I have sent T some angry emails recently. I take offense so easily if he says anything a bit "off" and then I get mad at him and push him away. On weekends I have been very disconnected from him and it can almost feel like he does not even exist outside of his office. This past weekend I hit some grief again related to oldT. I have these very visual thoughts running through my head (I hesitate to call them flashbacks) and lately it has been about his office and how much I miss being there in my sanctuary and my "home". That last day I saw him for a normal session and he told me to go find another T and then called the police... well I didn't know it was the last time I would be there and I never got the chance to go back there to his office. The next 2 times I saw him was with 2 other T's in their offices not his and I never was given time to make my peace and have closure in leaving a place that had come to mean so much to me.
I have struggled with trying to make a new home in my current T's office. I have tried to feel like it was a place I really wanted to be and that felt safe and special to me so I could feel okay to talk to him about the trauma. OldT's office was in an old farmhouse with lots of warmth and charm and my current T is in a sterile office building with a sterile kind of office, except for his bookshelves with lots of gifts from clients. I now sit in an old victorian arm chair with a faded floral pattern. The chair is big enough for me to snuggle down into (I'm not a small person) and I feel protected in that chair. So you can imagine my surprise when I walked into T's suite of offices and saw how he re-arranged the reception room, moving chairs, adding lamps and new pictures and knick knacks. When I commented how disoriented I felt, he told me that "my" chair was also going and he was replacing the two client chairs with new leather chairs!!
I was so upset I started to cry and I told him I hate leather, it's cold and stiff and uncomfortable and slippery. I told him he has managed to make his office even MORE cold than I already see it! He told me that some clients had complained that his old chairs were ratty and horrible and they would not sit in them (he also has a long leather couch in there). So he is taking away my safety and comfort zone and I will be forced once again to try to make myself feel okay in there. I am so angry about this and I know it's over a stupid chair but I don't want to sit on that new chair. He told me I may like it and to give it a chance. Maybe I'll just sit on the floor or drag in a chair from reception. It just feels like another thing he has done to make me feel less safe.
Aside from that I spent the session telling him how I don't feel him there with me when I cry. That he leaves me alone in my pain. that I feel like a specimen he is mildly curious about and is just watching for amusement. And that I am afraid to cry with him now because of that time he chastised me for crying at the end of the session, not leaving him any time to soothe me back to calmness so I could return to work. He said I was unconsciously doing that to set us up for failure. So now I am just shut down.
He listened totally non-defensively and said that he knows I'm just really scared of being attached to him or anyone. And of course that makes sense seeing how it turned out for me last time around. He asked me what I thought attachment meant to me and I said "pain", it means pain. That is all it has ever given me. He nodded and aske me if he has caused me pain through the attachment and I said yes, at times.
I told him that I have had to move away from him because it felt too dangerous to get close to someone as detached and remote and unemotional as he is. I know he was not happy to hear that but he didn't move and said I have critiziced him more than all his other patients put together and that I am a continual challenge. But he also said he thought it was so great that I was not being the good girl. He said he knew I trusted him enough to not feel I had to be a good girl and that was a positive sign.
I told him that I feel like a failure and I was not sure I could ever heal after what happened in my prior therapy and how traumatized and betrayed I was by another T. He said I would heal and that I have already started to heal. He said it was easier for me in the beginning in some ways because I was SO very desperate for connection with anyone after what happened. But as we got closer and as he began to matter to me I got more and more scared. He said that I have been trying to get him to leave me for a long time but that he was not leaving and not giving up on me. I told him I was toxic and surprisingly instead of saying that I was not, he said yes, there is some toxic stuff I'm holding but I am healthy. I asked how I could be toxic and healthy and he said that people get infections but they are basically healthy people aside from that. He said we can eventually get rid of the infection.
On some level I know he is right. I have been pushing and pulling enough to give anyone whiplash and it's out of fear. He also said that it's so hard for me to take in anything good he says to me because I am so afraid he will take it back so I'd rather not have it. He says the only time he gets angry wtih me is when I hurt or punish myself because that makes him very sad. He said the attachment on HIS side is fine and he has no issue with my being attached to him. He tells me such kind things like I work hard, he's proud of me, I'm smart, and brave but I can't FEEL the words. They do not get through and it scares me because I feel like I've been so ruined that nothing can get through the shield I have put around me to protect myself. I'm mostly so numb that my whole body feels like it went to sleep.
In the end he said I was progressing enough that he was pleased with things, that this is all very expected after what happened to me and that he would see me next Tuesday. I knew he was going to cancel me on Thursday due to something he mentioned last week and having an 8 day break is really freaking me out because I'm not feeling connected or secure and my state of mind is chaotic. I know the wait won't "kill" me but it feels like that. He told me to contact him before next week. And he told me to try to take him with me or it would be a long week. So far, I have not been able to feel him with me at all. It's all just a blurry haze. The only thing I remember is that he squeezed my arm on the way out.
I am so tired of this attachment push/pull. I don't know how to end it. He told me it would end when I began to trust him.... and then corrected himself to say when he earned my trust. I just don't even know what to do or say to him when I see him next time and when I walk in and see those dreaded new leather chairs!
TN
As far as the chair is concerned, would he consider keeping it for you? Or is space an issue? I like leather myself. It seems cold but really absorbs body heat and I actually prefer it now. Never thought i would say that. It's much easier to clean too. Spray it and it's clean. But so much harder to clean upholstery. Think of all those germs. 
for TN and for TN's T 
) through it with you. One thing...when we first started sitting on the floor together, I was not at all prepared for the effect that it would have on me. I think it was that single action that led to the rollercoaster that led to the parts work we are doing now. It might be different with you, because at the time, I had never had any proximity with my T and yours has shaken your hand and patted your arm and such. But, for some reason, sitting on the same surface stirred up an incredible amount of comfort and pain for me. I'm not saying it will be the same with you...just something to be aware of, as it made all my millions of reactions and my hyper-vigilance on any signs of abuse or rejection go crazy. 
