Well, where do I even begin?

I’ve been in total survival mode this last month and been barely functional. The levels of stress, or should I say ‘distress’, have been off the chart and I feel like I have been pushed way beyond my limits of coping. January into early February is never easy. It is the anniversary of that bloody awful time ending with Em over the “tick” reference which hurts so much…but it’s also the anniversary of meeting Anita – which now also hurts ridiculous amounts because somehow or other we don’t exist anymore. We never got a proper goodbye and I am left holding such a lot around that end – or lack of one. So, essentially this time of year now just seems to bring into sharp focus feelings of loss…but also abandonment and rejection and shame and … the list goes on. It’s heavy and I feel so deflated and worthless.

So, really, there’s enough going on in my internal world without any complications in my external world. But of course … my life doesn’t really do ‘giving me a break’ and sadly, one of my superpowers (although it certainly doesn’t feel like it) is knowing when the shit is about to hit the fan. I guess years of trauma make you so hypervigilant that you recognise patterns and energy feeling ‘off’ and are alert to stuff no one else would even notice. People tell me I have a sixth sense and honestly, as much as I try not to listen to my ‘inner doom catastrophiser’ when it starts telling me things are bad, it’s never wrong…ever…especially in regard to work and finances.

I said a while back that I felt like things were unstable with my wife’s job and that I felt like all I could do was wait for the shit to hit the fan and then deal with it when it did. Well, the shit did hit the fan. Big time. Four weeks ago she came home in the middle of the day and that was that. Job done. It’s shocking. The industry she is in is so cut-throat but also really fucking toxic- at least in the private sector. And so you can imagine how that landed. The car crash stuff had knocked me for six, the financial hit on the insurance payout has meant we haven’t been able to replace the car, and now the main breadwinner is out of work.

I have been completely beside myself with panic and then when it all gets too much I just dissociate. I have such a brilliant autopilot that’s been so well-honed over the years that somehow or other I have got through the last month and I have really little idea about what has happened.

The gnawing ache in my stomach has been there – I know that. My inner mini bus of child parts is totally out of control and screaming. My anxiety is through the roof. My fear about being ‘too much’ and then being rejected by Elle is huge – but that’s not surprising given the anniversaries on top of all the instability of my everyday life…

I didn’t know what to do with myself the day my wife lost her job. My immediate reaction in my body was insane- I started physically trembling and my teeth started chattering like I was shivering. Total panic and overwhelm. I sent Elle a message telling her what had happened and that whilst I needed to see her (we had scheduled in a Friday session that week in person) and would come on Friday, that I would have to figure things out going forward because… well…money…or lack thereof.

She replied with a really kind message and said we’d figure out a plan on together and she’d bring snacks… because that’s what I usually do. In the summer it was so hot that I started bringing in ice in a flask and something cold for us to drink – and that has been really lovely as it’s certainly not been coffee weather. And then sometimes I would bring in biscuits or a pastry or something.

But lately, because food and intake have been a bit of a thing for the last few months ☹ I have recently taken to bringing lunch for us both to my sessions and we pick our way through it with the drink. Our sessions are 90+ minutes in the middle of the day and so it’s good to eat otherwise one or other of us tends to start getting the stomach growls about half way through and it’s really funny!  

Elle doesn’t explicitly know the extent of the eating issue that has reared its head is the reason why I have been bringing actual lunch rather than just a drink or biscuits for the last month or so – but I did mention a while back that my body had been missing cues for eating and drinking…which is so often how this stuff starts off. It’s unconscious…until it isn’t. I have been here before…and I hate that this is so familiar. And I also sent her a link to something on Instagram about a slide back into eating disordered behaviours…so I’m trying really hard not to hide what’s happening – or tell her as much as I feel able – because that critical voice thrives in the dark and silence of shame.

So, being with Elle, in the safety of the room feels like a place where I can really consciously look after myself…or hold myself to account maybe. I don’t want to anorexia to take hold again. I so thought it was long gone…or…very very dormant…and it was…until life got too much…

Anyway, I got myself super worked up waiting to go see Elle…because the very thing I most feared and wrote about a few months back was about to play out:

At the end of the day my relationship with Elle is a paid for relationship. Without money we do not/cannot exist. And that is reality to swallow. Because whilst we, as clients, have money to pay our therapists we can keep up the masquerade that the relationship is ‘real enough’ to do the healing work we need and that we are safe and not going to be left (ahem!!).

Facing this reality at a time when more-than-ever I needed the therapy killed me. Like I seem to be losing so much at the moment – financial security is so important without it there is no physical security because what about the basics like paying the bills and keeping a roof over my head…if we’re not even able to manage the bottom couple of rungs of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs what hope is there?

I (and all my little parts) felt so sad going to see Elle that Friday morning because how would be say goodbye…even it was only temporary? Even though adult me completely gets the situation the young parts were already bracing for abandonment and rejection – because to them Elle is their attachment figure and whilst a pause in the therapy isn’t her abandoning me…that’s how it would feel. They don’t understand it’s a therapeutic relationship.

As it was, I ran into Elle in the street about ten minutes before the session – and you know how you read the things about ‘what happens if you see your therapist in the street’ and there’s the general idea that they’ll ignore you unless you acknowledge them. Yeah, no. I saw Elle, and she saw me, and she smiled and opened her arms up and gave me a big hug, kissed me on the cheek, and told me she’d see me in a minute, that she’d get the heat on, and to go and get my coffee.

So that’s what I did.

I’ve never run into Elle in ‘the wild’ before and I’ve often wondered how I would feel or respond if I saw her in ‘real life’ – and actually it was nice. I think I would have felt really upset if she’d pretended not to see me, or been stiff or awkward with me. Instead, it was just like how we are inside the room…which is actually what I needed. I need to feel like whatever it is that we have is real and not just some weird construct that happens in that space and then ceases to exist beyond that.

When I arrived, Elle had breakfast pastries for us both and she pulled me into a big hug and I leaned into her body and just rested in the warmth and safety in that moment. Part of me felt completely devastated that the person I have allowed to get so close to me and have worked so hard at trusting with ‘all the things’ was going to disappear, though. It felt like grief. Well…it was grief.

However, Elle told me almost immediately that she wanted me to keep coming to my session because I need them – now more than ever – and that I didn’t have to pay her. I was in total shock and told her that I couldn’t do that…because … shame…

I hadn’t realised how big a deal money shame is until recently, but the idea of not being able to pay for something that has a financial cost attached to it is ouch for me. I guess I have put a lot of sense of my own worth and value on my income and the moment that was gone it felt like my value was gone.

I’ve realised that my love language wish list items in terms of what I want to receive (with Elle) are ‘quality time’, ‘words of affirmation’, and ‘physical touch’ which are different to my needs in my marriage which primarily is ‘acts of service’. However, I realise that the way I show Elle I love her is through gift giving because I can’t really do any of the others in therapy. I mean we touch (thank god for that!) but I know that the hugs are really more for me and I am not there to give her words of affirmation etc…because…it’s my session. So apart from telling her here and there how I feel about her, and how grateful I am to her and for her, the way I express my love and respect and value for her is through turning up, paying on time and bringing little gifts – i.e snacks, or things I find here and there that I know she’d like…or at Christmas, a stocking full of meaningful things…which I think was something else entirely when I think about it!

I am sure it’s a C-PTSD thing, but when you’ve been deprived of love and care and all the necessary things to thrive, I think the moment we get even a sense of something good we want to cling onto it…for fear it will slip through our fingers like sand or water. On a level, I get that Elle likes me, loves me even, but there’s a part of me that doesn’t truly believe that I am ‘enough’ just as I am, and that in some way I don’t need to earn her love and care.

As a kid I made myself useful, I was a mini-therapist anticipating the needs of my family and listening to things that were way above my age and pay grade. But I was also quiet, well-behaved, excelled at school…like I moulded myself into exactly what I thought was required of me. It was like a text book ‘do this, this, this, and this and you’ll be ok/loved’ … only bending and shapeshifting to fit what I thought other people wanted never really worked. It was just exhausting and the long-term impact of that has been that it’s taken me a really long time to realise that I can just be myself…and that’s ok and enough. (Well most of the time I can believe that…)

So anyway, losing my ability to pay for our time together felt to me like I would have lost all my value in Elle’s eyes. She is running a business after all. And if I can’t even afford a reduced fee then I would have to go…because … well that’s the deal isn’t it?

Only apparently it isn’t.

I almost couldn’t take in Elle’s kindness or believe it in that moment – and so I didn’t talk about it – and Elle didn’t push it. She knows that I sometimes struggle to find a place to put her kindness and love. It doesn’t bounce off me, exactly, but it doesn’t sink in straight away either. And I can feel overwhelmed by expressions of love and kindness…and seem to shut down or be standoffish or maybe plain ungrateful…but it’s not that…and Elle understands all of that, thank goodness.

I was determined that I was going to make the most of the session with her and told Elle some stuff that I hadn’t shared with her before about my mum. It felt really connecting because it was painful stuff but I hadn’t realised before then that she didn’t know any of it…oh the joys of having had two other long-term therapists and having to recount the story more than once! That’s when she told me, “If there was a Nobel prize for cuntery, they’d give it to your mother!” This felt really validating as so often I convince myself that I am just being oversensitive and maybe things weren’t that bad. Elle assures me that they totally were that bad.

So, we spoke about all sorts that session, and I told her about my financial stresses too – which felt embarrassing but honest as I have never spoken about money before – or the endless stress and juggling act that my life seems to be with bills and servicing debt and life stuff.

Elle brought the session explicitly back round to us and the therapy about fifteen minutes before the end of the session. She told me that she wanted to see me and that she would continue to see me free of charge until things worked out and that when they did, I could go onto her concessionary rate. Which was so kind of her. Like being in the absolute depths in so many ways right now but knowing Elle is still in my corner is literally all that is keeping me afloat.

My change in circumstances has meant a reduction in contact time. We now do one-hour sessions which are really one hour fifteen, instead of ninety minutes which was always more like one hour forty-five, and we’re not doing the thirty-minute call on Fridays – but the fact that I am getting to see Elle at all is incredible to me. Like I honestly don’t know what to do with that. I feel overwhelmed with gratitude…

And I am finding it hard.

What?

Yeah. I am finding it hard, too.

I am finding it hard not to second guess the situation now because of my hang-ups around money and my worth. Part of me feels like I can’t bring some of what I am experiencing to her right now because it’s too much ‘hard work’ and if Elle is seeing me for free then somehow, I need to be as ‘easy’ as possible. I don’t want to burn her out, or be ‘too much’ or for her to start resenting me.

It’s all my textbook stuff coming up.

I’m trying to navigate what is an acceptable level of contact outside the sessions. When we were essentially seeing each other two hours, or more, a week, it felt like I could email her and tell her stuff and that was ok. But now… how can I possibly take up any more of her time when she is already giving me so much? So it’s tricky.

And of course, there’s another bit that is struggling with the change to our sessions. The young parts of me that need a high level of containment don’t have that now. And, please, do not for one minute see that as me moaning or being entitled or any of that. Adult me is fucking blown away with what Elle is doing for me…but this is the child parts and they don’t understand why they can’t speak to Elle on a Friday or see her in person on a Friday for a longer session a couple of times a month.

Any change in routine is hard and this is hard.

I feel like my needy parts are beginning to freak out a bit… a lot. I am having dreams about being abandoned and rejected and all that fun stuff. My system keeps wondering if Elle and I are ok still. Part of me wants to reach out and ask and seek reassurance from her but another part feels foolish and again, doesn’t want to create some kind of resentment and …you know…the dreaded ‘r’ word. I do not need a rupture right now. So the little girl that keeps quiet and behaves is doing her thing.

So, yeah, it’s a lot right now.

But I am so lucky to have Elle still…and maybe after I come out the other side of this financial catastrophe (because things have to get better soon, right?!) I’ll be able to tell her all about it. For now, my friend the Critic is doing her level best to keep me safe, and I guess I have to thank her for that. She understands danger and she steps up in the only way she knows: to take control when things are out of control.

I am so glad I have therapy tomorrow…these weeks are loooooong…and wasn’t January like eleventy-billion days long anyway?!

x