[MissCharlotte]

So I saw T today after 2 weeks. It was difficult to come back, to say the least.

To begin with there was a misunderstanding as to whether I had an appt. today or tomorow. It had been switched back and forth a few times and I KNOW that he said on the phone saturday that he thought the appointment was on Monday. He says he said Tuesday, but I am right.

Anyway, this morning he calls me while I am in my car and tells me I don't have an appt. today, and I am in the midst of freaking out because I can't find my backpack and I start ranting about losing my %#@&#! backpack and say, YOU MEAN I CAN'T COME TODAY? He backs off and squeezes me in this afternoon. (PS losing my bag is a big deal 'cause it has loads of textbooks for my Masters practicum I am working on).

Then I am driving to his office this afternoon (21/2 hours back from school....) and my cell rings and it's him calling someone else. "Hello, Brother?" It's T," he says." I say, "T, it's sister." He says "Sorry, wrong number and hangs up."

When I got to his office it was really hard to settle in after being away. I looked at him and said that I was not the only one having a hard time coming back, that his head was still on vacation. (ouch) I bickered with him over the mixed up appointment. We went talked about an issue with my brother (who is a real shithead) and T looked at me and said, "What have we not covered here today?" I said, "I missed you."

He made his sad T face. I told him about the letters and poetry I wrote while he was away but didn't show them to him. I told him how the first letter I wrote was all about how I would miss him, but I knew he needed the time off, and by the time I wrote the last one it was like, %#@&#! you. I told him that it was not funny, that if he had not returned I would not have been surprised. (I had been po'd about his chuckling during a phone call.)

He started blabbing about object constancy and how it must have hurt when he was away and it was important for me to allow myself to feel the pain and that abandonment was abandonment and I just looked at him and said I didn't want to hear it. He asked what I wanted to hear and I said, "nothing, I just want you to shut up."

I told him I didn't want to feel the hurt, that it hurt too much.

Remind me again why I am doing this?

P.S. I found my backpack....and left a message on his phone to let him know I said, "that's how I deal with separation, I lose my things and myself."



"The more I see, the less I know, the more I'd like to let it go." Red Hot Chili Peppers

[Lemon]

((sister)) I'm sorry you had such a hard day. It sounds like you had built up a lot of anticipation/anxiety about the first appointment back with T and on top of that you had the missing backpack and apt confusion on top of it. How stressful.

While I was reading your post, I was impressed with how you handled it all. You could have just argued about the appointment time, but instead you actually told him you missed him AND that you were angry with him. I think you should be proud of that. I don't know how you feel about the session, but congratulations for expressing your true feelings even with all those other things going on.

By the way.....I had to lol at this response!
"nothing, I just want you to shut up."

[SecretGarden]

Quite am amazing day Sister.... and yes... many many points covered and lots of discombulation.... I think it is in preparation for settling down next week. Good for you for sharing your gladness and your frustration with him. It is a new day I think. New directions... new opportunities for discussions...

Congrats

[Gracey]

So sorry you are hurting.

I LOVE it. . .will have to remember that one. "I just want you to shut up."

hmm.

my t seems disappointed that i won't get angry with him over seperation. he is like 'do you feel angry?' and i am like 'nope' and he is like 'not even just a little?' and i am like 'nope'. then he starts to go on about how ****** it is when people leave and i am like 'well consider things from their perspective...' and he cringes a little...

he looked at me a little strangely last time and said 'you have this amazing empathetic capacity. it is like you are always understanding things from others perspective. whenever i focus on things from your perspective you always respond by focusing in on theirs'. and i was like 'whats the point in getting angry about it?' and he was like 'i wonder if you have always been like that or if something happened...' i said 'i know that anger is supposed to function to facilitate assertiveness and standing up for yourself' and he was like 'never mind the *supposed* to'. impasse...

sigh.

not sure why he wants me to feel angry. seems that you are feeling it though. i guess my t would think that that is a good thing. i don't understand why :-( dunno. maybe it is about... if you express anger then you just push the person away. provoke them to repeat the abandonment. i guess that is how i feel about it. he keeps on about how it is okay for me to be mad with him. maybe i should say 'if you don't stop trying to make me feel pissed with you then i'm gonna feel really pissed with you!'. sigh. i don't know. whats it for? i don't know. to stop me curling up on myself and attempting to will myself out of existence? i don't know.

why is it good to be angry? i need to know what its supposed to do... i don't feel angry. hurt hurt i feel hurt. ow.

empathy is supposed to be a good thing - right? to understand things from anothers perspective. i think the problem is that... i lost myself. i lost myself. understanding from anothers perspective understanding things from theirs... how do i feel? i don't know. i lost myself. i don't know how i feel. hurt. ow. :-(

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sister said:
and T looked at me and said, "What have we not covered here today?" I said, "I missed you."

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Beautiful. I love that.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
He started blabbing about object constancy and how it must have hurt when he was away and it was important for me to allow myself to feel the pain and that abandonment was abandonment and I just looked at him and said I didn't want to hear it. He asked what I wanted to hear and I said, "nothing, I just want you to shut up."

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Amazing. I love it. I love how you said he was blabbing... sometimes that's how it seems, LOL. Half the time when I'm mad, I can't even remember what my T said... something about anger... something, something... attachment... blah, blah, blah.... "I just want you to shut up." Good for you, saying what you feel. I would have said the same thing. Oh wait, I think I have.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
Remind me again why I am doing this?

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Because you are brave, intelligent, able to handle taking risks, and want to gain self-awareness. You realize that even though the work is hard, it is worth it.

Keep going, you are doing amazing.

[sunrise]

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sister said:
my cell rings and it's him calling someone else. "Hello, Brother?" It's T," he says." I say, "T, it's sister." He says "Sorry, wrong number and hangs up."

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post"> I'm sorry, sister, I know this wasn't meant to be funny, but it kind of read like a Smothers Brothers routine or something.

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sister wrote:
T looked at me and said, "What have we not covered here today?" I said, "I missed you."

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">That's great! So direct, so honest. I like also how he sensed the lack of connection and tried to get it by asking you that question. Great T.

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sister wrote:
He asked what I wanted to hear and I said, "nothing, I just want you to shut up."

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">A classic. Good for you.

What a great session, sister.

Sometimes I feel really separate from those of you who get angry when their T's take a week off. Is that the way you are supposed to feel? Is there something wrong with me that I don't feel that way? Here is how I feel when that happens. I feel like darn, it won't work this week for us to meet because T is on vacation or whatever. Darn, it will be hard to go a whole two weeks without seeing him. Darn. I will miss him. Maybe even intensely. And if things are really bad, I will feel I can't possibly last that long. But no anger.

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alex_k wrote:
my t seems disappointed that i won't get angry with him over seperation.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">Maybe I am kind of like you, alex, in that regard--that I don't get angry if T takes a week off. But my T has never tried to get me to be angry at him for taking a week off. He and I act like you know, stuff happens, sometimes we can't make an appointment happen one week due to his schedule or mine. Why is that something to get mad about? It's not like just because he is going out of town it is a personal assault on me or he is doing it specifically to hurt me. Why would this make me angry? You know, I am the one who isn't even angry that her husband has been unfaithful and screwed around with babes behind her back for years. I have never been angry about that. Really, sometimes I wonder if there is something wrong with me. I mean, if I can't get angry with my husband for his infidelity, why would I get angry at T for taking a week off?

what would happen if you did feel angry with your husband?
what would happen if you felt angry at your mother or your father?

i guess what i'm getting at...

is that it might be the case that...

one represses feelings of anger (one doesn't consciously experience anger) because experience of anger might have made things worse in the past. and / or because other peoples angry actions and / or response to your angry actions was negative so one represses the feeling.

i guess it is meant to be good to feel anger because anger can be used for assertiveness. assertiveness can be used to prevent further harms / hurts. etc etc etc.

dunno why t was so resistent to that take... i think he gets annoyed with me for rationalising. but what motivation do i have to feel anger if i don't have a theory of what benefit there is to feeling it? maybe it is about trust... trust that i can acknowledge feelings and he will respond okay to that. trouble is i can't feel the feelings in the first place. don't know how i feel. negative emotion. pain. ow. he is keen for me to label it anger but to me it feels more like... pain. ow. just want to not exist anymore. just want it to stop. doesn't feel like anger unless it is anger at me. not usually anger at me though... more pain. i don't know.

weird... he said something at one point about how i do something or other quite a lot. i was like 'this is why i do that' and he was like 'i'm not attacking you' and i was like 'i know you aren't attacking me i'm just trying to explain why it is that i do that'. is explaining a defence? i think he wants me to shut up. feel things. talk less. explain less. understand less. feel more. panic. understanding and empathy are good. right?

behind that there is just the little kid... the absence of empathy for others. the focus on her feelings and hurts and tantrums and rages. is the notion that the way to conquer that is to feel the feelings and process things by way of the feelings rather than trying to conquer that by empathising with others and incorporating other relevant information like what other peoples take is and facts about the way the world works and so on and so forth?

i don't like that :-( i don't want to do things that way :-(

[sunrise]

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alexandra_k said:
what would happen if you did feel angry with your husband?
what would happen if you felt angry at your mother or your father?

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Well, I don't know about the mother/father question as I'm not dealing with parental stuff right now. But I actually did get angry with my husband once, about a month ago, so I found out what would happen. He and I were doing couples therapy with my T, and my husband said something that just really made me angry. It was such a shock. It's almost like it was so shocking/surprising, that I just "felt" (no time for defenses to not let me feel). And I expressed it. I think it is the first and only time I have been angry at my husband (and it was not about the infidelity, which I have always seen as merely symptomatic of far greater problems). It was the only time my T has seen me angry. I remember when this happened in session, T just looked at me and said, "You're angry. I've never seen you angry before." And I felt like saying to him, "no, s**t, Sherlock, I hope you're enjoying the show." But I didn't as my anger was really at my husband so I stuck with that. Later T and I talked about it in individual session, and I told him this was the only time I had been angry at my husband and the only time in 20 years of marriage we had ever had a fight. I think T felt kind of good that he had provided that safe space for our fight to happen and for me to feel angry. I know I never would have done that on my own or in our house. After our fight, we didn't speak a word to each other for a week. Pretty intense. Yes, we have a dysfunctional marriage, and yes, I am ending it. So to make a long answer short, what happened when I got angry at my husband was that the world did not end. We survived. I think I thought before that maybe I could not survive that. But I did. And I'll survive the divorce too.

> Well, I don't know about the mother/father question as I'm not dealing with parental stuff right now.

sure. your choice. the thought was just that if you want to understand some of your core conceptions / unconscious beliefs about anger (that are probably functioning to inhibit your conscious experience of anger) then reflecting on that may help...

[sunrise]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
alexandra_k said:
behind that there is just the little kid... the absence of empathy for others. the focus on her feelings and hurts and tantrums and rages. is the notion that the way to conquer that is to feel the feelings and process things by way of the feelings rather than trying to conquer that by empathising with others and incorporating other relevant information like what other peoples take is and facts about the way the world works and so on and so forth?

i don't like that :-( i don't want to do things that way :-(

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Well, I think there is more than one way of doing things. There may be a "typical" client in therapy and you are not that client, alex, so the typical path your T has success with might not be the best fit for you. He might have to step outside his comfort zone of treatment and go to "plan B." But he sounds like a good T, so I think he can do this. You are just not making it easy for him. But I think that's OK.

Sometimes my T tries to treat me like the typical client but at the same time he has acknowledged that I do not really fit that profile, same as my marriage does not fit the typical profile that he, a divorce expert, is used to. I do see him sometimes trying to put me into a box or my marriage into a box, and I don't like it. I have reminded him that his box does not fit, so don't put me/us into it, as his therapy interventions based on "the box" are not helping me. I think sometimes T's can go into rote mode and just respond based on the box they see you in at the moment (like it's 7 pm, they've been seeing clients for 10 hours straight and they are kind of zoned out). Sometimes you have to draw them back into your uniqueness to get the genuine response that is truly healing.

[sunrise]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
alexandra_k said:
> Well, I don't know about the mother/father question as I'm not dealing with parental stuff right now.

sure. your choice. the thought was just that if you want to understand some of your core conceptions / unconscious beliefs about anger (that are probably functioning to inhibit your conscious experience of anger) then reflecting on that may help...

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Well, I didn't mean to imply I had done no work in therapy on my childhood, just not doing that right now. We did some of that early on in therapy when I was too avoidant to deal with the marriage. I hope to return to some of that early work later. Understanding some of my past, particularly in regard to my mother, was particularly helpful in my moving past a stuck point in my marriage. Right now I am (at last!) dealing with the marriage, am fixated on the divorce, and cannot divide my attention and dwell on the childhood stuff. Sometimes real life calls. Occasionally I am able to answer....

Note to sister: hope it is OK to use your thread for this discussion! (((hugs)))

[Caramee]

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sister said:
I said, "that's how I deal with separation, I lose my things and myself."

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

Oooh, that's rich. There's a few sessions right there. I'm sure you're exhausted from your interchange. I'm glad he's back.

[lilacbutterfly]

Well, my T was trying to get me to be angry, at him, at my parents, at anyone, for the longest time. Finally, when we had worked together long enough, I did get angry at my parents. And you know what? It was because I had been angry at them all along but had been pushing it down so long I didn't even know I was capable of getting angry anymore!

lilacbutterfly

[MissCharlotte]

Yes, Secret I do believe you are right--new directions and challenges for me.

Thanks.

[MissCharlotte]

((Gracey))

Thank you. Feeling less stunned and melancholic today.

[MissCharlotte]

Alex,

Yes, well I have not been able to express my anger prior to this. So yesterday was really a first for me. I know the anger is there. It is really the root of depression and SI.

It is difficult to access the anger particularly when I use the defense that you mentioned, the "why bother" deal. I really, really get that.

Having trouble mustering up anger today but feel sometimes that the anger takes other forms such as just wanting to quit, etc.

Hope all is well with you.

[MissCharlotte]

((Pinksoil))

Oh yes indeedy, in that moment I was just thinking "I wish he would just shut up" and it really was like blah blah blah constancy blah blah blah important to allow yourself to feel yada yada yada and I couldn't help myself, the words just came out!!!

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
Because you are brave, intelligent, able to handle taking risks, and want to gain self-awareness. You realize that even though the work is hard, it is worth it.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

Wow!! Thanks, I don't feel that really but I'll try it on for size.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
Keep going, you are doing amazing.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

This is the hard part. Right now I am pushing him away in my mind. The work is getting harder and harder and it scares the %#@&#! out of me. I might ask for an extra appt. this weekend to sort of face these fears of pushing him away.

[MissCharlotte]

((Sunny))

Well, I actually chuckled as I wrote up the phone routine and it was exactly like that. I even laughed in the car. And, by the way, when I told T he was wrong about the appointment he was so defensive and said he wasn't.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
I like also how he sensed the lack of connection and tried to get it by asking you that question. Great T.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

Oh, he is like a freaking detective. He hunts me down wherever I may go.....right in front of him!!

A point of clarification. When I told him to shut up it wasn't said really mean or angry, but just stated matter of factly.

However, this is the first time I have ever expressed anger at him.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
It's not like just because he is going out of town it is a personal assault on me or he is doing it specifically to hurt me. Why would this make me angry? You know, I am the one who isn't even angry that her husband has been unfaithful and screwed around with babes behind her back for years. I have never been angry about that. Really, sometimes I wonder if there is something wrong with me. I mean, if I can't get angry with my husband for his infidelity, why would I get angry at T for taking a week off?

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

So, Sunny, are you saying you can only get angry of the event was intentionally directed at you? Could you get angry if there was a thunderstorm and lightening hit your house? Could you get angry if you slipped on the ice and broke your ankle? Hmmm

Why aren't you be angry at your husband? I think it's worth exploring, you might be surprised at what you come up with. Mind you, most of my anger is still way down deep.

[MissCharlotte]

((Lilac))

I so understand what you mean about pushing the anger down. I think it's ready to come up and out! Carrying it around can't be good for our health.

[sunrise]

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sister said:
So, Sunny, are you saying you can only get angry of the event was intentionally directed at you? Could you get angry if there was a thunderstorm and lightening hit your house? Could you get angry if you slipped on the ice and broke your ankle? Hmmm

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
That's correct. I would only get angry if someone intentionally tried to hurt me or screw me over or did something that was unfair to me, etc. I might also get angry if someone, through general insensitivity, hurt me, even if they didn't deliberately do it. I would not get angry at a thunderstorm or breaking my ankle as there is no external target for the anger. I might be kind of peeved at myself for being clumsy if I broke my ankle. Would you get angry at a thunderstorm or the ice?

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
Why aren't you be angry at your husband?

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
I am not angry at my husband for his affairs. I do have some anger at the root causes of his affairs, though, and how he has, in general, treated me the whole time we have been married. I know I will never put up with this stuff in a relationship again (if indeed, I ever have one--not something I want to jump into now, that's for sure). Once I am done with the divorce, I hope to return, in therapy, to some of my unresolved issues and do some depth work with T. I feel like T and I got a good start and did enough productive work to free me up to proceed with ending the marriage, but now the depth work has been put on hold as I navigate the break-up and all of its attendant challenges. My kids come first.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
it really was like blah blah blah constancy blah blah blah important to allow yourself to feel yada yada yada

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
Hey, my T sometimes gives this same speech!

[Lemon]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
sister said:
So, Sunny, are you saying you can only get angry of the event was intentionally directed at you? Could you get angry if there was a thunderstorm and lightening hit your house? Could you get angry if you slipped on the ice and broke your ankle? Hmmm

Why aren't you be angry at your husband? I think it's worth exploring, you might be surprised at what you come up with. Mind you, most of my anger is still way down deep.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

This comment really made me think. I was about to reply that I feel just like Sunny....I don't get angry when my T is out of town. I am disapointed and lonely and wish I could talk to her, but never angry. I guess I was thinking that I would only be angry if someone intentionally hurts me, but now I need to think about this some more.

I rarely express my anger, it builds up inside me and turns into anxiety and other things. I think then I just ride it out until I can suppress it and distract myself with something else (I know, very healthy). I think my T is beginning to try to get me to be angry, but I don't have any experience with being angry successfully, so it seems like if I get angry I don't know what good would come out of it.

[lauren_helene]

Hey Sister what a great session! I think today was therapy day for many of us

I feel left out because I don't want my T to shut up...and I have never gotten angry because he left for a vacation. In fact, he just did that last week but saw my brother and me together before he left.

Now when there were some cancellations months ago and I was sure he was trying to get rid of me, well that was a different story. I cycled between angry, sad and then hurt. I feel bad about that now.

Anyway, I love when you told him that you missed him. I sort of said that today too but in a different way. I just said 'I was afraid you were having such a good time that you wouldn't come back'...

I wanted to give him a big hug when I first walked in but obviously I knew that might not go over well

Good for you I'm happy that you were so open with him.