In Session Today: Part IV

It’s kind of fun to think my sessions are sparking conversation and laughter somewhere else in the world thank you for this!!

Bleeding in session? Ten extra points for Gryffindor.

Thanks so much LT. I was wondering if maybe I was dissociating too, it felt like my mind was somewhere else -- somewhere that felt safer at the time. He does allow email, but thankfully I am seeing him again Thursday since this session was so intense. It’s weird because I know he’s a safe person, but I still get those moments where I panic. But I’m like that alone with any male besides my husband (nothing against guys, just my past stuff) so that’s probably why.

Well...it wasn't great but we connected in the last 10 minutes. He started by telling me he was full of cold and sat there sucking Halls Soothers. Everything I tried to talk about seemed to fall flat. Very little response from him. I tried to tell him the hug last session helped me feel connected and normally he would facilitate exploration of that which he didn't. Just reflected back what I was saying which is his default when he's off form I think.
About half way through the session I said I feel bored which I never ever have in therapy before. I said I can't just keep it light with you because I can't chat with him, he is in therapist mode and doesn't chat back but every time I try to talk in depth it falls flat too. He asked what I would do if I were feeling rebellious (as I'd mentioned rebellion in a different context) and I said I would just leave.
He asked if I think it's because he's ill. I said maybe...I just feel like i am connecting my crocodile clip to the battery and he's not bothering with his side. He asked what he hadn't connected with. I said basically anything I had said over the last 45 minutes. He said he felt foggy headed. I said I think I am annoyed with him because he's not as on the ball as usual but I know it's not your fault. He said "it's okay I'm not taking it personally" I said "well, I want you to take it a bit personally!" We both laughed.
Then just like that, he went back to the hug we had last week. I said how I had felt him physically pull me in and that had felt really good. That I felt his strength. I said that was hard for me to tell him and I was anxious about how it landed. He said he was just thinking about how subtle it is who leads and who follows. We were quiet for a minute and I said "that's one of the crocodile clips you could have connected earlier. He said he was sorry he didn't.
I said there his something he does that I can't put my finger on that creates space for difficult disclosure, and he managed thst in the last 10 minutes and that he usually always manages. I said that's what had been missing from the other 50 mins of the session. That space. He said he doesn't think he can put a name to what he did differently but that it was helpful feedback.
Time was up and we stood up and he said "it's your call" (about hugging him when he's ill) I said I don't mind. We hugged and he squeezed me. As he did, I said "I love you" and I felt him sigh (not in a bad way). We said goodbye and I left.

I feel awful and I don’t know why. We fixed the rupture I think. He has done all kinds of caring things for me. Tonight we were in two different places maybe. He is happy and had a recent healing experience of his own. I still feel pain for all the rupture-y stuff that has transpired. I don’t feel like anyone can help me. He pours a ton of care into me and yet I want more. It is never enough. What am I going to do.

Oh no! That's not good. Sorry to hear this, sending you cyber hugs. Feel free to message me anytime.

Hugs...yeah, does sound like you were in two different places. It's difficult when that happens. As for the pouring care thing: I think if we didn't get certain things we needed in childhood, then someone is giving us that as adults, it's like we just want more and more. Like, I don't know, trying candy for the first time or something. I think that may have been part of what happened for me with MC. That he would be caring and reassuring, but it was never enough. It helped me for a bit, but then I wanted/needed more. Because when it came down to it, it wasn't about him healing who I am now, but who I was back then. And he can't be my parent.

It's like he asked me about once, "Do you ever just feel this void inside you that no one seems able to fill?" To which I said "Um, yes!" He said it's something I have to figure out how to fill on my own, how he and ex-T (at the time) could help, but no one outside can fill it because it's from the past. Does that ring true for you at all? I later asked him how to deal with it, like do I need to grieve it almost? And he said some people just come to accept it's there. I'm still working on all that...

Totally get that. Sometimes not wanting the session to end is like that feeling as a kid where you can play with a favourite toy or game and it will never be enough time playing.

LT and dp thank you!

He started to talk a little about internal family systems type stuff that he seems to use in his own work. There was an emphasis on him wanting me to say one nice thing to myself per day. Self talk stuff never works for me Unless I imagine my t saying it. I have a hard time with self care talk as it feels empty not coming from another person. He did suggest that we record some things in his voice which we did not do today but I hope we will. The best I’ve been able to do is to internalize t’s voice. Major separation anxiety for me right now.

Agreed that childhood needs are flaring up now. T said he can’t fill all of my social needs even if he can fill a few for the time being. I hate how this feels. Just sent a long email.

Voice thing is an awesome idea. I hope you can feel good about stuff with you two again. Therapy is so tough somedays

That was a really intense session. It felt heavy.
‘This week has been a battle –really fighting to be here after last session, because that was deeper than usual.’
‘Fighting to be present?’
‘Yes.’
‘How did you feel after last session?’
‘I think that’s part of the problem –I felt.’
‘And it is difficult because you are still in that?’
‘Pottery has become a physical demonstration of my difficulty with boundaries.’
‘Can you explain what you mean by that?’
‘It is a very physical process, you have to be really aware of what you are doing with your hands all and what is going on below the neck.’
‘I’m not familiar with the process of pottery but it looks beautiful.’
‘Many times I have come to and put my finger through the pot or attempted to cut it off the wheel and then cut the bottom of the pot.’
‘You use the expression “Come to”, which is usually related to coming back to reality. Does that imply that you feel as though you’re elsewhere?’
‘When I’m working on something, and it becomes apparent that is not going to work –usually because I’ve been working on it for too long - my pottery tutor will tell me I am over thinking it, and I have done my best to explain that I’m struggling with something at the moment. But last week, I spoke up for myself and said that I wouldn’t be ready to exhibit the pieces I have shown you pictures of until 2019, because I’m wary of sharing from an open wound.’
‘I felt a warm feeling when you said that, and I feel a sense of pride from you. You are doing this for you and nobody else.’
‘Thank you. That is pottery, and I went out to dinner with a friend on Saturday night.’
‘How did that go?’
‘This was the friend to whom I have explained everything, and she still doesn’t get it.’
‘OK.’
‘She asked me whether I thought April was going to be any different this year.’
‘How did you feel about her asking such a specific question?’
‘I didn’t know how to respond, and she continued: “You usually take a couple of weeks off.” Take a couple of weeks off, become unable to function for anything up to a couple of months… Now Valentine’s Day is over, the displays are everywhere and I’ve never had such a visceral reaction – we are six weeks out and it is like something has happened to that surface layer.’
‘You just said we’re six weeks out, so you had a process and worked that out. Can I ask –before your friend brought it up, had you thought about it?’
‘I just wanted to say that’s the reason for the picture being missing.’
‘Is that something to do with you being safe?’
‘I didn’t want to… I didn’t want to… It hadn’t crossed my mind at all. The conversation wound on after the hen party came in and I was on edge from the noise…’
‘Oh.’

‘I lost the ability to speak, to even communicate what was going on for me but we know the power of one sentence.’
‘Huge trigger right there, and after she made it sound like a holiday.’
‘I am really struggling to express what I want to say today.’
‘I can feel frustration from you. I can’t tell whether it’s because this isn’t how you imagined the session going today…’
‘There are different kinds of safety, as I said last week, and when I’m in that place…’
I wanted to admit the intensity of the pain in that moment, but something stopped me. I’m not entirely sure what that was.
‘I am a visual person and I can see you on a journey on a bus. It’s scary journey and things keep cropping up that we have to deal with together, before you can carry on.’
‘I always think of Michael Rosen, and We’re Going On A Bear Hunt…’
‘I love that book. You’re on a big life journey, Lost’
‘I can see you’re experiencing a lot of feelings and trying to process them and understand them. Then there’s the pressure of trying to explain to me.’
‘I admire vulnerability in other people but don’t know why I cannot allow myself that.’
I reached for her hand. ‘I’m proud of myself for not saying it but if I could have left under my own steam at that point, I think I would have. How could it ever be different?’
‘It feels heavy, Lost.’
‘Really heavy. How could it ever be different, when:
‘No matter how much I try to explain, she will never understand what Chris was/is to me.’
‘And knowing that she doesn’t understand that, or what an effect Easter has on you, just makes you feel more lonely?’
I didn’t know how to respond to that.
‘Your entire body language changed just then. Holding on to stuff is draining, and you just released it.’
I think I know where we need to go next session. I’m terrified, but the more I think about it, the more it needs to happen. I came very close to crying at several points today – R pointed out that she can see me fighting the feelings that I am having, and wonders whether I might be able to accept them.

I'm sorry you're having such a rough time right now. Those moments of not feeling on the same page as your T can be so incredibly lonely.

I am wondering if you would prefer not to know so much about your T and his healing journey and personal therapy and stuff. I know that you have had moments of worrying about the line between client/therapist and friends. Maybe this would be an opportunity for you to practice setting a boundary with him. I say this because I personally know how satisfying and connecting it can be to know personal things about your T, but then also at the same time how very disruptive it can be to your own healing process. Recently I was going through a rough patch and inadvertently discovered some very happy news about my T's personal life at exactly the wrong moment. It led to me being catastrophically upset, and it took a long time for me to come back from that. (And to forgive myself for how very upset I was.) My T regrets the whole incident too, because her job is to support me and to meet me where I am regardless of what's going on in her life, and she feels sad that what's going on in her life made me feel so distant and separated from her.

I also know about the endless pit of need thing. I'm filling the space with stuff from my T right now and branching out to try to let other people help too. It's not easy. My T said that she has heard many, many people say that they feel like they need too much and can never be satisfied and so far it hasn't been true. So hopefully it's not true for either of us either.

I put my hand on Ts tummy, apparently I made him feel like a pregnant lady

tummy touching? Interesting.

We started with me bringing up wanting to come up with some sort of 'protocol' about how to work together, but that I also had no idea where to start -- haha. I actually don't fully remember how we started at all, but I did ask if it would be helpful to begin our sessions with a sort of check in as to "who was there" with me today.

Today, it was the 13 year old, 10 year old, little part attached to S, and little part attached to C -- I realized we hadn't even defined how to refer to the parts, so we backed up...I hadn't even told him the 10 year old was 10, so... anyways, they are now the 13 year old, 10 year old, and (per my own tongue-in-cheek suggestion) "thing 1 and thing 2" are the two littlest ones, who I said I believed to be about 6 years old... thing 1 being the one attached to S and thing 2 the one attached to C (and I swear I'm not actually thinking of them as THINGS with those names but more so as twins and apparently I really like Dr. Seuss...)

We spent some time talking about getting the parts to interact with one another, and I brought up my fear of not knowing what would happen when such interaction occurred. This led to discussion of what to do if "things went bad," including talking about what "things going bad" might look like...basically, I told him I was afraid of leaving disregulated and doing SH -- I didn't go into specific detail as it was too embarrassing. (This actually shortly branched into a side topic about the difference between thoughts and actions, but I digress.) It basically came down to I have a list of things I do when I get these urges, and contacting him is on this list...I asked him if he was ok with that, and he said he was more than ok with it, he wanted it to be prioritized. I'm not sure how I felt about that, it was a weird emotional feeling. We clarified that it would be important to distinguish crisis contact from regular between-session contact and that texting him would be the best way to let him know of something urgent.

From there, we basically just started...idk...talking. C directly asked thing 1 to say something to him, which promptly frightened her, and she hid. I didn't even know how to communicate that to C... he made a statement that the parts could always decline requests, and I said "well, but I think it's important I get better at communicating the visual...because there's a difference between "decline" and "ran and hid." He asked if that's what happened -- had she run and hidden, and I said yes.

I think I'm getting things mixed up in sequence here, but it doesn't matter. We spent time talking about the 13 year old...and her feelings about needs. And, I told him that I'd come to realize it was the 13 year old who kept asking him if he had "those feelings" (Read: d-word feelings) about just the little parts. I told him that I realized she was asking this question repeatedly because she wanted to know if he had those feelings about her (I didn't pose this as a question nor did I give him any space to answer -- too much anxiety)

I told C that 13 couldn't hear anything I was sharing, but that I didn't feel like I was betraying her talking about it -- that I felt like I was telling him this in a "parent to parent" fashion (no idea where that came from, but it's how it came out). I told him somewhere in here that the mom part had come out too bc that's where a lot of this was coming from (the 'parent to parent' comment for instance). He asked me what I felt towards 13 about her "i don't need anyone" ness, and I said I wanted to hug her... he said "that's an urge, but what do you feel towards her -- what does the mom part feel towards her" and I said "heartbreak, mostly..." he asked me what the mom part would say to 13, and that was tough for me, but I remembered what I had been saying about/to Olivia's 14 year old....because, really, all of that was what the mom part feels towards the 13 year old.

I said "that she doesn't need to be so controlled/distant. that she can be little too." I didn't really get it right - what I wish I'd said was "that she doesn't need to be so strong and protective." But, I imagine that C picked up on a similar enough message.

I mentioned that 13 really likely really wanted to know if he had those feelings for her because she is the one who tends to 'frustrate' him most -- C smiled and said "what, a 13 year old girl?" in this very kind sarcastic way like "a 13 year old girl? frustrating? haha" and we laughed.

That's pretty much where we left it. I told him I'd be having the call with S and about my sadness and texting S last night. We reflected that the session had worked really well for both of us.

So, a really good day. I'm very relieved.

Aye. We sit next to each other so wasn't like I just went up to him and did it. I had started to disassociate a little so can't remember what he said (if anything) that made me do it. He just put his hand on top of mine. I wonder if unfulfilled paternal desires helped guide his career choice?

Aargh...now noticing loads of typos in my post. I handwrite, and then dictate into my computer. Frustrating.

It made sense if that helps. My auto spell check does crazy things to my posts.

Heavy but good session.

I nearly broke down twice, but I managed to hold it in. Talked about childhood wounds and they just came to the surface without warning. I felt like I was chocking. T’s body language changed when that happened and he became more compassionate. He looked at me pretty intently throughout the whole thing (I found it hard to meet his eye) but it didn’t feel uncomfortable. It was a look that said “I’ve got you. I’m here.” It comforted me because I felt pretty vulnerable.

Sounds like me. I've only broke once in nearly 11 months. It's so so difficult for me to show emotions.

Sounds like your T is very kind and compassionate though which is good

He really is. Most of the time when I go see him I’m giddy because I have paternal transference for him. But last night was different—he pushed buttons I didn’t know I had so the emotions came out. I usually find it super hard to show emotion in sessions.

My T seemed prepared for session today, after not being on Tuesday . He was really attentive, and spoke to some worries I talked about here on PC , but didn't confide in him. I had a second of being scared he read on here, but then that seems impossible. He is perceptive and contientious, so it is possible he felt badly about forgetting things last session and mindread how I might feel about that correctly?

Overall though, it is like I caught this sense of futility like you catch a cold. I think I just clanked into reality, and stubbed my toe on it.

Part of it is we had been doing heavy duty trauma work with prolonged exposure ideas, and then the holidays came in which I had to see the perpetrator exactly when my T went on a cheerful vacation. I felt left without a net I guess, or sold out or something . He said it was retraumatizing and he wants to take it slow to go back to putting my mind under so much pressure bc I was so sad, and bc he feels I lost trust in him. I wish it would go back to a meaningful feeling. I miss it.

For so long, I did have the feeling everything about therapy was so new and promising; now a series of tiny wake up calls and disillusionments reveal that to my T, (he was initially kind of taken with me unusually for him he says), his practice is super full, he has kids and a wife- he just seems to show less interest in me as a person though plenty for me as a patient.

My response is torn between being thankful for what I do get, and being hurt and almost bored with the routine. I am not sure if this is growing pains with a stage of therapy, or if I am ending it in my heart, before ending it for real. Therapy confuses me.

In session today, he gave a lot of ground on not being a blank slate. He is worried I lost trust in him, so he did listen and talk somewhat normally rather than concealing his thoughts like he is in the CIA. I appreciated that. He is used to working with soldiers on PTSD, and it may be his initial enthusiasm for the "extreme challenge" of my situation has given way to the fact that it is work for both of us now.

Text session today, went well. Left me in a good mood for the weekend!

@SE ouch, does it feel ok to be considered an "extreme" case? That wouldn't feel reassuring to me.

Fille Folle, I really appreciate you asking me these questions because they make me think. Actually when he said that, I felt sick to my stomach. I did appreciate that his eyes filled up with tears even though he isn't very emotional, and he seemed very resolute to help as a male clinician treating a female patient especially. The problem with all that is it's is unsustainable, and naturally he got used to what my deal is, and now it is our mutual job to wade through it. I feel like I entrusted this life story to inly him, and now it is just sitting there between us and I also kind of feel like the other patients who are not "extreme" in their stories are just easier. I feel apologetic for being more work, even though I don't push any boundaries.