Once upon a time...

About 7 years ago I started seeing a therapist. This was a big, crazy new thing for me.

I'd been to therapy before...but it had always been in childhood (teenagerhood?) and forced on me so I didn't care much or try very hard. But this time I was paying for it (w/the help of a church group) and it meant so much more. I wanted to do well and have it be worth it. I worked my butt off for that woman. Of course, working my butt off meant merely being willing to sit in a room and talk, but I did that. We didn't talk about the big stuff....mostly because back then I didn't realize that the "big stuff" was all that big or really needed talking about.

Just shy of a year of working with this woman, stuff got bad in my life. I honestly don't remember exactly what was going on, but the emptiness was creeping in and I started getting "creative" with my medications. Word got to my therapist that I was doing this, including one time where she ended up calling an ambulance because there was question if I had OD'ed to a dangerous level. (One of the problems with the whole church group funded thing...way too many connections and ppl passing on news to therapist that she shouldn't have known...and I have a suspicion her telling others some stuff as well.)

A session soon after the ambulance thing she left me absolutely floored. She told me, "This isn't working anymore. I don't want to call any more ambulances." She was kicking me out, just like that. I'm sure I'm shortening what she said a bit, but it was very quick like that and I remember the "i don't want to call anymore ambulances" line very, very well. We didn't even have a full session that day. She didn't give me any referrals or help me get in anywhere else. She really didn't even give me any suggestions. After a year of working with her, suddenly it was over. I guess she thought I wasn't willing to try or not being open enough...or that I didn't care. I was absolutely crushed because I was finally starting to really trust somebody. I had finally let someone in...let someone know some of the deep down secrets of me....and here she was able to hurt me just like i'd feared. (At the time I couldn't rationalize all that...i only knew it hurt. But I walked out stone cold saying "ok so be it." I wasn't that open yet).

It took 5 years after that before I would even consider seeing another therapist. For a long time every time I tried I'd only make it through a few weeks at best, before the fear of that hurt came back to me. By the time this summer rolled around and I knew I really needed help...it would make me physically sick to walk into a therapist's office. Every intake I did scared the hell out of me and I had to fight just to keep my insides inside. I could barely say a word. In fact I said so little at one that my 1.5 hour allotted session was done in barely 45 min.

I tell this story because it still impacts the way I think about therapy of any sort, and what I expect from these sorts of relationships (or maybe relationships in general). I know that I see rejection because I expect it. I know that every perceived slight...every unreturned call, any lack of expressing appreciation for me being there, any accidental forgetfulness towards me, etc. look like rejection to me. I try my best to tell myself that these are generally accidents or misunderstandings, so that I can be willing to keep trying and believe they'll still help me.

Yesterday's conversation with my t brought up all these thoughts and fears to a very intense level. There was a lot of scary, uncomfortable, rejection-like thoughts. He said things like...if i can't make it to appt's then this level of care is not right for me and I need to be discharged to somewhere else. And that maybe it would be better for me to not be in the iop. And that maybe I need an inpatient program instead. And maybe I need a different therapist. It all felt painfully accusatory to me.

Frankly I think it was bad counseling on his part. I came to him telling him i was desperate and he started an unbelievable number of statements with, "You..." I said it felt like he and others there weren't offering me the help with how to deal with this stuff, but were instead just waiting and then "punishing" when I did wrong. He said it's not meant to be punishment and I know that....but I felt I was being pushed away and told that I was wrong and it terrified me. Yes this stuff is hard for me sometimes and i push it away, but I don't want to lose it. I'm terrified now that they are going to suddenly walk away from me too.



I made it to iop today mainly because I was afraid they'd kick me out if I didn't. I took my time on my way there...even stopping for snacks on the way (because I needed cash for parking money...I really did...but there were other much quicker ways I could've done it...) and waiting in the long check-in line when I know full well I can skip that.

Turns out i'd forgotten today was a craft day so by the time I got in there I'd pretty much missed the whole talking part. It's kind of a bummer bc ppl brought poems they wrote and that would've been fun to hear. I brought a poem but when i realized they wanted me to read it out loud I said no way. Stupidface asked if I wanted to share anything else and I said no. He respected that...thank god. He kept me back afterwards to talk while everyone else went to crafts. We talked a little about my fear and emotions and all that. He said he doesn't think there's any danger of me being kicked out of iop and he doesn't think the thought of the program not working for me is exactly true, even though some of my behavior says that. Basically the conclusion we came to is that i'm terrified of everything. (No new news there, but it re-enforced just how much so. He started describing the physical symptoms of fear/terror and I realized that's how I feel all the time. Not exaggerating. He wants me to try to focus on the behaviors for now and not worry so much about the feelings. Basically, suck it up and get myself to iop no matter how scared i am...and if I need to sit there and cry the whole time then so be it. I told him I hate to cry in front of people. He basically said get over it. lol

I'm not really sure how I feel right now. I wish the thoughts would slow down long enough that I could make sense of one at a time. It's like as soon as one starts to make sense at all the others race in and fill in the gaps so i'm just as confused. I'm sure there's progress being made on all of them, but I just keep feeling like I'm tearing my hair out. Ugh. And also, every time I start to see where these feelings are coming from it makes me realize just how far I have to go to make them better.

After talking to Stupidface I had to go to the lab for a blood draw for a med check. Because of past experiences I HATE needles. Really any sort of medical environment but especially needles. I had to wait a long time so lots of additional panic w/that but once I finally got in the girl who did it was amazing and did it super fast and almost pain free. I'm working on relaxing from that now. It took so long I didn't make it to any of the iop craft time. I did want to go at least say hi to everyone cus I was really only in the group for like 5-10 min...but maybe it's better to not have to do too much talkin w/them just yet.

So that's where I sit now. Waiting for the next group to start. I will still be going to the afternoon art group...mainly because I have a t appt. after that anyway. More than anything I just want to go home and go back to bed...mostly all I've been doing this week. But I'm doing what I can to stick it out and stay here.

Another day...continuing the fight...