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

continuation of Dear T

Dear t,

Did you look in my bag? My friend who saw you after me tells me it's hanging on the back of your treatment door...

Dear A,

I wish you would give me longer answers in your email. I understand that you are busy, but I spend more then 2 minutes writing an email to you, giving you more info about me to help you do your job better. It wouldn't take that much out of your work time, to make your answer a little longer. (Would only take 5 minutes, tops) I only email you once per week and see you once every three weeks. It's not that often

Don't think I will email you next week EVEN if I need too. Maybe you think once per week is a bit too much. After all, you didn't answer me when I gave you the choice via email out of once per week or once every two weeks or maybe you need a break from me?

hey there t. i had a pretty rough week at work, lots of overtime this month and the stress has been building up and i pretty much lost it yest morning and was sitting in an empty conference room bawling. I wish that could have waited til I got home or at least to my car, but... well... the important thing is I finally LET myself feel it and cried it out and things are better again. Still stressful but I don't feel like my stomach is eating itself anymore. I'm still glad we scheduled an appt in early Feb, I'm going to be ready to talk to you again. And btw I may not tell you this for reals but - dangnabbit - I'm starting to MISS you again like crazy. Bah humbug. I don't wanna love you and I don't wanna miss you and I don't wanna need you. but i do and i do and i do. what are we going to do with me?!

T...

Please, please don't ask me what I want our focus to be in therapy. Please don't ask me for direction like you're uncertain. I know I'm being spoiled here, but please don't ask me that. Please just choose on your own, because if you ask me that I'm going to think you think maybe I don't have a problem, just because I don't obviously, transparently have one in our interactions, and want to let me go. I know I am overreacting... but please don't put that pressure on me.

Your patience in the face of my stubbornness and fear is overwhelming sometimes. How do you do it? How is it that you can reassure me and stick with me when you see all the ugly? How are you still okay with me? You should hate me. That's the only explanation I know. But you don't. And that's so confusing. WHY? Why won't you just quit? Why haven't you thrown in the towel yet, and seen how impossible your job is with me? Is the money I am paying really enough to earn this level of dedication? I barely pay 2/3 of your normal fee. There's no way I would put up with me for that amount. I feel guilty for taking up your time and loyalty when there are others who could easily get better faster than me and be more gratifying. People who aren't me, who don't constantly question you and run from you at the first sign of emotion, who are more open, and who are less messed up.

I try to be the person you want, but I don't even know who that is. You don't seem to distinguish between things I do or say that you like more or less. You are so confusing! My normal habit is to figure out what people want from me and then spend my time making sure they don't reject and abandon me by constantly giving them that. You would say that comes from my narcissistic family, where my whole existence was making sure I made other people happy. But it's how I relate to everyone, not just narcissists. I don't know how NOT to. Yet you have said you don't want me to "take care" of you. But...but...I don't know any other way of relating to other people. I can't accept things from then without feeling like I'm in their debt and they want me to "pay up" for their kindness. I need to rebalance my relationships fast or they will get bored and realize I won't give them what they want (because surely, they don't want a relationship with me simply for who I am...that's impossible!)

And you are so available and caring and reassuring (you remind me of the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, self-control). I can't even fully describe it, what it is or what it means to me, or how it affects me. I feel safe around you (unless I am doubting everything), I want to snuggle up next to you (we weird as that sounds) and never leave, and it gives me hope which I don't know quite how to handle. I don't get my hopes up normally because it hurts when I'm let down. And yet, I can't help it with you.

I have been in therapy for just over a year and a half. And it took this long for these feelings to start appearing. Before the beginning of December, you could have walked out of my life and I wouldn't have been too affected (I kept expecting you to do so any minute). It wouldn't have been fun, but it wouldn't have been overwhelming. But that has all changed in these past two months. Suddenly, I need you. And I am terrified of you leaving. And I can't imagine you not being there for me. And I care about what you think. And I tell you things I never would have told anyone. I think I may even love you (but not in a romantic way...it's more of an admiration and care...basically I don't want you to disappear on me). And because of this, all kinds of stuff is spilling out. And that's not easy to deal with.

I expected you to be angry at me this week for resisting your suggestion so much. Yet you responded with a willingness to do what I felt was right, and did not get angry or frustrated with me. You even said that you would never want me to think and feel exactly like you do, and that you are okay with me being unique. That sent me reeling. And filled me with sadness. I have never been comfortable being able to disagree with any authority figure because I knew that punishment was imminent should I attempt it. All of this is so new.

Another thing...my sudden, intense relational needs (are they really needs?) are freaking me out. I texted you just to say hi. Only that! What the heck was I thinking? Basically, by doing that, I said I missed you, I wanted to hear from you, and I valued and cared about our relationship. And I know you could see all that. You're smart enough and know me well enough to be able to read the emotions behind that. Eek! You're not supposed to know those things! You could do so much damage to me now. I don't allow people this close. And now I feel out of control of the relationship because you now have the power. S**t. I was trying to avoid that.

Whoever invented this therapy stuff was wacked. It hurts!

I've finally come up with a fantasy of what I want to have happen with ex T. I had a dream where she cried out , " I'm sorry!!" In a tortured sobbing voice. But I don't want an apology. That woukd mean she cared, and I don't really want that any more. My fantasy is that you and my lawyer and ex T are in a room . Lawyer starts asking very matter of fact questions . Questions that make her tell what she did in front of people she knows will understand how unethical, self serving and uncaring her actions were. You're only there to answer the lawyer's questions. She asks you to describe my therapy . You tell I protected ex T's secret until I became scared of her. She tells about how I can't remember things, how i can't make decisions and how depression has overtaken my home. Ex T respects you, and is scared of the lawyer. So she answers the wuestions until she can't talk anymore because she is overcome by embarrassment.

Dear T,

You told me that you thought guilt was a stupid emotion because it doesn't accomplish anything and that's been sitting in the back of my mind for a while now. I finally concluded that I disagree. Because of guilt, I didn't go out today and get a second tattoo that I probably would've regret in a few years and broken my mother's heart. Thanks for the challenge.

Dear T,

Did you see that Cambell Brawl?!!? OMG!! It was AWESOME!!!

-me

Dear T,
Thanks for taking my suggestion and starting to work with me on CBT. It should start to help my thought processing and feelings of paranoia that people aren't laughing or talking about me. I hope it helps because I'm tired of being dissacociative.

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So much has happened since I was here last l its been almost a month. I had a crisis , but got through it, i had an accident with a big blue truck whose driver didn't see me , lots of snow days to give me time to be alone and think and write - which I've been doing a lot of.

What do I need help with? Sometimes despair comes over me so strongly that I feel glued to the ground. I guess i need to know what you think that is about, and help me figure out why that is happening.

But when I come in, you always ask me how I'm doing, and I feel like you want me to say " great" . In some ways I am great, because I've got words , and I'm working on some things I want to send into surviving therapy abuse. I'm getting more done and feeling more focused.

But still these moments when it's hard even to stand up, much less move.

I've been making myself stand up , and dance a little. Putting some music on just to get through the moment. But I've spent too much time getting through tough moments, and have got to learn what they are telling me. Help?

Dear T,

Let's see, what tomorrow brings, shall we?

-Me

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Dear T,

I'm kinda mad at you. Okay..not really...but yeah...I kinda am. Doesn't make sense, does it? You just kinda made me mad but I still wanted to connect and text you.

See you Tuesday.

Dear T,

I'm so scared that me getting better will result in you terminating. Please don't leave me. I know you're kinda useless but I really like having you around and I miss weakly appointments with you.

I like your fantasy TopiarySurvivor about exT in post #7.

Especially the part where exT must respond to questions that reveal who he/she really is to everyone. And then they are finally embarrassed by their own actions. It isn't until then that the T has any concept of the magnitude of what they've done. It is only by suffering their own embarrassment that might cause them to wake up.

Dear T,

I no longer feel that you are my hero . . . this makes me feel alone in the world again.

Dear T,
Lying awake again almost panicky since my daughter who is my #1 support will be moving 2 1/2 hrs away. She also helps with dad, so it will just be me and that's overwhelming esp. as he's 89 and needing more help.
I wish you could be there to call in the middle of the night.

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Dear T.... I realized something productive.

I had this idea that I wanted to seduce you... be really charming and beautiful and special so you couldn't help but develop feelings for me. I thought I just wanted your love. I thought I believed you couldn't help anyway so might as well be manipulative. And I did, but behind that, I wanted to force you to stay. I wanted protection from the vulnerability of losing you, the first person who has shown me unquestioning empathy. That was the only way I could think of... to make you love me. I still want it. I am selfish. But at least now I understand why. Maybe someday I will be mature enough to tell you and be TRULY vulnerable.

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Yes! My current therapist asks me what I WANT to happen . She ( current therapist) said that some people have mediated sessions, but she wouldn't be able to do it because of her own sense of betrayal for the profession. So I started thinking- who woukd do it? My lawyer, but I don't want it in court because of my ex T's mom among other reasons.

Dear Pdoc

I know you don't do hugs or touch in therapy at all, but sometimes I really wish you would, because I know coming from you it would be appropriate and part of me feels like I need a therapist to approach me with therapeutic touch just to wipe out the remnants of what that other prick of a Pdoc did to me. Except I don't trust any other Pdoc/T but you, and I'd actually feel weird if you did touch me, simply because I know that's a no go area for you. Confusing much.

Dear T, Feb 6 is too far away. I know I said I didn't want to talk again this month cuz of work being so intense right now. Well I guess I must be a big fat liar and still trying to be little miss perfect despite my pronouncements otherwise, because I sit here wishing I could talk to you today. Knowing all it would take is a phone call. But while I'm calling myself names I'll add stubbornhead cuz I know I won't call. Oh how I fight against this need. We have talked about it before but I think I need to talk about it again but I don't know how to bring it up.

Dear T,

Well, those were two really awkward sessions. I feel that you could sense my anxiety around the whole topic, which is why you commented that perhaps neither of us were prepared to really discuss the issue of transference. I will, however, continue to stick it out with you and hopefully we'll work through it together.

PS - When I ask you to listen to a song before our session, please listen to the whole thing. There's a lot to uncover in the verses I've chosen to share with you.

Dear T,
I wish you had pushed me harder today. I know I said that I didn't want to talk about food because I am embarrassed about purging, but I actually did want to talk about it. I am not sure what would have made it easier for me to talk about, I don't think anything would have helped. But please push me harder next time.
I realise how defensive and obstructive I was today, i'm sorry. I know that you will say I don't need to be sorry, but I do feel as though I am being silly and wasting my therapy time by acting through my teenage angst with you.

I think our session topics should change into something that doesn't dwell on what's been going on in the past year. I'm moving forward and am getting better. It might be time to put some topics to rest and start with more helpful ones. Like my overall well being, goals, social skills etc... Ones that I need more now.

Dear T,
I'm so glad we're working on CBT . It feels more proactive. I can say' that's my grandiose or paranoid thinking' ,and am more self aware and can say 'that's my illness'. That helps with the crazy thoughts that never leave me with peace. At least it's a start.

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