Bah! tired of my trigger-able-ness: simple schedule shuffle...

[amosmorris]

I have a hard-working T who has tried to be responsive even when I know I present a learning curve for her (aka a "good challenge")...I know she's been generous, that she tries very hard. Today she wrote me last minute to offer me an earlier time slot--all while telling me I could keep me current, later appt but that she just wanted to offer me the earlier slot since it was open. I couldn't do it, and then spiraled into shame/fear/self-loathing about how my late appt was keeping her at the office, and that really she just wanted to go home...In the meantime we are on the cusp of some hard trauma processing and had discussed this session and goals in that area--so much so that I've been nervous about this session (which is tonight), but also desperate for the help getting this garbage out of my head. I am aware of--and frustrated with/sad about--my developmental trauma, attachment, abandonment issues and right now I'm so mad at myself for being so damn trigger-able! I feel like a delicate flower and I'm sick of it (of me). I feel like I'm at this critical point where not a hair can be out of place with her--I'm always sliding into the belief that she's unsafe, that I've finally uncovered the "truth" and it's bad. I feel so sorry and am so tired of it all--esp because I'm capable of "getting it" or seeing it, knowing "it's me" but...the cycle of reaction I just can't seem to turn off. I just want to hide from her sometimes. Of course until this T I have never even experienced my attachment pain--I've never attached in the same way--and so these feelings are new/foreign/excruciating. There's a part of me that gets angry at her like--you know what my issues are so...no fast movements, ok? Don't give me a diff appt time the day of if it's not absolutely essential. But in reality, and most of the time...I just feel like giving myself a kick. Can anyone relate? What do you do when you get stuck in this cycle?

 

[Friday]

. Can anyone relate? What do you do when you get stuck in this cycle?

For sure. 1 thing is to break apart my black & white reasoning. For example:

and then spiraled into shame/fear/self-loathing about how my late appt was keeping her at the office, and that really she just wanted to go home...

Thats one reason why she might have offered you the earlier slot. Some others are that she knows it's a hard session coming, and

- Wanted you to have the option of 2 appointments -if needed- today. Either 1 long one, or 1 regular + break to settle + 1 regular.

- Knew you'd be hugely anxious, and by offering the earlier appointment could cut short some of your worry/anxiety ramping up.

- Had a cancellation and the first person she thought of was you.

- Is going to be working very late tonight, ie also coming in late to start, and given your situation thought she might come in an hour earlier than she'd planned and offered you the slot.

- et cetera. Really, I could go on with 15 or 20 more of these, easily, all of them with your best intentions at heart & another 20 or so that have nothing to do with you, and then a few dozen more that are a combo of wanting to do what's best for you whilst also managing life stuff. NONE of which have to do with going home early &/or your keeping her at the off &/or being inconvenient.

So unless she said to you that she's offering you the slot so she can go home early, because your slot is really inconvenient for her? If it were me, I'd be looking at the reason I came up with "why" as just that. Something I came up with. (Which begs the question : why did I come up with it, instead of the other couple dozen possibilities .... But less than dealing with the immediate aftermath of my imaginings. IE how do I calm down. EG one way is look at other reasons -beyond the worst case scenario & worst possible conclusion.... And break apart my black & white reasoning on the subject)

***

If I'm being reeeeeeally smart, Id also

- go burn off some of the stress this has ramped up
- up the self care since I've just realized I'm edgier than I thought
- ask her directly (reality check myself)

 

[Sideways]

What do you do when you get stuck in this cycle?

If I've got the a fair bit of insight into what's going on, which you definitely have here? My 2-steps are:
(1) acknowledge what's going. Don't try and fight it off, it is what it is.
"Hey Ragdoll, here we go on that guilt cycle again. Feels like crap. Dang! Next thought..."
(2) Offer myself some alternative self-talk options, self-talk that I might be more comfortable with, like:
"Actually this situation probably isn't the big deal to me T that I'm making it out to be, sticking with my original appointment is a reasonable thing to do. I'm responsible for me, my T is responsible for herself. So, next thought..."

I'm big on not trying to fight off the symptoms that I have as a big urgent "must not have these symptoms". I have the symptoms, that's ok. Fighting them? Makes them bigger, tougher, more formidable enemies.

But I'm also working on making a more comfortable alternative possible. And since I can't help listening to my self-talk, I offer myself more realistic and helpful (or at least neutral) alternatives.

 

[Muted]

If you can, I would discuss it with her.

 

[amosmorris]

For sure. 1 thing is to break apart my black & white reasoning. For example:



Thats one reason why she...

You're so good @Friday --thank you so much for all this help. Our session was not a very good one (if only I had read this great advice beforehand...!) and I was predictably tangled up (in me) and she knew I would be and so uncharacteristically started off our session, "So did I cause you anxiety by...?" And so of course I'm like deep in the "you know me" self-loathing and I did explain my black/white chain of thought. Her angle was that she had this earlier slot and she felt it was important that she "at least see" if I could do it--if she didn't at least ask then she'd not be exercising her autonomy--and then I needed to see that I could say "no" to her (my autonomy) and that didn't mean she didn't want to be there at the later time, or that she'd retaliate against me or whatever because I couldn't do what she had asked of me. It felt a lot like a bit of a pscyhoeducational lecture, very "see what we're learning here?" and "see how we're working through this and see how important it is?" and she threw in a comment about how in fact she was looking forward to me coming in. But it felt ill-timed because last we talked I was in desperation mode and--a first for me--asked to talk briefly on the phone during which time I essentially was like "please help me...I'm scared but I need your help getting this stuff out of my head" and the plan was--so I thought--we were heading into this session to try to do some of the trauma processing stuff I haven't yet been able to really, more openly do (even though she basically knows the gist but--you know what I mean). And I knew that if I was able to share more of the experience with her I'd have a backlash--that I'd push her away--but I felt ready to try harder.

And so it's like--while I'm not disagreeing with her, at all, that I need to work on the saying no/surviving thing, the schedule-change-panic thing, the I-have-attachment-and-abandonment issues torture circus...I also have sexual trauma issues and I felt like we just were not on the same page at all last night because if you push one button--attachment/abandonment--that's fine but it means we can't also push the other button--sexual trauma. I explained to her that I had come in there thinking we were going to take on some more of the sexual trauma stuff and that now we couldn't (which I blamed exclusively on me and my other issues).

I'm disappointed in myself, always, for those issues and I'm there to work on them and I am working (I swear) so hard that some days I'm just like no more therapy, no more of this, I'm too tired and it's too hard but...we've been at this for over two years and she knows what my issues are and she knew as well as me that if she did the schedule juggle thing that'd be the focus of our session. So I guess if I'm being wildly honest I'm also disappointed in her--all while, of course and again, acknowledging that all roads lead back to my issues. It's just--ugh--I wished we were on the same road last night. She tried to offer me the rationale that since--historically--any time I've shared some more traumatic stuff I've always also had a reaction of fear afterwards towards her, where I get threatened by her/unsafe and so maybe, she reasoned, this was good because we were dealing a little with that relationship safety bit in advance. (eh....this felt a bit like a retroactive explanation to me...)

So the session ended with us talking about "what I was afraid of" around sharing more trauma-related stuff with her and I'm like--"that you'll be scared of me, that you'll be repulsed by me, that you'll want to get away from me etc etc"...and she's like "I can't imagine that there is anything you could tell me that would make me feel that way" and then she added "I've heard a lot of stories" and I'm like--more spiraling--"I don't want to be another story"....

She was saying something about how I'm not but time was up and I was in pack up/dash out mode....I imagine others know that mode well enough...

Anyway--I ain't proud of anything I've written here. I'm just being honest because I'm sick of hurting and want to get better. I can't tell you my gratitude for this forum. There isn't anywhere else where I recognize these aspects myself--this space is life-saving and gives me the conviction to keep in this work, however much of a mess I make of any of it. @Ragdoll Circus thank you to you too--both you and @Friday --I admire your strength and your insight. Thank you so very much for sharing any of it here. :hug:

I should add that my asking to talk on the phone a few days before this session was "a milestone"--something "we've been working towards"--something she's encouraged. It's taken me all this time to do. But of course the fact that I did ups my fear and wish to be invisible after the fact...