Dear T: I really need to tell you something XLIV

You asked me last week if this week I'd be in person and you seemed kind of eager to have me in your office again. I know I can get tired while doing remote and hearing me is often hard for some reason so I have to repeat myself a lot. Its nice though to have it the other way around. Have the therapist eager to be doing in person sessions.

Thank you for today's session.
Thank you for understanding.
I am exhausted, and yet grateful to you for holding space for me today.

I've eaten 7 things on the food list you made me. Including the blackberries. You have been harping on me about fruit. First it was vegetables. Now its fruit. I've had both this week. I've had a lot of vegetables actually and I've cut back on candy. So I still am not really seeing an issue. I've been in legit serious physical pain though. I take tylenol and zofran and then I can eat. A lot of the time it is healthy stuff. I don't know what you have planned for tommorow. But I hope its nothing serious.

Dear T,
For the first time since I know you, I am mad at you. I understand illness and the need to reschedule etc but you could just have waited a couple hours before giving my space away to someone else.
I think I may appreciate a few months break from this trauma work. I though the effort of working on that with you in such a busy moment of my life was worth it but today I felt like a paycheck and am no longer sure I want to spend so much energy on this work with all those major changes in sight. I’ve been feeling totally unloved these days and today you made a mess. If this has to be the way, then I have no space for your treatment in my life now.

Heya L. Today for some reason I am missing you in a way that is approaching being uncomfortable. I think I know why, too. It's because it's almost my birthday, and because you used to text me a birthday wish, but there's no reason for you to do so this year since I'm not seeing you anymore. I think I'm already feeling a little sad that you likely won't this year. I mean, there's no reason anymore for you to think about me on that day, is there? Damn it. I suppose I will talk with you in my head about this tonight. Anyway I'm missing that sacred space of the therapy relationship today. Sigh.

Dear E: Sorry about e-mailing again.

Eh, maybe the missing of the sacred space comes from the dream the other night of being in a therapy session with a different t. Tis possible. I haven't dreamed of him again yet, hopefully I will soon, I want to know more about why he had me draw a circle.

I don't understand why therapists can blow off clients and don't have to give a reason as to why they are cancelling, yet if a client is having a health crisis and the therapist knows this has been going on for awhile, its still an issue to cancel a session. I guess it totally wasn't up to you, but we got it moved to remote on Friday morning. But I just don't get these supposed double standards. I have never cancelled before. I didn't want to be charged more then I pay for a session though.

What a long process this is separating from you emotionally. I wonder if I ever will. I don't even know if that's the right phrase but it's the best I can come up with right now.


Sigh.

Dear T: I wonder what you will say to me if I text you and tell you that I am feeling depressed and want to SH. I know, I know. Bad idea. Especially as I have to go back to my GP next week. I don't care. Maybe I will cancel the appointment. Kit

I had a very restless night last night, and overslept this morning.
This has really rattled me...or maybe it's brought what we really need to discuss to the surface.

I am livid with Steve for so many reasons...

Dear T,
I called the doctor's office, and I can't do the blood work in advance, but they *can* give me an order for Quest or Labcorp (or I can come to their office) for after the appointment. So going to go with that option. Even if it means waiting a week or two to get it done because of my going out of town. Certainly better than canceling the appointment.

It made me feel better that you'd also put off your physical due to the pandemic. And that you mentioned some of your own issues with staying healthy. I mean, I knew about the coffee one! I didn't feel judged by you, even when I was essentially asking you to judge me at that one point (thanks for not taking the bait!). And I really do hope your doctor found you to be generally healthy.

I do think we need to talk about the health fears more. I feel it's one of those things for me that is always there underneath the surface, but it's not an acute thing most of the time, so it doesn't occur to me to talk about it. Same with things like the one phobia I mentioned. It's there, and on some level, it's regularly affecting my life, but it's been doing so for so long (like since childhood), that it's not a thing where I think "Oh, today we should talk about that" unless for some reason it's particularly affecting me.

Hm, maybe that's a thing for me to do, to write down some of the stuff that does keep affecting me on a lower level, but still affecting me, as future things to address? As maybe they affect me more than I realize, just because I'm so used to them....

Love,
LT

Just to let you know I'm right there with you Artie... If it's worth anything!

Hugs Waterbear.

Well, tomorrow the dream summit starts. It will give me something else to think about for the next 3 days anyway. Plus I'm reading Machiel's new book, talking it slow so I can take it all in.

I’m trying not to be hurt by your response to my email but I’m struggling. I was inviting you to offer me reassurance that it was ok to talk to you about it but you just responding ‘I hear what you’re saying’ seems to suggest that you also think that it’s inappropriate and irrelevant to talk about it.
This is where your short and brief replies really cause an issue. Because now I feel like I definitely can’t talk about it with you. I have a history of CSA how can you think it’s irrelevant and inappropriate to talk about intimate medical examinations? Maybe it’s because you’re as uncomfortable as me to talk about it. Maybe it’s because you’re a man.
All I wanted was you to say it’s completely appropriate and whenever I’m ready to talk about it you would be ready to listen. Was that really too much to ask?
Now it’s another topic that is completely off the table to discuss. This list seems to be getting longer and longer.

One of these days, I'll learn to go with the flow.
Today is not that day.
I hope you can be flexible in November/December, because they want to do another series of workshops on a bloody Thursday morning.

Why do the words 'I have a medical appointment' never make it out of my mouth?

Dear T. If I text you again today will you think I am too much? Kit

I could hardly wait for my lunch break today so I could start watching the videos on the dream summit!! Waiting for the first one to load now!

I still wish we could have just cancelled altogether this week. Sorry I am not eating today. It is not your issue though to worry about. I have been buying and eating the stuff on our food list. If I can't eat I simply won't eat anymore. I don't know what your eating habits are like but I heard on a podcast "you don't mess with a big persons food, and you don't mess with a small persons food." I have fennel and broccoli and hummus and carrots that I will eat when I feel like eating.

I just want to be honest with you in the morning. Like brutally honest. I ****ing hate food. It makes me sick. Mentally emotionally and physically. Do what you want to with that information. I don't care. Just remember, that when we first met you said you could help me.

I just, well, y'know, um...

don't know. Why am I feeling so sad today?

I'm feeling better. The drum circle was really fun. What a great group of folks.

I couldn't get it removed from Google Books.

Dear K,

The rose I bought 'in memory' of you last year is flowering. And it's beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. You meant so much to me. You gave me the gift of life - at least you really helped me to learn how to live it, and that's as good as in my opinion. You taught me that there is goodness in this world. You taught me how to make friends, and helped me to find my true place in this crazy life. And then one day you weren't there anymore. Just like that. And because you didn't die I have no gravestone to visit, no 'special place' to go to to say hi to you. I have no old phone number I can just text randomly with my updates, knowing full well I wouldn't get a response, but being ok with that. In fact, even harder than that, I know you are still out there, just not in the same way as before. Like a ghost almost, a fragment of what once was. Teasing me with your presence but then when I reach out, it's... hollow, somehow.

There is no answer here, I know that. It cannot be what it was; I am grateful for what it is; yet I silently wish for something different. I miss you. I miss us. I miss..... me??

The rose I bought is called 'Peace'. I hope that you are at peace now, and I hope that I can continue to work towards building that peace for myself. I definitely see it sometimes, it comes and it goes, just like a lot of things in life. As a wise woman once told me, 'nothing lasts forever'.

I love you K x