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An Updated Website Full Of LIES And Glowing Testimonials, Triggers RB’s Rage As Well As A Significant Wobble!

rubberbandsandchewinggum17 Comments

Can I start yet another blog post with, ‘well fuck’? Because WELL, FUCK!… FUCK ME!… You just can’t make this shit up. I’d love to say that this blog was a fictionalised version of an imagined experience of therapy with serious levels of embellishment to make it all the more appealing to the reader…but it’s not. It’s just the sodding truth of what ‘therapy’ can look like and an insight into how some therapists ‘work’ and the untold damage that they can do. *Not Elle, she’s great (thank goodness).

At this point I feel like Anita is the equivalent of a drunk driver in charge of an ambulance. She’s ‘driving’ whilst on her phone or half-asleep, not paying attention, and is veering all over the shop. The rear doors keep opening and closing at intervals and people keep tumbling out onto the road, sustaining further injuries, but she doesn’t care or even notice. Instead, she continues speeding along the road totally oblivious to the carnage she’s left in her wake, believing all the while that she’s doing a sterling job.

There’s a reason that paramedics work in teams (for the safety of the patient!), but Anita is seemingly operating as a one-man band and her co-pilot is actually a magic fairy that lives up in the Shetland Isles! I imagine her co-pilot fairy has little idea what kind of driver Anita actually is because for all intents and purposes she appears to have a clean license. “I’ve never had an accident” she’d say and I’m sure the co-pilot would take Anita at her word because why would you doubt someone that waxes lyrical about the importance of ethical behaviour and safe driving?

There are quite a few bodies lying injured in the road now, though… it’s not just me, apparently, because it turns out other ‘paramedics’ are picking up the pieces of Anita’s mistakes, and talking to each other. Anita is getting a bit of reputation in our area which is both validating and absolutely fucking terrifying…because even though people know what she’s doing/done there seems to be no effective mechanism to deal with these rogue paramedics unless the injured person goes through the long and arduous act of reporting to the governing body that actually seems to be completely on the side of the paramedic and dismisses the injuries of the patient – maybe even suggesting that they threw themselves out the ambulance on purpose and are overplaying their injuries.

It might be different if all the injured patients could get together and take on a class action but sadly, none of us know who each other are, and this is why these people like Anita (and all the other people you guys tell me about) keep getting away with what they are doing.

Ok let’s stop with this metaphor shall we?

We all know she’s not a paramedic (thank god, can you even imagine that?!) but it seems that Anita is now getting a name in therapist circles.

She’s hurt a lot of people.

It’s shit.

Fuck her.

Still, I am not here to talk about that because I don’t know them, but I do feel for them…because I know what she’s done to me and how much damage it’s done and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

I’ve been thrown through a few loops again this last month or so with all this ‘stuff’, ‘shit’, ‘disaster bollocks’…but the good thing is I am, at least, safely supported by Elle. She is helping me loads. We’re bandaging the wounds and waiting for the broken bones to heal and gently sitting with it all. Elle’s really looking after me and when I am not triggered out my brain I can see it so clearly. I feel really lucky that I have someone like her to help me manage whatever fallout there is with Anita and I feel like the steady work we’ve been putting in over the last year, or so, is really starting to pay off now. It’s been slow-going on my part but I’ve needed that time to build trust and safety with Elle – it couldn’t have been rushed.

Anita can’t do me too much damage now, the worst has already happened, but there is lots of processing to be done. Our sparse interactions pretty much always feel upsetting in some way, but it’ll be over soon because there is movement with it all (finally!)…I am just mad that this ‘end but not’ hash-up as dragged out for as long as it has. I wish that when we hit the three-month mark back in September 2023, she’d have met with me as we had agreed, to end properly, rather than saying she wasn’t “in a good enough place”.

Chasing her on and off for the next six months and being fobbed off or totally ignored until I mentioned bringing in her supervisor or a colleague made things much harder than it needed to be. It’s been such a long, drawn-out process simply trying to get her to even agree to meet with me that it’s felt exhausting and upsetting and it should never have been this way. Like terminating is bad enough but ending without a proper end is awful! Surely, this isn’t how you treat a long-term trauma client that you’ve been seeing twice a week for three-and-a-half years…? But apparently you do if you’re Anita…and sadly, it looks like I am not the only one who’s suffered her…what’s the word?… Carelessness?

The whole thing sort of ebbs and flows so far as my coping goes around this stuff. It’s been a fucking mess these last few weeks again, and it’s totally impacted how I have experienced my relationship with Elle outside the sessions. I have been so anxious and fearful — and it’s ALL because of Anita and nothing to do with Elle at all…and I can completely see that now.

It’s nice to be writing from a reasonably calm place today rather than from deep in the hole or spiralling through anxiety like my last post. It’s Friday today, and I haven’t yet hit the panic of ‘disappearing Elle’ … at the moment she still exists in my mind, I just miss her a bit. She reminded me on Tuesday (a huge erecting of scaffold around me and shoring up my foundations sort of a session) that the bracelet she gave me that I wear all the time is “evidence” that she “exists” and I can literally see that…and Monty, too, like I just need to use my eyes sometimes. We all know it’s not quite as simple as that, though, don’t we?!

https://www.instagram.com/montys_awesome_adventures?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==

It’s been hard being really massively triggered lately, and I feel really sad that my brain (Brian) hasn’t been able to differentiate between real life threats from Elle (there aren’t any), and the fears that feel massive but are not rooted in the here and now about Elle hurting me in some way. I am terrified of being abandoned and rejected and it’s because all the feelings of being abandoned and rejected have been reactivated by my recent interactions with A – like I say none of this is anything to do with Elle.

So, what’s caused the utter chaos in my system this time? – You know, aside from my being fucking mental?!

Well, turns out I really don’t do well with the feeling I am being lied to.

You might remember I had my own health stuff going on earlier in the year just as I had been in the process of trying to negotiate a meeting to end (remember Anita’s ‘walk and talk’ suggestion?!) but as it happened, I got shoved onto the rapid pathway referral for cancer investigations (all clear – phew!) and had all the blood tests and hospital stuff to do instead, so told her I’d be in touch to arrange to meet once things were more settled and my work had settled down after the crazy exam period in May/June. Then of course my son got very very sick and has been basically in and out of hospital since May and that has been an enormous amount to hold and cope with.

The summer just evaporated into medical appointments and caring for my little boy and then somehow, I found myself in mid-September, term had started again, and I realised that I still hadn’t got in touch with Anita to end but also realised that I was in no place to deal with her/us/this with so much stress in my daily life. I would have to be feeling pretty robust to see her and also have a degree of confidence that she wouldn’t make a total balls-up of any meeting which would actually set me further back.

I’m now basically 90% sure that I am just going to arrange to get my stuff back and not bother with a meeting at all because I have zero faith that she can end in a way that honours the work we did or our relationship but it’s taken this last few weeks of shit and also talking with Elle for that to really crystallise…so how did I get here?…

On the 15th September I sent Anita a message to say that I had been going through a lot of shit over the summer in one way or another and didn’t feel like I was able to meet with her just yet -this is the last bit of it:

None of this is really important but it’s just that I don’t really know what to do with meeting and getting my stuff back from you because I don’t feel like I have much capacity to hurt any more right now and actually that’s all there is. I feel so sad that all that we worked on over the years has been reduced to a sick feeling and another rejection added to the pile.

Like literally everywhere I look, it’s abandonment and rejection or just fucking horror and I think seeing you will only compound that right now. So, I don’t know what to do really. I feel like something has to shift because it feels like limbo and it’s painful but I am out of ideas on how not to make this feel any worse than it already does.

She replied a couple of days later with another of her stock feigning personal but actually pretty blank replies:

O my goodness, I am so sorry to read your message. I really do understand and will wait to hear from you to decide what would be the best way for you. Thinking of you with love and care, Anita x

When it came in, I didn’t really have much of a response internally. It is what it is. More of the same. I didn’t reply. What was the point?

So, lord knows what got into me on the 27th but I decided to check out her website – you know as an act of active self-harm it would seem.

Anita’s website hadn’t changed at all in the entire time I was working with her (since 2020) and low and behold it’s just undergone a MASSIVE overhaul. This would make sense seeing as she’s changed how she’s working wouldn’t it? It would make sense to update and remove any mention long-term work, or trauma work, or face-to-face sessions if you have stopped with long-term and complex clients, and are moving your practice online…so of course she’d need to do that, I’d say it’s well overdue 16 months after she dumped her long-term trauma clients.

Only this isn’t what’s happened to her site at all.

I suspect you might already have joined those dots and noticed a hint of sarcasm.

So, what’s the site like then?

Well, there’s lots of new/additional pictures of her looking really smiley and happy. There’s a fuck tonne more ‘glowing’ testimonials (I could fucking puke!). There’s an updated listings around her work etc. But absolutely no mention of her plan to move to online sessions only or the fact she won’t do long-term work or work with trauma anymore – in fact it’s the complete opposite.

I’d love to type up some of it here verbatim, but I know that could be searched in Google and despite everything I won’t compromise Anita’s confidentiality even though it is sorely tempting to at times.

To summarise, she waxed lyrical about being a member of the BACP governing body in the UK, her commitment to creating a “safe environment” and the importance of ethical working (warning clients about a local therapy organisation that has therapists practising who have been struck off from BACP). She mentions her ability to be flexible with appointments both face to face and online, even at weekends, as well as working on an “open-ended basis”. She then explained how “passionate” she is about her work and her commitment to providing a safe and caring space…

Ha!

It was particularly galling to see listed among the issues she works with:

  • Past and childhood issues
  • Abuse past or present
  • Post-traumatic stress disorder

Perhaps the most hard to swallow thing was a quote by Jung:

Know all the theories,

master all the techniques,

but as you touch a human soul,

be just another human soul.

Is she fucking serious?!

I swear at this point I was incandescent with rage.

The only soul Anita is right now is an arsehole.

Too much?

I told you I was mad!!

I basically lost my shit, and fortunately a good friend of mine who knows all about this saga was there to let me rant on Whatsapp. It was a lot! A useful bonus to this ‘unravel at speed’ and ‘rage’ was that it was all there ready to be screenshot!

Despite the big feelings and the embarrassment I felt about it (not with my friend, she totally gets it) we decided that it might be a good idea to let Elle see what I had written and how I had felt because it gave a really good ‘real time’ insight into what I was feeling and was a really good springboard into starting the conversations Elle and I have been having lately which have started to really metabolise this stuff.

Of course, reading Anita’s website made me feel so angry but also just really let down. Because all this time I have been patiently waiting for her to be ‘well enough’ to see me to end and then here she is with the time and energy to go into massive personal promotion, extolling how much she enjoys her work and what a privilege it is…and here I am in the fucking black pit of doom, battered and bruised.

So, well, umm, I decided to reply to her message:

I think the problem is there is no best way because however you look at it, this is not what I wanted or ever imagined would happen. All the years of work just feel like a joke and the words of love and care mean nothing because I don’t get how if you actually loved or cared about me we’d have ended up here.

The fallout and damage that’s been done is enormous and that’s especially the case because you didn’t just stop working because you were sick you stopped working with me and continued on with others. Even if I sometimes can get my head around needing to end so you could have space to recover, I’ll never recover from how big an abandonment and rejection this has been.

I’ve never been so emotionally upset for such a protracted period of time and it’s made me really ill. I’ll work through it but it’s been utterly awful and completely impacted my ability to trust in anyone but especially my therapist because I’m just waiting for the same to happen with her.

I know this is a big rant and I’m sorry. I just can’t believe that we ended up here.

I obviously didn’t mention her website or anything like that – there was no point- but after having been such a ‘good girl’ for so long I just felt like I had to say something. Because I feel like she’s pretty much washed her hands clean and feels like we are ok now – and we just aren’t.

I didn’t expect a reply. Anita has a habit of burying her head in the sand when I bring up anything remotely challenging.

And ten days went by and there was no response. Not that it really asks for a response. If there was going to be one it would have been nice to hear something like:

I know that our ending has really hurt you and I understand how much pain this has caused and I am sorry. I never would have wanted this for you but I accept that I have hurt you in a way that has tapped into your original wounding and I know that this is incredibly painful. I would like for us to come together and spend a proper period of time working this out so that we can move on from this with a degree of repair and get some proper closure. I have been thinking we could meet in my office for 1-3 sessions to enable us to properly tie our therapy up and to give you the space to collect your things. I know that this won’t be easy for either of us, but I want to honour the work and relationship we had, too, and feel in a place to be able to do that now. I know that this is not what you wanted and I understand that this we need to take this gently.

I mean that’d be hard but fine…

So, this is what came in last week just before my session with Elle literally a week and a half later:

I know it’s hard to believe but my life has not gone the way I planned. My practice has completely changed and, yes, I am still working as I can’t afford not to. I am in the process of moving to online only, and I don’t work with complex trauma anymore. I am unable to give my clients myself as much as that work requires and I can feel the protection of myself as a survival mechanism is very much there because it needs to be, whether I want it or not. My website is still the same as it gives me a platform to inform clients about the lack of regulation and [therapy practice] in an effort to try to keep clients safe even if it’s a very small way. So yes, I am still working but not in a way that you feel I am and I had to end with the deep emotional connecting work as I just can’t do it anymore.

This message came in a 4:50pm and I immediately sent it to Elle. When we were talking about it in our session this week, she said it had the feel of a 2am WhatsApp message not something written in the working day because it seems so defensive. I laughed. Defensive and reactive!…and yet again nothing at all to do with my experience of what’s happened.

I think it’s interesting that she made reference to her website, though – because as I say, I never have. I wonder if she was aware that it’s changed and that I may have seen it. But why lie about it? It’s not the same. It’s updated and yet also inaccurate.

Imagine finding Anita’s website, contacting her, and her saying something like “I only have online availability at the moment” but thinking you’d start like that and then hopefully move over when she freed up space – only to discover she doesn’t, in fact, work face-to-face. Or thinking you’d go and see how things go but with a view to there being long-term work and you’ll eventually get to your childhood trauma and PTSD once you’ve addressed some immediately pressing relationship issues and work stress if it feels safe to go there and then finding out actually that’s a no go zone.

I don’t for one minute think she’d end with those clients. I actually think she’d just a fucking massive liar.

It’s hard reading her message because as much as it isn’t personal – it is . I am ‘Complex Trauma’ and apparently, it’s that (me) that is triggering her need to protect herself as a “survival mechanism”. I know she would be horrified to think I would read it in that way, but that’s basically what she’s saying. And ending with “deep emotional connecting work” isn’t an abstract concept. She ended with me. She abandoned me when we were right in the thick of the work because she just couldn’t do it. All the words of “It’s not what either of us want” and “I love you so much but I have to get well” feel utterly ridiculous don’t they?

Anyway, that’s why I have been a colossal wreck for a few weeks. Elle has been steady and available and actually really just helpful. We’ve looked at this stuff quite a bit and that’s huge given how much I have shied away from bringing it to session over the last year.

Having had a lot of space to turn this over in my brain with Elle, and seeing how much it’s all upset me, I have pretty much decided that I am going to ask to get my things back and leave it at that for now.

As much as I would love to go and meet Anita and really lay out how badly this has all affected me, I have absolutely zero confidence in her ability to hear that and not somehow throw it back in my face. I don’t need her reacting defensively. I need for her to be able to hold the space.

A while back Elle suggested getting another therapist to hold the meeting with us and act as a facilitator. I think this might be a good idea but I can’t see Anita ever agreeing to it.

So, the next plan that Elle and I are figuring out at the moment is finding a way to get my things back. Again, Elle has suggested using someone as an intermediary – so she wouldn’t meet her. I am wondering if she might be thinking the person that shares her office on the days she’s not using it. To be honest, Anita works over the road on a Thursday and she could just drop a box of stuff in to the hall/reception and it could be taken in at some point during the day if they knew it was coming. Still, this is something to think about…

Ooofff. This is long again… x

Mental Health Crash: Stuck In The Hole

rubberbandsandchewinggum10 Comments

Well, shit, I have been stuck deep down in the emotional black hole this last week (again). Tbh, I am always in the hole somewhere, it’s just distinguishing in which part of it and at what depth of it I am located. Sounds cryptic but it’s not really. You see my ‘hole’ (not a euphemism so stop that!) has a very particular quality to it– it’s like a bloody endless underground cave system these days rather than an open pit! Awesome. What a gift long-term and enduring mental health issues are!

I imagine a lot of people when they hit the skids with their mental health probably feel like they tumble and fall into a dark hole. These pits all look slightly different – we all have our own personal holes that come with our own specific and individual décor! It would make for a really great issue of an interior design/mental health magazine if people submitted plans and images of their nightmare hell zones wouldn’t it?…  

Anyway…

When we fall in, I guess it’s common to get stuck at the bottom for a bit, feel pretty hopeless and alone, and then try and scrabble our way back up and out to ground level when we feel able to – maybe with the help of someone else. Assistance can certainly expediate things but unfortunately a by-product of landing face first in the hole is that we often don’t believe there is anyone else who can see us or help us. And even if there is, there is a very real fear that we may inadvertently end up dragging that person into the hole with us, and if/when we do manage to get out together, they’ll leave/abandon us because they’ll be so horrified by what they witness in that hole alongside us. (It happens, sadly).

The hole is a bit like ‘Fight Club’. You do not talk about the hole. What happens in the hole stays in the hole. Because even though the hole itself is fucking terrifying enough on its own – how we behave in the hole can also be problematic. It can be a place where we fall into self-harming behaviours, self-neglect, and addiction to name but a few issues – and let’s keep that shit secret! Well, that’s what our shame would tell us, anyway.

We are not always our best-selves down in the hole – we’re simply trying to survive using whatever tools we have available to us in the moment and, honestly, even after years of therapy, my go-to self-care strategies often feel completely out of reach when I am suffering in the depths. It’s amazing how quickly I can slip into negative coping strategies just like a comfy pair of slippers…only, actually, these ones are full of thorns and hurt every time I move!

The goal, then, when you find yourself stuck in this cess pit of doom is to get the fuck out of the trench as quickly as you can. Of course, that’s much easier said than done. There can be a lot of slipping, sliding, and stumbling on the way back up because the way out isn’t easy and it’s fucking exhausting work trying to drag your dead weight back to relative normality.

I really feel like the struggle isn’t understood or appreciated enough, and I think sometimes people make the assumption that we must like being down in the hole, or that we are deliberately careless because we keep tumbling in and spend such a lot of time in there. It’s hard enough when friends and family might hint at this sort of thing but it’s especially awful and shaming when therapists comment on how “stuck” you are and that maybe you’re not trying hard enough to get out… FUCK OFF!! (I’d forgotten about this until now, and so that’s just given me the rage when I am already in a rage!!!)

Of course, if and when you successfully make it out the hole, it’s super important to try and be mindful going forward. I really try and scan the path ahead. I’m constantly trying to spot any future holes so that I can try sidestep them should any come into view – but we all know it isn’t that simple! My life has been riddled with concealed hole entrances and at times it can feel like an endless landscape of craters waiting for me rather than solid ground. It’s inevitable that I will, at intervals, be unlucky and end up in the dark…and actually, I have been consistently feeling my way through the dark for almost two years now and so it’s hard to imagine what it’s like not being in the hole.

So, what’s my hole like? (stop it!) Well, I suppose my hole isn’t really a hole at all, rather it’s a series of holes or dark rooms stacked on top of another linked by unseen trapdoors going deep into the depths of the earth. The further down we go, the spaces stop being dark rooms with manmade walls and instead become cold, dark, damp caves almost like prison cells buried deep into rock. I’ve spoken about falling through endless trapdoors before, and this analogy far better fits my experience of being in the dark depths for me than in a singular sticky shit hole.

So how do I end up in this place?

Imagine being at ground level, wandering along the street, minding your own business, living your day-to-day as best you can, occasionally getting your foot stuck in a puddle that actually turns out to be a pot hole, twisting your ankle, but generally maintaining momentum and keeping in touch with the world and people around you. You’re functional even if you have a bit of a limp. You can usually feel the sunlight on your skin – well, more likely it’s a dark and cloudy day, but you at least have sense that it is daytime – it’s ‘good enough’. Life above ground isn’t perfect by any means but it isn’t terrible, either.

Then imagine, unexpectedly, falling down an open hole – you know, like how pubs have cellar trapdoors outside in the street? Well, that first fall down into the dark is bloody shocking and painful and you want to scream “OUCH!” but generally it doesn’t take too long to assess the situation and start looking for a way out. You brush yourself off, check for any broken bones, and start shouting up to the world above “HELP ME!!!” because you can very clearly see the sky and the people walking along outside and you believe that there is a way out. You’re probably only 12 feet below ground at this point and a return to the world above is completely possible.

The problems really start to come when you repeatedly fall down the hole. Bones break. Bruises never quite seem to heal before you fall again. Fatigue kicks in from the endless effort of trying to escape. It gets harder and harder to crawl back out the more times you fall. At times it can feel completely pointless even trying as you know it’s only going to be a matter of time until you’re back in the dark and honestly, I feel like maybe I should just accept that the hole is where I actually belong and make the best of it.  

Sometimes, there’s a complicating factor – especially for those of us with childhood trauma and relational injuries. I can be doing absolutely everything right. I’m checking every step I take and can be wandering along quite happily and then some fucker (who I really trust) deliberately pushes me down into the hole and runs off! I mean that’s just fucking horrific.

That’s where I am now. Only, it’s worse than that because I wasn’t at ground level to begin with when I got pushed. I had Anita in a mid-level hole with me having worked our way up through quite a few levels after Em had done a fab job at leaving me for dead down in the depths in 2020. Anita was holding my hand and it felt like we were successfully navigating our way through the dark…and then she decided to leave me, but not just leave me on level -5 of the hole, she forcefully pushed me down through another trapdoor.

As I have fallen, I have kind of rolled and rolled and unfortunately found more and more trapdoors. I’ve passed the place where Em left me and have kept tumbling and tumbling. Surely, I must be pretty close to rock bottom now. There simply can’t be any more trapdoors to fall through, can there?

The saddest thing about all this is that it isn’t just adult me in the hole. I could cope with that. But there are all the child parts too – and they are so scared. Every single one of them is terrified of the dark and it is totally pitch black. There’s not even the tiniest bit of light where we are. It’s like their worst nightmares playing out in waking time and as much as I try, I don’t always have to ability to contain them all. No matter how I try to reassure them and say we are safe and that it will be ok, it just doesn’t land…because I am not sure I really believe that either, now.

To say that it’s really not nice in the cave/pit/hole would be a huge understatement. My brain can attack me/us with some pretty shit messages about being “a burden” and “unlovable” and “too much” or “not enough” – the list is literally fucking endless…! If you’re reading this, then you’ve probably been there. You know the drill. Basically, you’re stuck in the dark with a sound system that only plays your Inner Critic’s hit list on full volume and on repeat the whole time you’re down there.

Just glorious!

I mean who doesn’t love their deepest wounds and insecurities coming at them on loop? Who wouldn’t want to be told that “you’d be better off dead” or that “no one would miss you if you were gone” and that “even your ‘friends’ only tolerate you” or that “you’re disgusting” or “pathetic” or “worthless” or a “fraud” or that you “deserve this” and “what kind of loser can’t even pay someone to stay and care?”… and then of course throw in real life soundbites from people who have really hurt you, “you’re so sensitive and defensive”, “you’re too dependent”, “your child parts are adhesive like a tick” and … well… it’s not brilliant is it? I could go on and on and on but you all know your soundtrack and will be familiar with how hearing it makes you feel. I mean it is a total immersion in the shit and shame isn’t it?

The messages of doom and isolation have never really changed much since I first found myself in my dark place back in my early teens – perhaps the messages are more insistent and louder than they were initially, and the shape and dimensions of my hole (honestly, every time I type that I am giggling like a fourteen-year-old kid!) have definitely changed. As I say, these days it’s not just a hole or cellar – it’s a much more complex subterranean structure. It’s not a dark hole with a consistent depth and bottom – I’d take that any day of the week.

Despite how crap it is, I’ve come to accept that this multi-floored/roomed/cave system is just part of my internal landscape now. I know that I can’t avoid it, it can’t be filled – there is not enough concrete in the world for that! – all I can do is tread carefully and try my best to keep feet on solid ground if I do ever make up to ground level and I will continue to put things in place for the next fall.

When I am in the dark, feeling scared and really suffering like I am now, it’s really really important to try and remember that the Inner Critic is only trying to protect me. As loud and terrifying as it is, it really doesn’t want to harm me – it’s scared too, it just doesn’t know how best to express it. Perhaps there is a little bit of comfort in knowing that all my system is ever trying to do is look after me – it just has some pretty fucked up ways of doing it.

When it is awful, like it is now, I need to trust that it is always worth taking the chance on screaming and asking for help even if I believe that no one can hear me, because there are people who care and who do want to help…and have ladders and torches… I just need to let them know where I am rather than cowering silently in the dark.

Last week, before our session, I pre-warned Elle that I was in the hole and unravelling – which felt like a big thing to do. I needed to do that, though, because False Adult is so skilled at pretending that everything is ok and denies that there even is a hole (A ‘Fight Club’ hole pro!), let alone that we may be stuck in it. As I result of letting Elle know quite how bad it feels, I’ve been hit with some huge feelings of shame and panic. I feel like I’ve dragged her down into the hole and am terrified that she, too, will freak out and run off, but not before giving me a hearty push down through another trapdoor. She’s given me absolutely no sense that this would happen…but my brain can’t help but worry.

It’s really sad that I feel this way and it hurts a lot to know that my trust is so fragile. For now, Elle and I are just sitting together, waiting for some of the painful injuries to heal a bit before trying to make a plan to find our way out of this mess. It doesn’t feel quite so cold and scary with her sitting beside me and the dark doesn’t feel quite so overwhelming when I can physically feel her holding my hand. The problems happen when I lose contact for a bit (you know, like the six days between sessions!) and can’t immediately find her…it doesn’t take long for the Critic to get back in my head and the panic to take hold.

I will write a post about why things are particularly hard right now, next time. But needless to say, it involves Anita… bleurgh.

Sending love and light (candles, torches, flares!) down into your holes. Whatever your Inner Critic may have you believe, you are not alone and you are worthy of love and care. x

A Year With Elle – Now The Fun Really Begins!

rubberbandsandchewinggum9 Comments

Well, fuck, I’ve got so far behind with this blog and everything again that it’s hard to know where to begin – such a lot has been going on, in various ways, and part of me just wants to bring you up to date by saying ‘same shit different day’ and be done with it! The ‘same shit’ being my impressive ability to live as an emotional kangaroo and trying to navigate all the mess that goes with bouncing around like that.

Things are still an absolute colossal steaming pile of shite in my everyday adult life and the last month or so has really been all about survival and wading through the general bollocks that is my existence! My son is still sick, it’s back in the full flow of term and teaching, and then last week my estranged grandmother died so it’s felt a lot just to keep my head above water.

Of course, alongside this there’s all the stuff that hides beneath the surface that’s always pulling at my ankles dragging me down – namely the crazy mental health stuff, the attachment stuff, and trying to move through all the pain from, well, all of it really…

I imagine a lot of us feel like this, but I find I am way more capable of managing my inner world when the day-to-day stuff in my actual adult life isn’t going down the toilet. If daily ‘life stress’ picks up and reaches a critical point then it starts to get super bumpy on the inside. The safety features in my internal mini-bus seem to be a bit hit and miss, and would certainly fail a MOT, when the road gets lumpy and full of pot holes. Like sometimes all the seatbelts just unclip all at the same time and then I’m completely and utterly deep in the emotional shit.

Usually, if one or two parts of my system are in a panic I can just about hold their hands, keep them safe, and remain broadly functional…but if everyone is unstrapped – including the driver (me!) then…yikes. I mean big YIKES!

Some things never change, eh?!

I guess, there are some positives to be had … maybe? I feel, these days, when my system gets triggered, I am far more able to move through it and get out the other side of the worst of it in a ‘reasonable’ time frame…whereas, back in the day I could get stuck for weeks and weeks in the emotional hell zone and be totally hijacked by my system. Now, it’s a bit like doing the hokey cokey – and having one foot in then one foot out on repeat!

I’d like to say that I know myself so well these days that I don’t get upset or triggered by ridiculous things, but that would be a total fallacy. Small things can still act like a massive wrecking ball and send me sideways. I think it’s probably this kind of thing that I struggle with most-  knowing full well that whatever is upsetting me is tiny in the big scheme of things – but my system feels like it is enormous and runs off into catastrophe canyon. I still have an impressively speedy set of runners who bolt when things feel off.

Knowing my response is sometimes like that of a toddler having a big tantrum because they can’t get ice cream evokes feelings of shame and embarrassment but it is what it is and it is all information isn’t it? I suppose, now I am far more accepting of my system no matter how it is presenting in the moment. Like today I am really aware of the needy little ones who desperately want a cuddle and to connect with Elle…and that’s fine…just hard to feel because it’s so visceral.

So, where to begin with this catch up?

I guess I should mention the fact that Elle and I made it to a year working together back in August without any serious mishaps or ruptures (go us! … although it’s the three-year mark that things generally go to shit with my therapies so let’s watch and wait!) AND immediately after this birthday/anniversary we also got through another therapy break without me completely losing my shit (I only partially lost it – small triggers and big reactions again!).

I wish I was better at keeping up-to-date with the ins and outs of my sessions because the content of it all sort of melts away pretty quickly afterwards and then I can’t remember what happened when. I guess, this might be seen as a positive – like nothing really massive and disastrous is going on and my brain can let the sessions go rather than filing into my long-term memory bank alongside ‘like a tick’ and ‘too dependent’! However, it feels more like an unwanted amnesia tbh because I lose all sense of EVERYTHING.

Elle more or less falls out of my universe altogether when I can’t physically see her and it’s tough going. The object constancy stuff is just fucking dire. I feel sorry for Elle. I don’t imagine for one second that when she first met me, she would have thought the person she sees now was in there hidden away! I think at this point she must be wondering what the fuck is wrong with me. Like I leave a session, appear completely fine, and the next minute I am freaking out and texting her, asking her if we are ok or not. It’s horrible.

I hate that I need such a lot of reassurance…but I am not really surprised given how people (therapists!) go from being ‘ok’ to ‘not ok’ in the blink of an eye. As much as Elle gives me no reason to think she’d just fuck off one day without warning – my system doesn’t trust anymore after what’s happened to me, and because I am invested in the relationship and am attached to Elle now, all this crap has gone live… I hoped it wouldn’t but it has… with alarm bells on!

This round of therapy has my brain doing something that has never really happened too much before. I don’t know if it’s dissociation or what, but I find that not only do I forget the sessions and lose Elle to a degree – but even if I can hold onto the fact that she and I exist and have a relationship, I have zero recollection of the times when I have been really vulnerable/open/honest with Elle both in the room and outside it. So, I lose her, but I guess my brain thinks that she loses me too. It’s hard to explain this…

Like sometimes I’ll email her the unfiltered version of what’s going on in my brain and when I see her, I have no sense of that big stuff being in her field of vision at all. My brain likes me to think that she has only ever experienced the capable, together person …and that is SOOOO not the case!

I wonder if it’s a protective thing? My system somehow needs to feel in control and so hides the bits that make me feel exposed when I get to session? It’s frustrating, though, because I think I waste a lot of time edging my way closer to being how it really is underneath, tentatively peeking out from behind the sofa, and Elle already knows me and all this stuff. In the moment none of that is there, though.

Isn’t it amazing what our brains do to try and stop us from feeling unbearable feelings. I think I am so sensitive to rejection and abandonment that my system is doing all it can in person to prevent that happening and sadly, it must feel like the young parts of my system are a liability and need hiding away until we figure out what is happening on the day in the session.

I can’t lie, it is incredibly difficult doing therapy in the wake of what has happened with Em, Anita, and Hannah. I think my poor system was sent spiralling off into orbit last year. The string catastrophic fails in my therapeutic relationships on top of childhood trauma have done something terrible to my onboard circuitry. Elle and I are trying to do our therapy with a busted circuit board and wiring system and we’re desperately trying to rewire as we go but it’s a challenge. If we were just dealing with childhood trauma I think we’d be ok but things are so massively complicated by the shit that has happened with therapist…what shall we call it? Shithousery??!!

The problem is when lights should be green my system shines red…and the smoke alarm feature is constantly screaming because there’s a hair or cobweb over the sensor. I can’t differentiate between true danger and a malfunction now. Sometimes Elle feels like she’s a decent enough electrician and sometimes I worry she’s just another cowboy tradesperson (this isn’t because she’s done anything to suggest that though!) and I’m about to have my tentative renovation project demolished again.

Anyway, there have been some really lovely times with Elle – the problem is – I forget! So, instead of building on something great from week to week, I instead, seem to not notice that works have been carried out already. I seem to yo-yo between False Adult and days where my armour is off. Still, there have been quite a few ‘armour off’ days over the last couple of months and I guess these are important to recognise.

You might remember a while back I was brave and told Elle that I loved her in an email (!) which was a huge deal because I’ve been guarding my little broken heart very carefully this last year knowing that it doesn’t have much hope of withstanding very much more hurt and wounding. The problem is, I feel like the only way to really heal a broken heart is to let love in (and out) but if you’re always in hiding and armoured up how can you? I guess this is where my texts and emails have been doing some heavy lifting behind the scenes.

I’d been slowly gaining some momentum here and there in my sessions … you know, one step forward three steps back, four steps forward…and so on. But in one particular session I must’ve been feeling particularly safe and connected, or unguarded. I was cuddled into Elle’s body (I know I have said it SOOOOO many times over the years but physical touch sends a clear message to my system that things are safe – I don’t have to do any guesswork at all). and a very quiet, “I love you” crept out.

Fuck!

It’s one thing typing it into a screen and hitting send (and then wiping it from your consciousness and having several days until a session) and something altogether different saying it to someone when you are right there with them and being physically held by them. And even though parts of me know how Elle feels about me BECAUSE SHE’S TOLD ME ENOUGH TIMES in various ways, I nearly cried when she replied, “I love you too”.

Like…thank fuck. No rejection there. No bristling. No change in body language. No “I’m just your therapist”. It was all just really fine. Like yep, of course there is care between us – duh! I wish I could hold onto that better. Now that I have Monty I do have a constant reminder of Elle with me and that does help a bit, but there is a little part of me that fears that Elle will change how she feels towards me if she really ‘sees me’ and that is scary.

I think it was that session- I’d been in a bit of a state (although can’t remember why) and stuck in my own personal hell until I managed to ask for her to come sit with me and have hug. She’d been gently stroking my head and it was almost time to go when she asked me to give her my arm. She took the bracelet she was wearing off and tied it around my wrist. She said it needed to be on my left wrist as it was closest to my heart … honestly, it was such a lovely gesture and I wear it all the time (although in this picture Monty was wearing it as a necklace!).

https://www.instagram.com/montys_awesome_adventures?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==

So – I may have more evidence than ever that Elle is real and we are ok enough AND YET STILL I FUCKING HAVE TO ASK WHETHER OR NOT WE ARE OK!!! – but this is because people change (Anita) and one minute you’re safe with someone and they say they care about you and love you and the next they are completely gone.

I was quite excited about getting to a year with Elle because about a month beforehand I had stumbled across something I thought she would really like and was desperate to give it to her as a gift but it really was something that needed an occasion. I wouldn’t necessarily say that gift giving is one of my primary love languages but I think in this case it was a definite expression of love. I can’t really say what the thing was here because it is sooooo niche that it would be pretty identifying. She seemed to like it, though, if an excited “holy shit, you’re kidding me!” and “this might be the most impressive thing anyone has ever got me!” is anything to go by.

I think I have probably been so cagey this year that she couldn’t really miss that this was a huge expression of care and thanks. Like so much goes on in my head but I realise I’m like an iceberg and Elle only gets to see a bit of what I show her.

And then it was summer break.

Damn!

The break itself wasn’t desperately bad. I had a lot going on with my son and as much as I missed Elle, we did have some contact whilst she was away. The morning of our first session back I must’ve been on a roll with bravery because I had text Elle and asked her if she might spray Monty with her perfume when I saw her. I had pretty much figured out that that is what she had done when she gave him to me and so decided to ask. Elle didn’t bat an eyelid and at the end of our session sprayed Monty and me and that was that.

You’d think that would be proof enough that things were really ok between us and that the little parts were acknowledged and more than welcome too… but the age-old problem of physical distance had proximity cropped up the moment I saw her and it sent me spiralling.

Breaks are hard because they are a total severing of physical connection, so when I return to the room, I am looking for evidence of what might have changed or if things are still safe. Elle did nothing wrong by sitting in her chair (because that’s her fucking chair!) the first couple of sessions back – she, after all, at that point had no clue that I read so much into where she is in relation to me and how difficult I find it to ask for her to come closer to me – especially if there’s been a break. But for me, her being across the room and behind the coffee table sent the littles into a panic.

As a result, things in the bus were getting more and more dicey, seat belts were unclipped and the terrain was getting bumpy…and we were travelling much too fast. I think when I was leaving and hugged Elle at the end of the session (like always) I hung on for a reaalllly long time because I was devastated to have missed the chance to actually be how it was and connect in that physical way during the session. I’d done a tremendous job with False Adult and it was only at the end, when I was clinging on like a baby monkey, that I think she picked up that I wasn’t ok and said something about having a really long hug the next session.

I cried on the way home and ended up texting her when I got back because my system was in freefall. I think we can just about hold it together in breaks but it puts a tremendous amount of pressure on that first session back. If that session isn’t ‘enough’ then the water that has been building up behind the dam during the break floods out. I actually feel like sometimes I could do with two sessions the week following a break in order to ensure that I feel properly reconnected.

This is what played out that day:

I feel like I can’t find you at the moment and I’m lost. I know it’s a post-break thing – because I find them really hard and the disconnect feels like a total severing of connection. It feels really bad now and scary x

She replied almost immediately with a heart and:

I feel sad hearing that because you felt very connected to me before you left the room. Let’s think about how to use the time better next week. I wasn’t joking about the hour-long hug btw…

It was a quick message between her sessions to not leave me hanging and it was enough to open up the flood gates. Now came the ‘how it really felt’ message… brace positions everyone!:

I’m really a long way off my ok place at the moment. Like, yep, my life is a complete fucking shitshow on the outside so it’s understandable, but it’s much more than that. My internal world is in meltdown and week on week it’s getting worse. I feel as though I’ve been furiously spinning plates this last year and now, I’ve just reached a point where there are several crashing to the ground all at once as I don’t have energy or capacity to keep it all going and it feels like I’m watching everything go wrong in slow motion.

I feel really far away from you – or like I can’t find you – and I get that this is me and not you, but it doesn’t make it any easier to navigate even knowing what the problem is. It feels really terrifying being in this place and it’s not just emotional – it has a massive physical quality to it, too. 

I find breaks really hard and actually I find the time between sessions hard on its own and so coming back off a break is always really hard for me. It feels like I’m starting from the very beginning and lose all sense of things being ok or safe or actually that you have any idea of who I am at all or that we have any kind of relationship- which is obviously really shit and I feel really dysregulated. I can’t really put into words how bad it feels.

I don’t suppose this is evident at all. I probably appear ok, calm, present – but I’m anything but. Inside I feel panicked and fearful and like I’m going to cry. I struggle a lot with feeling like you are far away in your chair – even though you’re not- and my brain tells me it’s because you don’t want to be near me and that it’s because I am too much and it just spirals.

Occasionally, I can find a way round it and ask you to come sit with me but I find this especially difficult if there’s a sense of being very disconnected and it will always feel like this if there’s been a break and so I need to find a way of quickly reconnecting after breaks- and actually, really, just week to week. 😞

I hate feeling like this because it totally derails me and then just getting through the usual life shit feels extra difficult. And I get that it’s a lot and it’s really hard to not get engulfed by shame. Lots of the time I am just about capable of outrunning this stuff … and then other times I get caught up and start to drown.

So, yeah… another one of ‘those’ messages that I wipe from my conscious mind.

Elle replied with some very holding messages that really soothed my system and that week we had quite a lot of contact as I limped my way through the week and into the next session where she sat with me from the very beginning and asked me if I wanted to hug.

Around that time, I wrote my last blog post about what a perfect therapy room would look like and I sent it to Elle. She seemed to like it and replied to the message and at the same time asked if it would be ok to share with her supervisees and people starting their own practice which is nice…what was less good was that she also told me that the bear I had seen in the room one day (that I had mentioned in the blog post) actually belonged to someone else and that it was still there in the room but put away – and I am guessing we don’t need to detail how that landed.

OH MY FUCKING GOD!

The runners were in full Usain Bolt mode. It was really fucking awful. Like of course I knew that’s what it would be – but ugh. Any mention of any other clients just sends my system into a full-blown meltdown. Adult me is fine (just about!) but eek – the littles just weren’t. I think it’s because I have found it sooooo hard to get anywhere near my young parts in the sessions with Elle and then I learn that actually the very things that would help she’s already doing with someone else.

Fuck my life!

I had just about gathered myself back together by the time I saw her, because of course there are other clients working out their own shit in a way that works for them and if I was a bit braver then I could too…and I swear to god, next week I am taking my bloody elephant out the fucking bag even if it kills me! (it won’t kill me).

The session after all that I walked in and she said, “I was thinking of moving the table but seeing as I’m going to sit right here with you, I haven’t, as it’s not in the way between us.” And the second clock was gone, too! And then she said she’d ordered a new couch for the room and was wanting to get a load more cushions! I don’t suppose the new couch was off the back of my blog but it felt nice that she had really listened to what I had said. She said she was really keen to get the space right for me and this felt … lovely. And the irony about that whole blog post really, is that the space doesn’t matter at all so long as I feel connected to Elle.

This is getting really long so I’ll end it here for now – but let’s just say, we’ve leapt forward quite a few steps… I guess, I just need to be myself in all my messy glory so Elle can respond to what’s there!

The Struggle Is Real

rubberbandsandchewinggum20 Comments

*not my finest hour of writing!

I think I might be having a breakdown guys…honestly, I am just so fucking sick of living in my head right now. (Tell it like it is, eh, RB?!). I actually don’t really even know where to begin because it’s just fucking whining, really – another big heap of ‘woe is me’. And frankly, who cares? No one wants to listen to this crap AGAIN. I certainly don’t!

The place I am in right now is driving me mad so why burden anyone else with this endless bullshit? I am so bored of feeling this way – bored of myself – bored of ending up stuck in this shitty emotional place time and again – I’m just so fucking bored of the perpetual fucking struggle to be alive. Like what’s the point?! Ooffff. It’s tough. And, it seems, exceptionally sweary today!

Deep breaths… count to…eleventy billion… think of the sea… imagine your feet on the sand…distract with music…take a bath…light a candle and try not to burn the house down!

Nope. That’s not working today. Fucking useless bullshit grounding exercises. Lol! I don’t need that. What I need someone to take hold of my hand, breathe with me, BE WITH ME, and help me regulate.

Actually, really, what I really want is Anita (the old one not the new faulty Shein version). I want to be safe in her arms, to listen to her regular rhythmic heartbeat, to feel her steady breathing, breathe in her familiar safe smell, and to be able to properly rest. I want for her to read me some of our stories, and to look at the pictures together…and not feel like any of that is weird or too much. I miss it, and her, such a lot.

Being endlessly hypervigilant is exhausting. To think I used to see Anita twice and week and get that consistent co-regulation, it’s not surprising that after fourteen months without her/it I am at breaking point. I so want a safe place to put down all the shit and be…seen and held…as I am…and right now – ‘as I am’ is in a right state. The littles are not ok but to be fair, none of me is ok. Adult has been through the wringer recently and there’s just nothing left to hold me together. My rubber bands have perished and snapped, and the chewing gum is dried out, rock hard, and now crumbling.

I’m done.

It’s hard not to keep spiralling downwards when you feel completely hopeless. I feel like perhaps this is bottom – again. But as I have said many times before, there always seems to be a few extra trapdoors ready to fall down through!

I think this blog is something like seven years old now – and what’s different from back at the start, really? Some of you have been here since the very beginning and have been alongside me for what?…three failed therapies…some growth (perhaps)… but essentially it’s the same old me tapping away at the keys struggling with the same old shit. Here I am, once again, circling the emotional drain and on the limits of what I can reasonably manage. And you know what? – it’s really depressing. I’ve tried so hard to get myself into a better place over the years but look where we are…

Slow clap RB. ‘A’ for effort ‘E’ for execution.

In some ways, this, this…’bonkers rage depression crap spew’ today… is probably really needed – and yet writing has been out of reach for a while now. I just can’t even bring myself to turn on the laptop…even if writing is helpful a lot of the time. There have been no words.

This last week or so I’ve been almost paralysed with depression and that awful attachment panic and disconnect that the young parts struggle with so much. It’s been pretty rough for the last few weeks but reached its peak on Thursday and that upset of – what? – abandonment, rejection, all that horrific stuff – has been visceral. When it’s like that I’m instantly thrown into the cold, grey wasteland and my three-year-old self is terrified. It completely overtakes me. There is no adult self to help, and it feels incredibly isolating.

I stupidly looked back over some messages from Anita and the instant physical pain in my chest and stomach was immense and I just fell apart crying. Everything caught up with me. There’s such a lot of grief still to process…and probably, new grief coming if we can ever find a time to meet and end but I’ll save that stuff for another, more together post! But suffice to say, the moment I get anywhere close to that stuff I’m done for. It’s been too much to hold for too long now and I guess life throwing in a whole lot of stress has meant that my capacity to hold this stuff just isn’t there.

Alongside all this, the desire to reach out and connect with Elle has been huge but there’s another part of me that wants to run for the hills and never see her again at the moment. I get this is because actually my need for connection is sooooo BIG and so the fear of not being met where I need her to meet me, or worse being completely ignored, or in some way rejected feels too much. It’s a mess. I’m so sensitive to even the slightest hint of rejection … or no… just subtle shifts in energy…that it’s a disaster. Any normal person wouldn’t even notice this stuff…because it’s probably not even there – but… ugh…complex trauma is just the gift that keeps on giving isn’t it?

It’s embarrassing to even have to try and explain why I feel like this because from the outside there would seem to be nothing wrong at all between Elle and I…because there really isn’t anything wrong! In fact, so much is really right – and this is where I begin to despise my wonky brain and the attachment trauma and the legacy that Em and Anita and Hannah have left for me in terms of therapy, and trust, and *all the things*.

Honestly, when I look back over the last few months with Elle it has been so good on so many levels…and then…my system has to go and complicate it all.

You know what it’s like – when you feel really close to someone for a moment, that’s how you want it to feel *always*, and any perceived slight difference in the room feels rejecting. (EVEN if there IS NO DIFFERENCE other than sitting in a fucking chair that she’s sat in ALL YEAR!)

I imagine you’re all thinking, ‘What the fuck are you talking about RB??!’

Ok, so here we are again…been here before…no change there, then! Ugh.

Some of you might remember how after about nine months when I was working with Anita, we’d reached a place where the walls came down and there were those mammoth sessions where the young parts finally made it into the room and Anita held me and told me she loved me? It was incredible and did amazing things for my nervous system.

But then one day she started a session back in her chair rather than beside me on the couch and I immediately felt far away and disconnected from her. I was thoroughly dysregulated and then dissociated because all the parts that so desperately needed proximity and physical reassurance saw the distance between us in our chairs as a signal that something was now wrong, that the young parts weren’t palatable, and I must be too much. I think she had a cold or something and didn’t want to pass it on, but I saw it as a rejection. It felt horrid.

And of course, none of it was about rejection or abandonment but my system is hard-wired to view things in this way. Fortunately, I was able to bring that to Anita and from then on, we had it that she’d sit beside me on the couch this is how it was for the next three years.

Yep… so I’m in the same fucking mire again… only this time with a couple more episodes of being abandoned and rejected under my belt and so the sensitivity levels are massively high and so it feels really difficult addressing this with Elle.

A few weeks ago, around the anniversary of my dad dying, I left my session and literally within seconds had that crushing feeling of separation anxiety and panic. I had wanted to ask Elle for a hug in the session because my system was going mental but instead False Adulted my way through the session and I left with a hug – but we all know a goodbye hug is not the same…in fact sometimes it feels really hard because that closeness is so short-lived and then you’re out in the world again.

Anyway, July is always a shitty month but that day I really couldn’t see how I was going to get through the next week in one piece and less than an hour later sent Elle a message telling her that I was in a mess and asking if she had any space to see her again that week. I have really noticed lately that one session a week is just a little bit of a bridge too far. By Friday I am on my knees and it’s a real struggle – it’s the object constancy stuff and it really fucking causes me difficulties. Elle works online and face to face, but she didn’t have an f2f that week. She offered a zoom call as stop gap or if I’d prefer, said I could write to her, and she’d reply.

I decided that a zoom call probably wouldn’t help because actually what I really wanted in that moment is to be in the same physical space as her. So often I’ve found online triggers my system when I am like that…it almost makes it worse. I guess maybe it would be good to try again at some point as it might feel different with Elle and be helpful -but it didn’t feel right then.

My brain has been so frazzled lately that writing has been almost impossible – but I did manage to send something late that night explaining how lost I felt and how the minibus is out of control. It was ok but the next morning I realised that the bit I really needed to say was missing and so sent it:

Oh and I think the bit that’s missing is that actually because it feels so bad internally right now there’s huge anxiety about being too much. Because actually when I see you, I feel really far away and feel like I just want to be next to you and hold your hand so I don’t drift away.

It’s weird. It can feel so risky sending this sort of vulnerable message in the moment because I completely forget ALL the lovely messages and things that Elle has said in the time we’ve been working together and how accepting of me and whatever I bring she is. Like how can I not remember that she replied to my message telling her that I love her with ‘I love you too’? and all the other incredibly holding attuned messages over the last year?

I know it’s my brain trying to keep me safe but it’s actually a hindrance – especially when I feel like I do now- because I really struggle to dredge any of this up to the surface and just see her as someone who doesn’t care – and barely exists. As much as this blog today has been a sweary rant so far, it’s actually done me some good because I have remembered this and some other things…and that actually has settled something a tiny bit.

Phew.

That day she responded with the most perfect holding message. I hope she wouldn’t mind me putting this here – but it feels important – to remind me that there is good. I actually feel like I should make a scrapbook of our emails and text for when I am having a meltdown!:

Sitting next to each other and holding hands seems like a really good place to start. Maybe we could do that when I see you next?

When I was reading your description I remembered how my mum used to always tell me that – if I ever got lost – that I should go back to the last place I saw her and wait there, and that she would find me. Maybe we can work out a safe place where we can always return to to find each other, and then breathe together for a good long while as well. It’s incredible to me how learning to breathe in using my whole lungs and then breathe out super slowly like I’m trying to move an invisible toy sailboat has an almost immediate effect on my nervous system. It’s like having a release valve on all the internal pressure.

I like your (horrible) mini-bus analogy, even though driving the bus and being responsible for the safety of all those passengers feels like a lot, especially when you’re well into overtime having already driven a full day’s shift. 

I know these are just words and that you’re reading them not hearing them, so it’s that much harder to feel them, but you are safe with me. I am a safe person, because I know very well how to keep myself safe and I work really hard at it all the time.

Not everyone is good at keeping themselves safe, because from the outside it can sometimes look like the opposite of ‘really caring deeply’ which invites judgment (both internal and external), but it’s an essential skill in order to show up again and again and to be able to tell you with authority and total honesty that I’m here and will continue to be here for you. 

Waiting in the safe place. 

With a Chupa-Chup.

Elle x

There has been such a lot of this over the last few months that…I suddenly feel a bit of a wally for wobbling like I am now. To feel so much upset and disconnect when there is so much evidence that there is no disconnect is really hard. But this is the problem with parts when they take over and adult loses the capacity to hold them and be alongside.

I get that some of this horrible feeling of panic and fear of being abandoned will be complicated by the fact that Elle and I have a break coming up soon. Adult me has no problems with this – of course – but the young parts are just not ok at all…because it opens up space for more of *this*.

I really don’t want the young parts to be in long-term distress so that the protectors feel the need to step in and go on bouncer duty. The young parts have experienced too much pain for too long now and the protectors have come online to do what they think they do best…but it isn’t best. It’s not helpful. Attacking myself and unpicking anything good with Elle isn’t protective. It’s damaging.

I hate this!

It’s insane to see notice how different I feel writing now, to when I started an hour ago…yikes…but I have had weeks of really vocal young and protector parts and seemingly have lost my grip on adult and that’s what comes out. Frustration, upset, despondency, hopelessness… and I get it. Adult feels it all too – but just not quite to the point of feeling like self-harm might be a good idea… ugh.

Anyway, back to the stuff about seats putting the heebie-jeebies into the system.  After my reaching out to Elle that week I just about made it through to Tuesday and by that point realised that I really needed to do something to help the young parts – alongside holding hands. I sent Elle a text on the morning of our session and asked if maybe we could look at doing something with a transitional object. She responded that she loved the idea and would bring in some things unless I had any particular ideas of what I wanted.

After all the hell with the pebbles with Em and the months of shit round that, it felt really nice that Elle had responded so positively and as though it wasn’t a weird thing to request. I know Anita had always been amazing with this kind of thing but it’s hard to know how people will respond and it’s easy to hold on to the worst-case scenarios and panic.

That week between sessions seemed quite massive in lots of ways. There’d been between session contact that felt like it really moved things along. I had taken more steps towards Elle and opened up more about the struggles I was having and now we were going to do a transitional object… and we all know transitional objects are really for the littles so I guess this was my way of showing Elle that there are parts in the mix now that require attention.

When I arrived, Elle sat straight down beside me on the couch and pulled me in for a cuddle. It was exactly what I needed. Only, typically, it was a warm day and I felt too hot! So, as much as I would have loved to have stayed snuggled in close I couldn’t. Instead, we sat together, I leant up against her, and she got out some items that she had brought that she thought might be good transitional objects. She told me the stories behind each of them and then put them on the table and I reached for her hand and held it. It felt really lovely, and my system settled right down.

Of course, when it came time to leave, I picked the soft toy option. A little mouse called Monty.

I think Elle had sprayed him with her perfume because he smelled really nice- it’s fading a bit now so I think I may have to be brave RB and ask her if that is what she’d done and if she might do it again before her holiday…and if I am wrong, I can just die in a pit of shame can’t I?!

I decided to make Monty his own Instagram account and take pictures of him out and about…because I am completely fucking unhinged! After the first week I shared the link with Elle. She responded really positively to it and actually it felt really connecting. Like maybe I am not a complete weirdo and she gets it? Or maybe she’s just kind! Lol.

If any of you want to see what Monty is up to then this is the link:

https://www.instagram.com/montys_awesome_adventures?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==

hmmm not sure that’s working but the handle is montys_awesome_adventures

As I said, off the back of all that it’s opened up a lot of the young stuff inside again. So, imagine the bloody horror of walking into the last two sessions and Elle sitting in her seat across from me and the table being there between us. The table isn’t a new thing, but it does always feel like a barrier between Elle and I.

So, yeah, the distance thing has triggered my system into this fucking mess…well, not just that, but it certainly hasn’t helped. It’s ironic really – I’m probably closer to Elle than I have ever been but because of that, my vulnerability is off the charts. The moment the hurt parts and needy parts have been properly exposed the whole thing has blown up… but it’s not surprising that my system would want to protect me – I don’t want to be hurt again. More than ever, I need proximity and reassurance until the littles and the rest of my system understand that they are not imminently going to be dumped. I don’t think Elle would have even the slightest clue that this is what’s going on behind the scenes.

Although, maybe she does… the other day she referred to something in session that I hadn’t told her that she could only have found out from Monty’s page. I have absolutely no problem with that at all – in fact I think that it might be a really useful tool for Elle to see what I am posting via Monty…as it gives an insight into what’s really going on. But then this made me think about this blog.

Does Elle ever read it? She has the link to it, and I’ve sent her specific posts before to read. But I wondered the other day if she’s ever gone off and read any other the other stuff here. It’s in the public domain after all.

When I first approached her with the idea of maybe working with her, I obviously mentioned the blog straightaway and what had happened with Hannah because I needed to be sure that whomever I chose as my next therapist would be ok with me writing about my experiences of therapy. I didn’t want to get two months in to work again and then be told it wasn’t ok.  Elle said she was completely fine with my writing and also asked if she might have the link just because she’s interested in MH regardless of whether we ended up working together.

Thinking about this the other day I realised that there are probably quite a few posts that I have written that I would really like Elle to read because I think it would give her a good insight into what it’s been like for me –  you know, the uncurated mess of it all!…and then there are others where I would probably want to the ground to open up and swallow me whole if she were to read them…which probably means they would also be useful for her to read! It would be nice for her to see some actual writing rather than ranting…which is really what this blog has descended into this last year or so!!

Tbh I can’t imagine she has the time or energy to read any of this, but I know I would find it really hard to know that someone might be writing about me and no want to see what was being said!! Lol.

Anyway, this is long… and… bumpy! If you made it to the end – kudos to you.

Next week will be a year since Elle and I started working together and I think it’s safe to say the work has well and truly begun!

Losing My Marbles AND Gaining Some

rubberbandsandchewinggum15 Comments

“It’ll be ok. I’m coming back. Nothing is going to change. I love you.”

Today is the anniversary of the last time I saw Anita as I ‘knew’ her. She was just about to head off on a two-week holiday and we parted on warm hugs and these words of reassurance and care.

With hindsight, these are not promises anyone can every truly make to us, even our family. We don’t know what’s ahead and even with our very best intentions the universe can throw us curve balls and change the trajectory of our lives in a heartbeat.

So, a therapist saying this, whilst absolutely well-intentioned, has actually proved to be massively damaging in the long run. Despite all the good will in the world, Anita has broken those promises and her attempts at reassurance to the youngest, most vulnerable parts of me, have now branded into my brain as individual soundbites of betrayal and lies because nothing was ‘ok’, she didn’t really ‘come back’, everything ‘changed’, and…’I love you’? Well, is what’s happened in the last twelve months the actions of someone who loved me? I wrestle with that a lot.

Adult me can understand this has been a complex situation, but the little ones inside?- not at all. It’s horrific for them. They can’t make sense of it. It’s another mother who has chosen to walk away when she promised she absolutely would stay because I was ‘worth it’ and have never deserved my previous treatment by others.

In the end, though, Anita made the choice to stop work with me (and all other long-term clients…apparently…although who really knows?) whilst still retaining some ‘easy’ clients. She needed to reduce the ‘stress in her life’ and I was part of that package.

I’ll be honest, after three and a half years of consistent love and care and meeting on such an intimate level, it wasn’t a choice I actually thought she’d ever make to dump me and keep going with other people. Despite my issues around trust and abandonment I genuinely believed her when she had said, ‘she’d always have space for me in her world’ and that even when she retired, she’d see me because she ‘couldn’t let me go’. Like I didn’t have a gun to her head to make her say those things, she offered them up freely. And the amount of kind, loving, reassurances that came from her sunk deep down into me. It was all so healing … until this happened.

Well, it turns out it was all lip service, and I was a fucking fool. She left me and has been working consistently since. In fact, she’s been actively advertising her availability for new clients. I understand that her work may look different to how it was. Her caseload has a different complexion but, still, it’s impossible not to see this as a complete and total rejection of me for being ‘too much’ hard work and causing too much ‘stress’.

But actually, truthfully, who wants a burnt-out therapist who declares themselves ‘broken’ but continues to work because they ‘can’t afford not to’? That’s never right…and part of me, at least, knows this. Part of me, knows too, that really none of this is about me at all, and more about Anita’s ability to manage (or not) her personal life.

The work we had been doing had so much been about feeling good enough, worthy enough, lovable enough, valuable…and when it came down to it I was none of those things. I couldn’t even manage to have someone I pay to spend time with me to stay…yet other people can. It’s hard not to allow that critical inner voice to take hold because it’s been so much of my internal narrative over the years – especially after what happened with Em.

I need a therapist who is steady and capable of holding the work. I need someone who can manage their own life without crashing and burning and taking out a vulnerable clients as collateral damage. And Elle, seems to be that. I am aware, though, that I am keeping parts of myself very well protected now.

After all this crap with Anita I am reluctant to let anyone that close to me ever again because, honestly, it’s broken me. Today I was walking out in the countryside and burst into tears because I allowed my mind to wander a bit and it alighted on Anita. This next month is going to be tough as it signals a year for all the hell that was the last few times I saw Anita but also a year where there has been no resolution, no termination session, no return of my books … just a limbo period. It’s A’s birthday and honestly, knowing this time last year I was giving her a gift and this year she’s not part of my world at all is hard.

Therapy is delicate work. As Elle said the other day, when something goes wrong with a therapist it’s like dealing with an engine. You cannot work on it whilst it’s still on, turning over. You have to turn it off, completely stop, and mend you cannot go ramming your hands into the engine when it’s going. What’s worse, she said, is that Anita has been poking her hands in other people’s engines whilst they’re on, too, and doing untold damage. It’s not ok.

And it so isn’t ok – I am not ok… although I am doing my very best to hold it together with my rubber bands and chewing gum.

Anyway, in that last long post I was jumping all over the place- and talked about a session with buttons and another with the lovely hug…and I will continue on from there soon but today, I’ve got derailed by all this sadness and grief about A…and so want to talk a bit about another connecting experience I had with Elle a few months ago.

I mentioned in my last blog about how I keep forgetting how much Elle actually knows about the vulnerable stuff because my mind seems to completely block that from my consciousness when I am with her. I somehow, in the moment face-to-face have no idea that I have sent several ‘exposing’ raw emails to her since we met last August and actually she probably sees me more than I think she does!

Anyway, I hit the skids again and sent this to her in February…I’d had more of those False Adult fronting sessions and was just driving myself fucking mad:

This is the note slid under the door…because frankly no one cares about how tidy (or not) my house is- and I am so fucking good at avoidance that next week I could talk to you about my lost marble collection (not a metaphor – although metaphorical lost marbles would be useful to speak about seeing as I feel like I’m going slowly mad).

I don’t really know where to begin with this because the overriding feeling I am experiencing at the moment is shame – and unlike like you who (weirdly!) seeks out opportunities to sit in shame to prove it’s not going to kill you – I try to avoid it where possible. Having said that, it’s stuck to me like my shadow so I can never truly outrun it. And I guess you’d say don’t run from it, explore it – and believe me I know what it’s all about but that doesn’t mean I want to be covered in its thick tar-like substance for any longer than is absolutely necessary.

I feel a bit like one of those sea birds that’s been caught in an oil slick like you’d see on the news when a tanker would run aground. I know that the only way out of this hell is to bubble up with a massive load of washing up liquid – a soapy shame remover if you like, but right now I am head-to-toe in black, and it feels like there is something terribly wrong with me and I can’t find the soap. There’s also a bit of a problem now because the shame remover I had found that seemed to work really well was connection – but actually a couple of bottles of connection had tar in and so now I don’t seem to trust that either.

Shame has been so present – in me/on me/both – over the years that I am surprised that I haven’t become less sensitive to it or adapted some kind of Teflon type skin – but nope. It’s still that horribly visceral all-consuming visit from a dementor and I feel sick.

You probably have no idea that I have spent the last (almost) six months trying very hard not to allow myself to feel very much at all in the relationship with you. It’s not really worked though. Therapy feels really dangerous  – well, at least to some parts of me… and so I am really aware that the person who turns up to therapy is me – but that person is also a really excellent shield for all the hurt and vulnerable parts. I guess it’s a bit like that chicken analogy you used the other day – where the chicken tucks the chicks under their wings. And whilst that seems like a really sensible thing to do- it’s protective- it’s not much good if the chicks actually need the vet!

I read a book years ago by Patricia DeYoung about chronic shame and this bit really stuck out:

In brief and speaking from the perspective of a child’s regulated self, a regulating other is a person on whom I rely to respond to my emotions in ways that help me not to be overwhelmed by them, but rather to contain, accept, and integrate them into an emotional “me” I can feel comfortable being. A dysregulating other is also a person I want to trust – and should be able to trust – to help me manage my affect or emotion. But this person’s response to me, or lack of response to me, does exactly the opposite: it does not help me contain, accept, or integrate.

Then I become a self disintegrating in relation to a dysregulating other. This is what happens: as an infant, when I am in an affective state of distress, or as a child, when I am feeling a rush of emotion, the other’s response fails to help me manage what I’m feeling. Instead of feeling connected, I feel out of control. Instead of feeling energetically focused, I feel overwhelmed. Instead of feeling that I’ll be ok, I feel like I am falling apart.

This kind of experience is the core experience of shame. All of it has something to do with needing something intensely from someone important, and something going wrong with the interaction between us. I feel, “I can’t make happen what I need from you”. If the sequence is repeated often enough in my development to become and expectable experience, I will have a core propensity to feel shame whenever I have strong feelings, need emotional connection,  or feel something is wrong in an interpersonal interaction. In all of those situations, I will be likely to conclude, consciously or unconsciously, “There is something wrong with what I need- with my needy self”.

And that’s kind of how it feels now. It’s not quite the dysregulating other thing because I haven’t told you what’s going on or how I feel but that makes no difference to my inner experience because essentially there’s this really sad, vulnerable, part (several actually) that’s in pieces and feels shame because there’s so much need but it’s hidden and unseen and can’t regulate. And I get this prison is of my own making – which is so fucking annoying – but there is this bit of me that is absolutely fucking terrified of fucking things up, actually trusting you and being seen and then to be deemed unacceptable is a massive fear.

Like I hold myself together with rubber bands and chewing gum which is always a bit problematic at the best of times – they’re doing a lot of heavy lifting in lieu of super glue – but now I feel like I am disintegrating.

I keep circling this drain over and over.

I really can’t overstate how damaging what has happened with Anita is. The reason she gave me for ending seemed legitimate at the time. She was really unwell. But I am really struggling to understand how she can still be working and yet now say that she’s not in a good enough place to meet and to properly end as we had agreed. It all feels like lies now – and avoidance…and really unfair. And unfortunately, my brain’s default programming always lands on “It’s because you’re too much”. So I am having a really hard time because the person I really trusted with me – all of me – has become someone I don’t recognise at all and seems not to care in the least that they’ve hurt me…so that must make this a me problem.  

And then of course my mum being … well… gone…feels like a me problem. 

This is really not dealing with my adult self…which I guess is why I am seeing you in the first place but ugh…

So now I am really aware of how all this stuff is just swirling around inside and how scared I am of breaking you too.

I can’t make Brian (my nickname for my brain) make sense today. I guess – I like you a lot and there’s a pull to want to be closer to you but it’s terrifying on so many levels.

Anyway, I’ll go hide in my pit of shame and embarrassment now x

-GAHHHH – Fuck! – like, how do I manage to wipe this from my consciousness? I mean it’s clear my brain is wanting to stop me being too exposed or clamming up because I feel like I have been too vulnerable – but it’s so funny in a way. My best-friend had to remind me this week that Elle knows a lot, because she’s had all the letters!

Oh god!

Anyway, Elle replied with something nice and connecting and then in the next session I walked in feeling a bit sheepish and sat down.

She came over to me at the start of the session and told me to hold out my hands.

Errr. Ok??

And she poured a handful of marbles into them and told me that they were for me.

It was a lovely symbolic gesture in reference to the email I’d sent and opened up a really helpful conversation about my literal lost marble collection, but also the wobbly losing my metaphorical marbles.

It’s a slow gentle edging towards trust and safety…

Since then, I have taken one of the marbles with me wherever I go. It’s acting as a transitional object.

Recently, I was at the beach and decided to photograph the marble in different places…and something possessed me to send one of the pictures to Elle. She thought it was one I had found at the beach. I got that immediate squirmy shame feeling and figured I had to be honest and reply, and told her that, no, actually it was one of the ones she had given me.

Anyway, that’s just another example of some of the nice things that have happened in therapy, and I do have to consciously remind myself of them. It’s so hard sometimes to hold onto what’s good because I am so scared of losing it all but also convince myself that none of it is real. It’s very different from the work with Anita and it is hard not to perpetually compare backwards and feel like it’s not enough, or I am not seen or held or *whatever* but actually I think all things considered Elle and I are doing pretty well considering the state I came to her in.

This week, though, is going to be especially hard because I am feeling so vulnerable about the anniversary with Anita and feel acutely how painful this grief is. It’s absolutely live again. It makes me feel alone and isolated and terribly small…and I want to reach out for someone safe and there doesn’t feel like there is anyone. I could email Elle, I suppose, but there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to overburden her or be too much.

It’s so frustrating being in this place…but that’s the thing with loss and grief and attachment and trauma and all the things…the path isn’t linear. It’s a spiral. Sometimes I am at the top of the spiral and looking down and in reasonable control; other times I am spinning so fast I feel sick and giddy.

Trying not to puke, today!

x

Letter From Love

rubberbandsandchewinggum19 Comments

Hi guys,

It’s been a while since I made it here to post anything. I will catch up with the last couple of months soon. Suffice to say it’s been hard and I have been stuck in a hole and haven’t really been able to do very much other than get through the day-to-day dodging panic and anxiety attacks – and that hasn’t been a wholly successful enterprise I can tell you. My brain has had no capacity to write BUT that changed yesterday and so here I am with something a little different to usual.

For a bit of context, I am an avid listener of the ‘We Can Do Hard Things’ podcast with Glennon Doyle (love), Abby Wambach (swoon) and Amanda Doyle (is she my twin?!) – honestly these women get me through the week most weeks. The topics they address, the raw vulnerability and honesty they bring, the humour, the love, and the brilliant guests they have (Brene Brown, Liz Gilbert, Lindsay C. Gibson…endless list of brilliance) lifts me out of my life and makes me feel like there are kindred spirits out there – the pod squad! I really recommend finding this podcast if you haven’t already and giving it a whirl. It never disappoints.

Anyway, recently the wonderful Elizabeth Gilbert was on talking about something she’d begun as a daily practice called ‘Letters From Love’ – you can find her on her Substack page:

https://open.substack.com/pub/elizabethgilbert/p/welcome-to-letters-from-love?r=3g0cmo&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Basically, the premise is you ask Love what it would have you know…and you listen and then you write it down. And frankly, it’s mind-blowing what comes out. Some people would say that this is their God Self, or from an Internal Family Systems (IFS) lens it would be the Self, others might say it’s Source, Spirit, The Universe…Love… whatever… but what it is the wise, knowing, benevolent voice that we so often miss and can be so drowned out by the negative, critical voices that are SOOOOO Fucking loud! It’s the one we could all do with finding. It reminds me a bit of the posts I wrote to my seventeen year old self in 2018 and 2023 but better?! I don’t know.

I’ll post link to the first podcast here and from there you’ll be able to find the others as they are so worth a listen if you have time – the episodes you want are 268, 269, 281:

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/we-can-do-hard-things/id1564530722?i=1000640284400

And here’s what came up for me – in twenty minutes- uncurated, unedited, just how it was… and honestly, I am going to do this more often. Give it a go. You may get a short message, or you may get loads…the lovely thing is, that voice is there, residing inside all of us, if only we dare to look.

Big love to you all xxx

Dear Love, what would you have me know today?

It’s funny, RB, you’ve been yo-yoing for weeks now – flipping between asking me to come to you so you can hopefully hear the words that you so badly need to hear (but wonder if I will even tell you), or instead whether to spend your time writing a piece called, ‘Inadequate’ for your blog. I can tell you I am so glad you chose to come to me today although I know that other piece is bubbling up inside you, too and that’s fine – there is space for all of you with me.

You may feel inadequate. You may see nothing but evidence in the world around you to prove this narrative to yourself, but I can assure you are not inadequate. Far from it. You are not even simply ‘adequate’… I see you roll your eyes at that, but I hope one day you will see how truly brilliant you are. Your light shines in so many ways and yet you feel like you are trapped in darkness and coated in shame as thick as tar. That darkness isn’t yours though, honey. And I promise you that the brightest, whitest, most spectacular blinding light is there waiting, like me, ready to banish that darkness for good if you’ll let it.

The shame you feel is not yours to carry, either little one. You can set it down and know that all of you is worthy, all of you is lovable, and all your feelings are valid. You are, after all, a perfectly imperfect human being. You are meant to be a mess. You are meant to figure it out as you go along. You are meant to make mistakes. You are you, and you need be nothing more or less than who you are. The vulnerable, needy, scared, loving, loyal, cynical, raging, despondent, lazy, perfectionist …the list goes on and on… parts are all welcome and I love ALL of them – I love all of YOU – no matter what that critical voice inside your head tells you. You are enough. More than enough. Just as you are.

I know no one ever explained all this to you – in fact you’ve been drilled with the total opposite, “ace the test”, “be perfect”, “be strong”, “have a plan”… and so you’ve spent your life trying to meet totally unrealistic expectations placed on you by others in the hope that if you played exactly by the rules then you’d finally win the love and approval of those that you should NEVER have had to prove yourself to in the first place. You’ve valiantly risen to the challenge, but I think you’ve also realised that no matter what you do, no matter how hard you strive, or how much of yourself you sacrifice it will never be enough for some people.

The lesson, here, love, is to look inside and listen to me. Know this: there is nothing you could ever do that would make you ‘too much’ or ‘not enough’ for me. You don’t have to be perfect to be loved. It is ok to rest. It is ok to play. You do not need to be endlessly productive to prove your worth. If you completely unravelled and failed to function (which I know you fear) it would still be ok. Honestly it would. And you know what? Sometimes we need to break a bit to be able to rebuild better. We’d fill your cracks with gold and your scars would be the very thing that shine.

I know you’ve been put off reaching out – or in – to me because you wondered whether I would even be there, wondered whether I would have anything to say to you, or in searching for me you might find only a silent black void proving once and for all that you are as completely and totally alone as you feel. You couldn’t face another one of your calls for care and reassurance going unanswered. Rejection and abandonment have been so much a part of your journey and I understand your need to self-protect sometimes even if hiding yourself and favouring isolation keeps you trapped in the darkness. I want you to know that even in the darkest times I have been with you. Darling, I am always with you. I always have been, and I always will be. Whenever you speak to me, I will answer. I may not tell you what you want to hear but what I say will always be exactly what you need to know. I promise you that.

I want you to know that I see and know all the hurting places inside you. I know how you struggle to keep going when you seem to hit wall after wall. You feel like the unluckiest crash test dummy in the world – the one that never wholly breaks and so keeps being tested time and again. I know you are tired. I know you are weary. I know that you feel like you are on empty. But you’re still here. It’s miraculous, really. You hate the word resilient but that’s what you are. So many people would have given up (and I know you nearly have sometimes) and yet your dogged determination – and let’s be honest here, your belief in love and your massive heart, has meant you keep showing up over and over– for you, for your family, for your friends and that is commendable…no… it’s remarkable.

In a world that can feel so devoid of love and care your complete refusal to give up hope and your commitment to opening up your heart even if that means continuing to risk heartbreak is EVERYTHING. It is your softness that is your strength. Despite the hurt you have experienced in life you still believe in the power of connection. You still feel the biggest gift in life is the connection you make with others. I see too, the hard work you are putting in with yourself. You know yourself so well now, and this relationship to yourself will serve as an anchor in the stormiest of seas…and let’s be real here, you hate boats and the sea is always rough so good going, girl – you’re well prepared!

So, my love, what do I want you to take from this?

I want you to know that I am always with you in those dark places. Those lonely places. The times when you feel like you cannot go on. I have been waiting for you to come to me, or rather, take a chance on believing that I might be here for you and to tell you that you, too, are worthy of love. I am here for you. I love you. So much. But, my darling, you are here for you too – and you are all you need in this world. I promise I am alongside for the journey and you are not, and will never be, alone.