Dear T: I need to tell you something but I don't know how (Part V)

Therapy has been 95% frustration lately, and I'm tired of it. The little bit that is good isn't worth the constant distress at worst, disappointment every week at best. I don't want to talk with you about this, I just want a break from it. I don't understand why that is a problem, why people say that when we don't want to go we need to force ourselves to go. I don't have to do anything. Therapy is important but it is not the utmost importance of my life and if I stop, forever or just take a break, it won't be the end of the world.

This week please help me find and sever the invisible string between my ex and me. I can't keep going like this. I feel he tugs it and I just respond. So find a massive pair of scissors and cut it finally.

I really hope you can do this T as I'm feeling squashed and throttled by it.

Dear T, the last session UN-nerved me a lot. feeling like my feelings are all over the place. it was because i talked too much. and that something you said, the why i ran out i have figured out and now i have a stupid goal for fixing it. except i really need it to work because then i might get the control back????

weird feeling--> i am soo soo needing control back and it just feels you have it all. not good!!!!!



please help my crazy thinking...

T,
I am trying to do what is right and be independent. I am feeling dysregulated and angry because I hate this feeling. I don't matter.

ANTI MATTER

T,

how very ridiculous I must seem to you.

SAWE

ok buddy... your turn

50 minutes once a week just isn't anywhere near enough time to sort this all out. I'm worried about tomorrow because there's so little I can cover in that time...and maybe I'm facing the end anyway.

I'm not over just how much has gone wrong. There's been so much. The hardest things are still that really angry session and all the awful comments said that day. I'm also struggling with being called intrusive. Some of the things that were forgotten and ignored were really hard. Some of your defensive and angry reaction since that first bad session have been really hurtful. I also don't feel good about being pushed to record a session when I didn't want to. I don't feel good about how sure you are that you wouldn't think of me in a life threatening situation if we were in one together. Ouch.

This was my one stable thing. My safe place. You were my one person...and I don't know who you are now. Maybe I can't heal because no relationship will be stable enough for me. I guess this is what it comes down to after four years. I've been saying four years for the last few months because we're almost there...but actually this weekend it will be official. Four years. Maybe that's as long as anyone can cope with me.

What is left for me to hope for? Please be kind tomorrow.

Dear T,

So when I see you later today, you will be ultra impressed about what I did to get ready for Thursday: ZERO! Unless you count picking out clothes, shoes, and makeup? That would probably impress you even less, right? I thought so. Thinking about it otherwise makes me want to hurl. And you know this isn't going to go like we have it on paper, right? Right?? Because he does. Which is why he is so nervous, too. Get ready for a big 'ol mess!

I don't want to go. Please shred everything I've given and terminate me

Please

Okay just be gentle.

... but instead of that, I'll just say "not so great".

I don't think little me is coming out tomorrow. Not safe. Too much to discuss and try to sort out first. I feel too 'cut off'.

Dear T,

Sorry I'm not making any effort to get up and ready to come see you. My head just HURTS and I am tense and we can just talk on the phone and I just don't care right now anyway. Which you'll find out in about 30 minutes.

Dear T,

Please, don't give up on me.

SAWE

Thank you for being understanding and not insisting that I come this week. I seriously need to briefly step back, for my own good. I'll see you soon, hopefully more refreshed for a better session.

Dear T,
Did I just quit? Are you good with that after all this time? Did I really fail at one more thing? It's all too much and I don't know how to keep doing this anymore. I don't really know where to go from here and I am very sorry for everything. I'm just so incredibly tired of this constant struggle. You mention the light at the end of the tunnel and that there is hope. Then out of the blue FIL actually says that the light at the end of the tunnel is the destruction heading my way. Coincidence I know but there's too much of this stuff and I am so tired of fighting the inevitable. What's the point of any of this? All of this pain and struggling to get free and in the end I will just fail anyway. I'm sorry.

Dear T,

Although therapy was really terrible today, I did it. I finally called the ED clinic when I got home. The part you maybe won't like- my assessment isn't until April 11. I had nothing to do with it being a month and a half out either, thats the earliest they could get me in. After finding out I'm losing 1-2lbs a week lately, you told me I'm at a critical point and need to do this right now, so I did. And now I get to stress even more about going in to the clinic for 6.5 weeks. Instead of feeling proud of myself for making the call, I'm feeling like I made a huge mistake.

((((((((((((((((((((((( nightlight )))))))))))))))))))))))

i hope it went well for you today.
Can you not schedule a 90 minute with T now and then? Once a month maybe? Or just try one and see if it's helpful?

Thanks for thinking of me! I can't even afford the 1 hour really so it's quite hard. I still have 3 hours to go before my session starts and I'm so exhausted that I doubt I'll manage to talk about anything useful. I just want to lie down and not get up again.

Dear t:
Why did you suggest three weeks to my next appointment instead of the usual two?
Me.

Dear T,

I’m annoyed at you, no, I’m really, really mad at you. The problem is I feel I have NO reason to be angry with you, which only adds to my frustration and aggravation. I’m upset that you didn’t read what I gave you, though I know it is unrealistic to expect you to read all the stuff I gave you and you explained why you didn’t read it. Then that makes me wonder what you DID read, if anything. I thought you were reading everything I gave you, and I was taking comfort in that knowledge and thought it helped our sessions. Then today when you told me you didn’t read my stuff, it made me wonder if you read ANYTHING. Have I been operating under false assumptions that you were reading what I wrote and implementing the changes? I feel like all these good feelings I’ve had over the past 2 weeks, all the realizations, the progress that I feel like I made and wrote about, are founded on false pretenses. I guess it doesn’t help that to find out you haven’t been reading the stuff I gave you reminded me of last year when I gave H something very important to read and he said he would read it, but never did, no matter how much I asked. That hurt me very much, the same way I feel hurt now.

I feel guilty and unjustified in writing this because I really feel I have NO right to be angry with you. You did nothing wrong, I’m the one who did wrong. I had unrealistic expectations of what I wanted from you and from therapy, and today I realized those expectations are not being met. Instead of accepting it maturely, I take it out wrongly on you. I remember one other time this happened, where I had unrealistic, unspoken expectations from someone and I got angry with them. It almost cost me my friendship with soandso. I do NOT want to go through that again, but I can’t stop these feelings of anger, betrayal, and rejection. What’s worse, I know if I bring this up with you, you’ll probably say something that will justify your behavior, or explain everything. Then I’ll realize you’re right, I'm wrong in my perception and I’m just overreacting and blowing things out of proportion, as has happened many times in the past with other people. Then I get more upset and frustrated at myself because I was wrongly angry and upset with you without all the information necessary to justify my feelings towards you and that leads me to feel even more guilty and small.

I’m also angry with you, unjustifiably, because you are making me hurt. You are stirring up emotions in me that I have not felt for YEARS, if EVER. I do NOT like these emotional feelings, it’s extremely painful, scary, overwhelming, and really pissing me off because the emotional pain combined with all the racing thoughts generating the emotions are consuming all my time and affecting my productivity. I know, again, I have no reason to be angry with you because you are only doing your job. I know my anger is displaced, but knowing that my anger is unwarranted only makes me more frustrated and angry because I CANNOT control my emotions.

The worst part of it all is that I feel like I WANT to quit, to just give up, to go back to the way things were before I started seeing you. Yeah, my life sucked, I was miserable, but at least I was getting my work done, and able to function day to day without breaking down in tears, or having to take a nap to cope with my feelings, or spend hours writing things down just to clear my head. I think I wrote MORE in the past 2 months than I have in the past 10 years, seriously! Yes, I know you said I would feel worse before feeling better, and I know this is the “feeling worse” part, but I don’t know how to get through this part. I don’t know if I CAN! I can’t tell you how many times since I’ve started feeling these emotions over the past few days that I’ve had horrible thoughts of how to cope – thoughts of drinking myself into oblivion, thoughts of hurting myself just to make the emotional pain go away, thoughts of just giving up completely. Then I realize the promise I made to myself, that I WOULD not do any of those things because I’m trying, I’m trying to change, to improve, to break bad, old habits. I know you’re going to say that I’m trying to hard, but I CANNOT help it. I’m an all or nothing person. I throw myself 110% into everything I do, and give it my all. Yes, that’s probably very unhealthy, especially in this situation, and yes, it places extreme undo pressure on me, but it’s all that I know.

I feel so helpless, so out of control, like I’m drifting in an open sea with no sign of help in sight. I know you’re going to say that’s not true, that you’re here to help, but you’re NOT. You’re only there an hour every other day, and usually when I see you is when everything is somewhat okay. I need you NOW, I needed you Sunday evening, I needed you Friday after our session, I need you when you can’t be there. I need you BETWEEN sessions, or I need to KNOW how to be able to cope between sessions. What’s worse is that when I come to our sessions, I never seem to be able to address the issues that affect me between sessions. It’s like you always say, I’m not “in the moment”. Well, that’s the problem! I come to see you and my moment of crisis from the day/night/weekend passed and then all is fine. Then those issues just get pushed on the back burner, or buried but never resolved until they fester up again, and they usually resurface at the most inopportune times. HOW is that helpful to me!?

Maybe I’m looking at this all wrong. Maybe I have this warped perception of how therapy is supposed to work. Maybe therapy isn’t intended to solve my immediate problems, but rather the bigger issues and give me the ability to solve my immediate crisis on my own. That’s all well and good, but HOW do I survive until I reach that point of being able to solve my immediate crisis on my own? HOW do I cope when I’m flooded with emotions and feelings that I’m not used to experiencing? I know you said feelings are like a wave, and they’ll pass, but it sure doesn’t feel like it! How long do they take to pass? How frequently do they come? What do I do when I go home after a session and fall apart like I did today, and Friday and other times? I know what I WANT to do, I want to bury the feelings, push them away, ignore them, but to do so is counterproductive, and would undo what little progress I HAVE made. So instead, I take your advice, I let the feelings be. Easier said then done. When I let the feelings exist, I end up experiencing more feelings and writing angry letters to you expressing just how I’m feeling, and thinking unhealthy thoughts and doubting myself and what I know.

Do you know how many times in the past week or two I have actually debated quitting coming to see you? How many times I thought that maybe we aren’t a good fit as therapist/client? How many times I thought maybe someone will be better, different, and not make me feel what I’m feeling now? Then I realize that if this is all part of the process, a different therapist probably will NOT change that. I am the one that will need to change, to embrace the process. I wrote this all down a few days/weeks ago, but since you probably didn’t read it you don’t know that I’m having these doubts and questions. And because our sessions go by so fast (or so they seem) and we always talk about other issues because I’m not in the moment or I forget to bring these issues up, these things never get addressed.

Okay, I think I’m done, I’m just repeating myself now, going in circles – heh circles, just like you say, everything is circular, not linear. So true…I’m still angry with you but at least I feel more controlled, like I got everything off my chest and I can go back to work now.

T. Dude. I am okay this week! I'm not angry with you, I don't feel any kind of needy longing to connect with you. I feel secure. Holy ****, I didn't think that was possible.

ETA: Of course, being the pessimist that I am, I'm sure what I'm experiencing now will end. But then so will whatever else I experience after that. Impermanence. I think that needs to be my new mantra.

been a while since i posted here...or at PC at all...



Dear T

I am tired. Yes i am still holding on, remembering, considering, wondering, worrying, exploring, struggling, experiencing, and submerged in all of *this*. As well as everything else. I am tired...

...in this process and progress, i don't know how to relax, let go and just be...



*also waves hello to ((((everyone else here))) in the meantime*

I feel very sad that I could not trust you and had to leave last week. I wish I knew that I could really feel safe in s*x*al boundaries. I left you because I was afraid you were going to try to get me in bed or date you. Which is inappropriate. There was no way to know, really, but you did not show professional detachment; you behaved more like an audience to my entertaining you, rather than a therapist.

I wish there were more stringent laws or protections for patients! I wish your office had a receptionist and your waiting room had at least 2 ppl in it.

Why did you act so gd creepy?

How can you expect a female patient to be comfortable under your conditions?!

Carol

Ouch. That's gotta hurt.

Dear T,

You know I have huge stress and anxiety around using the phone. You know how desperate I must have been feeling to actually pick up the phone and call you to ask for an extra session. You would have heard how stressed I was about leaving a voicemail. You know I would have been stressed about you ringing me back.

Sending me a text instead of calling me back feels like the kindest thing anyone has ever done for me ever. I was so grateful I actually cried.

Rabbit.