What my DBT T told me yesterday

Yesterday we shared homework about what our grief looked like. My former DBT T skipped the pages about grief so I never discussed it in the group before. I had drawn my usual: a child looking sad, lots of unshed tears, and question marks with "what happened to me?" written on my paper. Also a Mommy holding a child.

The T told me there is a concept of "birth trauma". She said that when I was born, they didn't hold preemies or let their parents hold them. She says it's preverbal, and that's why I don't have words to describe my feelings of grief.

My own T has told me this, but it was validating to get the same answer from a T who has been practicing for many years.

I think about how much the touch of my T's hand meant to me: skin to skin contact like mother and baby.

I think about how hugging her last session, really hugging her, satisfied me.

I think about how I screamed in the car last summer when she suggested quitting in December, and also not emailing her anymore. I'm not a screamer. Those screams were from some other part of me, maybe the preverbal baby who was left alone.

I think about wanting to cry and be comforted. It's always been my primary fantasy for years. It's the wanting to be comforted that's the most important.

I can imagine screaming/crying in the hospital and no one coming to take care of me. Or, if they did, maybe I knew it was the "wrong" person, not my mother. It was only a couple of weeks, but the first couple of weeks in a newborn's life are crucial.

So, I don't HAVE to know what happened to me but it's helpful to know it may have been something tangible. It helps me to understand why I'm so attached to my Ts, and why in particular, I felt so safe and cared for when T held my hand.

I believe it. Remember my backwards hug, also written about in the book everyone hated? That was very healing for me, and it wasnt like it needed to be an ongoing thing. It was just a couple three times.

Thanks, hankster. I sort of remember about your backward hug and that book, which I've never read. I'm glad the hugs helped you. I'm just afraid my T won't like me getting dependent on hugging her like I did with holding her hand. The hugs have been "nice" in the past, but they didn't mean anything to me. I don't know if it's a good or a bad sign that I'm "taking them in now". Maybe a good sign, I hope? I'm feeling them. For about 3 years I have hugged her with no feeling involved.

Thanks, gtgt, for the hugs and for reading my threads. That means a lot to me.

Hi rainbow8,

I just wanted to say I know it must be hard for you not seeing your own T as much, but it's impressive the work you are doing. I liked reading about this breakthrough! Keep it up!

Thank you, Elsewhere. It isn't as hard as I imagined it would be to see my T every 2 weeks instead of weekly. I know that this week is my "off" week so I make sure I'm busy with other things and kind of put her out of my mind.

It also helps that I now feel like she is "with me" all of the time. Last session was a little difficult, and I'm missing her, but thinking that it's not HER, it's wanting something that she can't give me anyway, makes it more tolerable. She can and has given me something, though. She's tried to build up my Self, and that's been happening more and more.

I always thought it may have to do with the infant, preverbal stage because of the incredible pain I have felt when my Ts have disappointed me. My screams and cries when I've felt alone after a session where it wasn't "enough" have given me clues about the extent of what I missed. I'm feeling sad about the past, as I know it's no one's fault, least of all, not my Mom's. My story may be diffferent from others, but I don't feel like I have to justify it to anyone anymore. I have a good life now, and had a fairly happy life growing up, but that doesn't take away the pain I've felt.

I identify with having this need. I believe it could be preverbal. According to Erikson, the "crisis" of infancy, the first stage of life, is trust vs. mistrust. An important part of developing trust is through physical contact with the mother in the first weeks of life. Taking this into consideration, being removed from your mom shortly after birth would be a huge trauma. If your mother continued to be hands-off through age 2, this can cause a deep need for maternal touch. I believe the healing comes partially with the experience of touch through hugs, holding hands, or sitting side by side with a maternal figure combined with completing a grief process over what was lost. Just my 2 cents, but I'm glad you had this realization with the help of DBT T.

Thank you, Chopin. What you wrote makes sense except that I was a very much wanted and loved baby by my parents. I have a lot of baby pictures and I know my mother is holding me in some of them. So I know the hands-off policy was only during the time I was in the incubator. Still, it is what it is, and I do want to be held, though for much of my life I refused physical contact like that. I didn't like to hug people, not even my parents. Touching with boys was a challenge, too. Holding my T's hand felt incredibly satisfying. I wish she hadn't stopped.

aloneandafraid, thank you for the hugs. I appreciate them a lot!

(((((((( rainbow ))))))))