*there is some mention of general SI stuff in here*

i don't even remember what he was wearing today. there were no cheese cube-like designs or ugly tropical leaves. oh now that i think about it, i remember blue socks. but that was because i was staring at the floor the entire time.

i gave him the thing i typed and i let him read it. in front of me. i gave it to him in the beginning of session and he said he would just hold it until i was ready to tell him he could open it and read it. well for some ridiculous reason, i became ready.

the note said that sometimes i can't even look at him because my feelings are too intense. that i don't know what to do even when we are connected, because there is still an absence of something. i wrote that in those moments, i want him to take my hand, to hold me, or to hug me. i wrote that the little kid wants him to hug her, wants to be taken care of and kept safe by him. i wrote that similarly, in my other relationships, i will feel connected on certain levels but then there is still emptiness left. and that it is intolerable.

then i died.

no i didn't. i'm still here. but i wanted to. i asked him if that was an option. after he read it i told him that it hurt. he asked why and i said because the inner child's needs are never met in the child-like ways that she wants. what i really wanted to say was "because i don't think you will ever hug me and that feels like a rejection." but i didn't say it.

he asked me if i didn't think he already knew that these feelings existed. i told him i was almost certain that he knew... but that it was my job to finally acknowledge them. and of course process them, but it's still so new. we'll get there.

then we talked about how i don't integrate the different parts of me. how they are distinct personality states that i am completely aware of (as opposed to anything dissociative). i told him how when i am the little kid i get very reckless in my SI because i just want to destroy her. i told him how the "angry" part is the quickest one to come out. i am a completely different person when i'm angry and i can turn into that person at the drop of a hat. he sees that in session all the time. i told him about the "normal" me who defines herself by her career and education. told him that makes the little kid part all the more shameful and embarrassing. then i told him how the depressed, empty part is now called the "big" part and is the most dangerous. that is the part of me that gets tired, not only of itself, but of all the other parts and all the switching. it is the part that cannot deal with its own implications, plus the fact of not being integrated. that's why that part carries all the suicidal ideation. because unlike the child who wants to destroy that specific part, and unlike the angry part, who wants to destroy everything around her, the "big" part wants to destroy them all. i am thinking of more parts as i write this and i am eager to write in my journal, begin to sort this out, and talk to T more about it on friday.

he thanked me for being so open by bringing that note in. i asked him if it was okay. he gave me the most genuine smile and said, "it's okay."

i didn't feel like we were terribly connected today. but we weren't disonnected by any means, either. we just.... were there. i'm still trying to see if i'm okay with that. it seems so ambivalent... and ambivalence is generally something that is intolerable to me.

he asked me if i could integrate any of the parts, even in the smallest bit... like identify my "normal adult self" with the child... accept that some of the child's needs can be the adult's as well. i said no, not at this point. i said i completely understand how he meant that the pieces can overlap and integrate, but when i take on a certain character, it is in its extreme and its entirety, and there is no room for integration.

i told him how i think i push things off on the child that might be part of the adult. for example, like wanting him to hold me. i push that off as the child wanting it because i don't want to admit that for my (adult) self. i think there are a lot of reasons for that. being married, for instance. the guilt. the guilt of wanting to be held by my male therapist. the child and the adult both want it. but i would rather push it off on the child. it makes it easier to deal with. not easy. but easier.

[MyBestKids2]

{{{ pinksoil}}}

sounds all in all things went pretty well. Congrats on your honesty!

Take gentle care,
Dee

It is amazing how it is one thing to know that rationally it is fairly typical to have little kid feelings of longing to be held and comforted... And quite another to express those (and nearly die of shame).

I get that so much. That is how come I email him stuff. Stuff that I could never say in person because I'd die of shame in expressing them and couldn't bring myself to discuss the feelings with him. Of course I wouldn't really die of shame... But then I might... Jeepers feelings can be so hard.

What you said took a lot of guts. More guts than I have. I email precisely because... It is a way of telling him that is semi kinda sorta safe because he probably won't email me back (though I guess he does now because he has finally managed to fix his router). I nearly died of shame when I read his email... I don't know how I'll go when he mentions it on Friday... I think you are right that words aren't what is needed...

I wonder if he will get sick of sitting with me through the shame. My shame isn't nice. Sitting with me through it... Kinda means that he needs to feel some of his own shame. That has gotta be draining and unpleasant.

Lots of courage. I'm glad that he responded well.

If my t offered me a hug... I guess that would be kinda awkward. I guess... I'd kinda dissociate. I'm good at giving nice comforting hugs when I'm in a dissociated place. Giving them... So I don't have to deal with receiving them, if that makes any sense.

I told him (by email) that I was kinda scared about jumping him. Lol. I don't believe me sometimes. I know I'll die of shame if he mentions any of the other stuff I've said... But if he mentions that... I'm pretty sure that I really will. I really really will. I think the thing to be done... Is to give him a look like 'I have no earthly idea what you are talking about' if he mentions my emails. I guess... I shouldn't push so hard with disclosing things I can't face. Hmm....

Yes, it's also amazing how I rationally know so many things, but the way I feel about them is radically different. For example, rationally I know that just because I told (wrote) him that I wanted him to hug me does not mean that at the precise moment the session is over, he is going to jump up and throw his arms around me. Inside, however, I am hurting bad. Like I have already been rejected.

You are pretty brave to email your T about jumping him, lol. Sometimes I cannot believe myself and what I do either. Like giving him that poem in which I directly wrote "You are probably %#@&#! your wife." What was I thinking? If he ever, EVER brought that up, I would go out the window. Or maybe I will choose your idea, which is a little safer..."I have no idea what you are talking about." Then he will pull out the poem and show me.... I would say, "Hmmm... this is not mine. It must have accidentally gotten mixed in from someone else's work from my writing workshop." lol.

I asked him if we could have therapy from now on via email because I can't bear to look at him.

Actually we don't have email correspondence. I'm glad for that. Who knows what I would say. I tend to lose all censorship when I write.

Interesting what you said about pushing disclosure of things you can't face. I knew I brought that note for a reason. And the reason was because I wanted him to read it. He directly asked me when he was holding it, "Did you want me to see this?" We both already knew the answer. I think that anytime you disclose something shameful... whether it is verbal, by email, on paper... it is because in some way, your unconscious was ready to let it go. Consciously, you might not be ready to deal with it yet. The disconnect there is of no one's fault. Everything in therapy has two parts-- the experience and the process. Sometimes the two have to occur at distinctly different times. Today I dealt with merely the experience of the disclosure... the experience of the in-the-moment emotion in reponse to doing it... but I did not process it. It was more of an acknowledgement. Perhaps Friday I will deal with processing not only what was on the paper, but what it meant to open up like that.

What did he say when you asked him if you could have therapy by email because you can't bear to look at him? I used to wish that I could have therapy by email for precisely that reason. Turns out that he is rather hopeless with the email medium, however. Bummer.

Yeah, I do tend to lose all censorship when I write. Partly because I tend to write at crazy hours (like three in the morning). Partly also because of the online disinhibition effect, no doubt.

I told him...

I remembered my earliest memory of feeling ashamed, you see. I really think that it is my earliest memory of intense, dysregulated shame. My mother tried to distract me from it instead of taking my feeling seriously and fixing it. It was that... She was big on letting/making me run around naked in public. I must have been 2 and a half or 3 or something like that. Starting to feel selfconscious. I remember crying and crying and crying and begging her to let me wear clothes. She would try and distract me so I'd stop crying rather than letting me wear clothes. I understand that you have to say 'no' to your kids sometimes, but my mother would say 'no' about things like that. I remember that I'd get distracted (eventually) then start running around and playing and stuff like that. And then... It would hit me all of a sudden and I'd start crying again. And she would distract me or whatever. Horrible horrible horrible. That feeling never went away.

I told him about that. Feel humiliated when I think on it, even. Ugh ugh ugh. My mothers bright idea was that the feelings of little people didn't really mean anything because they were so easily distractable from them. One habituates eventually I guess and so see, one doens't have to take their feelings seriously. Saving a little money from wear and tear of clothes on the one hand... Psychological trauma from unregulated humiliation on the other... For ****s sake. I bet she would be really very surprised that I'd remember that now. She had no idea, really. How sensitive I was... How easily scarred...

[MissCharlotte]

Pinksoil,

I have been thinking about how to respond to your post.

You are very brave and have found a way to communicate some of your feelings with T. I believe that just the act of identifying the different parts and their needs is a huge step. But even bigger, to me, is:

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didn't feel like we were terribly connected today. but we weren't disonnected by any means, either. we just.... were there.

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That sounds so darn integrated to me. Just there, plain old just there. Nice.

Congratulations.

[lauren_helene]

Wow Pink, you always have such intense thought provoking sessions. I am proud of you, you are expressing more and more of your feelings to him.

That is not an easy task since it seems it is a one way street when we do that...I'm uncomfortable not knowing what he thinks of what I say...

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alexandra_k said:
What did he say when you asked him if you could have therapy by email because you can't bear to look at him? I used to wish that I could have therapy by email for precisely that reason. Turns out that he is rather hopeless with the email medium, however. Bummer.

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Well he looked amused, but I didn't give him the chance to say anything right away because I went on about how expressing myself verbally is useless really, when I'm perfectly fine using other mediums to convey my thoughts/feelings, i.e. art, music, journaling, poetry. I said I was never any good with verbal expression. He said, "Is it that you weren't good at verbally expressing yourself or is it that no one was listening?" Then I wanted to punch him. I always want to punch him when he comes out with one of those.

Hey, that's a pretty huge thing to tell your T, about what your mother did. I am so sorry that happened to you. I remember when I told T how my sister (who is 14 years older than me) told me that when I was a little girl my mother would sometimes go like a week without bathing me... and my sister would say, "Don't you think it's time to give her a bath?" And my mom would give some vague response, but not do anything about it.... so my sister would bathe me. When I told T that, I wanted to die. It was so shameful. I tend to feel like the things my mom did are a reflection of me as a person now. Like he's going to think I am horrible and disgusting and weird because of it.

Yeah. It is amazing how we feel ashamed even when it wasn't our fault.

Mentalization. Maybe that is what you mean about how verbal expression can be hard. The ability to mentalize when the attachment system is active. There is some stuff on that... I'll see if I can find it...

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/en...t=AbstractPlus

there was a special edition of some journal (can't remember which one - sorry) that was on the mechanisms of change in psychotherapy for borderline personality disorder. you might find it interesting... perhaps...