So, I've had two sessions with T since his vacation. It's been a bit hairy. I wound up cancelling my regular Monday appointment right after his vacation because I was so angry at him and couldn't face him yet. My emotions were completely and totally out of control and I wanted to calm down before I saw him. He called me after he got my first of two letters, told me he wanted to squeeze me in before Thursday and gave me some choices. I picked Tuesday, the next day.

He wound up getting my second letter before I saw him on Tuesday, which was a good thing because I wanted him to have it before I saw him. The first one was more from the point of view of a child. The second one was more adult like. I said some mean things about him in the second one but also mean things about myself. Actually I kind of wondered in my letter if he was being an ass. He never commented on that and never acted as though he was angry with me for saying it.

T was very calm and gentle when I saw him. He was steady and took it all in. He was glad I saw the consult. He wanted to know what happened, how I spun out so badly.

In our second session, he apologized for being so insensitive in the session before he left. In the first session, he told me that he DID put off telling me about his vacation plans because he worries about how I react to things. That I'm strong but there is a "frailty" to me. He didn't use that word. Not sure what word he used. Actually, I think he might have stopped talking before filling in a word. He apologized for not having dealt with the issue sooner and for not giving me more time to process it. We haven't really crossed this bridge because in all the time I've been seeing him, he's never cancelled or rescheduled an appointment. He only took one other vacation two years ago and I was not ready to admit at that time that the vacation would bother me.

I explained that he told me I can ask for things but then when I finally get up the courage to ask him if I can email him while he was gone and he said no, then I felt like a jerk. And then he was laughing the whole session because he was in a good mood and so I was left with this image of him laughing while I did something really hard and really risky for me and he turned me down. He totally got it.

The interesting thing that came up for me was that I felt sad that he feels I am so fragile that he cannot say the things to me that he may want to or need to say. It reminded me of how it was as a kid in my FOO. We all had to tiptoe around my Dad out of fear of getting him upset. Not that he would hit us but there was a sense that HE was FRAGILE and we had to protect his frail emotional state. And, there were many times when he actually did get angry with me for things, for needing him, for needing comfort. There was that aspect there too.

I told T this and we didn't get to talk too much about it but I thought it was interesting that somehow T and I have recreated this dynamic, this same dynamic that was in my FOO, in the therapy room.

All in all, it felt as though we made some REAL progress although I still want to talk to him about my very real concern that the consult brought up that he is uncomfortable with my feelings for him and so is not dealing with me in a more sensitive way. Which kind of seems in line with what he actually admitted that he is a bit more cautious with me.

I did take a huge risk and tell him that the consult felt as though some of my feelings were sexual towards T. And I told him that I actually thought that was a positive thing, that it reminded me of relationships I had with men before the date/rape and they brought back memories of how much fun that stuff can be when you are in a trusting relationship. He totally agreed and seemed really comfortable talking about it. He told me that I deserved a full life but also made a comment to the effect that I am far away emotionally from being able to have a trusting sexual relationship with anyone.

The reason why I spun out so badly when he was gone was because I have these incredibly intense feelings of jealousy about T, that my role in his life is limited, etc., and the vacation and his joy was an incredibly in your face reminder of those boundaries and those feelings, which were just too intense for me to deal with. Didn't talk to him yet about my jealousy but since I got the sexual feelings out of the way, heck I think I can talk about jealousy. Tomorrow. Definitely tomorrow.

I told T that I felt like a hamster on a wheel. T told me that he wants me to think of myself as a hamster on a wheel with the door starting to open.

All in all it's been positive. Still have a few things to hammer out and then we will see if we will continue working together.

Hope everyone is well out there in forumland today.

Liese