ok.. then I bop up the stairs.. I'm really bad with eye contact so I mostly put my head down but try to look at him and at least smile briefly and say hi.. then we ask each other how are you, and I sit in my usual chair by the door and he shuts the door behind me and goes to his chair..

Then I feel really awkward.. like shoot... what do I say ,, how do I start...then I just do..... sometimes with help from my journal.

[stopdog]

I walk into the building one minute after the appointment time. Her office door is open. I walk in, shut the door, and sit down. I usually sit there and shake/have pounding in my ears for about the first 5 minutes or so. Then I run through topics which I know the woman does not usually screw up and think of ways to put them to give her the greatest opportunity to understand. Then I speak.
Every so often she will ask a question =which I will respond to in some fashion - answer or not.

He's usually already sat down when I go in. We say hi, I hang my coat up and I sit down and start talking about whatever it is I have in my mind to talk about. Quite often I smile uncontrollably when I first go in. Sort of smirking as if I'm trying to stifle a laugh. I haven't worked out why that is yet.

[MobiusPsyche]

She comes out of her office and greets me with "hello." I follow her into her office, arrange the pillows on the couch to my liking, retrieve the box of Kleenex just in case, take off my shoes, and curl up on the couch. She closes the door and sits down.

Then I usually say that my weekend wasn't horrible, or that I had a rough weekend, as appropriate. Then I start to talk about whatever I decided to talk about that day.

[awkwardlyyours]

Have to ring the buzzer to get in to the building. She says 'Hi....okay' and opens the door from her office. I say nothing. Take the elevator to her office and hang out in the waiting room. She'll come out, say Hi and when I walk in through the inner door, say Hi again. I mumble something.

I walk into her office and wait for her to come in behind me. Just as she walks in, I awkwardly slip her the cash. We both awkwardly say 'Thank you' or some such banality.

I re-arrange the cushions on the couch (I hate her couch and the damn cushions -- it's all very cushion-y and couch-y). She'll either be silent or say 'How are you?' or if the weather's been a bit crazy (like lately), ask me how bad it's been where I am (since I live out in the country / middle of nowhere) etc.

If she starts with pleasantries, at some point we'll both awkwardly stare at each other and wait to get past the pleasantries. And, then she'll tilt her head, indicating that I should speak.

I'll basically bend over, almost touching my feet (since talking makes my stomach seriously churn) look at the carpet (which may or may not have spiders on it) and start with a long "Uhh....." while being totally conscious of my head spinning, a whole lot of palpitations and general panic. I'll mostly blurt out the first thing that comes to mind and then either stare defiantly at her waiting for her response while she looks at me quizzically wondering what I just said or just go into a rambling stream-of-conscious mode interspersed with lots of "Uhhh...."s and she'll stop me ever so often to ask a question that indicates exactly how unintelligible my attempt at speaking so far has been.

[growlycat]

Kashi and I are still working out a routine. His building is somewhat closed on the weekends so that means that security has to walk with me to the elevator to put in thier access key. So there is security guard small talk "have you been to the state fair ?" No I have not I reply. Or nice weather... Etc. this building drives me mad because the floors are honeycomb shaped or hexagonal or something. No right angles. So once I am on kashi's floor I try to control my breathing because the layout makes me feel disoriented. I find the bathroom then the kitchenette and rummage around like a bear for cups and tea or coffee Sometimes I just orient myself to where things are and I don't necessarily get a drink. I have started to wait in the central area not closer to his office because I've been running into his other patients when they leave. Most have been nice and say hi.

He will come look for me but he tends to say I'll be right back just to the restroom then to get tea. Not unlike what I just did. He lets me in the office and he shuts the door. I put the couch pillow on my lap and notice that someone else's butt has warmed the seat.

He sits and asks how I've been and smiles or says what's been on your mind ? I've been in the habit of keeping a notebook/journal of things that come up during the week. It starts to read as a book of worries and what ifs. Or if there is something I want to ask him I'll write it down too. And off we go.

[Out There]

He follows me up the stairs so I sit down first , then I'm looking that we both have water , then I have a few minutes contemplating what in the maelstrom of my life and inner world I want to work on today ... And we start with that !

T and I live on opposite sides of the world and both have insanely busy schedules. we do not have scheduled sessions. when one of gets a chance to talk, we text/ email/ call each other and say , do you have time to talk? whats up? If we are both available, we talk. usually start off both of is with are you busy today? whats new? how have you been doing? and hen after some chit chat, she starts asking me questions about something.

[calibreeze22]

She comes into the waiting area, where I am sitting and looking at my phone, and says, "Come on back." I follow her to her back room office while she's standing holding the door. I HATE walking past her, and I hate that I irrationally think she's there because she doesn't trust me to walk up behind her (her chair faces away from the door). I sit, figure out if my week was bad enough to lie down, decide it was but I don't like her looking at me while I'm lying down, then pull the feather out of the couch pillow that I will play with for 50 minutes. I try very hard to not obsess over the thought that she finds me disgusting, boring, and stupid. Session starts with an exchange of "How are you?" greetings, but no other small talk. I can't wait for it to be cold enough for her to be holding a mug, so at least some focus is off me.

[waterlogged]

My T's office door is about 7 feet from the waiting room. Usually I hear her start to come out, and then I finish up on my phone, and then she usually says hi, and I say "morning". Once I saw her in the afternoon and I got all flustered when I said morning even though it was afternoon.

She walks in first, sits in her seat, I follow, close the door, and sit across from her. As I sit down I shove her pillow behind my back.

Finishing usually means I get up, and as I leave I say "See you ____" - whenever the next scheduled appointment is. Once I said "Have a nice weekend" and she followed with my standard "See you ______". Once we hadn't talked about an upcoming break, except I referenced it in my goodbye, and she brought it up the next time - like maybe she had messed up by not bringing up the break. I'm pretty routinized - I always go to the bathroom both before and after (I see her in the morning, and usually I've had enough coffee I have to pee).

[ScarletPimpernel]

Once I get to the waiting room, I sit in my chair in the corner. She comes out and says she'll be right back (she has to use the restroom). Then when she comes back she'll say "Ready?". I usually reply with a nod. She'll lead me back to her office. She enters first, but waits to close the door behind me. I move the pillow from my side of the couch.

She'll start off with "How are you doing?" That usually will lead to either a small conversation (if I'm doing okay) or what our session is about (if I'm not doing okay). If it's only a small conversation then after it she'll ask "So what do you want to talk about today?"

[growlycat]

Bathroom before and after. Check. Anxiety for me.

[waterlogged]

Originally Posted by growlycat

Bathroom before and after. Check. Anxiety for me.

Glad I'm not the only one!!!

[nottrustin]

Her office is in her home so if she is in with somebody else i will wait in my car until the other person leave. She had a waiting room but you go through the waiting room wick makes me uncomfortable. I open the door of she is in her home pay I go in and wait and play with her dog. We may make a bit of small talk for a few minutes them we stay with how I am feeling.

[annielovesbacon]

My T comes and gets me from the waiting room area, and I follow her to her office. She lets me go in first and I choose which chair I want to sit it (I always sit in the same one).
Then, she asks me how I've been generally since the last time I saw her, then she gets into refreshing what we ended with last session or my "homework" from last session.

[junkDNA]

i go in , usually early, go to the bathroom. sit in the front room and look on my phone. T comes out with his last client (if there was one) and says hi, hello, good morning, how are u, etc. i reply. he turns the tea kettle on and goes to the bathroom for like 5 min. i dunno what he does in there. he hangs out in there. anyway, i wait for him. he comes out and makes tea and asks if im ready. i say yep and he follows me into his office. he closes the door, we sit down. he asks how i am again, and off we go

[Electric76]

No one else starts with a meditation? Anyway, I arrive at least 5 min early. I look out the waiting room window which doesn't have much to look at, and calm my mind. T comes to get me, we both say hi, I follow her back, she lets me in we exchange a smile as she's holding the door (feel awkward with myself here). When she sits down we exchange another hi and smile, there's room for me to make small talk but I hardly ever do. Then she says we'll do our meditation, I say "k". She taps a bell, taps again after 1-2min. I usually stay quiet looking at the ground for another minute as I gather my thoughts. She waits in silence.

[Waterbear]

I arrive at the gate at the side of Ts house and ring the bell. Initially when we started using the 'shed' and not the conservatory any more she said to ring the bell and wait there. After a few sessions she said just ring and come down the path into the garden but I find that so difficult. I can't see in to the garden, I don't know where T is, in the house, the garden or the shed and I have no idea what I might find. I might have got the time wrong and could walk in on anything. She keeps saying, you can come down. Please don't wait there, especially if it is raining or cold etc etc. I am starting to be able to venture tentatively towards the garden but it is hard.

Anyway, if she hears the bell she comes to meet me quite quickly, if not it can take a few minutes until she comes to get me and then we walk to the room. She goes first and opens the door, I go in and sit down, keep one cushion, put the other on the floor. She closes the door or asks if I want it open. Sometimes opens the window. Lights a little candle to keep the flies out (doesn't really work but it is a nice thought) and then sits down. I look around the room and find it mostly awkward to get going. She normally asks how I am etc and we somehow find a way. Sometimes I have brought things in and use these to help me get going, sometimes we just fight through.

I knock on T's front door. She amswers, she opens it, says hello, stands aside to let me in then I walk upstairs first. I'm aware of her behind me.

Sometimes as I walk up, I get these intense feeling of stupidity hit me. A feeling of loving and hating being there at the same time. It's like all the objects in the world, the door frames, the stairs rail, the walls are all judges. These feeling as intense as it is, us momentary, then I enter the room, sit down and stare at her book shelves.
T comes in behind me, sits, looks at me, and either waits for me to talk or asks how am I.

My routine was to arrive early and relax in the waiting room. I was usually coming straight from work, so time to just sit and decompress before my session was really important. He came to get me when it was time and we walked back to his office.

Usually we started with a check-in. What was my mood level? Sleep? Etc. We worked from there kind of depending on those markers for how I was doing.

There is no waiting room so I leave my coat and shoes on the landing outside T's office door. He buzzes me in and waits for me to get inside, we say "hello", shake hands and sit down. Then he'll wait in companionable and patient silence for me to gather my thoughts and let him know what I want to talk about. No small talk at all.

If I have contacted him between sessions to let him know I want him to help me bring something up, he will do that without my prompting. That happens maybe twice a year or so. If there's any scheduling or other admin-type issue he'll bring that up first as well, but other than that he'll almost always allow me to begin, and to set the topic.

[Myrto]

There is no waiting room as she practices from home. I ring the bell, hears her unlocking the door as I'm her first client in the morning. She opens the door, says "hello" I say nothing. We shake hands (that's a new thing, I asked her about it about a month ago and we've been doing it ever since) I walk in and turn right to reach the little room where she holds the sessions. I move the cushions to the side as I don't like having cushions behind my back and sit on the couch. She sits in front of me in her armchair and waits for me to speak. Sometimes 10 minutes pass as I say nothing. I find it hard to begin even when I have prepared something to say. After a while, she'll try to encourage me by saying "so what have you been thinking about this week?" Sometimes I respond to that, sometimes I don't. She rarely conducts the sessions: she usually lets me lead.

[ECHOES]

I wait in a small waiting room, reading Time or The New Yorker since I'm usually early. She escorts the person(s) she sees before me, I wait for them to pass me to get to the door to leave. I wait a sec for her to say Hi because sometimes she tells me 'just one
minute' if she has to make a call, then she comes back to get me. We take our places, me on the couch and her in her chair. We exchange 'How are you' and then she says 'So', unless I begin first. I just say whatever comes to mind. I might start with something about work-the people I work with and work for. We just go from there.

Or, if I have emailed her, we talk about what I wrote in the email.

Or, if I've have a dream to share, I'll start with 'I have to tell you about a dream', so she can grab a pen and paper, the only time she writes anything down. Sometimes that search is humorous to watch, because she is brilliant but disorganized sometimes. So, I tell her the dream and we analyze it.

And, sometimes I'm distraught and it's hard to speak through my tears. She speaks first, helping me find the words that go with feeling distraught. So I guess my tears start first.

And, sometimes I'm withdrawn and can't think of a thing worth talking about, so we start with talking about the withdrawal, and what it's about, when it began.

From time to time, in an election year, we might talk politics for a few minutes first.

We begin 'where I am'.

[therapyishelping777]

Thanks so much for commenting here, its so nice to hear how everyone starts and to realize I'm not the only one who feels kind of awkward .... starting.. the "what are they really thinking " to the breaking of the initial stare once you sit down... the the gush... well.. well all have our own ways and T's have their own styles... its all interesting...

[SoConfused623]

I arrive at the Community Mental Health Center which is in a huge old home (4 stories). I pay in the waiting area and then have a seat and entertain myself with my smart phone.. At exactly 9am she calls downstairs and asks them to send me upstairs. There are a TON of stairs so I usually arrive a little winded.

When I get to her office she is ALWAYS sitting in her chair with her feet on this little foot rest and very enthusiastically says, "Hello SC, come on in!" I take my coat off and put it and my purse on one chair and sit in the other chair. There is never any water or anything offered but I always travel with a bottle of water, so I take it out of my bag and put it next to me. There is no couch and I kind of wish that there was. There's a little clock next to me and I usually turn it so that I can see it better, T can see the same clock more easily than I can.

I sit down, she smiles and says, "Where would you like to begin" I'm usually still trying to catch my breath and in my most recent visit, I said, "I can't believe that you're voting for Trump!" (as a joke to try to get a response) She could tell I was joking and said, what would it mean to you if I voted for Trump? I told her that I knew a few people who were and that it was her vote and she could do whatever she wanted with it. I then said that I couldn't imagine her voting for Trump (I know that she's a democrat from the public posts that she's liked on FB but I'm not supposed to know about that....) and she continued with her dead pan look. I hate this blank slate stuff!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then I take a deep breath and decide what I want to talk about first. She NEVER follows up on anything that we've talked about before which in some ways is good, but in other ways it makes me feel like she doesn't care. I once brought this up and she said that she only wants to talk about what's important to me....

So that's pretty much it..