Some of you may have seen my posts in the check in for how you're feeling thread about how T never showed up for my last appointment. I called her and she apologized profusely and offered to schedule me for the next day. At first I agreed to the appointment, but later that evening I realized I just couldn't bear to see her or her office again that soon. It was horrible to be left like that but it seems to have had something of a freezing effect on me. I thought of this poem by Emily Dickinson which describes it well.

After great pain a formal feeling comes--
The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs;
The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore,
And Yesterday, or Centuries before?

The Feet, mechanical, go round
A Wooden way
Of Ground, or Air, or Ought,
Regardless grown,
A Quartz contentment, like a stone.

This is the Hour of Lead
Remembered, if outlived,
As Freezing persons recollect the Snow--
First -- Chill-- then Stupor-- then the letting go--

--Emily Dickinson

I've decided to stay away until I thaw out a bit. I emailed T that night, rather coldly (haha) informing her that I was cancelling our appointment for the next day and that I didn't feel like rescheduling. I said I was sure I would start to miss her eventually and that when I did I would call to make an appointment, if that was still okay, but that for now I am taking a break.

T wrote back and apologized again. She also said a lot of nice things about how she understood if I wanted a break, she would miss working with me, she wished me all the best, etc. etc. She also signed her email "with warmest regards" which I thought might be code for love? Because isn't love the warmest regard you can have for somebody?

Anyway. The last couple days and nights have been a bit difficult. I've been crying at the drop of a hat, having trouble sleeping, frequently forgetting to eat (H has been helping to remind me about that, which is good cuz I'm pregnant.) But beneath it all is a feeling that I really will be okay ultimately.

I keep reading T's email over and seeing different things in it. I am touched by her kindness, but mostly notice the absence of any manipulative techniques to get me back. She doesn't try to imply that she's doubtful of my ability to get by without her (which I thought she might be) her expression of regret at my flight was of the mildest, while still managing to convey warmth towards me and a sense that I am welcome back if/when I choose to return.

This is all so amazing because I see so clearly that T does not need me. I don't have to offer up my emotional life to her as some kind of offering to make her feel good about herself, or connected, or whatever. She feels kindly towards me, but whether I come back next week, next month, next year, or never, she will be the same and she will be fine. It makes me very happy to think of her over there across the highway, living her life fully and not missing me more than a little. I don't feel any sense of obligation towards her and that is very freeing. When or whether I go back is all about what I want and need.

So much of my relationship with my own mom is built around my sense that she needs me. I think she needs me for companionship, emotional support, ego boosting, and image enhancing (she sees me as very much a part of her own image that she projects to the world). I love my mom, but sometimes this all makes me tired.

I was a little surprised that maternal transference with T happened as swiftly and decisively as it did, because I would have thought that someone as wrapped up in their mother's emotions and thoughts as I am would not have anything left over for a maternal attachment to a T. Yet the bond quickly formed and I realized she was meeting needs for me that my mother couldn't, or hadn't, and that I hadn't even been fully aware of.

I felt ambivalent about it, though. There was a sense that seeing a T at all was in some ways a betrayal of my mother, and the transference made me feel like I was "cheating" on my mom in a way. So I've begrudgingly tolerated the transference, but I haven't actively encouraged it or allowed it to be the creative force in my therapy that it probably could be.

Now I'm thinking what I may need to do when I return to therapy is to actively lean into the transference. To simply let T play mommy, and to learn what it is really like to be cared for by someone that doesn't need me back. I think if I can make a very conscious and deliberate choice to detach more from my own mother and attach more to T, I will have set myself in the direction of some real growth and improved functioning, because T does not need that attachment for her own well being and so should not be tempted to misuse it to keep me dependent, limited, and second guessing of myself.

I'm not entirely sure I'll be able to do this, though. I worry about my mom.

I wonder if a healthier mother daughter relationship would really look more like what I have with T? Would I really just be able to walk away (like I am temporarily doing from T) without a sense of guilt or anxiety for her well being?

I don't even know how this should work, if I'm becoming healthier or just more selfish. I think I at least have a glimmering of how to go forward, though, which is something.

Phew! I think this is my longest post ever. I'll be surprised if anyone made it through this far to the end. Thanks for your patience, if so.