At my last session, my T and I ended up talking for a while about my older daughter who is having a difficult time adjusting to leaving home and actually being on her own. I didn't realize that I was really upset about it, but my T picked up on it and when we started to look at it, turned out I was struggling with a lot of guilt of the "man I really screwed her up" variety, along with some very very deeply buried resentment that I had provided such a better childhood for her than I got, why was she having such a problem? (Not a feeling I'm proud of and as I typed that I heard the voice of my mother.) My T provided an extremely good balance of recognizing that some of my issues undoubtedly contributed to the problem, BUT it's extremely complicated with so many other factors including her personality and environment etc. That it's impossible to pick it out. He also reassured me that I have been trying to fix my stuff for a long time and that I'm handling things well now. That although I cannot change the past, I can go forward using all the knowledge I've gained to help my daughter get through it. He actually made me say a lot of what I believed out loud so I could hear the absurdity of some of it.
Which was really good because my daughter had a pretty serious meltdown that afternoon and I was in a much better place to handle it. When it started I began to panic but then I heard my Ts voice telling me I could handle it and I steadied down and really did do a good job handling it. Which is amazing. And then very sad, because I didn't need my T to get through it, further confirmation that it's time to leave.
I'm training to be a volunteer for Contact, a crisis hotline and the training classes are the evening of the day I usually have my therapy appt. Near the end of my appt my T told me we were going to have to skip this week because he was going to be out of the office for a few days but he wanted to make sure that I knew there was no message in that. (I actually stretched my appts out just once to two weeks, promptly fell apart and went back to weekly where I have remained since.
) I really appreciated his being careful about that because I would have went straight to it being a message which I ruefully admitted to him. So I scheduled my appt for a different day to move it off the training (if I have a rough session at 8:30 in the morning, it leaves me pretty exhausted and facing a 5:30 to 8:30 training session). So he moved me to Wednesday. Of course as soon as I get back to the office, I realize that I've scheduled therapy for the same time as a teeth cleaning. I called the dentist put it was close to impossible to reschedule (I have really bad teeth and skipping or even stretching out cleanings too far is NOT a good idea) so I realized I was going to have to reschedule. I'm not sure if I've ever talked about this but my Ts scheduling abilities are not the greatest. It's a massive flaw in his otherwise almost perfect abilities.
I've had some bad experiences and major disruptions over re-scheduling appts in the past so I was trying to be really careful. I immediately called his service and left a message that I needed to talk to him about rescheduling my appt. 48 hrs go by, no return phone call. So first thing Friday morning, I leave another message with his service that I STILL need to re-schedule my appt. Both of these were non-emergency calls. No return phone call. By now, despite my knowledge that he can get really behind, and he's bad about getting back to you if you don't say it's an emergency, it's starting to feel a little panicky. I can feel all his appts slipping away and I'm starting to think I'm looking at a three week gap. Which of course is invoking all that anxiety about the never-ending gap when I go (if I ever manage to). Then I ended up really seriously pissed that he was doing this to me and ranted and cursed and spat at a very patient friend. After the anger cooled down, all the insecurity set in. I was already doing a lot of crying and it was getting to the point where I couldn't stop. I also forgot to mention that my husband is working 13 hour days with no days off for a month, so I'm running the house alone right now. I ended up calling a close friend who very wisely convinced me that I really needed to make an emergency call and connect, and for once I listened to her. I ended up calling on Saturday afternoon and this time I left an emergency message. My T called back in about 10 minutes, apologized profusely about not getting back to me, and was extraordinarily reassuring. Which helped immensely. I was able to tell him about what happened with my daughter and he asked me how I handled it. To my shock I heard myself saying "pretty good, I think I handled it well." I'm not sure who was more surprised to hear that, me or my T. But he was really happy to hear it. OK. To quote Bill Cosby, I told you that story so I could tell you this one.
I got a call Tuesday morning from the head of the hotline who is also the lead trainer. She's a really lovely woman. I have been enjoying the training more than I can possibly say and am finding it fascinating and really fulfilling. In some ways, I'm feeling like I'm finally the person I am supposed to be. Judging by the feedback I've been getting in class and during the role-playing, I've been doing fairly well also. So the lead trainer called and asked if I would be willing to be the caller in a role-play that night with a trainer. Up until now, we would basically have lecture and discussion for about half the time, then two trainers would perform a role-play of a call in front of the whole group emphasizing the skill we were concentrating on, then we would break up into two smaller groups and each trainee would role-play with a trainer.
When it came time in the main group for the role-play, the head of training announced that I and one of the trainers (who I had just spent an observation shift with, she was great!) were going to role-play. I had been told I could make up a scenario or use a real one and I decided that what I had just gone through with the missed phone calls and subsequent panic would make a good example for a crisis line. I was a little worried about it being too much but in the end decided to go for it. Well, we did the role play and it went very well, and there was a lot of good feedback. But I left feeling weirdly agitated and with that feeling that I was trying to shove something away. Every other time I've left training I've been extremely energized and up so this was strange.
I went online and was chatting with the same good friend who has listened to me rant and trying to figure out what was going on. She did an amazing job of listening and asking good questions and I realized later that I used skills I had learned with my T. I didnt' edit I just let fly with my feelings. And I remembered feeling very similar to this in the past, that I was experiencing a deep sense of shame. I finally connected that the role-play had been more intense than I expected, that I felt very exposed. That I had dared to let a whole room full of people see the "real" me. So I realized it had been extremely triggering to the point where it felt like it had been some kind of weird test and I wasn't sure if I had passed it or not.
Now my T has painstakingly taught me that when I'm wondering what's going on and coming up with horror scenarios that I need to ask the other person what's going on. But I've really only done that with my T and a friend or two I feel secure enough with. But I knew it was the right thing to do. So I emailed the head of the program, explained some of my background, how I had been triggered and told her that I needed to know why she picked me.
I got a wonderful reassuring response from her and was told that she picked me because I was friendly and outgoing so she thought I would be comfortable doing a role-play in front of all my classmates. that was a nice answer. What was even better was daring to expose my insecurities, to move towards connection and have it met with understanding and reassurance. And I had risked doing it with someone that I wasn't COMPLETELY sure of. And wasn't paying to stick around.
This feels really amazing because I'm able to see that I'm actually taking what I've learned in therapy outside to the "real" world. And yes, I had gotten very important support from a friend but I didn't need to contact my T. It's more affirmation that I'm ready to stand on my own and reassurance that all of my gains won't disappear when I walk out my Ts door for the last time (major fear I've been dealing with.) Followed by an incredible sadness (ok which can turn into searing grief) that it's time to go. I still want my T but I'm capable of getting my needs met elsewhere now.
This in turn has led to my being able to hang onto a sense of peace, that I am working my way through to being able to leave, and even trying to be ok with it taking some time. I'm looking forward to talking about all this with my T next Tuesday (oh yeah, we did reschedule during the emergency call.
)As always, thanks for listening.
AG
