When I begun with T September 2004, I felt warmth from her, but her lack of revealing anything about herself was hard.

She still spent reveal much. But there's been change over the last year more so.

Just last session she was coughing and I said "you may as well smoke with that cough", I just took it for granted she'd never smoked. From conversations we'd had I'd mistakenly picked up that she didn't have a need for smoking. But she then said, "I've not smoked for years". I looked at her and said, "you use to smoke?" She said "yes for 20yrs, I got it off my dad"

It felt surreal hearing her day this and mention her dad.

I think I want to tell her that I actually need to hear these things about her. To normalise who she is. I'm not sure how much I need to hear or what she is willing to tell, but I feel our relationship has reached a different level.
I also needed to change my day this week because my boiler is broke so I emailed asking her if that was OK? She replied saying "I hope you have better luck then get with the boiler as she had to have here's replaced over the holidays".
These are only small things, but they feel different

[Moment]

It sounds nice. She may not even be aware of the change. I guess if I were you, I would wonder if she is responding to some change in your relationship--to some positive change in you that's made her feel more comfortable sharing these small details.

So not so much, "I need you to tell me more of these things," but "I was wondering if you've felt some change between us that's made you feel more open to sharing bits of your life?" Because as I have to keep reminding myself, the goal of therapy is to learn more about myself, not so much more about my therapist....