Dear T: I Really Need to Tell You Something, but I Don't Know How...Part XXXI

Just wanted to say that I identify with what you wrote here a lot. T asked me to show them to him in one of our first sessions. It felt good to not have him flinch at them while at the same time picking up their severity.
Whatever you decide to do, I hope it goes well

If I think of the word mother, your face pops up.

Dear Dr. S,

Well, I guess I'm not doing so well overall. I am using all kinds of not as safe coping mechanisms, pretty much everyone in my arsenal is at play right now, about the only one not happening is alcohol and that's on the list for after work. I stopped on my way to work and bought not my usual breakfast of champions but a very good and maybe "better" substitute. This has been a very long and grinding week. And you are not here. I surely hope this is the "it gets worse before it gets better" stage of this process because... the weird and sad thing about this is my mood overall is better. My SI is almost nonexistent and there is actually moments of hope where I think things might be able to be better. I'm just on a path of self-destruct/destroy and yeah, having you throw me out is part of that path. I think I'm daring you to show me you don't really love me.

I sure hope you know what you are doing,
me

Thank you
Is it terrible that I kind of want him to flinch? If he didn't have a visible reaction like that I'd start to worry that they weren't "bad enough."
I'm glad your therapist was able to react and respond in the way that was most helpful to you

Hi P,
I don't think I care anymore. I think I'm ready to give up now. I'm lonely and you're all I've got. I'm sorry.

-me

I know you can't fill that hole, so why do I still feel like you can?

I miss you

That email... the most beautiful thing I've ever read about myself.... I'm still crying. I wish I could hug you right now. I love you and I truly mean it. Thank you.

T,

I don’t know if I am supposed to email you or not. You have mentioned before I how I rely on in it a lot when things get bad. Which is true, but you generally never respond and I don’t expect it.
It’s just I don’t know who else I am supposed to say things to. I have been reaching out to my bff, but she is a bit self absorbed, and freaks out easily and feels like I can be truly honest with what I am feeling idk.. I just hate being a lone with my thoughts.

Healed

I was completely disconnected today at work and I think it was the depersonalization about which you spoke. I noticed that even when I was talking to people, that I still felt the same way. I noticed that I was also experiencing a total absence of motivation like I have told you about. This is why I have talked in the past about the time going by second by second. It's maddening. I want to talk about how I make it through these times and if there is something I can do. Like I said, interacting with others didn't make it better nor worse.

I am feeling powerless and am going to address that in regards to my insecurities and in regard to me being dependent upon you and texting you. I know I decided a long time ago not to text you, and then went back to texting you, but I am at that crossroads again.

I think I am absorbed in my thoughts a lot of the time and it is scaring me. I want to continue to work on things I have brought up with you lately. I'm at a point where I am in a better place with the person we spoke about. We are communicating and working things out although it will take time. But things are good and there is hope.

The thing that I am most intolerant of and in need of finding a way to fix this, is my absence of motivation. It makes me feel like I've been exsanguinated and that getting anything done is hopeless or excruciatingly painful on a second by second basis. This state, or whatever it is, is very disturbing to me and gets in the way of any productivity I might have. I worry that this is not fixable, but I hope that it is.

IMHO, it’s a perfectly reasonable thing to want. Maybe you want him to see your pain, and for it to matter to him so much that it elicits a visceral reaction? Wanting to be seen isn’t even a little bit terrible.

Something it might be worth keeping in mind, though, is that some therapists and nurses and doctors and the like have trained themselves to maintain an outward stoicism in the face of pain and injury. (I think it’s something about trying to keep yourself calm in the face of chaos, or maybe it’s just more of the patriarchal nonsense that is so deeply embedded in medical training.) So it’s possible that he might see you but not make a face to reflect that.

Anyway I’m not saying you shouldn’t want it, just offering a thought in case it doesn’t happen the way you hope.

Dear Piaf,

Well, that was disappointing news. I spent about five minutes feeling lousy and telling myself, I quit, then I remembered what you said when we first discussed this issue: “But you don’t plan to let the chance of failure stop you, do you?”

The answer then was no and it’s still no. I just need to remember that.

ATAT

PS I wonder if you know that T Roosevelt quote: “far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor souls who neither enjoy much nor suffer much because they live in that gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.”

I'm back to not hating you, but am hopeful you can sqeeze me in next week.

How am I supposed to do this for a week?? I wished I could talk to someone about this... anyone. But my friends and family don't care anymore, and you will offer me a phone call at most. And that doesn't make much sense for that topic, does it? And after talking about it next week I'm gonna have to be all normal because I have to see my mom, fml.

I'm only human

Umm could you please update your FB pic so I know you're alive?

Goodnight T...

75 minutes.
I still haven't decided what I am and am not going to tell you. I doubt I'll reach a decision before the session, and I'll probably end up winging it.
I think we should probably talk about transference, but I have no clue how you'd respond and I'm so ashamed. It's very tempting to put that conversation off indefinitely.

Hi T. Why on earth when walking into my house on a friday after work, did I feel like crying? It was a weird, spontaneous thought, and then it was banished when the kitties came running up to me after me being gone all day.

But I was weirdly shaking and nervous (i think?) as I was getting ready to leave work, except it is Friday, and my favorite thing about the weekend is the ability to sleep as much as I want.

I swear I do not understand myself. At all.

Self harm TW


If I complete a thought record on this and share it with you we're probably going to have to have that conversation about transference I've been avoiding.
Did you know what you were in for when you agreed to see me? Would that conversation be enough to make you go running for the hills?
This is probably something I should talk to you about sooner rather than later. As much as I'd love to put it off, if your reaction is negative, the longer I've been seeing you, the more it will hurt.

Maybe I should jump before I'm pushed. I was googling other therapists at 4am this morning when I couldn't sleep. I don't want to see anyone else, I want to keep seeing you but I'm increasingly convinced you're going to leave me and that will be too painful. But then seeing you is painful. Everything is painful.

So tired. If I could really, truly believe that I did the best I could at the time, then we wouldn't be doing this. Even knowing that, it still hurts. 'I think I know what you want' - what did you mean by that? I'm not going to ask, of course.

Congratulations. Enjoy your day.

I'm so angry. I'm mad at you and your stupid pseudotherapy, even your stupid face.

Dear T,
Would you be willing to lend me one of the stones from your office, just from Monday to Thursday, so I can have it in my bag during the interviews? Or...I'm not sure if this would seem too weird for you, would you be willing to hold the piece of blue quartz I keep in my purse for a few minutes during session to sort of "charge" it? Perhaps I could give you those options and see which you choose...Or maybe you could write an empowering sentence on a piece of paper, and I could take that?
Love,
LT