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[23 February]

23 February

Last night I went out for a "date" with my lovely other half. Conversation somehow found it's way to friendships and one friend in particular. Or should I say, Ex-friend.

Last August I cut ties with one of my closest friends after a particularly brutal verbal attack.  It was the last in a very long line of them but this time I just had enough.

She wasn't a typically "nice" person. She did sometimes do and say some awful things, un-PC things, shocking things.  I had learnt to laugh them off, shrug them off or just roll my eyes at her and shake my head.  Don't get me wrong, I did tell her she was wrong – countless times but it always fell on deaf ears and I didn't want to always spend my time telling her what she should and shouldn't say or do.  That was up to her.

Anyway, cutting to the chase – I've been without said ex-friend now for about 5 months. We had been very close friends, at least in my eyes, for about 8 years. I miss her sometimes and particularly when I've had a glass of vino like last night or when I'm feeling lonely.

I don't have many friends. I have some friends and I have my boyfriend and step-kids, but the horrible, hard truth is that ex-friend and my mother are both very narcissistic: I've "lost" them both recently, or so it seems.

Actually, I don't think I should say lost because it's been my choice – what would the right word be?  I'm leaning to remove the negative things and people from my life. Both of these women hurt me over and over again, for years and I just used to let it happen. I'm not actually sure I even knew it was wrong at the time.

Trying to explain to my boyfriend that despite her/their horrible ways and the many ways she/they hurt me and knocked me down time and time again, I did love her and I did get something from our friendship, but it's like persuading someone that Hannibal Lecter was a nice guy!!

I miss having someone I could go out with once every few weeks and have a drink with, talk rubbish with – connect with (although looking back, I guess it wasn't an authentic connection) and just relax with.

I know deep down, I can't have really relaxed, not properly, because I was always on guard for an attack or at least repairing the attacks she spat at the bar staff or innocent people sat nearby.

Realising that ex-friend and mother are exactly the same is still a shock sometimes.  You know the kind of thing that you know, but you get reminded and it's like you've just realised all over again?

The fact that I accepted and loved both these people for so long still hurts me. How was I so blind for so long? And now I can "see" how can I miss someone so bad for me?

Another example of the inevitable pain that comes with recovery I guess. Newly educated, logical mind tells you that "X" is bad. Old mind wants what is "normal" and misses it's old creature comforts – be that abusive or not.  Perhaps it is fear of the unknown or maybe it's just that familiar is comfortable, whether it's good for you or not.

It's our default position and that is what we are fighting against all the time in recovery.  Fighting against repetition compulsion.

Weirdly, I've noticed that I never want to text or call my mother anymore. Never. I guess I've replaced her with my new "good mother" – the therapist.

The journey continues....

[Written on 21 February]

Written on 21 February

I was in a really horrible and desperate place yesterday.  Today, it feels as though the child part of me – I will call her "Little Twink" has settled back down.  Perhaps she is taking a nap after exhausting herself being so hypervigilent and alert yesterday.

Yesterday (and Sunday) I was really feeling these child-like feelings of abandonment and pain. Sadness, grief, worry, embarrassment – all of it. The post I wrote yesterday was as raw as they come. I very nearly didn't post it because it is embarrassing to me to have feelings that strong, that needy and that dramatic, but, the point of this blog is to share my therapy journey and so it wouldn't be right to not include these darker moments with you all.  Being able to accept these feelings as being "allowed" is still very much a work in progress for me.  I hope that by sharing some of this darker more desperate stuff, people are able to see that they are not alone if they experience similar things and on a totally selfish note, it helps to validate my pain when people tell me they understand it too. Win-Win right?!

Looking back to yesterday, everything felt so terrible. Everything was going wrong – it all felt so hopeless and just, well, *! Today, I feel so much better. I am smiling again, I am laughing again and I feel in my "adult" brain again.  I have been trying to understand what took me out of that place and I don't really know.  Perhaps I just felt everything enough to let it pass?

When I regress like yesterday and Little Twink takes over, it's nearly impossible to imagine feeling better.  When the adult me is back in control, it's hard to imagine having felt that bad!  It's a weird concept.  I knew the second I opened my eyes this morning that today was going to be a better day. The first thought I had when opening them was that I had been able to sleep, all night, unlike Sunday night – that seemed to make things better immediately. I managed to get out of bed easier and the day just seemed "lighter" somehow.  When I was on the bus to the station this morning, I read a few posts on here that made me smile – they genuinely lifted my spirits and when I caught myself physically smiling (like a loon on her own!) on the bus, I knew adult me was back!

I hope that Little Twink has settled down because she feels heard and reassured and not because I've shamed her to pipe down. It's hard to tell isn't it? I am aware as I read this blog entry back to myself before posting that that my need to refer to those feelings in me as another person/part of me – Little Twink – and by using words like she and her I am objectifying to make it easier to tolerate. Baby steps.

I read about emotional flashbacks ages ago. Pete Walker's work talks to me as though it was written for me alone.

When I read sentences like this "Flashbacks strand clients in the feelings of danger, helplessness and hopelessness of their original abandonment, when there was no safe parental figure to go to for comfort and support" I can rationalise that I can tell my T the feelings I had yesterday without feeling hideously embarrassed because she knows this stuff isn't really about her – it's transference.  Yet, there is still a huge part of me that finds the whole thing so scary. I am learning that for me to really, truly need or depend on her (anyone?) it scares the living daylights out of me – I think this is actually what triggered all of this in the first place.  To acknowledge and admit that her being away for one week could cause such awful angst and sadness is one * of an insight for me – but I am glad that I am starting to be able to let the feelings in because for the last 2 years, I've been adamant that I've had no feelings whatsoever about the breaks.... Clearly my unhelpful defence mechanisms are starting to thaw – and that is progress.

Anyway, thank again everyone. I am sure there will be much more where that came from!

I have neglected my journal here thanks to my new found blogging experience - come check me out anyone who is interested - for now though, I am going to post here what I have posted there so I can keep my journey up to date.

www.unpackingthesuitcaseblog.wordpress.com

Eugh San, I can totally understand this. So sorry you have been feeling so torn.

Fighting with your conscience is not easy. You have your logical thoughts and then you have your emotional ones. It is so hard to do "the right thing" when your emotional side of you wants to feel less guilty.

I know this isn't comparable really, but I dreamt the other week of an old friend of mine - I went NC with her in August because she was very toxic towards me but I sometimes dream of her and have to really fight not to get back in touch with her and reconnect. I am pretty sure she would love for us to see each other again (although I could be wrong). I have to stay NC with her for my own sake.

I think what we have both got in common is that we are carrying guilt. Guilt that doesn't belong to us. You tried to do the right thing before and look how that ended. I think you need to walk away now, as hard as that would be!!!

Sending hugs x

***Warning - very desperate and needy post ***

Have I been triggered by T being away?

I can't make any sense of what is going on in my head but I don't like it. It is horrible. It makes me want to scream and cry and punch things and cry some more. My mind is absolutely consumed with therapy things and the fact that T is off this week – yet I wouldn't even have a session until tomorrow anyway, so how does that work? I keep reading and writing hoping to suddenly "get" something to make this all hurt less... but all it does is make it worse. I'm trying to intellectualise it away.

I hate the break, it is really painful this time, really, really horrible. I never understood when she used to say it might bring up painful feelings – I didn't foresee it feeling like this. I read earlier that missing your T can feel like missing a friend when they go away, but it is nothing like that at all. If my best friend went on holiday, it wouldn't make any real difference to me for a week – or even two.  We might have contact via text, but that's all. T said if I needed to, I could send her a text message to ask her "are you there" but as I've said previously in a blog, how is that meant to help me when "there" is just somewhere that I'm not??

I keep thinking that maybe this is how I felt as a child when my mum went away. Maybe these feelings are emotional flashbacks, but I can't remember.

I don't know if it's worse knowing she is at home and not physically far away or whether it would be harder knowing she was miles away on a beach abroad somewhere. I can't work out why I wouldn't be feeling like this if she weren't on a break because I wouldn't be seeing her yet anyway!! so why is it making such a huge difference to how I feel?

I feel like the child part of me is in charge at the moment. I didn't want to go to work today, I really felt very down the second I opened my eyes. I forced myself to go, obviously, but it was hard. I feel very miserable and I can't even explain why. I am even questioning whether it is about her being away or whether I've just made that up.

I want to hide away yet my thoughts are so loud that I don't want to be alone because then they would be even louder. I know I sound desperate.

It's made me realise this was how I felt at Christmas those days when I felt so miserable and cried easily – it is exactly the same. Those feelings kicked in very quickly after my last session to, and before I would normally see her again.

I don't like this feeling of being left to fend for myself, without therapy. It makes me want to cry. I can't handle things on my own. I need to check in with her twice a week – it makes my weeks okay. I need the connection and I need to see her and talk to her. I need the understanding, the smiles and the odd "in joke".  It feels like I'm suddenly obsessed with it all – I feel ashamed for feeling this way. I am a grown woman and not that child anymore, but it doesn't feel like that at the moment.

I'm already thinking about the Easter break and that makes me want to scream. After Easter it's summer break – her's and mine – constant breaks all the time, why???  All that therapy breaks do is BREAK ME.

I could never imagine a year or two ago having these feelings because of the breaks. I used to laugh at the thought that you could feel so strongly because your therapist had some time off, I admit I thought it was a bit pathetic really. Now I am in panic because what if this is only the start? What if there are more horrible feelings and thoughts like this? I just want to make some sense of them so they don't feel so powerful and so confusing.

I don't like feeling this needy and this vulnerable and weak and young. How the * did I cope with these feelings when I was actually young? How didn't I die?

It feels like life and death – clinging on, surviving. So bloody dramatic.

Why won't I just send her a message? I am adamant that I won't – my reason being that it won't help or it will make me miss her more. It's like I'm punishing myself somehow or just trying to take some control back over feeling so, well, out of control.

Hi everyone.

I passed my driving test last year, in September after spending many years learning and then giving up again - over and over again.  Since then, somehow, I actually got confident and really loved driving - it was great...

Then the last week or so, it's vanished!! Gone! I now feel like I've gone right back to the very beginning again. Suddenly I feel like I can't concentrate at all, I feel like I am stupid and like I am a bag of nerves.

Yesterday I got in the car and within minutes I had to pull over where I burst into tears. My OH told me that I was doing absolutely fine but that I was rushing a little - I just kept saying over and over again "why has this happened??"

It seems to have come at a time where my mind is very consumed with therapy thoughts and I've been feeling rather sad - maybe there is a link.

Could this be an inner critic thing or what? Whatever it is, I HATE it.

Howdy, it is Friday 17th February just before 2pm in the afternoon.  I am working from home today so taking the opportunity in my lunch break to write.

It was my last session before the therapy break yesterday and I had forgotten! I'm not entirely sure how that is possible given I've spent over a month in countdown for it and spent Tuesday night's session crying at the thought of it - defences? Maybe.

The session yesterday was very light-hearted. Very different from Tuesday's session where I cried a fair bit.  I wanted to find something to connect with her on in one way, yet in another, it is easier to leave for the break on more of a light-hearted chat... I guess it depends what mood I am in on the day.

I slept heavily last night and I know that I dreamt about her - I remember waking (I think) and "understanding" something about her - I can't articulate this very well because the memory is now hazy - more or less gone.  It was like I accepted or understood something from the child's point of view - my inner child that is.. but now it's gone away again and I can't get it back. 

I read some articles this morning in bed about the therapy break and I had tears falling down my face again... one thing that I hate about it is that it hasn't even begun yet - I wouldn't normally see her again until next Tuesday, yet the countdown to the break being over has already started ... that makes me feel both sad and needy. 

I was reading a wonderful book which I finished today, the ending of which was very tear-jerking and I cried again. I've been wanting to write here or on my blog but I don't know what it is I have to say. How do I feel and what am I thinking and feeling? I don't know. What would happen in an ideal world - I still don't know.

I've worked in absolute silence today. No TV, no radio. Absolutely no background noise and that is unheard of for me - does that mean my brain is noisy enough with unconscious thoughts that I just can't grasp?

I look around the house and notice I need to clean,  the house needs hovering and dusting - bathroom needs bleaching yet I just don't want to do it.  I am usually extremely OCD about this so that is also weird. Have I regressed or have I put my barriers back up to defend myself for this break and I'm having a strop? Am I angry? I don't seem to have the answers. I guess that's okay, isn't it?

My T says that I like everything to be neat and tidy - to have its place - to be understood.... she says that I don't like my "messy feelings" and we've been working on trying to get me to stay with them - to tolerate them but not let them overcome me.  So this is a work in progress but this is me saying - I don't know how I feel today but I won't lie, the break that I am already "in" in my head, sucks arse.

Hey sanmagic7,

I have just caught up with your last couple of posts, how are you doing today?

I am glad you finally got some decent sleep and that writing here helped to rid you of some of the yuck!! Sometimes I literally feel as though I HAVE to write otherwise my head is cloudy and full up all day.

Have you spoken to your hub about feeling as though you have to rely on him? I wonder whether there is anything you could change for yourself to stop you feeling like that?

Hey!

Her "joke" was meant like - I won't tell you the next set of dates that I'm going to be away then!!  - because I was crying....

Sorry, so Boffin is a derogatory term that means geek - someone who likes learning/is always reading etc.  "Saffy" - was a character in a programme in the UK in the 90s called "Absolutely Fabulous" and "Saffy" is the daughter of a Narcissist (like me) who was the opposite of her mother. She was more serious and more organised and sensible - whereas her mother liked to go out clubbing and drinking and stay up late, that sort of thing. Role-reversal between the mother and daughter and that is exactly why my mother used to call me "Saffy" when I was being, in her eyes, boring.

Re the job. Yes, I would like to stir things up for myself. I would like to find something different but I don't know what. I've done this job for ten years now and I have no other qualifications.  I agree that I stay inside my comfort zones for sure - I admitted that - I think that I cried because the truth hurt.

Reasons I haven't looked for another job - fear for sure. The worry I will be bad at it, look stupid - be laughed at - wish I had never left, that kind of stuff.

Thank you for that idea, I will certainly try it. I will write a lot - I always write a lot but particularly in the break, it seems to help somehow.

Thanks as always Sanmagic7!! sending you hugs xx

Driving to my session last night I realised that I didn't want to be driving. I didn't want to be in control of the car and I felt like I wasn't "there" enough.  Something felt wrong and I felt nervous to be driving. Part of me wished I hadn't passed my test last September.  This was a bit of a strange feeling for me to have because since passing my test, I've really enjoyed driving and have recently got very confident.  That was a sign for me that I've had before... something was going on in my body.  When I arrived, I was relieved I had got there okay. My body physically deflated and I realised I had been holding a lot of tension in my shoulders.

My therapist opened the session as normal, "How's Twinkletoes" and I said my usual response – "Yeah, I'm fine..".  She always repeats this and laughs – not in a cruel way but it's always enough to make me try to elaborate or say something else.  "I'm fine really is a non-committal statement isn't it?".  I told her how I felt on the drive over and that I've noticed it before – she said perhaps I was nervous about coming and I said I didn't feel nervous, but it has happened a few times and it feels like I can't concentrate – like my head is foggy..

I also told her that I had my yearly appraisal at work during the day and she asked how it went. I said that it was okay, I pulled a bit of a "sulky" face and said that they had told me they thought I had become a bit complacent and that they thought I could do more.  They told me that I never left my comfort zone and they wanted me to try some new things and take on some new responsibility. I told her that when they spoke to me about this stuff, I had burst into tears and was shocked by that – it had left me feeling a bit sad all day. 

T asked me what it was that had made me cry.  I said I wasn't really sure, but that it was true what they had said and for some reason it had provoked that response from me so suddenly I didn't have time to think about it! She told me that she thought perhaps I had realised quite how much my childhood/the trauma etc had such an effect on me. How it/my mother has held me back in life and how I could have had a different life.  She asked whether I felt the sadness of that.  I said I wasn't sure. I said I just feel bored in life in regards to my job. I don't have any passion for it, it is mind-numbingly boring at the best of times and I've wanted to do something else for many years, but I never do.  She asked me why and I said I wasn't sure but I was scared to look stupid.  We discussed where this thought came from and I said I don't know. We then spoke in detail about how it is my mother's internalised voice – not my own and that it's the "inner critic" and I should try and fight against it and not believe it. 

I told her that although this may be the case, it feels like my voice and I do really believe the things it says – it isn't like I am aware they aren't my thoughts.  She tried to explain to me that they are my thoughts, but only because of her.  Because I didn't have the kind, encouraging, supportive words I should have done. 

We went on to discuss different career options, college, university courses and various things – I felt like I had a reason none of them could work.  She said sometimes it's scary to think that everything could change and I cried again.  I said my boss had told me that everything in my life was comfortable and that I should try and change things up a bit – she understood that maybe it looks that way to him, but in therapy, everything is changing.  She said perhaps I needed that anchor of something staying the same whilst I dealt with this stuff and I agreed although said I felt this was also a bit of an excuse on my part. I know I would be much happier if I felt excited and challenged by a new job.  I told her that I used to love learning. I love reading, I love writing – I like highlighting things and the feeling you get when you really understand something you've just learnt, how it opens your mind up to wanting to learn more and more and more..... she told me to try and stay with thoughts like that. 

I told her that being called "Saffy" and a "boffin" when I was young doesn't help and she told me off for saying them things and didn't laugh with me at all. I felt embarrassed and like I'd been told off my a teacher or parent.  Naughty Twink!

After a while, conversation moved on and eventually she brought up the therapy break next week.  Despite what she thinks, she hasn't asked me how I feel about it. I have been waiting for her to ask me and I've been equally dreading and wishing she would – very conflicting I know. She still didn't ask but she didn't need to as she started to speak about how the breaks generally can be tough, I began crying again. I felt very embarrassed.  She said that she could see I was upset and that she really did understand etc – luckily I didn't need to say much. She reiterated like last week that I can email/text her and ask if "she is there" and that she would reply to tell me she is, but I am struggling to see how that will help me right now.  I don't need to know she is "there" – when "there" just means somewhere in the world. When I feel those needy feelings for her, it's because I need to see her, be with her, feel the connection and cry to her – or whatever it is... even so, I do appreciate the reason behind her saying it.

But then she made a joke.... "I will wait a few weeks before giving you my Easter dates" *laughs* 

..... ..... Child me is not happy about that joke. It felt very insensitive when I was sat there with tears running down my face regarding the therapy break. However, of course, I laughed along.....   

Bit scary, but I've decided to write a blog about my experience with therapy. It is pretty much diary entries so I'm not giving advice, but if anyone fancies a look I would be delighted!!

unpackingthesuitcaseblog.wordpress.com

Thanks in advance everyone!! xx

It's Saturday 11th February and its 2pm. My boyfriend has taken the kids out for a bit and so I have some rare quiet time, well quiet except from the washing machine that is broken and so is spinning so loudly I am sure the whole road can hear it!!

I don't often get a chance to write at the weekend so I thought I would make the most of it whilst I can.  I feel quite happy today. I feel very comforted by little things around me.  Silly things really, I'm drinking tea out of a mug I brought myself a few months ago which I thought was pretty, I have just cleaned the house and so it smells and looks nice, I've been playing my music and I've always loved that.  I finished one of my new books last night and it was fantastic and now I get to start one of my other new books - there is nothing nicer than the first page of a brand new book is there, I even love the smell! Bit weird aren't I? ha.

I've thought about my therapy a lot today, well a lot most days if I'm honest - and so obviously in turn I've thought about my therapist.  I was wondering whilst cleaning, what would life be like without that and her in it? I can't really imagine it, is that strange?

Going to therapy gives me some kind of structure I guess.  I look forward to my sessions in the week (I go twice a week).  I like the journey despite how bloody hard it is sometimes - I like knowing I am improving myself, my life, my chances of my future.  I guess I feel that it makes me more contained and more aware or something... I'm  not entirely sure what the feeling is. 

Having her there in my life has been a wonderful strange experience.  I spent a long time, over 2 years I think, being pretty highly defended that she wasn't that important to me - she was a professional who was pleasant and knowledgeable, but not important to me, no.  In the last few months I have accepted on a conscious level that actually she is extremely important to me.  Isn't it scary to admit that?  Admitting someone is very important to you, to your life leaves you feeling vulnerable to be hurt doesn't it.  I guess that is why I spent so long not acknowledging that attachment to myself. She has never given me any reason to doubt her but the whole paying for her time thing is still in my head I guess. At the end of the day, if I didn't pay her, she wouldn't be there for me - end of.  The adult part of me can talk this part down mostly, in that I pay for her time so she can be doing this with me and not out there doing something else, but her care and thoughts etc are free - those were her words.  Anyway, she is important to me now and I can admit and acknowledge a real connection when I see her. I can feel a very obvious change in me when I leave her on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I am starting to be able to admit to feelings of missing her sometimes.  I don't know if it's "her" that I miss, but certainly that connection with someone who understands you more than anyone else really can.  I know my boyfriend might know me better in terms of my quirks or my habits or even my day to day stuff, but she"gets" me on a whole other level - she understands the fears I have of being abandoned, of being seen and rejected - all that stuff. 

She knows it better than me, isn't that weird?!

I am so glad I took myself into therapy 3 years ago. It is the hardest, most life-shaking, wonderful thing I've ever done and for once in my life I can admit to myself that I am PROUD of myself for embarking on this journey.  I've never felt proud of myself before.

If we manage to maintain this relationship, me and her - it may possibly change my whole life.  It might bring me an "earned secure attachment" - I might see the world differently, see myself differently.  Isn't that huge? No pressure on her part hey!! I am learning to be vulnerable and I am learning to trust.  Mostly, I am learning to feel. 

Life feels like it is at a real turning point for me at the moment and I think I feel quite emotional about it today - in a good way. Good emotional.  I want a word to summarise that feeling and I can think of is "embracing".  I am embracing the changes right now. 

Twink x

Oh thank you!! As always. Your support never falters! I feel like you're becoming my OOTS mum haha!! X

Awwww San, you sound like such a wonderful lady!! Your daughter is extremely lucky.

I loved reading your post. It made me smile. You sound like you're really in a good place right now, you so deserve to be!! Looking after your body and mind is a fantastic sign of that and I know that sleeping is an issue you've been struggling with lately so even better!!

I totally get what you mean, therapy stuff and these feelings can feel all consuming at times can't they? Being able to come away from it from time to time is sensible and healthy.

Go you! I'm your own personal cheerleader right now!!! X

Okay so her words are running through my head today over and over again. Sometimes she says something and it's like she is shouting it at me really trying very hard to make me pay attention, to sit up and understand what she is saying (not literally).  I don't know whether it is that she really does say it in a different way, or perhaps that she repeats it enough times that I finally listen or whether sometimes something in me realises somewhere along the line, this is important, Twink, listen up.

Yesterday's words that are having this effect on me were "your needs and feelings are not too much.  You just attract people who cannot handle feelings.  It isn't your feelings – it feels like it is, because everyone around you is the same so you blame yourself, but it isn't you". Or words to that affect anyway, I can't remember the exact words but I remember playing it back to myself at the time thinking "she is saying that it feels like EVERYONE in the world thinks my feelings are too much, only because I've attracted those people around me.... so that's all I know"...

Repetition compulsion at play again I guess.

So, do I believe her? I guess the adult part of me has sat up and thought about this and understood that she is a very clever, knowledgeable lady and what's more, she is a therapist.  It is her job to point things out to me, make me understand and believe them and not lie to me. Yet I guess there is a part of me that still thinks she is just trying to be nice to me and say nice things, whether they are actually true or not.

When I've sent her an email in a dark place, I send it off to her and I don't hold back. It could be full of desperation, loneliness, sadness, anger, fear – any of those things.  All I care about is getting it out of me, making some sense of it and sending it to her "to hold" because she is the only person in the world who could possibly understand what I mean.  Sometimes I worry that my emails have little emotional effect on her and that she reads them like reading a story about a stranger in a magazine, skimming to the important bits just enough to be able to tell me that she has read it and the other half of me thinks that is entirely unfair because she is clearly invested in me and has known me for nearly 3 years, enough to care about me when I'm in pain.. surely?  Anyway, I send her the email, I eventually calm down and return to a bit more of an adult way of feeling and then I'm whacked by this great big shame storm for having been so needy, so desperate, so pathetic. I hate that I've sent it to her and I hate that she has read it and worry she will think "Jesus Christ, will you stop!!".  Obviously she hasn't ever given me any reason for feeling this, although when I emailed her last Tuesday to tell her that I was not looking forward to coming because I really felt so ashamed for having sent such a desperate email a few days before, she didn't reply and that really didn't help contain me when I was already feeling extremely anxious.

She said that she thinks I get this shame attack because I've had it drummed into me that my needs are bad and that my feelings can't be handled. My mum couldn't handle my needs or feelings and made that very clear to me over the years. She said that is why I find it so hard to really bring the feelings into therapy and why I've found it so hard to cry with her because I am so worried I will be too much. Makes sense....

Another thing we spoke about was that when you are a child, you have to keep your parent good – you can't allow yourself to "see" the bad stuff about them.  So you push away anything that doesn't fit with the image you hold of them, the one you want to hold for them.  You idealise them. She also explained to me that in a relationship, at the beginning stages, you idealise your partner and you both project onto each other what you want the other person to be – a while later, maybe years, that projected image starts to fall and you are left with the real person.  She said that it is this stage that effectively makes or breaks a couple. Do you really/still like what you are left with or not?  She said that couples who get through this period are normally pretty set for life. 

I told her that I've been crying so much lately and she asked what the main feeling/fear was. I said I wasn't entirely sure and that it was hard to make any sense of. I thought a while and then I said that I think it's that feeling that "we" weren't really real. That what we've had wasn't as good as I thought it was and that I don't really know him at all.  It made me cry quiet, slow tears again.  She nodded and seemed to understand.  She told me that she thinks although I am starting to use her as the mother figure for transference issues, she thinks I've done a lot of it with My boyfriend.  She said that obviously she can't be there with me at home every day and that he is so she thinks I've maybe done a bit of this with him...

So today I'm trying to digest this... I'm only just now, 3 years in, realising that he isn't able to be emotionally open with me and he can't discuss his feelings, fears etc because of his own things... and I guess that is proving so unbearable for me because I have to "keep him good" like a child has to keep their mum good.  Now that I've had my eyes opened to the truth, that he isn't emotionally available to me, it is killing me because I NEED for him to be what I NEED him to be.. I don't know if this makes any sense but the words seem to be flying out as I process it.

I told her that after our last session, I had sent him an email telling him our theory about why he finds it so hard to be emotionally vulnerable with me and about our theory of why concerning his upbringing and his mum and dad's relationship etc – I told her his reaction which was mainly defensive although he agreed to one small point in it.  She said "you can't be his therapist, don't even try".  I said oh no, I'm not, I just want to help him so that it helps us! But she said "you can't change him".  I didn't like her saying that because I don't want to be someone who is accused of wanting to change someone they love.  I guess I was feeling instantly defensive.  Am I trying to change him? I guess I am, but not because I don't think he is lovely as he is, and not because I don't love him – just because I want so much for our relationship to blossom into a healthy, authentic and equal one and that him being more in touch with his emotions is something that we need to happen... still, I guess the words have stayed with me because she is right. It isn't for me to try and get him to do that – I just want to encourage him to because I guess I worry what the alternative is... if he doesn't ever open up to me and learn to confide in me, will our love stagnate because I will change due to all this therapy and I will one day realise we are incompatible because of it?

I have been so busy playing my part of this relationship triangle business and enjoying the "benefits" of being the victim – getting all the comfort, support, love, advice etc that I hadn't sat up and looked at things in a clear light.  Now I can see that I've attracted a (wonderfully) imperfect man, its scared me.  All I want to be able to do is accept that he is imperfect as we all are, and be able to still feel the love I feel for him.  I hope that is possible more than I can write.  All my previous relationships have been with emotionally unavailable men, and I've spent the last 3 years telling her that he is so different – which is is don't get me wrong!!!! But on this level, they were somewhat the same. That is a hard thing to discover. I had totally idealised him as my perfect saviour – my hero. 

As I write this, I feel totally consumed with my love for him. I can picture his face smiling at me and it makes me feel so happy inside. I truly love him, I hope whatever is next in my therapy teaches me to be able to tolerate any pain I feel which is really aimed at my mother and my loss of what she couldn't give me so that I can keep me and him safe whatever issues we may have to confront together.

Perhaps one day he will agree to some couples counselling – but I can't see it right now.