Therapy break

I’m Still Here! – 2023’s Therapy Started With Turbulence.

rubberbandsandchewinggum33 Comments

So, it’s been another while since I have posted again… This is mainly because life is so unbelievably busy that I simply haven’t had time to sit and write – but it’s also because really I haven’t found my feet back in therapy since the Christmas break (yes – I know it’s almost March!). It’s felt like there’s been a catalogue of ‘mini-disasters’ in the room with Anita since the holidays which has made it feel difficult to drop into feeling completely safe – or at least safe enough to address some of the lingering murk that always rears its head in the early part of the year – namely the catastrophic end that Em and I went through three years ago … THREE YEARS AGO!!

Because that stuff around Em (and by extension the mother wound) is so huge, and so painful, I have to feel so completely contained and safe in the relationship with Anita to be able to go anywhere near it….and I just haven’t. Parts of me have gone into hiding and it’s not helped things in the room at all. I mean it’s been ok, but just not ok enough for me to get to the parts that are requiring attention and care…and because time is rolling on and those parts are not getting what they need, it’s making it feel crappy inside. I feel abandoned and rejected – and part of that is my doing because I haven’t let Anita in, she doesn’t know what’s going on.

My system is having a bit of a malfunction and it feels really disappointing to be in this place tbh. I am trying not to judge myself and just accept that whatever is coming up is just part of what needs to happen right now – but I can’t lie, I am not enjoying the levels of upset and dissociation that has crept back in. I know that I need to find a way to get properly back to A this coming week because I can feel myself starting to fall down a hole that I haven’t been in for a long while and I know that if I don’t send out an SOS cry then I am going to be…well…I just can’t go there again. I feel really lost. And the young parts – particularly the teen is not ok.  

I tend not to write mid ‘crap’ on the blog these days. I prefer to write and process things a bit after whatever was going on has run its course and things have resolved a bit…basically when things feel a bit more together.  I want to reflect from my Adult self rather than post in a triggered state – but the rate things are going it could be 2024 before I am able to do that so I guess I’ll just do a quick catch up before this blog dies altogether. I know I keep saying this, but I think I need to carve out some time somewhere for me to be able to write – even if it’s not blogging- because it has been such a helpful tool over the years…I just don’t know where that time will come from!

Anyway, here goes…

It’s clear as day to me that I am swimming (drowning) in the shit infested emotional seas right now. I feel like I am lost. And where in the past I’ve used the analogy of Stevie Smith’s poem, ‘Not Waving But Drowning’ – where people on the shore mistake the drowning swimmer for someone who is waving at them so they don’t respond. However, right now I feel like I am not even trying to get noticed – I couldn’t be mistaken for waving because I’ve almost resigned myself to drowning. Well not that, exactly, but I am not sending up the signal to show that I am not ok because the fact is there is no one standing on the beach watching. There is no one to notice the distress to come and help. There is no one to save me, and so I am trying hard to muster the energy to save myself but it’s not easy when you’re exhausted.

We’ve all been here.

We know we need to do better but sometimes all you can do is just keep treading water until things ease off…but it’s hard. Fortunately, I am a strong swimmer and I have been in choppy waters and rip currents enough to know that the sea will calm and I will find my way out of it…eventually.

I seem to be triggered left, right, and centre- and just as I feel like I am getting my head above water I get hit with something else. I really don’t think perimenopause is helping with this– and that’s not me playing the crazy hormones card, but honestly I am finding that my emotions are very heightened alongside my cycle now. I feel so bonkers around ovulation, and even paranoid at times –  so, I am sure that’s an exacerbating factor in all this, too. Unfortunately, there’s not a great deal I can do about that other than up the self-care, be mindful, and take the supplements, eat better, and try and get the sleep in. Ah sleep…that elusive balm. Again, I am sure this is perimenopause. ARGH!!

Anyway, I am struggling a bit and the reality is, the anniversary of mine and Em’s end really hit me hard this year. I don’t know why – you’d think the further I get away from that the easier it would be, but sadly, “like a tick” is stuck deep in my young parts’ psyche and whilst Adult me knows what she said was completely out of order, as we well know, a hurt young part holds onto these negative soundbites like a security blanket confirming why we are unworthy of love and care.

Christmas was especially hard this year, too, when my mum failed to acknowledge me, my wife, or my children. And whilst our relationship is patchy at best these days, it felt like a deliberate and calculated kick in the teeth – a punishment for I have no idea what…?

Let’s be clear – I am in therapy because of my mother wound and whilst events in the here and now aren’t the end of the world (and they really aren’t) what these rejections or abandonments tap into is all the pain I experienced as a child and it seems to pour petrol on the fire. And that’s when it all goes wrong!

So, my mum not really engaging with me anymore is what it is – no worries – I have a wonderful little family unit and we are happy as we are – but to the little parts that are so hurt it just twists the knife again into that wound…and of course that then plays out in my therapy with Anita as I search and scan for evidence that she, too, doesn’t really care and would rather not be around me. And of course, breaks do this. Again, breaks are just breaks to Adult me…but breaks to the young parts…well, it’s not great is it?!  #therapybreakhell

I think sometimes as an adult you can really sometimes doubt your childhood experience and wonder if you are just stuck and locked in victim mode and perhaps it wasn’t really that bad. I mean, seriously, I am getting really bored of navigating this emotional territory over and over but I am not doing it on purpose! I am not choosing to be here. I am trying hard to heal this stuff so I don’t keep falling flat on my face…and it’s working…I think. But some weeks are better than others. Today just happens to be part of one of the bad weeks but there have been months of much much better weeks.

Adult is gaining power, but the young parts are obviously still very much part of the system and I think will continue to be. I don’t see the goal as ‘getting rid’ of those younger parts – they are there to give me information about my feelings and need listening to – and dare I say it, are welcome…even the critic! The more I can give them space whilst being able to keep a foot in adult the better.

The biggest difference that I feel now is that where previously the young parts could completely steam roller me and almost take Adult hostage (kind of how it feels this weekend), there is a move towards Adult being able to communicate with those small parts and hold and soothe them to a degree. I mean obviously I am not the preferred Adult/parent but this is a million miles further forward from when I was working with Em. Back then I could see and feel these distressed young parts but I could do absolutely nothing to help them. Because of the work I’ve done with Anita I know what it is to feel held, loved, cared for and can now copy that, sort of.

Anyway, back to actual therapy:

The first session back after the break was 9th of January…which felt like an eternity after Christmas. So, it had been a looooooooong break – not ideal. My mum had been shit – again, not ideal. It was knee deep into the anniversary period of the notoriously bad time when Em and I colossally collapsed – not ideal…and so, yeah, I was very fragile, sensitive, and hypervigilant heading back to A… I was desperate to see her. I mean the little ones were absolutely in need of hugs and stories and reassurance that everything was ok.

It’s been such a long time since those early sessions that I can’t even really remember the details of what happened and I can’t be arsed to go back and listen to see what happened. What I can tell you is that there have been a few hiccups that have meant I haven’t been able to quite settle into the therapy. You’ll laugh when you read this, because I think on their own these things perhaps aren’t a big deal – but cumulatively they’ve felt big enough to stop me doing the work I really need to do. It’s felt like the safe container is a bit of a leaky bucket and so I’ve been waiting, poised in false adult a lot of the time waiting for ‘safe Anita’ to be there consistently.

Tbh I can’t quite remember the chronology of the little things that happened with Anita but I know the first session back she opened the door and her hair was still wet. “Big deal” I hear you say, but what that signalled to me was that she wasn’t quite ready for me, had been rushing, and probably wasn’t in the zone. Perhaps she was not wanting to be back to work and would not on her A game. I know that’s a lot of projection but that’s what we do isn’t it? When we feel vulnerable and uncontained, we really badly need our container (person and space) to be robust and any hint that they may not be sends things off.

The next session her dogs barked loudly for almost the entire session and I just couldn’t relax at all. I was jumpy and stressed out. I’d needed to talk the first session back but it was just filler and False Adult and now it felt like she wasn’t providing a safe, calm therapeutic space. I felt angry that day. I had stuff I really needed to dig into and I was left feeling like she didn’t really care enough to make sure the space was ‘therapeutic’.

In another one I could hear her adult daughter wandering around in the corridor right out outside the room which again made me not be able to relax (I think this is the one that pissed me off the most!).

In another she’d forgotten to put our stories out, which again signalled that she wasn’t really ready – or more over, didn’t have the young parts and me kept in mind. She forgot the books once before a long while back and I went belly up about it. It was a big rupture. This time I didn’t say anything – teen me was just thinking “what’s the point?” because we were traversing this weird not quite right space and quite frankly, I didn’t have the energy for it. But of course, the little parts were upset and disappointed.

In and of themselves these things above don’t seem like that big a deal but as I have said, cumulatively I just felt so off – such a departure from the Anita I used to see.  So, False Adult turned up to lots of the sessions because I just did not want a rupture…but inside there was a lot up upset and unrest. The head injury I sustained at Christmas really affected me for most of the month of January too. I felt dissociated but not. My short term memory was awful and I would forget trains of thought and words and….well basically it was a nightmare. There was one session where I just sat there. My mind was completely empty. Peaceful even (Wow!). But it meant that there wasn’t really much therapy. I wasn’t sad about it though because I was so cognitively zoned out. I literally had no fucks to give!

Then anniversary of ending with Em rolled around and I didn’t speak about it despite the fact it was swirling inside. It was mine and Anita’s three-year anniversary but I felt awkward somehow. I gave her a gift, but it just felt a bit…I dunno…strange this year. I think that’s definitely me, not her.

That’s not to say during this period A and I haven’t connected. We have had a few hugs and stories – it’s not been completely distant…but I just haven’t felt quite right. Stuff was building up and up and up and then I had a very bad dissociative day and it hit me afterwards that it was the actual day of ‘tick gate’. The body remembers even if the mind isn’t quite on it!

The next session I was determined to go and talk things through with Anita. You know when it’s just built up to a point where you have to? Avoidance is out. You just need to do the work. You need to take a risk and oftentimes when you do that that’s when things feel most held and connected. Anita is not a mind reader and so if I come in in False Adult I think she can think I am ok…enough. If I actually show her or tell her I am struggling then she’s there. Sometimes I think I don’t give her the opportunity to meet me, but then there’s another part of me that feels like by now she should know me and my patterns well enough to spot when I might be hiding away.

So, that day a few weeks back (the ‘let’s do it’ day)  it felt like the internal fog had lifted, the mistrust and crap about not feeling held or contained was gone. Anita and I have been together long enough for me to know that she’s there. She cares. And she’s human. (Am still fucked off about the disruptions though!) But it wasn’t serving me to keep stuff to myself. The child parts needed to be seen and held and to talk through the break and all the feelings of being left and abandoned.

It’s a 45 minute drive to Anita’s and I had just arrived in her town when I got a phone call from my wife telling me she needed to go to hospital urgently but didn’t think she could drive. So, that was therapy out. I text Anita just 15 minutes before my session and cancelled. I was gutted, but obviously my wife’s health and well-being take precedence. When I arrived home, I saw a message from A saying she hoped everything was ok and she was sorry not see me. I spent the day in hospital with my wife and it triggered a lot of the trauma from being young and also when I had to have all the chemo and radiotherapy for cancer- I wasn’t in a very good place and also so sad about not being able to see Anita when I had REALLY needed to and was REALLY ready to let stuff out.

I text Anita in the afternoon explaining what was going on (bad) and asked if she might have time for a quick check in before Friday and…she didn’t reply until the afternoon of the next day. That triggered me. Ugh. But not only that she said she didn’t have any space for me.

Ouch.

I wasn’t asking for a f-2-f session, I literally just wanted a five minute phonecall to touch base and she was too busy.

I was really upset about that. I mean really upset.

The next session was quite shutdown I think until I started crying and told her I had really needed to see her on Monday and then all the stuff about hospital trauma and stuff from being little came out. I thought Anita knew about this part of my story, but I think I must have shared it with Em (this is one thing I really hate about having switched therapists – I feel like so much of my story is held with Em). A responded with lots of love and care but, despite this I wasn’t able to tell her how hurt I felt about not having a check in. She’d brought it up and said she was sorry…but I was hurting a lot and the young parts just felt like she would have made time in the past.

I was due to go on holiday in half-term and so that was creeping ever closer…another break. Another disruption. I was flying on the Friday before half-term and I had asked again in a text if we might be able to check in. Again she said she was full. When I saw her in session she said she was sorry that she had no space in the week. I moodily replied, “I don’t want to see you, I don’t have time this week either, I just wanted to talk to you.” Anita hadn’t realised the check in I was asking for was a phone call and said that she could talk to me on the Wednesday evening before I went. It’s a day she has her grandchildren overnight but once she’d got them in bed we could talk. That sounded good to me.

So I left on the Monday feeling sad that it would be two weeks until I saw A, but grateful that at least we would talk and the child parts would get a bit of reassurance on the Wednesday.

Wednesday evening rolled around…and my phone didn’t ring. There was no text. Nothing. I went to bed upset but also kind of resigned to the fact that she’d not remembered me. On Thursday my phone remained blank. No contact.

By the evening part of me was panicking that something had happened to Anita…but more voices were shouting, “She’s forgotten about you. She doesn’t care. Out of sight, out of mind! You’re just not that important anymore.” – that stuff on a loop. I felt really sad. I went to bed on Thursday ready to fly on Friday and when I woke up at 3am there was a message from Anita on my phone sent at 11pm Thursday night:

I am so sorry about last night. Not only was it children, but our electric kept tripping off on the sockets, so (partner) had to come down to sort it. I hope you have a lovely time away and can fully recharge xx (heart).

I looked at the message and was just really fucking mad. Like, really? Sure things go wrong and perhaps it all got chaotic that evening. But the thing that really hurt me was that she was only acknowledging this more than 24 hours after we were meant to check in. It hurt because the reason I had asked for the check in in the first place was because there was a break coming up and the little parts get so distressed. Anita knew this. And so that message just felt shit on so many levels.

In the past I would have replied to that message and fired something back showing just how hurt and upset I was. But I didn’t. I just didn’t reply at all. I was sick for the first part of my holiday which was a real pisser and I was having nightmares with Anita in them. By Monday evening I was really struggling with the little parts. I sent Anita a message with something from Carolyn Spring about shame and the link to a song, a friend had shared with me by Sia which really encapsulated how I was feeling.

I heard nothing from Anita.

In the past when I have been away and it’s been our session time she’s sent me a text to tell me she’s thinking of me. Not this time.

On Friday she sent me a text wishing me a safe journey home and sending a hug…but by that time I just felt really cut off. Like, really? Can she really not know how upset I am.

Ugh.

Monday ended up a complete shitting disaster. I could barely speak to her and dissociated so badly that it felt like there was literal grey fog in the room. I couldn’t see properly. I was quiet. I was hoping Anita would say something early on about the missed check in but she didn’t and this shut me down even further. I had expected her to say something – surely that text wasn’t adequate and she couldn’t feel like that was the matter closed? The pain inside was intense and A just seemed to leave me in it. She didn’t reach out, ask to hold my hand, see if I wanted a hug, enquire which parts were there. At around the half hour mark she asked if what was going on was due to gap or her not calling on the Wednesday.

I couldn’t speak.

And then she said, “In hindsight, I won’t do that again. I should have said no in the first place.”

With that I got up and said, “I’m so done. That’s not fair.” And walked out.

I was so upset.

Maybe she shouldn’t have offered the check in, and maybe with hindsight it was a mistake but the mistake has been made and surely it’s up to her to try and find a repair and allow the hurt parts to talk about what it felt like to be let down and seemingly forgotten about. Instead, it felt like I was being punished for her cock up. My reaction was making her uncomfortable, obviously another example of being ‘too dependent’, and so rather than look at that, just withdraw yet another thing that helps. We don’t do longer sessions anymore, now check ins are off the cards. I am waiting to see what happens with bank holidays. Previously, we’ve always rescheduled to another time in the week but I am guessing now I’ll just miss the session…that I have paid for.

Oh, and don’t get me started on that. She’s upped her prices too.

So, yeah. It’s all been a bit bumpy to say the least. We have managed to repair things a bit. I went back after walking out and a glimmer of old Anita was there. She had softened a lot and told me she cares, loves me etc etc and held me in tight hug for the remainder of the session…

But…

Ugh…

It feels like we are a long way off base right now.

Part of me is wondering how much of this has been triggered by all the stuff I am carrying emotionally and so I am just being over sensitive. Another part is wondering if I just need to be realistic and adjust my expectations of the therapy. Anita’s capacity has changed. She isn’t the same as she was, but I still get a lot… I dunno. And after all, she is just a therapist.

I guess we’ll see. Apologies that this is just a moaning rant of nothing. I don’t have much reflective capacity right now. I just feel sad. I’ll get through it, though, I always do.

Love to you all x

Holiday Season Is Tough.

rubberbandsandchewinggum13 Comments

As 2022 draws to a close I just wanted to pop in and wish you all a …well, I guess I want to say Happy Christmas/Happy Holidays and a fabulous New Year…but I know for many of us this time of year is really difficult and sometimes that upbeat message can fall flat or feel almost like a full-on smack in the face dose of toxic positivity (and I really don’t want to do that!). We look to be happy at this time of year, long for it even, but the truth is this- Christmas can be massively triggering and for many of us it can feel more like survival than the joyous time the movies would have us believe it is/should be. At this time of year, we spend a lot of time trying to look ‘fine’ when we are anything but.

I’ve worked hard over the years to create a Christmas that I want rather than one that feels obligatory (with family)- but it’s been hard won! Really, for as long as I can remember, Christmas has always felt tough – well certainly since my parents separated when I was a kid. Splitting Christmas between mum and dad was tough. Feeling like my loyalty was split. Then being carted off to my mother’s boyfriend’s parents’ house on Christmas day and feeling like an outsider as the ‘real’ grandchildren were spoiled by their grandparents and I sat there feeling like a cuckoo in the wrong nest – it was hard.

Then there was returning to my actual family on my dad’s side a couple of days later and being overlooked by my own grandparents. I was frequently gifted things from charity shops that didn’t fit or were so well-worn they had to go in the bin. Yet, at the same time, I’d get dragged around the city Christmas shopping with my grandmother who would gift herself diamond jewellery and expensive perfume: “Don’t tell Grandad, if he asks say it’s Cubic Zirconia.” I’m not knocking charity shops at all, what I am saying is that my grandmother always put herself first no matter what. And in a family that couldn’t express love in words they were also pretty shit in deeds…but then of course it wasn’t love. As much as I wish it wasn’t the case – sometimes family is just biology and blood doesn’t mean love.

Looking back, there was no Hallmark quality to those childhood/pre-teen years.

Then as an older teen I felt just…what?…desperately lost and alone, isolated, unseen – and that, of course wasn’t solely restricted to Christmas but I think it all becomes glaringly apparent in the holiday season doesn’t it? It’s a time when you look around you and see ‘seemingly’ happy families enjoying time together and there I was…out in the emotional wasteland. It feels a bit like that 80’s show Bullseye, when the host would say, “Look what you could have won!” as the contestants stared at the speedboat and ‘his and hers’ shell suits disappointedly having failed to answer a question correctly. Only we didn’t long for the speedboat – for us the prize was that… magical thing, the bond, the love, the feeling of belonging, being safe in ourselves and held safely by others…it’s the absence of that thing that has left that gaping hole inside us all these years that seems impossible to fill or repair. And the laugh is, it shouldn’t be a prize to be won, something that some people are blessed with, and others aren’t. But it is. And the fall out is hard to put into words…but if you know you know.

OMG I am really a Debbie Downer today aren’t? Thanks RB for the uplifting Christmas post!

Thankfully, meeting my wife changed things up massively so far as Christmas goes and having my kids has been a massive game-changer, too. But despite the special family Christmas and the new traditions I have created with my little family I still find this an incredibly tough time. I am already bracing myself for the period between Christmas and New Year which I guess I should really refer to as my ‘Signature Depression Zone’ because without fail, that lull point hits me really hard. I am much better at self-care for all the parts of me now but no matter what I do, there is a still a little voice in there somewhere that wants someone else to bring the love.

This year’s Christmas build up has been hard, too. Anita and I found ourselves navigating a complicated rupture over the last month (fucking wonderful!). It has dragged on a bit and has taken a lot of talking and processing. I haven’t got around to writing about it yet and I didn’t want post anything whilst we were in the thick of it because it seemed to be so dense and hard to make sense of and at times I was really triggered and didn’t even make sense to myself but I will get to it now that we seem to have come through the thick of it (just in time for the CHRISTMAS THERAPY BREAK!)

I think (now that I have come out the other side a bit) the ‘Mother Wound’ stuff all started coming to a head with Anita because once again the relationship with my own mum was thrown into sharp relief. Or should I say the lack of the relationship? Oh and of course it’s the anniversary of the shit hitting the fan with Em (ex-therapist) which is essentially ‘mum’ stuff. So, yeah, it’s been a tough month, really. Of course I got to play out stuff with Anita that was maternal transference 101 – which I guess is the work. I just don’t think I realised quite how much my relationship with my mum is hurting me even now.

I genuinely thought I was getting better at managing how she (my mum) affects me. But this year, once again, I feel like that little girl who’s been left: not important enough, not valued, not kept in mind. As I say adult me does a cracking job of looking after my kids and as part of that, I give my inner child all kinds of experiences that I know she would have loved and it goes some way to a repair for that sad little part of me. A visit to see a Father Christmas show and meeting the Big Guy in his grotto this week was enjoyed by me probably more than my kids!…but it doesn’t completely take the edge off for that little girl that just wants her mum to fucking show up and care.

The end of November and December have been hard (not just the rupture with A). We’ve been running the gauntlet as a family with various illnesses – the flu-like cold from hell was bad (still dragging on) but then norovirus was the absolute fucking pits. I won’t drag it out here but basically, it’s been another occasion where my mum just hasn’t been there in any tangible way. I have told her how hard it’s been and how much of a struggle we’ve had. Silence. Asked if there’s anything she wants for Christmas. More silence. Adult me doesn’t care – but I feel her lack of interest and care for my kids acutely. Her disregard for them feels like a repeat of the disregard she had for me.

It’s sad.

It’s also really compounded when I’ve been going to see K and she’s said she is so sad for me and wishes she could be a mum/granny to my family as we deserve so much better. And despite the recent wobbly bits with Anita, again she has, as I repeatedly say, given me a more consistent and positive experience of mothering than anyone else. She has been there now for nearly three years and seen and held more of me, my pain, than anyone.

Today is Christmas Eve and yesterday I finally received a reply to my messages to my mum from mid-December (one of which was about my brakes completely failing on ice on the school run…literally had nothing!) “Sorry for the delay…” to tell me she’s bought a present and will get it to us in the New Year. Again, adult me doesn’t care…but kids at Christmas? You have grandkids. Do better. That’s what Amazon is for. Tbh I am just so done now. And to be honest it’s not even about gifts. We don’t need things. We don’t need money spending on us as proof of care. Like I said the other week my love language isn’t gift giving. All we have ever needed is quality time, care, to be celebrated for who we are… a relationship. But it isn’t forthcoming.

I realise the only person that can break this cycle of pain and disappointment is me. I have to find a way to stop letting this stuff hurt me over and over – because I am repeatedly allowing my young parts to be hurt and keep in a pattern that was forged long ago – but the one I am in the therapy trying to heal. And I have to make it so that my kids don’t end up hurt too. I’m not sure how to do it though? How do you stop caring that your mother really doesn’t want you?…even as an adult.

Anyway, this wasn’t a therapy post was it? But it’s the core wound again. I won’t babble on too much longer as it’s just morose and depressing.

Thankfully Anita is solid. We had our final session of the year yesterday which was really nice, settled, calm…which I am very glad of (you’ll see why once I post about the rupture stuff!). We had a story and a really lovely long cuddle and easy chat that felt really connecting. It felt like just putting everything to bed for a bit…or at least trying to. Anita is off until the 9th so it’s a pretty long stint and I know it’s not going to be easy this year.

It’s sad that my therapists both gave me Christmas cards sending their love and presents this year – and my mum hasn’t. I am trying really hard to take on board that I am valuable and worthy of love and care, and am recognised by people that mean a lot to me. But the stab of rejection feels so acute by my mum. Does anyone else feel this way at this time of year?

When I opened the package from Anita yesterday, one of the items was this coaster:

And honestly, I love it. I love it because it’s true. And I love it because she gets it. And I love it because it represents so much of what we have built together and shows how simple a need it is. There is no shame to be had from needing that or expressing love through touch. And I am so lucky to have found her. However, she’s not my mum, she’s not family, I can’t access her when I need her. I can’t call her up and say, “A I don’t feel good can you come?”…because it’s therapy. But then I don’t have that with my family either so…it’s better than nothing isn’t it? A lot of the time it is easy to get caught up in what therapy isn’t or can’t be…but actually what it IS is A LOT.

Anyway, sending so much love to you all this holiday season. Take good care of yourselves wherever you are and whatever you are doing. Solidarity to those of you in complex family situations, trying to fit in and yet feeling like you stand out like a sore thumb. Love to all your young parts who are reminded of the pain of your childhood and navigating triggers whether through being in contact or not. And sending care to everyone who feels alone whether in actuality or emotionally. We’ve got this – our adult selves can be there hopefully enough to hold the hands of the little ones that feel so sad x

Reunited: “I’m back now. I still love you and still care about you…very much”

rubberbandsandchewinggum10 Comments

Argh – so I began writing this on the 17th October…and then…well… time evaporated again and it’s now midway through November and it’s just been festering in the hard drive like so many other blog posts I’ve started over the last year or so. So much for the idea of being able to find the time to post more ‘regularly’! – Ah well, rewind a bit and I’ll take you back to the first session post two-week therapy break!

——–

So, this morning I felt a bit out of sorts as I drove towards therapy. No bloody surprises there! It was the first session back after the break and here I was, again, nursing those horrible feelings of isolation and disconnect that I am so familiar with. I guess, it was self-imposed, forged out of panic. My system so massively fears the potential of there being a true isolation and disconnect enacted by Anita (which essentially amounts to an abandonment) that I get in there first. It’s a protective withdrawal on my part. If my system checks out first, it beats Anita to it, and therefore, she can’t hurt me. Only…my being distant ‘first’ does hurt me…so how is that any better?!

Of course, it’s not better, ESPECIALLY when Anita ISN’T trying to be disconnected or distant -far from it. She wants to be there for me and to connect. But when will I stop reacting from a place of fear whenever we come back from a break? Not today, it seems. Sadly, that anxiety spring is coiled tightly in my nervous system and it’s taking a long long long LOOONNNGGG time to convince my system that in the here and now things are ok, and that Anita is not going to repeat the relational pattern I have come to expect.

I am so shit at this (therapy/relationship) game of snakes and ladders, aren’t I? Honestly, I really messed up when the rules of life and relationships were being explained to me. I must have been napping at some of the crucial junctures because I keep hitting the same pitfalls over and over again. More often than not, I roll the dice I land on a snake and go sliding on my arse back to the beginning again. The thing is, I don’t think this is all my fault – I am trying so hard to navigate the board, to make it so that I go up ladders, make positive forward movement and dodge the snakes…but it just doesn’t always work out.

I think, perhaps, the problem came from the fact that relationship rules were explained to me by people who also didn’t understand how to play the game (my family) – and yet, because we all followed the same ‘made up rules’ it wasn’t apparent there was anything wrong until I ventured out into the world and tried to play the game with other people and they were like, “This isn’t how to play the game!” So, in order to make it through life and relationships, I’ve found some work arounds – paid attention to how it’s meant to be done. I continue on in the game but not, always, in the usual way, I don’t think – especially when there’s been a break.

I trusted that Em knew how the game worked, but it turns out that she, too, had some random, off brand, version of the rules and so that was really fucking confusing for me because I tried to play the game her way but it wasn’t right. Anyway… that’s a fucking bizarre metaphor that’s run out of legs…sorry!

I arrived a bit early to Anita’s and sat in the car scrolling through my phone – trying to settle the parts that were having a bad time, panicking that it wouldn’t be ok when I went in, fearing that something might have changed, and dreading a rupture because the parts were not in a good place. I had elephant ready in my bag to take in, but there was a part that was baulking against taking it to the session. I knew, however, that if I left elephant in the car there would be zero chance I would let the young parts out. Even if elephant stays in the bag in the therapy room it’s very clear it’s in there and if Anita has eyes (reader- she does) then she’ll know young parts are at least somewhere in the vicinity and hopefully will be able to reach through protective barriers and to the parts that so need reassurance and reconnection.

As I walked up the drive, I felt a bit checked out, on that path towards dissociation but not quite fully there. I was kind of apathetic and “What’s the point?” You know – disgruntled teen. Anita opened the door and smiled at me and asked me how I was, “tired” I replied flatly. That is my go to…because I am ALWAYS tired but also it’s just how it is: no energy, done in, running on empty. I wandered into the room and sat down on the couch. From what I could see, everything was still the same, my story books were out on the side, Anita sat on the couch beside me, there wasn’t anything ‘obviously’ different. I had no idea how it was going to be, though. I felt a bit overwhelmed and was all set for false adult to dive in and take the session and then for the teen to shut it all down at some point, but the moment I sat down A said, “I’ve got something for you from my trip” and handed me a little fabric bag with a chocolate lolly attached to it.

I was not expecting that. At all.

I said, “thank you” and put it to one side without looking in the bag and immediately asked for a cuddle. Whilst I was intrigued to see what was in the bag, I was more desperate to physically reconnect with A after the break. That couple of seconds together, to hear she’d thought of me on her trip, took a sledgehammer to my apathetic self and the young parts just wanted to be as close to her as possible (Cringe!).

I’m not a big fan of Autumn and Winter (I’m actually really struggling with SAD this year really badly -it’s either that or a colossal whack of post-viral fatigue) but the one positive about the changing season is that the temperature has really dropped these last few weeks and so there was no fear about it being ‘too hot’ to touch (hug) which is what happened over the summer and triggered the young parts…

The young parts immediately relaxed into being with her. It felt so nice to snuggle into her warm body, to be back in that familiar safe space, to hear her heartbeat, to breathe in her comforting smell of fresh washed clothing and clean hair (look don’t judge – you know how it is!). All the armour was off, everything I had been holding for the last few weeks could be put down, and I could just rest for an hour. So, that’s how it was for the entirety of the session – I just cuddled into Anita and it was exactly what I had needed.

We chatted about all sorts of stuff: her holiday, my being very ill, an episode with a wetsuit, my delinquent puppy and menace of a kitten, random life stuff – it was just really nice and connected. We laughed a lot. Anita asked me midway through if I wanted to look at what she’d given me and said that it wasn’t much, but she’d thought of me. Even half an hour in I just didn’t want to move from the safety of her arms. I guess after the separation I felt like I needed a huge top up of touch. I told A that I didn’t want to let her go and didn’t want to move, which I would have had to do to get the bag, and she held me tightly to her and instead told me about the pebble and shell that she’d found on the beaches whilst on her holiday and that she’d brought home for me. When the pebble is wet it sparkles from the quartz that is dotted on it.

She said that she’d been walking, the tide had just gone out, so the pebble was wet, and it had shone out on the beach reflecting in the sun. Knowing I collect pebbles (I had given her one that I had found for her from my favourite beach recently) she picked it for me. Then she told me about a beach she had been on that was completely made of shells and had picked one for me too. She also collects pebbles and shells and so it’s something we connect with. It’s a fucking world away from pebblegate with Em, that’s for sure!

I can’t really explain how cared for I felt in that moment with Anita but it felt healing. During the week before the session, she’d sent me a video of where she’d been, and then to know she’d consciously been thinking of me when I was out of sight (and I feared ‘out of mind’) was really, I dunno, special? I so often believe I am forgettable, unlovable, and frankly just not very important and yet here was really clear evidence (again) that that wasn’t the case at all. It was so nice because I have been wobbling such a lot over recent months on and off – almost creating a narrative that Anita wasn’t interested in me anymore – and yet here was a clear demonstration that Anita, the Anita I have built a relationship with over nearly three years, really is still there – invested – and she really cares.

I know that the doubting and the anxiety and the protectors are all there on loop. And whilst it is sometimes (always!) frustrating that despite doing this steady reparative work for so long, I still get plunged into the hell zone because of the attachment trauma, I guess there’s another part of me that can see that my panic and fear of abandonment can be heard, seen, and metabolised with Anita. I don’t have to live in fear of even telling her what’s going on for me (like I did with Em…WTAF was I doing in that therapy?!). Now, lots of the time my system is settled. Being with Anita is lovely, we do the work, her presence and care is so regulating for my system – there are plenty of ladders. But when stuff is triggered and awful and painful and I am sliding my ass down the snakes, there’s something really comforting in knowing that no matter how bad it might feel in the moment, A isn’t going anywhere. She tells me this often enough. And enough of me must believe it to have to meltdowns and throw ALL MY crazy into the ring.

In one of our very first sessions together we talked about the importance of building strong foundations so that we could weather whatever storms came our way – and we have done just that. The number of times I wanted to tell Em how I was feeling, to be able to express the most vulnerable parts of myself to her but got choked and dissociated was just hideous. It’s so different with A.

Towards the end of the session, with about ten minutes to go, and after a few minutes of calm silence, a young part quietly murmured, “I missed you” into Anita’s chest. She responded with, “I know.” Part of me baulked at this and that perfect peace was fractured. To at least some part of me it felt, I don’t know, dismissive somehow. I guess, it’s that thing about having unrequited feelings; fearing that my feelings are too big, too much, not reciprocated in any way. There I was being vulnerable and rather than replying with “I missed you too” which is what Anita has said a million times before, she came back with that. Had something changed? It was literally a split-second reaction in me – but it really goes to show how instantly the system can be triggered despite all the evidence to the contrary. The next words out of Anita’s mouth, literally continuing on the sentence were, “I’m back now. I still love you and still care about you…very much…I really, really do.” And with that the panic that flared up dispersed and everything was ok. BUT MAN…what a reminder of the work there is to do.

Of course, there’s been nearly a month since this first session back…and it wouldn’t be me if it had been plain sailing – lol – but it’s been ok. More than ok. There’s been lots of attending to the young parts through reading stories, plenty of hugs, and plenty of connected silence where nothing needs to be said because so much is ‘felt’. I’ve been so used to excruciating, dissociated, painful silences in therapy over the years but I have to say, I love that quiet, connected, safe silence where there are no words needed, when it’s just calm and safe. And frankly it’s good that we are in this sort of semi-rest phase because I have nothing at the moment. I am running on fumes.

Of course, there’s just one bloody problem – and the irony isn’t lost on me! – It’s going well, it’s safe, connected, and loving but MY FUCKING GOD it’s SOOOOOOOOOO hard to leave A and be thrown back into the real world to face the relentlessness of life. I am on hyperdrive in my day-to-day life and I am really on the edge of burnout after being so poorly and so of course the young parts are activated in the week and are yearning for that safe, holding space with A more than ever. Yikes! I really really need it to be Friday.

I hope you’re all hanging on in there. Yet another ‘brief’ 2500 word update! So concise 😉

September Sessions And Another Therapy Break.

rubberbandsandchewinggum22 Comments

So, the last blog post was really about how bumpy and unsettled things felt over the summer with therapy sessions all over the place, and lack of touch due to the sweltering heat wave we experienced, and then about returning to the more regular schedule of my Monday and Friday sessions when school started back up. And basically, the fucking meltdowns I experienced! (ARGH!) It’s nuts, really, how delicately balanced things are and how little it takes to throw not just a spanner, but a whole tool kit, in the works where my sense of safety and connection to Anita goes.

Hang on. No. Not quite that. That’s not adult me.  Adult me is fine, and trusts that Anita and I are fine and can get through whatever comes our way…so no, it’s not the whole ‘I’ or ‘Me’- it’s the young parts that really struggled with the frame being wobbled a bit and not getting the physical connection they are so used to. Adult me realises that sessions of long sweaty hugs would be grim, but the child parts don’t care about heat!! They just want mummy cuddles and stories…and to them, Anita is that attachment figure. Any sense of distance in the room sends terror down through the system and panic that something has changed…yeah RB – it’s the weather, the weather has changed…everything else is fine. I am not a big fan of winter but I can tell you I AM SO PLEASED to be entering hoodie and beanie season because that means cuddles are on the cards! (What a loser!)

Anyway, this won’t be a long post (ha! – relief!) because really there’s not all that much to report. Anita and I have continued to navigate the wobbles and now we’re on ANOTHER break. Oh man, I swear breaks and disruption will be the end of me. Summer break, Queen funeral BH, and now another two weeks, alongside a few reschedules…GIVE ME STRENGTH!

I want to get up to speed, here, before Monday as I’d like to be able to get back into posting a bit more regularly and not just these randomly spaced dumps of half-remembered stuff that’s happened. I miss blogging and as winter approaches and the dark and the cold sets in, I need to really up my self-care and part of that, I think, comes in writing. Taking an hour to sit, process, have a cup of tea, and sit by the fire is helpful. Sure, there’s piles of ironing to do and lessons to plan, but I need to take some time back because it’s starting to feel a bit like the balance is off in my life.

My wife has recently started a new job which means she’s away two or three days/nights a week and so everything has fallen to me and frankly I’m finding juggling two kids, clubs, work, the house etc a bit much. It wouldn’t be so bad if a lot of my work wasn’t also in the evenings but it’s a right nightmare trying to get kids fed and into bed around teaching three lessons each evening when they’re home from school. I’m going to have to rejig a bit before something breaks…and that something will be me!

So, what happened since the last post? Lots of talk. Circling the same stuff over and over. Abandonment, rejection, has something changed? Why do I feel so disconnected…on loop. It’s so weird, too. Like one session everything can be fine – cuddles, stories, talking, connection – and then the next it’s like I can’t connect at all and I can’t even see that Anita is the same person she was last session. To say that it’s upsetting is an understatement. But what I have noticed (once I can get a bit of adult online) is that there’s a lot going on for a lot of the different parts right now. It feels like they are all activated and jostling for attention in various ways. Everyone wants to be loved, but as we all know, different parts have different ways of expressing themselves- and the teen is especially good at shutting things down and giving massive ‘fuck off and leave me alone’ vibes when in fact what she wants is A to reach out and take her hand and tell her she’s ok.

Anyway… ha…ha…not funny haha but groan…

So, we were plodding along a few weeks ago and then the wheels just fell off big time. I didn’t know what triggered it at the time. I thought it was probably the hangover from things just not feeling quite settled enough over the last few months and the upcoming break, but actually it turned out I was getting sick…really sick…I have been really unwell for about a month now but at the time things started to shake inside I was just on the verge of getting poorly. I think that on top of the usual stuff just sent things into freefall. You jnow where it you just can’t keep the plates spinning any longer…well it was that.

I am usually pretty together (don’t laugh, it’s true!). I can manage the feelings that come up in the week between sessions. I can tune into the parts and hear what’s going on for them and then try and put things in place to settle things down. But this particular week no amount of cancelling my work, or taking a nap, or giving the littles space to snuggle elephant and feel what was going on helped me. I just needed Anita. You know? Like nothing else was going to cut it. And man, that is a bloody bind because I can’t have her whenever I want!

So, once again I faced a tricky dilemma. Should I reach out? In the past I would have had no qualms at all about asking for a longer session, or a check in, or an extra session in the week but these days I don’t. Part of this stems from feeling like I don’t deserve it and so I feel I shouldn’t ask. Because I pay a fixed monthly fee to Anita, I feel like I can’t ask for more than the usual number of sessions now because it feels like I am already not paying her what she charges so how can I possibly ask for more contact time even if I need it? (I think this is a problem for a lot of us on reduced fees and something that therapists probably aren’t even aware of – but money shame is huge). Another reason that I also struggle to ask for more time with A is because longer sessions were taken off the table in February.

UGH!

I’ve been navigating this weird space where I might ‘want’ her but I don’t necessarily ‘need’ her and have been managing with the odd rupture blowing up here and there as a result of it all. Only what came up that week was different. It was that feeling of crisis where EVERYTHING was wrong, and I felt like I was disintegrating (well I was – my body just gave up!).

And so, after several nightmares on Monday night and as things continued to get worse I decided to ask Anita if we could check in or bring our session forward from Friday on Tuesday morning. I knew that wouldn’t help things later in the week but you know what, in that moment I didn’t even see how I would get to Friday. Of course, Anita was Anita, you know the one I fear doesn’t exist anymore… and offered me a session f2f on the Wednesday which I grabbed with both hands. Despite having that safe space booked in for less than 24 hours ahead, that day was bloody awful. I felt like I was unravelling (I was, but I was getting sick too).

I’ve said a million times that I am not a crier but that night I found myself in bed sobbing my heart out for three hours straight. It just wouldn’t stop. You know, that snotty, convulsive, gives you a headache and makes you feel sick crying? It was just so bad. I felt so sad and lost and little…basically it was an almighty grief dump that seemed to come out of nowhere.

But crying is good, right? No. Not in this instance. On my own it didn’t feel cathartic. It felt overwhelming and I was plunged back into that grey space where the little four-year-old girl is standing with her back to me on the barren wasteland. Oh great. Even though I knew I would see A the next day there was absolutely no consoling the desperately sad, abandoned parts. As I say, I know now that I was starting to get sick and not actually having an epic breakdown  – I just didn’t know it in the moment.

The next day I drove to Anita’s and basically collapsed into her arms and spent the entire session cuddled into her. We had some stories and I really let her in in a way that I probably haven’t for several months. It was really hard but also really necessary. A was incredibly attuned and I felt her right there with me. I asked her if she has always been there like that in recent months and she insisted that she’s been there the whole time waiting for me, trying to connect. That felt hard to hear. I know my defences are strong and easily triggered – but here was A saying that she’s not changed and she still loves me and it’s been hard seeing me suffer so much…

ARGH!!!

It felt so good to feel so connected to her. It’s that feeling I think I am always searching for – and hope one day to feel that connected to myself. But right now I look for it in my relationship with her. To feel totally safe and totally held… it’s like being able to drop all the baggage, take off all the armour, and just be… it’s just great. Only of course sessions are not infinite, and I noticed I started to feel tense when I noticed the clock had five minutes to go. The idea of peeling myself away from A, leaving the safety of her arms and the room. I just wanted to cry…especially as I had forfeited my Friday session in order to see her which meant there was now a five day stretch of no contact ahead.

Imagine my delight then when Anita said to me that she was really, really glad we had had the session that day and how important it had been – but that she had kept my session open on Friday if I wanted to come. I can’t really explain what that did to my system, the system who for months and months felt like I was not as important to A as I had been previously, and that I wasn’t as worthy of her time as before. I asked, “Are you sure?” and she held me close to her and said, “Of course”. I left that session feeling so much better than I did when I arrived and felt so bloody grateful for Anita’s steadiness and care in what has been quite a bumpy few months.

You’d think, then, that that would be the end of the craziness for a while, wouldn’t you? – that things would settle down? But you do know who is writing this right? You know me! I am a magnet for disaster…and so it wasn’t long before the next rupture hit.

Brace yourselves!  

And deep breaths RB. The next session was different from the intensity of Wednesday and the visit down into the deep well of pain and grief. Instead, the session was connected but essentially small talk and stories and cuddles. It was lovely. When I left, I worried that A would think I had been wasting her time that week – having a MASSIVE crisis and then essentially being ‘fine’ by the Friday. Only it wasn’t that. I had needed that Wednesday to be able metabolise things and then be ok on Friday. The Friday session felt like I had finally found that calm space in which to rest away from the trauma and just be connected. I text A afterwards to tell her I hoped she didn’t think it was a wasted session and how nice it was to feel so close after such a long time – she agreed that it was not a waste of time AT ALL.

So, what the hell happened after that?

More disruptions – the Queens funeral day was a BH which unsettled my system – not that I could have gone to my session anyway because I got very sick following the Friday session with what we now think was Flu. I felt like utter dog shit and was not myself at all. I had to cancel work and was basically bedridden. It’s been a pretty ropey month and it’s taken a long while to start to bounce back. It definitely had an impact on the therapy.

Anita was still there (she sent some really kind, caring messages) but I felt so out of myself and so the way I read out communications was through a very distorted lens. I think basically I just really wanted mothering and it was painful to know that she will never be able to do that other than from a distance – it’s lovely having messages telling me to drink lemon and honey and stay warm in bed…but…well… you know…sometimes it would be nice to have actually had someone who would have done that as a child, someone to look after me.

GROAN.

It sometimes feels like a perpetual walking over the things that were missing and then having a meltdown about it in the here and now, despite knowing these things can’t happen and that it’s coming from the past.

I had a session booked in for Wednesday and by the time it arrived I was feeling out of sorts. I text A and said, ‘I am feeling anxious and small. Are we ok?’ To which she replied ‘Of course we are’ with a heart emoji. I don’t know why that wasn’t enough to settle things and the next two sessions felt ‘not good’ and disconnected. Or perhaps not quite connected enough rather than disconnected which basically amount to the same thing to the young parts. I was struggling to connect to Anita and asked if we could read a story. She asked which one and I said I didn’t mind. She started reading it, but I was still on the other side of the sofa. It sent panic further down through the system. Usually, Anita will ask me if I want to snuggle in. But she didn’t. I started to dissociate and felt awful. She had no idea. In her mind she was doing what I had asked for…only for the little parts it felt abandoning. FFS!

I do think that sometimes there is an internal pressure after very connected sessions to be searching for the intensity all the time. It’s not realistic to expect that, but I think a system that has been so deprived for such a long just desperately seeks that feeling of complete safety, and love, and care. Why wouldn’t it? Anita would say she’s the same all the time, but the parts can so easily freak out over perceived small changes and then make them seem like massive problems. I mean, it was literally sitting less than two feet from her having a story on the couch…but man, it sent shock waves. Then the Friday session wasn’t great… (although actually, probably fine!)

I can’t remember the details, but I know that after session I sent this:

Obviously, things felt pretty bad because I clearly felt like we were drifting apart. Or that I wasn’t seen. Or that she didn’t care… Honestly, I wish I had the clarity of mind that I have today in those triggered moments, but I was genuinely so poorly that I was thrown into survival and panic. I like the fact, though, that because we have so much shared experience, I can reference some of the books we read, and she knows what I mean, ‘The Invisible String’ and ‘The Rabbit Listened’ are two of ‘our’ stories in the now massive pile. We have that connection and that means a lot- especially to the young parts that wobble so much.

In another one of my recent ‘everything is falling apart’ moments before the break I drafted a text that was clearly coming from a young place…and I am glad, in a way, I was able to express it and let all that had been brewing come up and out because it’s really demonstrated to me just how bloody sad it is for the young parts to have been so damaged. They say you’re only as needy as your unmet needs and here was an epic list of unmet needs from the mouths of babes.

Adult me can see it for what it is. Anita can too. She isn’t scared by this level of outpouring. She gives it space and we work through it. I know Em would have (and did) run a mile when we came into contact with these parts and this need. Anita, however, realises that the changes to our therapy, the bumpy summer, the disruptions in scheduling, and her upcoming holiday would all have fed into this heightened panic and neediness and allows space for it all and meets me with compassion.

The irony is, in the moment when I was churning out the message it really felt so black and white…but of course when I went back over messages with my sane, untriggered, adult eyes – Anita has been responsive, she has checked in, she has said goodnight sometimes, she has held me close to her, she does tell me she loves me, she does talk to the young parts. It’s not all gone. But in that moment, or in those moments where adult isn’t available and something ‘bad’ has happened it’s really scary for the young parts and it all falls apart.

Tbh I am bored of saying it because it’s embarrassing – but it’s acutely clear that we are really in the thick of working with the ‘stuff’ now. And I am buckling up tight.

We’re on a break now. It’s been two weeks (and three days!). Back tomorrow. Anita has been away, but she sent me a message midway through the first week and then sent me another this week with a video of where she’d been. It’s been ok. I have been staggering my way through being really ill. In the first week I had a massive fever and vomiting. It was like my body just went into shock after so many weeks of having been so poorly with the cough, and sinuses and body aches and and and woe is me! The day after the big sick and fever I couldn’t walk properly. I experience peripheral neuropathy post-chemo, anyway, but it was as though all my nerves were set into a painful jangle in the whole of my body. It wasn’t much fun that’s for sure.

I spent the entire day in bed unable to do anything, dragged myself to pick up kids, and then had to order a pizza as had no energy to cook. We were all in bed by 6:15 that night! My wife was away for work, so it was hopeless. Again it was one of those times where I could really have just done with a mum to come and take over – like so many of my friend’s mums do. Someone who would pick the kids up, sort out dinner, and check I was ok. My mum doesn’t even know I have been ill. We have so little contact…and of course this all feeds into what happens between A and I.

Anyway, there’s not much to say now, more than, I’m glad the break is done. I hope that tomorrow is ok as I feel a bit ‘unsettled’. It’s just that end of break thing where the teen parts come up and get pissed about having been left at all and then want to push back and reject because they feel rejected. Fortunately, adult me knows this pattern. There is enough adult around to gently roll my eyes at myself and tell the teen I’ll make her a hot chocolate and we can watch a movie later. I’ve told the littles I’ll do my best to let them get what they need tomorrow and tell false adult to stay in her box so we can make the most of the hour.

Essentially, tomorrow I am taking elephant with me, and I need to make sure I ask for a hug and stories immediately. Wish me luck…because you never know how it’ll go when the minibus arrives on the doorstep!

The Dog Ate My Elephant…And It’s Too HOT For Hugs.

rubberbandsandchewinggum10 Comments

Well, blimey, where did July go? Ah, yes, work, work, more work, the kids, a bit of therapy thrown in here and there…and a lot of time at the beach! #Heatwave. You’d think July would be the time for things easing off and winding down in teaching but, honestly, it was like everything went on overdrive both with my work and all the stuff I needed to organise or attend for my kids: sports days x2, residential for my daughter, end of year assembly, random parents’ evening, school taster days, and end of year parties. It was full-on and I was on my knees a couple of weeks before term finished (honestly, some days I was close to tears I was so knackered) but somehow, I got to the finish line in one piece – or a collection of pieces deftly held together with rubber bands and chewing gum!

It’s week two of the ‘holidays’, now, and this is the first day where I have actually stopped and given myself permission to do nothing – it’s the anniversary of my dad’s memorial and picking up his ashes from a driveway next to his dive gear (don’t ask!) and so I feel a little fragile. I’m a long way on from that initial grief and pain of fourteen years ago, but I still find this time of year difficult. I get plagued by nightmares and I can’t help but remember just how bloody awful that time was.

Fortunately, I have Anita to take this stuff to and so I feel pretty ok having been able to let it out. I’ve had a cry and I feel sad to think how much I’ve missed out on with my dad over the years, but I can now see things in a different light. Watching my kids enjoy the waves and share in the place that my dad and I loved so much is so special and healing after so many years away from it – I can almost feel his presence when we’re there. I am loving being back on my surfboard and in the water enjoying the coastline where my soul feels most at home.

So, even when things feel unbelievably tough (which they really have done recently – our life seemed to just get wiped-out and body-slammed all at the same time), somehow, I am finding ways to not sink altogether and also trust in the fact that the universe will deliver, eventually. It’s not always easy to do that, especially when you suffer from anxiety. It is so easy to get caught in the endless spiral of doom when things are going wrong because it’s such a felt sense of panic, it triggers the flight response (for me at least) and the associated somatic experience is just fucking awful…

BUT…

I have made it through every tough part of my life so far, and frankly even though the money stuff isn’t great (I have always really needed a sense of financial security to feel safe but am learning again that safety comes from within and not only from what you have) I’ve been through worse. It’s not a sudden, unexpected death of a loved one, and it’s not critical illness and a year of cancer treatment. THOSE things were the big deals. Money makes the world go round and that sucks but currently I have my health, a partner, two great kids, wonderful friends, and a roof over my head so really, I am winning at life. My bank balance is pretty ummm…’low’ (read empty!)…but I can work more hours (might have a breakdown in October though!).

This year, unfortunately, I am working a full day each week with a student in the break (fortunately one of my home-school kids wanted lessons – phew) so it’s not quite the long holiday I had envisioned earlier this year but it’s a financial imperative after everything that’s happened with my wife’s work and so I’m making the best of it. To be honest, doing 7.5 hours once a week is way less stressful than my usual 25 (28 in Sept – eek!) hours contact time plus school runs etc so I can’t moan. The fact I only have to get up early one morning a week is a game changer and the fact I am lying on my bed in my pjs at 11am on a Thursday…well, that’s pretty good. So, yeah, all in all it’s ok. Great, in fact.

Don’t get me wrong. I have had weeks and weeks of stress and panic about our situation but there’s another part of me that’s trying to have a chat with those freaking out parts who is saying, “Look, right now, we’re still afloat. We’re doing what we can to make the situation better. The winter is going to be difficult, but we can’t change anything more right now so try and enjoy what we do have and make the most of the summer” — I don’t know who this pep talker is but right now the other parts are paying attention. I think the reality is that adult me knows I am going to be up against it in a huge way in September and I need to go into the new academic year as refreshed and recharged as possible or I don’t stand a chance.

Anyway, what else? I’ve been away from the blog for a long while. As usual I haven’t been posting because I haven’t had the time to write but I have also been thinking about the blog, too, and social media in general, lately. In recent weeks I have spent much less time on SM and I have to say I think it’s done me the world of good. Despite my best efforts to keep the majority of the SM content that I access light and uplifting (thinking Instagram here – cue astrology, spirituality, and comedy…oh and crazy animals!) I have found in recent months that my feeds across other social media platforms have been really negative. And it’s not surprising. Life is hard for so many people right now and everywhere you look there is injustice and that is playing out on the internet.

I am socially minded, and politically…what’s the word??… Appalled?! And so, I find it hard to switch off from it altogether because I don’t think we can live in a bubble. I like to know what’s going on, even if it is heart-breaking. However, I am finding places like Twitter and the comment feed on news posts really depressing. It feels like there are so many angry and disenfranchised people out there on all sides that take to social media and let it all out – but at strangers. The projection and the vitriol are really horrific. It reeks of bullying behaviour. And to be honest, I don’t think it’s doing me any good absorbing it in large quantities which is why I am spending less time online.

I think too, that what I have realised more and more is sometimes I want to respond to stuff online or defend someone or something but sometimes it just fuels a fire, and it isn’t worth it. Thankfully, I think WordPress falls into a different category where this is stuff concerned (thank goodness). In my experience over the years blogging here, it is rare to see abusive content or bullying or personal attacks. I think I can remember two or three pile-ons over the years on some accounts I follow (from people being in very bad places or who are massively triggered) but otherwise I have always found it to be a welcoming, supportive place. And I am grateful for that but I am also aware that these public platforms are open and so you’re never completely immune to someone wading in.

So yeah, I can wholeheartedly recommend a social media cleanse every now and then.

And therapy, what of that?

Well, you’ll probably be pleased to hear the Anita and I are out the other side of that epic rupture that was triggered in February when the time and contact boundaries changed. To be honest we’ve just been ticking along doing the work. It’s been ok enough. Sometimes it’s felt disconnected but that is linked to touch (or lack of it). Since the holidays started the sessions have been disrupted which has been a bit stressful, but so far I have managed to see her twice a week (Monday and Tuesday evenings). I’m not massively keen on the spacing – it feels like there’s a huge gap between the sessions after Tuesday but at the same time I am seeing her in person twice a week when I had thought I would only see her Monday. I still don’t know about next week.

It’s been so hot here that it’s caused the young parts a few problems here and there. As I said, I haven’t been hugging Anita in sessions because frankly it’s like a sauna here right now and it would just be too uncomfortable. Of course, the longer this has gone on the more the young parts have started to activate and wonder what’s wrong? Why doesn’t Anita want to be near them?…blah blah blah…which of course is not what’s going on but you know how little ones think!

Fortunately, though, it’s not been too loud and boisterous because a few weeks ago there was a slightly cooler evening and having refused the offer of a hug when I sat down (ffs RB!)) I broke my walls down for the last fifteen minutes and snuggled in and it felt lovely and deeply connected. I told Anita I had missed her, and she told me she’d missed me too. Sometimes those small interactions are everything and do so much to solidify things. The heat has definitely been the biggest driver for not asking for a hug but there is also another part underneath that is starting to retreat in preparation for the upcoming break.

Since that evening it’s been a bit of a touch drought and it’s just now starting to feel a bit eeek because Anita is off on holiday after next week for two weeks but I won’t actually see her for three weeks. This is going to be the longest I haven’t seen her I think (excluding the lockdowns – but then we were at least working online). Again, I am trying to employ the ‘don’t panic’ stuff and face it when it comes – but I know it’s going to be messy on Monday! Heat or not I think I’m just going to have to suck it up and ask for a sweaty snuggle!

I asked for stories at the end of the session on Tuesday after spending 45 minutes having a huge sweary outpouring about my mum, so the young parts are at least getting something but we need to make next Monday count. It must have seemed really incongruous, “Fuck this, fuck that, FFS…” and on and on and then…“Can we have a story?” I text Anita yesterday and acknowledged just how much I was swearing in my session and how really my anger is a body guard for sadness. I am free flowing with my ‘fucks’ in therapy but Tuesday was something else – there was more than one ‘c’ bomb and even for me I was like “whoa I am mad!!” Anita text me back this infographic and said I think there’s more than sadness under your iceberg with two hearts:

Of course, she’s right. And I knew this. And a part of me chuckled at how ‘therapisty’ that reply was.

Last Monday night as I was leaving Anita asked if she could give me a hug (thank god)…so it’s not that she’s not wanting to touch me it really is the heat and it felt good for her to reach out to me when I have retreated from it. I will be so glad when autumn comes,  I can tell you!

So, the touch stuff has been a bit of an issue and then, to add insult to injury, on Tuesday my new puppy (yes, I am mental – but he’s a rescue and I couldn’t say no! especially after the heartbreak of losing our pup on Father’s Day) stole elephant and covered him in drool. You cannot even begin to imagine the internal meltdown the young parts had. I cried.

At that point I didn’t know I would see Anita that evening and though that I would only have one face-to-face session before the big break…and elephant would be stinking and untouchable because there was no time to get it washed by Anita. Mannnnnnn! It was very bad. I text K about it because she is one of the few people who really get it. She responded with such understanding that it took away any shame I was feeling but not the disappointment of having my transitional object out of action.

However, as luck would have it, Anita had a cancellation and offered me a session that evening and so elephant is now with her being washed ready for Monday and so the break …well, it’s going to be tough, but it’s a whole lot less tough when elephant is there and smells right!

Anyway, that’s about it I think. Bit of a boring, non-post but that’s sort of life right now. I’m sure to get in touch with my feelings from next Friday and then we’ll see what kind of carnage ensues!

Love to you all. x

Letter To My Therapist…Do I Send It?!

rubberbandsandchewinggum52 Comments

Hi everyone – it’s been ages since I have blogged. And even this, today, isn’t really a blog, it’s a letter that I have written that I am debating recording in a voice note for A. We are on a break (ffs!). Things have been horrible for ages now. This ongoing rupture is bloody agony and is driving me crazy. My life is also falling apart… not because of therapy but the instability in the therapy is certainly not helping matters.

I don’t know what to do, really. I appreciate I sound like a brat in what comes below (which is why I have put it here first whilst I decide what to do). I get that this feels quite out of context as it’s been such a long time since I have posted and so the background isn’t there and there’s a lot of ‘big feelings’ coming out.

Anyway, I’m hoping to write something and catch up soon as I have a few days off now. I am sorry I haven’t been commenting much on your blogs. I just haven’t been here…although looking at my reader today, I think a lot of us are AWOL. I’d like to think it’s because things are going well for everyone but I suspect it may be that people are worn out and on their edge. Big hugs x

———————————–

A, everything is a right mess and I don’t know what to do about it. I’ve written something in order to try and process things a bit but I don’t know if it makes any sense because I feel so upset. I’m going to read it anyway because I need you to hear it.

The first time I contacted you to see about starting therapy with you I grilled you on whether you thought you were able to work with complex trauma and if you had done enough of your own work to work with someone like me. I remember sending the email and thinking I was probably asking a bit much, probably overstepping what was acceptable to ask a new therapist, but it was all heading south with Em and there was no way I was going to go blind into another therapeutic relationship and I really needed to be sure that any new  therapist really understood what they would be dealing with.

You assured me that you had experience of working with CPTSD and that having received my message you had thought carefully about whether you had the capacity to take on a complex client because you understood the need and how delicate the work is …but yes, you thought you could and you commended me on trying to take care of myself in asking those questions and so we arranged to meet.

Our first session felt so different to anything I had experienced in therapy before. It felt like you were really ‘there’ with me and for the first time in ages I felt seen and heard. But not only that, I felt ACCEPTED and UNDERSTOOD. There was no sense of being judged, you just felt warm, and open, and perhaps someone who might be safe enough to work through a lifetime of trauma with. The relief I felt was palpable, but I knew it wasn’t going to be an easy transition leaving Em…little did I know at that point just how bad it would get and the lasting damage that would be done.

Em’s tick analogy has lodged inside me like a jagged piece of shrapnel. It is so painful. I feel sick and tearful every time I think about it – which is daily, and to be honest it’s not even conscious thought, instead it’s like a shadow that follows me around, or worse, a deep sense of shame that I carry inside me. I’ve told you about that thick tar that I feel like I am coated in and runs through my veins – well it’s that. Even though all this happened a couple of years ago, it’s not gone away, and I am not sure that it ever will.

I don’t know if you know how much this enduring sense of shame and of being ‘too much’ is present in the room when we are together and in our relationship in general? Whenever I want to be close to you, to hug you, or to see you, or now simply reach out and text you my brain serves me up those words “It’s like you want to be inside me, your young parts want a constant drip feed of what they need, a permanent breast, they are adhesive, like a tick…” and I am floored. I can’t really explain how bad it is, but it makes that vulnerable part want to curl up and die.

The steady work we have done together on building trust and safety had silenced that voice a lot, the one that tells me I am draining you dry and am an unwanted parasite – the one that says I need to be careful, or you’ll leave. But it’s got louder and louder again in recent months since you’ve stepped back. The part that feels ‘unlovable’ and ‘too much’ is always looking for confirmation of that and so not being able to do longer sessions and you not replying to my texts is taken as evidence that I’m finally too much for you too, and it’s so painful. As much as I try and work round it it’s playing out in our sessions over and over again.

I know you say your need to retreat isn’t about me and you have tried to reassure me that this is your stuff and Adult Me can hear that and gets it. But the young parts, the bits that actually need to be in therapy, don’t get it and I need you to understand what’s been happening for me since February because things aren’t ok. Well, clearly, they’re not. I’ve run out of the therapy room so many times now because it feels unbearable being so disconnected, and other times I have struggled to make it into the room. I know things aren’t going to change but we still need to look at this because whilst you probably think it’s settled down now, it hasn’t, I’ve just taken it inside and it’s eroding my sense of safety in the relationship.

I feel so far away from you now. My protectors are on high alert because when they look for evidence that you’ve gone, it’s all they can find. The week before your break I texted you and told you I missed you. You didn’t acknowledge it. Then I asked if we could find a way to connect so that I didn’t feel so alone, and you said “absolutely” – but then the Friday session happened, and it felt like you hadn’t understood how desperate it actually felt. On Thursday before our session I sent you a picture of a crying child. Nothing. You used to send me messages saying things like, “looking forward to seeing you” before our sessions but you don’t now and so when I have already spiralled off it feels really precarious coming. Like do you want to see me or am I just another thing on the list that you have to get through?

The week leading into Friday’s session was awful. I was falling apart. Massively. For the first time in years, I seriously considered self-harming. My brain was wandering into not being here anymore. Things felt so bad, and I just felt like there was no way through it. I felt so alone and scared. You couldn’t have known from the messages I sent you how bad it was because I didn’t say it explicitly, but there would have been a time when I would have text you and told you that, or at least asked to check in or if we could do a longer session. But I don’t ask now because I know you don’t have capacity and so instead, I try and hold it on my own.

I didn’t self-harm but it was there like a shadow all week. What I did slip into like a comfy pair of slippers was not eating. I didn’t even know it had happened until Friday when I realised I hadn’t actually eaten a meal all week and had just been dashing about and had a few biscuits here and there. Fortunately, I caught myself quickly and have been on top of it. The last thing I want to do is go back down that road- especially on autopilot. Things are really bad at the moment – it doesn’t really get much scarier than thinking you could lose everything, but it’s been compounded by feeling like I am on my own now. I felt like I had dragged myself through the week and just needed to be able to put it all down for a bit and be safe with you but that didn’t happen. I worry that telling you that makes me sound manipulative but it’s not, I’m not trying to make you do or feel anything, it’s just a reflection of how bad it’s been feeling and I think you need to know because I always seem to be ‘coping’ when actually I am so far from it.

I miss feeling connected to you and I know I have to learn to find another way, but it feels like a big shock to my system. I miss the goodnight messages you would send. I miss the photos of places you’d been that helped bridge the gap when you were away. I miss you checking in with me when things were difficult. And I know it’s not like that’s completely stopped but I miss feeling like you were ‘there’ and I hate that you being ‘gone’ makes me feel like it’s happened because I am not important enough or worthy enough of your care and attention. Things are really bad at the moment, terrible in fact, and it feels like you just don’t care at all.

I know all this is hurting much more than it should because of how things used to be when I was little. But it’s very hard for the young parts who grew up without a mum in the week. You had begun to feel ‘real’ and I had started to get a sense that there was something maybe a bit solid and safe in the relationship even when I can’t physically see you. I was heading towards the sense of there being an ‘invisible string’ and I felt myself relaxing and beginning to breathe in the relationship. But now – to go back to what they’ve always known – well it’s like being body slammed. I know that seems extreme, but it is how I am experiencing it.

The young four-year-old part of me that had started to cry and reach out has gone back to silence and hiding because no one cares, and no one comes. She’s used to coping alone…surviving…and so it’s returning back to what is known. The baby is still screaming to be picked up and soothed but again it’s a scream that is going unheard and cry that will eventually stop. You told me once that a baby doesn’t try and annoy its mother by crying when it’s hungry and that needs don’t work on a timetable – but now we are trying to work on a timetable and it’s so hard because so much of the upset I experience is triggered from being left. It’s the sense of abandonment is what sets everything off inside. I try and get through the week and not be ‘too much’ and not contact you ‘too much’, but the internal chaos and upset is intense.

I try and coach myself and all the young parts through the week. I tell the parts to “hold on” and say that, “it’ll be ok” when I see you and that “nothing has changed”- but more often than not, when I arrive now, the despondent older child parts (especially the teenager) won’t let you anywhere near. They feel rejected and abandoned in the week so why would they let you close in person? That’s what happened on Friday. I was in complete agony, trapped and terrified. I don’t think you really got how bad it was, I could hardly speak and it was an effort to tell you anything at all. When I say things like “my body is in pain”, it’s physically excruciating and a symptom of how much emotional distress I am in.

Earlier that week I had I told you I needed cuddles in a text. I feel really stupid asking for anything like this, stories, whatever, but what you tend to get in messages is the youngest parts’ needs being expressed. They’re the ones that get imprisoned in the room and can’t reach out easily. So even if I arrive and seem stand-offish or shutdown or whatever it is that keeps you far away as you said, “keeping you at arm’s length” (which incidentally is how I feel about you – I feel like I am being pushed away and that’s why I am so protected) I need you to reach through that and get to those young parts. I know you asked if I wanted stories but I was already so far gone that I couldn’t get back to you.

I need you to know that when I say “no” to a hug it’s only the protector saying “no”. There has never been a time in the entire time I have been seeing you when I have not wanted you to come closer to me or hug me or hold my hand or give me some physical signal that things are still ok. I don’t know how we get round this, but I think I said before, maybe you could ask, “Is that what all the parts of you want, or is it a protector trying to stop the little ones from getting what they need because it thinks you’ll get hurt?” That sort of thing really cuts through that protective part that feels like it’s unsafe and you don’t want to be with me. When you acknowledge the young parts it gives the protector permission to step back.

I know how nuts that sounds –  and I think you asked me twice on Friday if I wanted a hug. So I do get you were trying. You’d think I would be able to respond to that, wouldn’t you? And I REALLY wanted to. I wanted to shuffle over to you and snuggle in and just feel safe. You’d think I would understand that you asking me more than once if I want a hug means you aren’t trying to get away from me or push me away, but I get frozen in fear. I don’t want to be too much and the longer we are far apart and silent the worse that feeling gets.

I can see the time ticking away and I feel desperately sad. Those little ones have been hanging on all week to see you and then this happens. It’s so painful, and so reflective of what it was like when I was a child. I needed my mum to look like she was pleased to see me when she came back after a week away, to give me some kind of physical cue that everything was ok, that I was still wanted…and this is what is playing out with us and going so badly wrong at the minute.

I am so filled with shame for needing you so much that I can’t even look at you now. I don’t know what your facial expression is like so can’t read what’s there, but it feels too scary to look at you or make eye contact. When I am frightened, we hardly talk so I can’t even judge your tone of voice and I read your silence as frustration, anger, or lack of care. I really, really just need for you to reach out and let me know it’s safe. I need for us to find a way to connect quickly at the beginning of sessions so it doesn’t spiral into something terrible where I feel like there is no option but to leave.

I’d told you I felt like I was drowning in that last session. You told me that people who are drowning usually put their arms out for help. That might be the case – but when I feel like you are not even ‘there’ I don’t register that I can reach out. That’s how bad it feels. The level of dissociation was off the chart. I genuinely felt like I was in freezing water, in a choppy, grey sea, and was totally alone. I might have looked like I am with you, but I was nowhere close. Adult me is a really strong swimmer but when it’s like that, and I tell you I am drowning I’m little and I am scared and I can’t swim.

You said once that you wouldn’t let me drown. You said there would always be space for me with you. You told me that I didn’t need to stay out in the cold. And I trusted that. You told me I was brave for trying again and you understood that coming to therapy was almost like asking me to run back into a burning building when I have already have third degree burns. It felt like you got it, but now I tell you it feels like you are watching me drown and you tell me it’s because I’m not accepting help. It feels like you don’t really care. If I was able to reach out and ask for help I would.

It feels like such a long time since you laughed and told me that you had a cupboard full of chocolate. With Em I had been told the cupboards were bare and that statement felt like you really saw me, understood the trauma I had experienced and knew what I needed. You said I needed a different experience of relationship – I was looking to do the deep relational work and you said you could do that with me.  I don’t know if that’s how you feel now, or whether I’m too much for you. I get that all this is probably a reflection of the depth of the relationship we have. It’s messy and sticky and covered in feathers not neat and clean…and maybe this is where the healing will come but right now I am face down in the pain.

You have never shamed me for my big feelings, you say that I am not too much, and sometimes you say you love me… but not as frequently as you used to.  After years and years of feeling chronically unsafe things had begun to settle but now… it feels like I’ve lost you or I am losing you. Or as I said last week, like I am lost. And it’s scary. I don’t even know if I am making sense it’s such a mess inside.

When it’s really bad, I sometimes wonder if I was sitting in floods of tears instead of frozen and silent whether you would still stay away from me? My silence and freeze is how I express overwhelm – that is my crying. Sometimes I cry with you but it’s not even a tenth of what’s stuck inside, it’s still ‘controlled’. I wish I could just fall apart and let it out but it wasn’t safe to cry as a child, and I learnt early on that no one comes anyway. But that’s the reframe that needs to happen – if I am silent and still,  I am not keeping you at arm’s length, I’m massively distressed and need you to come close. I know this is a difficult area but we need to figure something out because I can’t keep getting to the place where it feels so intolerable that I can’t bear to stay and run out because it feels like I am being abandoned and that is how it feels.

When I said I was going home last week you didn’t say anything – I guess you’d had enough too – but the message it sent to the young parts, again, is that you just don’t care. Rather than try and fix things you let me leave and then stayed to chat with whoever it was that was sitting on your front step. That really didn’t help. I guess it’s my fault for leaving before the session was over, but that whole episode just made me feel exposed but also highlighted that other people are more important to you even if I am falling apart.

With a break coming up it was always going to be tricky, but it really couldn’t have been a worse way to leave with a long break looming. Usually, I would have given you my elephant to wash just before a break but I didn’t this time. This wasn’t because I didn’t want to, it’s because I didn’t feel like I could, it didn’t feel safe for the young parts to express that need…and that’s where I am at. It feels like those young parts have been completely forgotten about and abandoned. There’s been no preparation for the break and now I just have to tough it out and frankly it’s not been going all that well.

It’s Thursday now and this is the longest period of time we’ve ever had no contact and I suspect that you won’t contact me before Tuesday’s session. It feels like a punishment. I get you need a break. I get that you are tired. I get that you have a lot on. And I get that I am hard work…but it gets to be even harder work when the young parts aren’t attended to, and it feels just like total confirmation that you have had enough. You’ve totally backed away. And I get why you are doing it – a bit – but the impact it’s having on me is enormous. I get you have to look after you, of course you do, and I have to look after me but so much of my looking after me comes through the relationship I have with you right now. I get I need to ‘individuate’ and take care of the little parts inside and I am getting better at that but we are still in the thick of this work and …I don’t even know what to say.

The fact that you and your supervisor have had discussions about referring me on makes me so unsafe because I feel like if I don’t do what I am meant to do or I get too upset about how different things are you get to decide to get rid of me. In so many ways I feel like the rock I was standing on has turned to quicksand. And none of this is meant as a criticism. I don’t want you to hear it in that way at all. I know this is the work. All these triggers and feelings need working through. This is life. But I need you to know that this is really painful and I am bracing myself for you to tell me that you can’t work with me anymore after this holiday…  which on top of all the stuff that is going on in my day-to-day life feels horrendous.

There’s a part of me that feels like I should just tell you I am not coming anymore and protect myself from more pain because I can’t see how it’ll be anything close to Ok on Tuesday as things stand. There is so much hurt right now. And I don’t know if you are meaning to hurt me or whether is accidental but either way I am struggling. If things can be mended, then I really need us to find a way to connect in our sessions and to have a plan for when things hit the skids because I am finding it hard enough to adjust to feeling like you’re gone in the week without also feeling like you’re not in the room with me. I need to feel like you have your end of the rope, or invisible string, and lately it feels like you’ve taken scissors to it and I am left completely alone.

Regulating, Reconnecting, Repairing…Rupture…REPEAT!

rubberbandsandchewinggum11 Comments

This post is massively delayed so the first part feels pretty ancient now – so if this all feels disjointed it’s because there’s a month to catch up on rather than the week I had anticipated when I began. I started writing this the day before my kids were struck down with COVID and ironically was banging on about self-care and taking time out. Life got ridiculously hectic with both kids off school and still trying to work and honestly, that two weeks floored me. I mean, really, it was as though a whole other trapdoor of fatigue opened up beneath me…and of course, there was a massive wobble due to the unscheduled therapy break, well from f2f, too… so there’s lots that’s happened but I can’t necessarily remember the order of events- apologies if there’s a bit of jumping around.

As you all know, I was having a big wobble last week (last month, now!). My energy was so low, my capacity was non-existent, and the resources I usually draw on to get by, were flashing a red warning light. I had to stop. Or rather I could no longer keep going, and so had to take the day off. There really wasn’t a choice, I simply couldn’t keep going.

I’d like to say that taking time out was massively restorative and I bounced back and was good to go again, but it’s not always like that. As I was saying in my last post self-care is often framed as bubble baths, and walks in nature, and eating healthily – simple acts of filling your cup – and it is, but what I was trying to say the other day is that sometimes self-care is none of that, too. Sometimes you don’t have the energy for ANY of that and so self-care can be temporarily stopping the stuff that is depleting you, whittling things down to the absolute essentials in an effort to function. Wednesday was me sticking a band aid over the wound so as not to bleed out.

Taking the day simply meant that I didn’t crash and burn later in the week. I didn’t replenish anything that day. I didn’t top up my internal tank at all – it just meant that I didn’t drain myself dry which meant I could limp towards the weekend instead of stalling and then completely conking out midweek. And that’s good enough. Sometimes self-care is just that, knowing your physical and emotional limitations and listening to your body and inner wisdom and trusting that you know what’s best for you and giving yourself what need.

Honestly, if I wasn’t self-employed I would have taken the week off sick, it felt that bad. There are so many upsides to being my own boss but not being able to afford to get sick is certainly not one of them! In the ideal world I’d have a savings account where I put a percentage of what I earn away into some kind of ‘sick fund’ but the reality is there’s always something that demands money: my car has just cost me a fortune and still has something wrong with it, bills keep creeping up and up, and I have kids…that need clothing and feeding! My life seems to work on the juggling act of 0% balance transfer credit cards – there simply isn’t a pot of money for off days.

Alas. Still, it could be worse. I, at least, have my health (at the minute) and that has not always been a given.

So, back to therapy. And Anita. Oh. Thanks to the universe for sending me this therapist. Because honestly, she’s just exactly the stable loving force I need in my life. I was spiralling like a tornado last week. Everything felt disastrous (and yes, I was due my period so that wasn’t helping!). As I said in my last post, I don’t think I’d really recovered my footing after the breaks in December and the anniversary of all the shit hitting the fan with Em just compounded my sense of things not being ok, not being safe.

Things were so tense in one of my sessions, recently, that Anita asked if we should go and have a walk around her garden. I was in such a protected grumpy teen space that I snarled at her, “No, it’s too cold” and then went back to my silent treatment and feeling like I had been abandoned. On reflection I wish I had taken this opportunity – sure it was cold, but to be invited into another part of Anita’s space and share that would have been nice. Still, my teen wasn’t having it that day, so that’s that.

—– 18th February…

So fast forward several weeks and here I am writing this from 36,000 feet on my way to the sun. THANK FUCK. It’s the first block of free time I have had in weeks, and I cannot tell you how delighted I am to be headed away on a holiday. Having said that, the take off in storm Eunice was….a… bit… (a lot)…HAIRY! I booked and paid for this trip in December 2019 before my wife got made redundant at the start of the pandemic and then went on and lost her next job in the February…it was booked and paid for before everything got so financially stretched and strained.

The trip has been cancelled four times over the course of the last couple of years due to COVID. Every time it’s been cancelled, I have been offered a refund by the holiday company and each time I have been so tempted to take the money and pay off some debt. Each time I have gone to therapy and discussed the situation with Anita, she has encouraged me to keep the holiday (if I can) and I have. And then it gets cancelled again and we have the same chat. For the last couple of years Anita has repeatedly voiced how badly I am in need of a holiday and honestly, she is so right, and I am so glad that we are now able to get away after the couple of years we’ve had.

Because I get a discounted rate in therapy it sometimes feels like I shouldn’t have ‘nice things’ if I am not paying Anita’s full fee. I simply couldn’t afford £120+/week to see her now, so I am really grateful that we have found a rate that works for us both. I pay a flat monthly fee and it’s the same regardless of whether we have breaks or not, or whether we have extra time. So, this month I miss three sessions because I am away and then another session just after I get back because A is away (groan!) but the cost remains the same. I know where I am at with this system, and it means that sometimes it works out better financially for Anita too.

Anyway, nice things…or lack of them! I take care of the kids’ stuff – their trainers were literally falling apart this week, so I had to get them new ones and also had to buy them some summer wear (they’ve grown since last year) but my wife and I are sporting clothes we’ve had for over a decade and topped up with the odd bit of Primani. It’s been a bit of a challenge with clothing for me lately seeing as in the last year I have gained a stone and finally kicked my 25 year ED into touch (I will write about that soon!).

My arse simply doesn’t fit into my size 6/8 clothes and for the first time in my life I am wearing a size 10 – which being 5ft 7, being nearly 40 and having birthed two kids feels right for me. Anyway, what  I’m trying to say, is that taking a holiday feels extravagant right now but I am so glad we managed to hang on to it and I intend to make the most of it because, quite frankly, it’s been a really tough two years has been tough…

So, therapy…well… what can I say? The short notice move to online sessions when my kids tested positive with COVID was really hard. Fortunately, the preceding Friday session that Anita I had, had been very connecting and I left feeling really settled…which is lucky because what came next was a complete shit show. The Monday session was ‘meh’ again. False adult fronted and talked shit for an hour. I disconnected the call and felt numb. Empty. Well, that was until all the big feelings from the young parts flooded in and derailed the week.

It was awful.

I felt so disconnected from Anita and it escalated at the week went on. As I’ve said before, lack of physical proximity and working on the phone just plunges me back into my mum being away for all those years when I was a child. It’s really painful.

I text Anita the night before the session to say that things felt bad…

The morning of the session I got up, got showered, got dressed, and got stuck…or rather, frozen. I was sitting on my bed ready for the session. Anita’s name flashed up on the screen. It rang and rang and rang and yet I couldn’t answer the call. My heart was racing but I just felt paralysed. Part of me wanted to talk to Anita and another part couldn’t face the idea of another session like Monday.

I sat staring at the screen and after a few minutes text Anita – here is the exchange:

d parts were absolutely besides themselves. It was agony.

In the end Anita called in and I left the phone on the bed pointing up at the ceiling. My cat had come in for a cuddle and was purring in my arms. Anita began to read ‘The Invisible String’. It took a long time for me to be able to tune into her voice and the story but eventually the child parts felt a little more settled.

The session was over and it felt awful again. There’s so much going on internally that needs sorting through and talking about but I have found lately that I have been so strung out just getting through the weeks that I simply haven’t had the capacity or energy to dig into what’s coming up. I am hoping after this holiday I’ll be able to – once Anita returns from her break.

Fortunately, for my system I was able to go to my Monday session and see Anita f2f as both kids had tested negative and I had avoided it all together. From what I remember we had a connected, holding session but I can’t tell you what happened as I have absolutely no idea!…oh hang on…yes…we’d been talking about how hard disruption is for the young parts and then Anita told me that she was going to be away after I get back from holiday for a week. I burst into tears as I snuggled into her chest.

Poor A! All I seemed to do that session was go through various states of upset and then calm down and then cry again. This extra revelation, I think, meant that the overwhelming feelings just burst their container in a big way. Nightmare. We spent the remainder of the session regulating and containing the young parts who are so scared that something terrible will happen or things will chance when we are apart.

The sessions leading into this holiday have really been a mixed bag. There’ve been really close sessions and ones where I have completely kept my distance and pushed Anita away in anticipation of the separation. I find those sessions really painful. No matter what Anita does it feels impossible to cut through. My protectors are so powerful. And my goodness it’s soooooo exhausting.

And so, to Monday – and our last session before the break. I felt mixed feelings heading to the session. Part of me didn’t want to go and another part felt like the stakes were really high because I so needed to leave feeling settled and connected because of this latest period of disruption heading all the way into mid-March.

Interlude:

Oh good…

”Is there a medic anywhere on the flight?!!! If there’s a medic on the flight PLEASE make yourself known!

 … the joys of being a nurse eh? So that’s been my wife busy for the last hour with a passenger. At least the years in acute care and crash response have been put to good use again! This is the first time in all the years I’ve been travelling this has happened. I think my wife most definitely deserves her holiday now. Still an hour until landing and I’m sure once we land, she’ll be so glad that I pushed her from her seat!

So, back to the final session. Because we were headed into a break, I asked Anita if we might start earlier. As I have said before, 75 minute sessions feel a bit more containing because it feels like there’s enough time to drop the defences (if they’re there), land in the room, connect, do the work, and pack everything back up carefully.

So, it was lucky we had more time as it turned out to be one of those sessions where what was said and what was heard don’t quite marry up – and not in a good way – or at least not for the young parts who are so quick to feel abandoned and rejected – especially around breaks. I’d sat down and downloaded the stresses of the week (too much to do, not enough time, body shakes, nervous system overwrought…blah blah blah) for about fifteen minutes and there was a natural break in the conversation. I felt myself step out of that day-to-day headspace and became quiet as what was underneath came to the surface. I felt the panic that I’d carrying all week acutely, and the memories of the nightmares I’d had came up. Ugh.

Anita wondered aloud where the young parts were at and asked whether I wanted a cuddle. I nodded and shuffled across the sofa towards her and into her familiar warm arms. My heart was racing and I was physically trembling. Anita commented on this and said I felt cold to touch and gently rubbed my back. I tried to tune into A’s heartbeat but the sound of my own heart hammering in my ears meant I couldn’t. After about fifteen minutes my heart rate finally slowed and I could hear A’s slow, steady beat. I felt my whole system settle and felt soothed and calm which was a welcome relief after how hard things had felt these last few weeks.

23rd Feb…(loving the holiday btw!)

There was quiet for a while, and I asked Anita what she was thinking. She said she was thinking about what was going on between us and about Transactional Analysis. I was so deeply in that child state that I felt panic rise through my body as she continued to talk. She said something about how for growth we are aiming for my adult and parent to be able to hold the child parts and how one day she won’t be there.

RED ALERT.

PANIC.

PANIC!

EVERYBODY PANIC!!

From that point everything got messy inside and I felt like I was going to actually going to have a full-blown panic attack. As all this was rising up in me and then something flicked, and I froze. Dead still. Hardly breathing. And I remained that way for a long time. I was completely out of my window of tolerance.

Shit.

This was not the fucking plan for the session.

Just for clarity, what Anita was actually saying is one day I will have done enough work in therapy that I won’t need therapy in the way I do now or need her in the same way I do. But this is not what I needed to hear before a break when the child parts were so present because all they could hear in that moment was ‘She’s gonna leave me – everyone always leaves me’.

Argh nooooooooo!

Anita said something about her acting as like a nanny or grandma who can settle the young parts when everything seems bad, until one day there will a point where my adult can take over and do it for myself. That’s what we’re aiming for. Again, nothing wrong with that, because I’m guessing that when I have worked through the early stuff, I’m unlikely to want to spend hours of my week cuddled into her but it just felt so rejecting in that particular moment in the particular young state I was in. And let’s be clear here, my child parts don’t see her as a nanny or a grandma…they see her as mum. And so, even this very warm, caring statement felt rejecting.

Anita went on to say that we are slowly trying to repair what went wrong as a child and redoing some of the stuff that was missed along the way and there’s a part of me that is glad to hear that after so long being told that, “The time for those needs to be met has passed and you need to mourn for what you didn’t get.” I guess what Anitas is saying is that what we’re doing is a kind of ‘limited reparenting’ perhaps. And I can definitely see that. From the very beginning she has been clear that it’s ok to have needs, express them, and if possible (and within reason) she’ll try and meet them. And she has. She’s been really great in the two years (TWO YEARS) since we met.

As I was lying cuddled into her with my elephant (ready to be washed as there’s one session back before Anita goes away), yet frozen, A talked about how with deep wounds you can’t just put a plaster over them and hope for the best. It’s a long process and the wound has to heal from right deep down in the core. She said she’s in for the long haul and won’t abandon the young parts. She’s there for the journey, but of course the original sound bite that was drowning out everything was “I won’t be able to do this forever” and so lots of the different parts were freaking out, ‘What if she leaves before we have done the work?’…etc etc.

Adult me gets what she was trying to say because it was said with so much warmth and love, and I know the intention was meant to reassure the parts of me that worry about being too much about the strength of the relationship – but the child parts have hung onto this and have filled up with shame about it. I’m going to have to talk about all this on Monday because it’s hurt me and yet I know this is not Anita’s intention at all. She was so good in the session when I was quiet and crying. She asked me to tell her what I had heard and clarified what she meant over and over – and after the session I sent her a message and she reiterated her position again:

I think this episode just really goes to show how easily triggered young, vulnerable parts are. It takes such a long time to build trust in the therapeutic relationship, to let these parts be seen, and then any hint or sense that the safety of the therapy will be taken away is massively triggering. Anita has no plans to stop the therapy. My therapy will end when it feels right for me. But coming off the back of a premature ending of a long-term therapy due to the young parts being ‘adhesive’ and ‘like a tick’ to Em means that I panic if Anita hints at us ending, or her not being there, or me not needing her.

As I’ve said a million times, Adult me gets it. All of it. But man, these child parts are right in the thick of the work and such a long way off ‘not needing Anita anymore’ and as I said, on the eve of a break the last thing I needed to hear was about a future where she isn’t as she is now, when the young parts needed reassurance that nothing is going to change. (And yes she did say all that “I’ll still be here when you come home. I won’t change. We’ll still be ok. And you are not too much for me…” on loop.

I don’t know how much of this has made sense because it’s been so split.

In summary:

The last session before the break wobbled me a lot – but it’s ok!

Lol!

p.s Sorry I have been AWOL on your blogs. I’m hoping to get some time online over the weekend to catch you x

A Long December… and here’s to 2022

rubberbandsandchewinggum16 Comments

So, we’re in that weird bit between Christmas and New Year again. That notorious chunk of time where I seem to flatline and become incapable of doing anything much at all after running at 1000mph into Christmas. There’s been no deviation from the long-established pattern this year: CRASH AND BURN baby! It’s like I have entered into a state of inertia…or maybe it’s just burnout…or depression…hormones…all of the above! – but whatever it is I’ve been completely out of it for the last several days – and not in a good way.

It’s not unusual not to know what day it is in this weird ‘no man’s land’ – I mean that’s everyone right? I wouldn’t say I am dissociated, either. I have a shit tonne going on in my brain but I feel paralysed and unable to do any of what’s on my list and that’s what I hate. It’s mental torture. I want to be able to relax and switch off and yet I get plagued by crap. To be fair, my tax return is like a dementor right up the last minute on January 31st so I may as well accept that that won’t be done just yet!

So, what can I say? It’s been a while since I have posted (again). I’ve been meaning to post something, the laptop has been on beside my bed for three days solid now, with the screensaver endlessly going. I keep looking at it, thinking I’ll write, seeing as I have some time (and that would be a good use of time rather than endlessly scrolling through social media on my phone and then feeling pissed at myself that I am not using my time off more effectively. Honestly, I think I need a tech detox for the next little while!…Ummm, well, WordPress excluded obviously.

There’s quite a lot of bits I could write about here, stuff to catch up on – like, perhaps I should go back to a few weeks ago and fill in from there? – well, what I can remember of it! Or perhaps I should write something thematic – I’ve been thinking a lot about the ‘senses’ in therapy – particularly smell and touch, oh an let’s not forget the x-ray vision! And then there’s Christmastime itself and all that that can bring up. Or gifts in therapy (in a good way). Or a reflection on the year (what a bloody year!). I don’t know. This will probably end up a mash up of all of it, span 4000 words and end up making no sense…so same as usual then eh?!

Maybe go get a cuppa before we begin!

And also, before I get going, I just want to say that I hope you are all hanging in there. My reader has been fairly empty of posts this last month from what I can see and I suspect that’s partly because it’s been the mad time heading into the holidays but also that people might be feeling similar to how I have been – kind of in a limbo, not feeling quite right, and not being able to reach out.  If that’s the case then, I get it. Lots of us have also had that hell time of impending therapy break to manage and then the actual break too so solidarity there. And I just want you to know that those of you who have written posts that I haven’t yet commented on, I will get to it…and I do see that you are there. So, that’s a long-winded way of saying I hope you are all hanging in there and that I see you x

Right, so where to start? The last few weeks have been a bit of trial. I mean I honestly was dragging my arse towards the finish line and the end of term. Only it’s not the finish line when you have kids and a family. It’s just dropping one set of responsibilities and commitments so you can focus on the others. Somehow, we got to Christmas day in one piece and the kids had the things they wanted. To be honest though, with a partner that works in health and social care it was inevitable that Christmas was going to a fucking washout. And we were correct. There were calls to Public Health on Christmas Day to report a COVID breakout and Boxing Day was trying to spread a very thin layer of staff across an already stretched service.

My wife has been working 14-hour days and has now, today, taken a suitcase to work and will be sleeping there- there physically aren’t enough nurses and care staff around and there is no alternative.

People might think that this new COVID variant isn’t a problem, “It’s just a cold” they say – but it is a problem when it’s EVERYWHERE and staff have to isolate who have got it. The workforce is decimated. Sure, we might not be getting the COVID deaths we’ve seen previously but when you can’t care for the most vulnerable in society in the health and social care sector because we’ve allowed the virus to run wild and there are NO STAFF…well, it’s criminal.

People are not receiving the care they deserve. Hospitals are cancelling procedures. Cancers are being picked up late. People are being discharged back into the community to free up acute beds when they aren’t really safe to be discharged because there is such a pressure on beds. I could go on and on.

I honestly can’t believe the burden that has been placed on key workers and healthcare staff throughout this pandemic. People are on their knees. The system is at breaking point. And the system isn’t a system. It’s people. People like my wife. People like my colleagues in schools. I am white hot with rage, and I cannot believe our government have allowed this to happen. Only I can. A bin fire of self-serving shits are running this country and we seem powerless to do anything to hold them to account.

Anyway, this isn’t meant to be a rant about the state of things, but I just feel so fucking angry. I’m angry that the government has shafted us. I am angry that some people aren’t doing more to limit the spread of the infection by just being fucking sensible. I am angry that the people that end up suffering the consequences are the people who have sacrificed enough already. I am beyond pissed off that we are throwing the clinically vulnerable under the bus as if having ‘a pre-existing condition’ means you are collateral damage for keeping the economy moving. And apparently, I am meant to send my kids back to school on Wednesday where no mitigations other than some open windows are in place, and primary aged kids are not being offered the vaccine in the UK. I mean for the love of GOD!!!!!!

Whew.

Deep Breaths RB!

So, back to therapy, which is what you are all here for, right?!…

The run in to the Christmas holiday was a bit fraught. Anita had a week’s break at the beginning of December (I think that was when I last posted) and so that set things off a bit internally knowing there was going to be so much disruption over the month. There were a few sessions between her coming back from that break and before the Christmas break – I think two weeks/four sessions. The first session back was really connecting but also really hard.

I’d asked Anita if we could start sooner that day, but she couldn’t which set some of the parts off. I was anxious that I might arrive and get derailed by the protectors who were feeling pushed away. It was the last thing I needed but always possible after a break. Fortunately, Anita and I reconnected really quickly (thank goodness!), she felt really attuned and pleased to see me and I settled quickly. I was cuddled into her and catching up when ‘out of nowhere’ (but also not out of nowhere) all the stuff about being a tick came up for the young parts and it was agony.

I guess I was panicking that after the separation we’d just had she may find my need to be close too much, like Em. Anita was incredible, really reassuring and holding, but there just wasn’t enough time to put it all back away at the end of the session. I left feeling a bit unsettled and off for the next few days. Anita and I exchanged some messages and she was really responsive and containing and it was enough to get through to Friday but I was more than ready for the session by the time it got to Friday morning. The young parts felt like they were hanging over a precipice and I just very badly needed to connect.

My best friend ‘Girl In Therapy’ wrote and published an excellent article that weekend that describes perfectly how triggering talk therapy can be for people with CPTSD – here’s the link:

https://www.girlintherapy.co.uk/articles/7fmjc9tewgc7nucxol32yhhk7x2c4q

– definitely worth a read if you haven’t already seen it.

The huge irony wasn’t lost on me as the next hour played out with Anita and how closely it matched the article.

I felt a sort of anticipatory dread as I walked up the drive. Something felt off. The dog started barking at the window and then I noticed her daughter’s dog was there, too. Ugh. I never have to ring the doorbell as the dog always alerts Anita that there’s someone there. That day the noise of the dogs really fucking irritated me – even though they settle once I’m there. I guess I was feeling sensitive and seeing her daughter’s dog triggered the jealousy and all that stuff about being inadequate and ‘less than’. Great.

It took a while for Anita to come to the door that day, not ages, maybe a minute or two – but that’s REALLY unusual. I started to feel myself panic. Anita finally opened the door and she had wet hair and looked absolutely done in. Basically, she didn’t look ready or in the right space for therapy which sent the parts that were already in a panic into freefall.

My need was huge that morning, I was already experiencing a vulnerability hangover from the tick stuff earlier in the week, and so it didn’t take much for me to read the evidence before me “Anita isn’t up to ‘me’ today” and go into hiding. I need Anita on her A game, not an Anita who was trying to ‘phone it in’. I’d clocked all this before I had even got into the room, and so by the time I sat down False Adult had taken over and was shielding the young parts. As children we were so good at knowing how to behave and adjusting to what was ahead of us and this hypervigilance has stuck. Sometimes I think it’s a superpower and sometimes it’s a complete bind.

Even though Anita had been so present and available and validating earlier in the week, I still feel a lot of shame about my insatiable ‘need’ and so my perception that Anita wasn’t fully there meant I could just avoid what was going on – pretend like Monday had never happened. I still feel so embarrassed that I am so affected by what happened with Em. I am terrified of Anita finally seeing me for what I am. She swears blind that what happened isn’t my fault and that Em is not fit for practice. She told me she thinks I have a very strong case for a complaint to Em’s governing body but also said that she doesn’t recommend a complaint because it’s a horrific process to go through (having raised a complaint herself).

Anyway, as the session went on, I could feel my young parts getting more and more distraught inside but the False Adult was so good, there’s no chinks in her armour, that there’d have been no way of Anita knowing. Especially as Anita was a million miles away. She had no idea what was going on. She didn’t seem curious, either… like, “RB, last session was really really hard and we left things a bit up in the air. You text me in the week and I know you feel unsettled after the break too…and you’ve spent half an hour talking about COVID and Brexit. Is there anything else going on for you that maybe we need to look at? Are the child parts ok? What do you need today?”

I could see the clock ticking down and I felt sick inside. I knew I wasn’t going to get what I needed that session and that I was going to be left holding all this over the weekend and it would be carnage. The session was over. I felt abandoned and rejected … unseen. I stood up and gave Anita a half-hug as I left. It was weird. I can’t remember the last time we didn’t touch in a session but it was setting all kinds of fireworks off inside. Mentally I was calculating that there were only two sessions now until Christmas break….AND IT ALL FELT LIKE A HUGE DISASTER.

Touch is such an important part of my therapy now. After all those years of there being ‘no touch’ and being made to feel like I was some kind of…tick…a parasite…for wanting to be close to Em I can say that the physical proximity and closeness that I usually have with Anita has done so much for moving things forward for me. I have said before that it is often when I am safely physically held that I feel able to look at the hardest, most vulnerable stuff. Anita can be so much more attuned – she can physically feel when I start to tremble, or I hold my breath, or whatever the fuck else happens that might not be evident or visible from a distance and respond accordingly. There’s just more of that co-regulation and so my nervous system can settle quicker and we can do the work.

Anyway, it sucked that day when I really needed to be seen and held both emotionally and physically and instead left feeling completely untethered and alone. It’s hard enough ‘detaching’ at the end of a ‘good’ session but never having connected in the first place is agony.

I text and called my friend when I got home – False Adult had gone offline and the Angry Teen had taken root. I was so upset, angry…all the feelings. Anita not being ‘present’ sent shockwaves through my system. There was a part that felt like I wasn’t deserving of her attention and care and so felt awful, there was another part that couldn’t work out ‘what had changed’ and another part that was furious that she wasn’t doing her ‘fucking job’! Somewhere on the outside of that was Adult who knows that A was probably tired or just a bit off, like we all are sometimes, but unfortunately all the noisy parts weren’t having it, “She’s just had a fucking holiday, she should be better than this!”

Anyway. Fortunately for both me and Anita I had to teach a double lesson that afternoon which meant no one could take to WhatsApp and let rip. Lol. After my lesson I had simmered down a bit and all that was left was a little part wondering where Anita was. What had happened? What had gone wrong?

So, I simply text:

Where were you today?

A replied that she wasn’t very well, had started to feel ill in the session, and had taken herself to bed, and was sorry that she’d felt distant.

Adult me understood it but there was another voice that couldn’t understand why she hadn’t said this during the session. If she’d have said, “RB, I’m really sorry but I don’t feel great and so I’m sorry if I don’t seem myself…” or anything really. Trying to carry on like I wouldn’t notice she ‘wasn’t there’ is daft. I could see it. The problem is, the narrative I create when she seems far away isn’t that she’s sick, it’s that she’s ‘sick of me’ and wants to be away. Ugh.

Anyway, I got through to Monday’s session which had to be an evening because my kids had broken up. And ARRRGGGHHHHHH fuckola. BAD BAD BAD. I don’t remember what happened – dissociation! Anita felt a long way away again. The distance was unbearable. Having listened back to the recording I can hear she was trying really really hard to get to me but I was totally frozen. At one point she asked if I would like a hug because she would like to hug me…and I just shook my head. I hate it when that happens. Every little part inside was screaming out and there I was frozen and unable to get out my prison.

The session ended and I felt absolutely desperately sad. I moved to put my shoes on and just fell apart, crying with my head in my hands and shaking. Anita shuffled over to me and wrapped me in her arms and I just sobbed as she held me close into her body. It was awful. I felt like the time had just slipped through our fingers again but at least I wasn’t going to leave completely disconnected.

Fortunately, my session being the last session of the evening Anita had a bit of time to run over and we had fifteen minutes where we really connected, and fixed things as she held me and I cried. She reassured me that she was still there and that we were going to be ok and that she understood that my defences were up because parts don’t feel safe and are scared. She acknowledged my fears and things felt sooooo much better.

It was time to go, though, and Anita gave me one last tight squeeze, kissed me on the top of my head, and said, “I love you, you know. I really do. You are very precious.” I got my elephant out my bag and handed it over. She took it and said she’d have it washed and ready for me for Friday ready for the break.

The week flew by as it always does at this time of year. I had to pack a lot into the week and before I knew it, it was Christmas Eve and the final session of the year. It felt nice to see Anita so close to Christmas and for the break not to be three weeks long like it used to be with Em.

I walked into the room and sitting there was my elephant and next to it, a gift bag of presents. Our stories were out on the side, too. The session was light but connected. I asked for a hug pretty close to the start of the session so there was none of that horrible feeling of space and distance. I have no idea what we spoke about but I know that it felt fine and safe. Anita said that she’d bought me some little things that were silly but had made her think of me and that I could take them away for Christmas and handed the bag to me as I left.

I gave her a big hug as I left and walked out feeling about as good as I could going into a break.

Earlier in December I had bought Anita a Christmas gift of a glass rabbit ornament with snowflake patterns on.  

She always does her house nicely at Christmas and so it felt like a perfect present given our story ‘The Rabbit Listened’. She placed the bunny beside the candle lantern I had given her last year. I didn’t notice it as I was walking up the stairs and she said, “Did you see bunny? He’s sitting next to the present you gave me last year.” It doesn’t sound like a lot but actually, to have A remember what I got her last year and to put these things up in her home…well… I don’t need to explain do I?

Oh, and just an aside whilst I think about Christmas and hypervigilance…GROAN… last year I had an evening session before Christmas and got to see all Anita’s lights outside her house (in the day you don’t notice them). This year, again, I got to see them in the evening. As I walked in the door I said, “Did you change the lights on that bush?” and she said that she had as the set from last year had broken. This is how much shit my brain stores- a single evening session a year ago and remembering the type of lights on a bush in a fully lit and decorated garden…trauma anyone?!

Anyway, we’re kind of up-to-date again. This holiday has been ok. Like I said, I have been quite lacking in energy and not doing much but I haven’t been overwhelmed with that attachment slime. Last night I was struggling to sleep- after really doing nothing but sleep in the last week – I missed A (very ready for Tuesday session now) and so I grabbed my elephant and breathed in its smell – Anita – and fairly quickly the young parts settled and fell off to sleep. I felt settled because that young needy part of me was quickly transported into the safety of Anita’s arms through the smell of the elephant.

I can’t say strongly enough that it is these things, the touch, the texts, and the willingness to try and meet the needs of the young parts (within reason) that have meant I can do a better job of regulating myself outside the room and holding the young stuff for myself. And it’s because I have something tangible to tap into. There is evidence all around me of my relationship with Anita, and it’s within me, too.

I can imagine what it is to feel safe because I have felt safety with Anita. I can imagine how it is to feel held because I have been held by her. I no longer have this longing and unmet need to be held – because she’s done that for me. And whilst I might miss her and wish I could see her, it’s not the same pain of wanting but having that need unmet – deliberately withheld week in week out.

I can easily bring Anita to mind and feel grounded because I can feel her. I know she’s out there and will be back on Tuesday – which is huge because in the past she’d disappear cease to exist, and it was massively distressing. I know I have a disorganised attachment style (I mean duh!) but I do think that bit by bit A and I are working towards building an earned, secure attachment. I’m not there yet – but things are so much better than they were!

I wish I had more energy to write that out properly and explain it as I am sure there will be some people rolling their eyes – but it’s really down to infant experiences that were missed being filled (to an extent). I guess it’s a kind of limited reparenting. Parts of me are healing through Anita’s willingness to repair some of what was missing.

Some people believe that the time for those wounds to be healed and those needs to be met has passed – we, as clients are not children anymore, and so instead we need to grieve for what we didn’t have and accept that. We need to hold everything on our own. Be our own parent. That was Em’s philosophy.

No touch. No outside session contact. No transitional objects… no “colluding with that young part that wants to be held” (puke!).

I don’t think it’s as simple as that. I don’t think it’s an either or. I still have to grieve for all that never was and that should have been. I am regularly faced with the limitations of the therapeutic relationship and have to grieve what I can’t have in Anita. But that’s not to say that there isn’t a lot to celebrate, because there is a lot that I do have and there is a lot that has been soothed that was left raw and in agony before. It’s ok for there to be a level of dependency because eventually there’ll be interdependency and then independency… or at least that’s the plan.

Anyway, this is SOOOO long and I need to go and feed the kids!

Take care and here’s to a better 2022. X

Oh, and here’s my gifts! 😊

The Runners Ran: First Session Back And I Legged It Out The Room After Five Minutes

rubberbandsandchewinggum29 Comments

PLEASE, someone, come and have words with my system because it is completely losing its shit at the minute!

Honestly, you just can’t make this stuff up… but as always, here’s the reality of life in the therapy room for RBCG. Brace positions!:

So, after my last post, last week, things were kind of limping along internally and then sort of conked out altogether because I had absolutely nothing left in the tank. It was certainly a relief when the weekend arrived because at least the immediate pressure of work was removed, and I could kind of do the ‘three more sleeps thing’ on Friday night counting down to Christmas seeing Anita!

I didn’t do very much at all over the weekend because I had a bit of a reaction to my flu jab and so just lay, wiped out, on the sofa for the entirety of Sunday!  The young parts were upset and unsettled after what felt like an eternity away for A, and soooooo NOISY but I had nothing to give them because I was completely done in. I was literally willing the time away to get to Monday evening to reconnect with Anita and to be able settle things internally.

We’ve all been there, right?

So, imagine my joy (not) on Monday when I woke up and the protectors had come online. The child parts were still absolutely beside themselves but shielding them were the angry parts that didn’t trust Anita and were raging that she’d left me/us at all. Those protectors had been so absent for the duration of the break that it was a bit of a whiplash effect waking up to that internal narrative of A not caring, and what a waste of time therapy is anyway…

I got on with my day but by the afternoon I had a really strong sense of not wanting to go to my session that evening. I mean the child parts needed to be there, but the protectors and runners had other ideas.

FFS.

I text Anita to confirm that we were still on for our evening session time and explained that I wasn’t really wanting to come. Or at least parts of me didn’t want to.

I think, now, what brought the protectors online was actually the need for connection with Anita. I know that sounds utterly bonkers because, actually, those protectors stop connection- but here’s the theory: the need for holding and containment for the child parts was so strong that the protective parts desperately wanted to save the young ones from the disappointment of that maybe not happening.

So often after a therapy break (with Em) the young parts have been so in need of care and love but it wasn’t forthcoming and so it set off that agony inside where it feels like you’re going to die from the pain of it all. Of course my system wants to save me from experiencing that ever again. Getting close to that acute feeling of abandonment and rejection feels like it’s going to annihilate me.

Anita’s responses to my texts were warm … but left me cold, somehow.

I just felt like something was amiss.

And it was me – my stuff – but could I get a way round the edge of it? Could I fuck!

Driving in the dark to therapy I decided to stop panicking and to just go and get what I so badly needed. Anita had indicated that everything was fine, so I just needed to lean into that and trust it. Stop putting obstacles in the way RBCG and just go see your therapist who cares!

As I walked up her driveway, I could feel those young parts soooooo ready for a hug almost launching themselves out of me and towards Anita.

Anita opened the door, greeted me, and smiled. I went on into the therapy room, sat down and that’s when it all started to go wrong.

“I will warn you that I have a cold” Anita said. “I’ve done an LFT and it’s negative, but it’s just a particularly horrible throat…You’ve struggled to come today?”

Sulkily I replied, “I didn’t want to come at all” then whispered, “Can we turn the big light off?” The main room light felt too bright and jarring and I just wanted the low glow of the side lights and to relax into the space with A. Anita got up, turned off the light and put on the softer table lamp.

As she sat back down she said, “I’m keeping my distance because of the cold, as well…”

And that was it. EVERYTHING went mental inside. It was instant. I felt like I was going to burst into tears right there but, of course, externally I looked fine. No reaction at all. Poker face. Don’t let her see how upset you are!

‘Distance’ is triggering at the best of times but after a break it’s the very last thing I need. I can’t recall a session in the last year where Anita and I have not had any physical contact and here I was so desperate to be close to her, to cuddle and she seemed to be saying that it was off the cards. It was just too much for my system to cope with.

So many thoughts were running through my head all at the same time. My body was in a full on panic and I started to tremble. I can’t really explain how awful it was – there aren’t words. But I felt completely devastated. The protectors inside were lacing up their shoes and ready to bolt. I felt so abandoned and rejected in that moment. It was another episode of having my face glued up against the sweet shop window and being told I couldn’t have anything having waited so patiently to be there.

And yes – I know that this is just a cold, and Anita trying to be careful and not a deliberate rejection – but the young parts DID NOT UNDERSTAND that at all. To them it’s another mother who wouldn’t come anywhere near them when they needed her and it’s massively MASSIVELY triggering.

Totally oblivious to what was now happening inside for me, Anita went on, “What do you need from today? What can help you feel more settled?”

My brain was screaming “I need a hug” but instead I replied a barely audible, “I don’t know.”

“What’re your fears?” Anita asked.

It felt like I was being bombarded with questions and we’d only been in the room thirty seconds.

With a hint of anger I said, “Will you just stop talking to me.”

“Yeah, of course” and Anita sat quietly. I could see she was looking at me in the dark but I was staring into the corner of the room, unable to make any kind of eye contact.

The level of overwhelm I was experiencing was off the chart. The room was so gently lit that Anita had no idea that I was shaking. Where usually she’d have noticed and reached out in some way, I was instead left feeling isolated and abandoned.

A tiny child’s voice whimpered, “I want to go home.”

In that moment things felt so bad, the distance between Anita and I felt so great, and knowing I couldn’t get what I needed from her the only option available seemed to be to leave. It was the last thing I wanted but it would be less painful that sitting apart from Anita when I had already been apart for a week.

Anita replied, “You can go home if you want. The choice is yours.”

Wrong answer.

Look, we all know that therapists have to respect our autonomy and all that jazz, but in that situation, it is completely the wrong thing to say (well for me anyway). I might have been seemingly pushing away but actually when I say that kind of thing, it’s really a desperate call for connection. When we’ve not seen each other for ages being told I can leave is … well…it feels like she doesn’t care and it feels abandoning…EVEN THOUGH IT IS NONE OF THOSE THINGS!

Silence.

Anita continued, “I will never force you to be where you don’t want to be.”

More silence.

I could feel myself starting to head down into that tunnel of dissociation. Anita didn’t seem to get it. She had no idea that I had been triggered into such a deep place of doom and all within the first two minutes of being in the room. She had no idea as she sat on the couch beside me that I felt like I was being rejected and pushed away by her.

I could feel everything kicking off internally and I felt like I was going to fall apart. Not just cry but literally lose my fucking mind in there. I had held on so tightly over the week just to get to be with her and it was unravelling at a speed of knots.

“What part of you brought you here today?” Anita wondered at the same time that I repeated more angrily, “I want to go home.” I quickly put my shoes on, grabbed my keys and phone, and headed for the door “I don’t want you to go home…” Anita replied but it was too late, I was already half way out the door.

“I’m going home.”

I was out the room, down the stairs, and out the front door in seven seconds. My runners were channeling Usain Bolt.

Fuck.

This is new, right? Leaving. Never have I ever run out of a session. I’ve always sat and endured that physical agony of the young parts feeling alone and rejected – but I just can’t do it anymore. I cannot be in that place. It’s too triggering.

I can hear on the recording as I get off the driveway and into the dark that I let out this really pained sob as I burst into tears.

It’s awful to hear it back.

My car was parked round the corner from Anita’s house. I was in a right mess. There was no way I could drive in that moment so I just sat in the driver’s seat with my head in my hands and my knees tucked up into my chest. I basically curled up into ball and trembled and cried.

I was devastated.

How could it have gone so badly?

I sat in the dark for about five minutes – although it felt like seconds – I just completely lost time. And then reached for my phone. I felt really stupid but also really really lost and small.

As you can see from the exchange it felt like the universe was conspiring against us this session. Just as I had got back to my car, all the street lights had gone out and there’d been a powercut at Anita’s. I so badly wanted to go back to the house but also just felt completely stuck, like I said in the message, ‘paralysed’. I guess I was in a freeze response.

I just sat there, unable to move. About five minutes after Anita’s last message to me, a torch shone on the path next to my car door that was still wide open. I hadn’t even been able to shut the fucking car I was in such a state! I hadn’t heard the footsteps and yet despite being down a side road in complete darkness I didn’t react…which is unusual as I am so jumpy normally.

I looked up and there she was in the pitch black, and with a concerned but warm expression. I put I looked away and put my head back in my hands. Anita bent down and said something – and I have no idea what that is because the whole next bit of this isn’t recorded and I was so dissociated I can’t really recall much of the detail!

She asked if I wanted to talk and come back with her or maybe sit in the car together? I couldn’t move and told her that she could come in the car. My car is like bona fide special ecosystem of its own right now and I genuinely can’t believe that it had to be that day when this happened, when usually it’s tidy and smells nice and doesn’t look like trash can!

Ah well.

Anita was incredibly soft and calm and reassuring. My head was still in my hands and I was curled up in a ball but I could feel her even if I couldn’t look at her. She reached out and put her hand on my leg and told me that we’d be ok and could I explain what had happened?

I said she didn’t understand. That she’d never understand because she doesn’t have this wounding. That she has no idea how painful it is to feel rejected and abandoned. She said, “So teach me about it.”

I told her how her ‘keeping her distance’ had triggered me because I had missed her sooooooooooo much whilst she was away and that I really just needed a cuddle that night and it felt like she didn’t want me anywhere near her.

Anita was incredible. She refuted that and said that was not the case at all, of course she wanted to be with me and near me. She heard everything I had to say, which wasn’t a lot in terms of words but was enough to explain what had just happened. She said that telling me about the cold was not her telling me I couldn’t be near her and how in the past she’d told me the same and I have said that I didn’t mind, and we still ended up hugging so what was different?

I couldn’t articulate it in the moment, but I thought about it after and wrote it in a message yesterday which I have attached below.

I remember saying that I lose sight of her care and think things have changed and she replied with “RB, I wouldn’t come walking out in the pitch black in a power cut for anyone else.”

I think this really penetrated through to the parts that needed to hear it and Anita said lots of stuff about our relationship and how solid it is. I realised as she sat beside me in the dark that she really is my rabbit that listens. She is there, always, patient and calm waiting for me.

I wish I could remember the detail but I know that time, albeit in a completely random setting really did a lot of good. I was disappointed that I had completely lost my shit and not got what I needed so far as the physical holding goes, but emotionally Anita was right there with me. We are definitely a team!

Anyway, the long and short of it is that it’s all ok. We got me sorted enough to be able to drive and for her to leave. She asked me if I wanted a hug – which is impossible in the car – so I said, yes, got out the car and we had a really long hug in the dark.

Anita said something like, “I’ll look forward to seeing you on Monday and it really is ok” and I didn’t respond. “I’ll see you on Friday?” she repeated. “I don’t know,” I groaned.

There was so much conflict and shame and all kinds of stuff running round my brain. Deep down I knew we were absolutely fine – but there were a lot of parts still having their moment to speak.

The next morning I asked Anita is she had time for a ten minute check in before Friday and she offered me a time that evening:

I had a bit of time over my lunch break to think and I wrote and sent this message:

Hey A,

I’ve been trying to think about what happened last night and why but it’s not straightforward but all comes down to feeling disconnected and rejected and all that stuff.

Adult me tried really hard to stay away and not bother you while you were away on holiday and communicate in a way that wasn’t super needy, or too frequent, despite really feeling rubbish and like things were really not ok. By the middle of the week – woeful Wednesday – it felt really bad. I kept shaking and it was just horrid. If I had texted you what I wanted/felt over the week it would have been more like this, than stuff about IKEA:

  • I miss you and I’m starting to feel like you’re not real.
  • I’ve been having lots nightmares and feel really unsettled and shaky.
  • It feels like it did when I was little, and I’m scared that when you come back it’ll be different or you won’t want to see me anymore and I feel frightened.
  • I really need a cuddle.
  • Are we still ok?
  • Can we read stories on Monday?
  • I’ve been really sick and dizzy feel really clingy and like everything is too much but really want to see you
  • I feel really exhausted from holding all this and feel sad and overwhelmed but hope that we can reconnect when we see each other
  • All…the…feelings…are too much

And so, what I really needed last week was some kind of connection for that young part who worries so much about things going wrong or being forgotten about. Adult me can cope with you being away but the wounded child parts that struggle so much with disruption can’t, and it felt like you didn’t see/remember them. And I really get that this is me being mental because you did send stuff and I can see that now…but…ugh… I just can’t explain it really. I just really struggle with breaks and when it feels that bad it’s hard to hold onto anything positive.

So yesterday felt really high stakes. I really just needed for all that painful young stuff to be seen, held, and contained because I was wobbling really badly. When I haven’t seen you for a while, I struggle to hold onto all the evidence that has gone before that actually you do care, that I am not a massive pain in the arse (eek…think maybe that’s changed!), and that you do want to see me. I know you sent me that text yesterday telling me that you did want to see me and that you could understand how I was feeling but I was so far down my spiral of doom that it kind of bounced off.

When I arrived, I was so tired and so overwrought – it’s like the weight of the last week just caught up with me and I just wanted to be close to you. When you said you were ‘keeping your distance’ it felt instantly like you were pushing me away and it just lit the petrol that sets off that massive fire where everything is about to burn to the ground.

I get that wasn’t what you meant but that young part that is so used to being pushed away or disregarded got really triggered and really fast. I was totally gone into that place that is terrified. I know in the past when you’ve said something similar, I have said that I didn’t care about the cold, but that’s when I am walking into a situation that feels stable and safe…and after a break it just doesn’t feel like that. I am automatically looking for evidence that something has changed or gone wrong, and this seemed to be it. It felt like you wanted to be far away from me.

The internal reaction to what you said was immense. I felt sick and my heart started racing. I don’t think you noticed, but I was shaking. It felt absolutely horrific. Sitting there having a full-on trauma response to you staying away from me was too much. I had to leave. Staying in that situation was too upsetting and that’s why I ran away. I wanted so much to see you and instead it felt like I was being held at arms length and that’s really hard for me.

I know none of this is what was actually happening. I get it. But I couldn’t see that at the time.

I felt so dissociated last night in the car. I don’t remember much of what happened or what was said because I was so physically affected by what had happened. I really really didn’t want to be like that or for that to happen and I am sorry. I am embarrassed, too. I thought that I had a handle on this stuff but lately it seems like I am so easily triggered by small things. I don’t know if it’s progress that I can at least tell you how it is or whether I am just hopeless.

Thank you for coming and sitting with me in the dark.

On Friday even if you are a snot machine please can we have cuddles because I feel like I have been run over by a bus.

I miss you.

x

The conversation we had on Monday night was holding and connecting and so I’ll leave this there because, yet again, it’s an epic length and the editing tool is not working properly on here today! Sometimes I really feel like this 😉

Another Therapy Break and “A Little Friend”

rubberbandsandchewinggum14 Comments

So here we are then, half-way through my least favourite thing – another therapy break – and ugh, I just feel utterly bleurgh. It’s not been helped by getting my period yesterday, either. TMI?! I always feel drained, and tired, and in need of care at this time of the month anyway, so having Anita away, too, has felt especially shit this last couple of days. Thank goodness for endless cups of tea, cake, soft toys and my weighted blanket…it’s just a shame I can’t hibernate, really.

Things are still as relentless as ever with work and life, and it’s still another week until half term break from work so I feel as if I am running on fumes right now. It’s that juddering, lurching motion before I completely conk out. Eek. I’m really just hoping that I can free-wheel my way into next Friday. I desperately need some time off and some serious sleep. I think the first few days of the holiday are going to be spent in pjs watching movies with the kids and recharging our batteries.

So, I guess I should backtrack a bit and fill in to how I got to this midway point of the therapy break.

Actually, the lead into this therapy break wasn’t too bad. Well, I mean, I had the usual internal panic about it (but of course!) and felt a bit sad about it (no surprises there), but Anita and I were able to talk about it several times before it actually happened which makes such a difference.

Break anxiety is not the elephant in the room (I don’t think there are any elephants in our therapy room, actually!) like it was with Em. I don’t have to feel shame or embarrassment about the feelings that come up around disruptions to my therapy. I don’t have to pretend that I am not impacted by breaks and separation from Anita. AND perhaps most importantly, I am not made to feel like there is something wrong with me for experiencing feelings of abandonment and rejection (even if adult me knows that’s not what’s happening) when Anita goes away – and it is such a relief.

I definitely think that being ‘left’ with my painful feelings around breaks exacerbated the actual time of the breaks I had with Em. But then I felt so alone with my feelings, before, during, and after breaks so, maybe it’s just that the whole thing was a disaster! Ugh. Never mind!

So, anyway, a couple of sessions before the break Anita directed our attention towards the upcoming separation. I had obviously, already, had my big meltdown last month when she told me about the breaks she had planned – or rather the meltdown about the way the information was delivered with the formal seeming note -and so we had discussed how hard breaks felt for me then, during that big rupture repair session, too.

On our last Monday session before the holiday, I was cuddled into Anita – I can’t remember what we’d been talking about during the session – all sorts of random shit about the trip I’d just taken (we’d missed previous Friday’s session), I think, but there was a period where it went quiet, and I felt so relaxed and safe. After a little while, I asked what she Anita was thinking.

She replied, “I am thinking about the gaps that we are having… how we haven’t had any gaps recently, really, and now there seem to be quite a lot in one go – with you going away last week and then me going away next week… and I’m wondering how you are with that, really, as I’m guessing you’re not very good with that?”

She held me closer to her and I started to cry. I really wasn’t expecting my reaction having been so settled a minute before. I guess I was in no way armoured up in that moment and so the genuine reaction just came. It felt really freeing that Anita had brought the subject up and given the little parts (and all the others) space to feel whatever was there in that moment – especially in the safety of being physically cuddled.

I have been so used to pretending I am ok about breaks (with Em) and masking what I really felt, or at least downplaying it if it did come out, that having the reality of how I actually might feel acknowledged by Anita let me be exactly how it was in the moment. It’s ok to feel sad and to cry about this stuff because it feels huge to parts of me.

I had felt moments of really deep sadness and longing when I was away on the previous Friday (missing my session), not enough to not enjoy myself, but when I was sitting down alone waiting for my wife and kids I felt a real ache in my chest that I wasn’t able to be in the room that morning. I text Anita a GIF to say I missed her, and amazingly we both sent each other a message at the same time.

It felt really lovely, to see that she was thinking of me and reaching out, not just responding to a message I’d sent. It felt connecting. I think so often we worry that being out of sight means being out of mind, but here, again, was Anita demonstrating not only that she does exist outside the room but that I am thought about occasionally, too. Those moments go such a long way in showing my system how things can be in a relationship. How I am not a burden, or unwanted, or too much etc.

So that Monday was our first session back…but there were only two sessions between the breaks and it felt really crappy. Anita went on, “I just want to reassure you that it will be ok. I know that’s not always easy to believe.”

I sniffed and my tears kept coming. Anita gently rubbed my back and held me close to her. I felt so sad. Like in that moment, all the feelings of how it was when I was small and my mum going away time and again just came flooding up and out. Part of me wanted to tell her I didn’t want her to leave me, but I guess those are really the words I swallowed so many times over the years as a kid that I needed my mum to hear. Watching her disappear on a train week in week out for years really has taken its toll on me and here it was playing out again.

Anita reassured me, “It will be ok. I promise. It will.”

I so badly wanted to believe her and clung on tightly to her. There would have been a time where an angry teen part would have shouted something internally, like “Fuck off! What do you know? You fuckers always leave. You don’t care! And I’m left here trying to hold it together through the shit storm.” But the teen was silent – or rather, she wasn’t even there. Instead, I just allowed myself to sink into the immediate moment of safety, connection, and reassurance rather than fight against it.

I guess, when it’s like that I am trying to absorb as much ‘the good stuff’ as I can so that this week, when things start to wobble, I can remember how it feels to be connected and held. And it is working. When I feel distressed or upset, I can now call to mind all the times that I have been safe and held by Anita. I don’t have to try and imagine what it might be like to get what I need because I know it, now. I have experienced it.

I used to find it so difficult when Em would say things like, “that young part of you wants to be held. Can you imagine what it would be like for that part to get what it needs?” It always felt so rejecting when she was sitting right there and yet a million miles away. I’ve said before that it felt like having my nose pressed up against the window of a sweet shop and the owner saying, “you can’t have any of what’s in here, but try and imagine what it would be like to taste this stuff.” It felt so rejecting and cruel.

I knew what I needed, she knew what I needed, but I couldn’t get it. I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to be held and the longing for it felt so fucking painful.  Em wanted me to take my young parts and hold them but I didn’t know how to do that for myself because I had never experienced being held. She used to say things like, “you do it for your kids so you can do it for yourself” again it felt so alienating and so distancing. Fuck.

Thankfully, now, I have experienced enough actual holding with Anita that when it feels bad, I can take myself to a place where I can go some way towards soothing that little part that needs cuddling. However, my visualisation doesn’t involve adult me holding that young part, it’s remembering how it ACTUALLY feels to be held by Anita. That’s what helps me. It is self-soothing, but I can only do it because I have a built-in reference point now. I can tap into that place and part that knows what it feels like to feel safe, and cared for, and held.

Asking someone to imagine being held when they have never ever had that is like trying to get someone to bring the smell of the sea to mind when they’ve never been there and only ever experienced the city. It’s impossible. It’s frustrating. And it makes you feel like you’re stupid for not being able to do something really simple… but it’s not simple when you haven’t got a basis to work on.

So, there I was in the moment with A, absorbing all the love and care I could. I’d stopped crying and was feeling settled and calm. I glanced up at the clock and noticed it was coming to the end of the session. Adult me had spoken a lot about my trip away but it wasn’t until the end that the important stuff (for the young parts) came. A little part of me whispered, “I missed you when I was away.”

With so much warmth in her voice, Anita replied, “I know. I missed you too. It felt very strange on Friday not seeing you. I’ll see you this Friday, though.” And then that was the end of the session, she gave me a big squeeze and kissed me on the head and I got up, put my shoes on, asked her if she would wash my elephant for me, (“of course”) and then we chatted about something random and adult.

We hugged again, at the door, as I left and I walked out feeling pretty good, but also knowing that it wasn’t going to be easy that week as there was only one session remaining before the break and that anticipation of A being away was sure to hit the various parts of me as the week progressed. I felt a bit clingy and A and I exchanged a few pictures, GIFs, and texts over the course of the week.

Thursday night was terrible, though. I was really looking forward to seeing Anita and felt quite ok in my mind, but my body had a completely different narrative going on. At about 8 o clock I’d just settled down from finishing work when I got the sensation of trembling throughout my body. I didn’t seem to be outwardly shaking but internally I was juddering. Sometimes I physically shake, and it looks like I am shivering, but it wasn’t like this that evening it was more subtle. I couldn’t seem to settle myself and eventually fell asleep but feeling really unsettled and not ok.

To add insult to injury my unconscious fired out a spectacular nightmare that culminated in me being attacked and then strangled by a family member (just wonderful!) and the last thing I remember was me trying to scream “help me!” over and over again but no sounds coming out until I woke up crying and shaking. I felt like I couldn’t breathe and the feeling of pressure in my neck was intense.

I text Anita that morning to give her the heads up about how bad things felt. And she replied with a lovely warm, holding message telling me that she was really looking forward to seeing me and sending hugs and love – but part of me was disappointed that we frequently do 75 minute sessions when we’ve had breaks or breaks are coming  (we’d done that on the Monday) but that day we weren’t when I really felt like I needed it and so whilst the message was really perfect at least part of me felt like she didn’t see how much I was struggling.

I arrived at my session at 10am, our storybooks were on the side next to my elephant and something else that I couldn’t quite see. I sat down. Anita said, “I thought we were starting at 9:45 today and doing longer?” I cannot explain how gutted I was when she said that. She had thought we were starting early which is obviously why she hadn’t asked if I wanted to start earlier in her text that morning. Ugh. Fuck. So, I said that I didn’t think we had agreed that – but had for Monday and never mind, but the little parts were wailing that they could have had another 15 minutes that day and hadn’t.

Anita could see immediately that I was really not ok. I knew I felt off after the nightmare but thought I was just about hanging it together with my rubber bands and chewing gum. Anita asked me straight away if I wanted a hug. I nodded and sort of collapsed into her arms. “I can feel you’re shaking” she said. I hadn’t been aware of that, or at least it felt similar to how it had been during the night, I didn’t realise it could actually be felt by someone else.

As I lay still, I became really aware of how badly I was trembling. It must’ve taken a good thirty minutes for my body to stop shaking and for everything to regulate. Anita and I didn’t really talk much until I got my system and breathing settled. Once things levelled out and I felt normal again we chatted about all kinds of stuff, but I wasn’t able to before then. I wasn’t in my window of tolerance.

I am so grateful to have a therapist like Anita. So much of my wounding is early, preverbal, trauma and so the touch and the holding does such a lot to soothe and calm that terrified, traumatised part of me. Once I am in my window of tolerance, I am good to go but it can take a while to get there and I really need that connection with Anita, the coregulation to get me to a place to do the work.

I spent the entire session cuddled into A. She asked me if I wanted a story about fifteen minutes from the end but I said no, I didn’t want to have to move from where I was in order to have a story. Anita then said to me that she’d got me “a little friend” to go with my elephant and that she’d washed it alongside him, so it smelled the same.

Did I ever mention that I absolutely love this woman?

Again, it’s these sort of things that really do so much for my young parts. She’s not in the least bit weirded out that I ask her to wash a soft toy for me before breaks so that it smells like her, and I can have that whilst she’s gone. At the end of the session, she gave me a bag and inside it was a little soft toy rabbit. “I saw this and thought of you”, she said. I wanted to cry because it was so thoughtful and relevant to our relationship.

Anita and I have this thing where I call her my rabbit. I gave her the storybook, ‘The Rabbit Listened’ for our first therapy-anniversary last January because I really related to the fact that through everything this rabbit stayed alongside the boy and never went away and heard and helped him through all his emotions. She reads this book to me a lot when we have stories.

Anita sometimes refers to herself as the rabbit so the fact that she’d bought me a soft toy rabbit as a transitional object for the young parts felt really lovely. Really, really, lovely actually.

I felt sad leaving the session knowing it would be a while until I saw A again, but at least I was as well-equipped as I could possibly be going into it. I decided I wouldn’t text her over the break, or at least try not to.

So, on Sunday evening I was so delighted when I got message from A with three pictures of the landscape of where she was that day – and again, I thought how really lucky I am to have a therapist who really gets how attachment wounding can play out and what is needed to try and repair that for the young parts. I sent her some pictures back of where I’d been that day and felt good for having checked in.

I miss A, a lot, but I feel safe in the knowledge that she is out there, that she cares, and that she will be back on Monday evening. She’ll not be back in time for our Monday morning session so she scheduled me in a late appointment so I don’t have to wait even longer to see her. I know I say it all the time, but what a massive contrast to what I used to get with Em.