Freezing In Therapy

[barefoot]

@watundah - I always want to throw up when I've emailed my therapist revealing something about how I feel and then spend ages telling myself I should never have sent it and now it's too late. Tiresome, isn't it?! ;-)
Fwiw, I think it's a good thing for you and says good things about your relationship that you did send it.

Stick with it...I think you are getting somewhere.

 

[Chava]

I did give myself a little credit as it is my way to quit anything that is difficult. Well, this is by far the most difficult thing that Ive ever stuck with.

Me too. I think the relationship and connection stuff is really hard where there was either an abusive or neglectful home, and/or really early trauma. Laurence Heller's book "Healing Developmental Trauma" talks a lot about the early connection stuff and so much of it fit with my life, even how I connect and get absorbed in mental or spiritual pursuits vs relationships. It's pretty hard to work around.

My therapist says I have some nearly intractable defaults but is hopeful. I appreciate that she seems to understand roughly where I'm at vs feel sort of threatened or insulted by my lack of ability to be connected at times. I go whole sessions without looking at her. A weaker therapist would subtly start criticizing me for this or making me feel cornered. But I never feel like I have to be more put together than I am, I guess, and that's really a good basis for at least feeling safe...then it's like it takes me years to really test that out and understand what safe even means. ... :unsure:. But it's enough to know it's worth sticking it out. Glad you are sticking with it too...that's a big part of it, I assume...

 

[watundah]

Yes, I will. It's only money! Ha! Seriously, I am learning a lot but daaaang it can take forever to grasp concepts that she introduces. A little spark of recognition and an aha moment. But that's a subject for another day.

 

[Teasel]

Just to say I relate to so much of what you say. In my situation - living in the UK - and having been utterly unable to receive any beneficial help whatsoever from the national health service. I have finally been able to find some help from a charity that helps victims of sexual violence. So anyway they offer 2 years of therapy - so anyway I think that the only thing that has pushed me to really open up is the realisation that I've already had one year if that therapy. And realising that I could easily hide for another year and then that would be the end if my opportunity to heal from all if this stuff. I think it positively frightened me into pushing through and making myself be present and vulnerable and real in recent sessions. Obviously I don't think it's a good thing that my therapy is going to be such a short time. And having opened up and been vulnerable in recent sessions I have frankly been quite terrified and overwhelmed quite often. But the other week I was able to turn up to a session and immediately sob my heart out and share my desperate pain and fears for the future. I'm aware that that is only the tip of the iceberg. And kind of since then I have been all over the place and so scared. But also I know that I've needed to share that with another human being for decades. And in my calmer moments I can see this is an amazing thing for me to have been able to do. I'm sorry I'm not really sure what I'm trying to say.
I'm so glad that your therapist seem so caring. Completely understand how that would make you freeze / hide etc - terrifying isn't it - and glad that it sounds like you will be able to continue therapy for as long as you need it. And hope that you will continue to be able to chip away at the years of defences. I think it's true that traumatic memories and learned reactions to trauma are deeply burned into the core of our brains - kind of like a mahoosive "warning - don't f*cking go there" excuse my french - that what we are trying to do must something akin to deciding to give up on a most basic thing like using the English language - and trying to take up explaining ourselves in interpretive dance whilst simultaneously being held at gunpoint, naked, and on TV or some equally attractive prospect.
All the best to you

 

[watundah]

T says in response to email: "I know therapy is uncomfortable so much of the time for you, and yet I also know that your ability to be with this discomfort is increasing, and that is a huge thing." Onward!

 

[stillstanding2]

It became clear to me that this younger self exists because 'she' is the one who takes over and shuts d...

Inner child is a subject I've examined pretty closely. Mine doesn't really have to "speak up" to be heard and felt. I know who he is and how he feels, so sometimes I give him the safe companionship that he always needed. I can actually hold him and tell him from his future that he'll never have to be like everybody else. He won't want to be. And the person he is is more than OK. He can trust me. Sometimes that dries his tears. My therapist is happy that I do that.

 

[watundah]

Great description, Berlinda. I do feel for you. I can understand how being under the gun to hurry up and "get there" could make matters worse.

 

[stillstanding2]

Great description, Berlinda. I do feel for you. I can understand how being under the gun to hurry up...

Here's another angle on the "inner child." Suppose you know a child identical in every way to the one you were and still are to some extent. And realize also that that child has yet to learn how to express himself, or fears saying the wrong thing.

Yet you know that child very well, sense how he feels and know the words he could use to be heard if he were your age.

Do you think you could say for him what he is unable to say? Could you explain his feelings accurately, or at least make a start? Could you be his voice in asking for help? Or does he have to hide unknown until someone can discover him?

 

[Tinyflame]

Thanks @stillstanding2 I've never met a child like me exactly or the particular circumstances/ character/ responses etc but your explanation above makes the most sense to me yet as per 'inner child' stuff'.

 

[stillstanding2]

Thanks @stillstanding2 I've never met a child like me exactly or the particular circum...

Thanks. I found that I couldn't let my inner child speak up when I began therapy after my wife's death. Even my therapist was unaware of my earlier trauma. I thought at first that I should keep it that way in order to keep the subject centered on my young daughter's immediate devastation and mine. I thought of my inner child as irrelevant to the NOW.

But the flood of fear stayed so intense that I questioned my own competence to be both mother and father. So I looked for the source of my fears. Eventually, I identified the hopelessness of the child in me who couldn't speak up. We became buddies. I may have become for him the "imaginary friend", older and wiser. He came to trust me to take him with me to therapy. At first he only listened, while sitting unseen on my lap. Then he slowly began talking through me.

My therapist, (whom I've kept for nearly 25 years) has become that little boy's other best friend, and encourages him to play and say whatever he wishes, safely in our sessions.

And she applauds me for finding a way to bring that little boy out of hiding. That accomplishment helped assure me that I could endure many challenges since that time.

It is easy to report the plight of someone else, but it is tricky finding a way to speak for yourself. That's what this thread is about. My heart goes out to all children needing comfort.

 

[Tinyflame]

I wonder if courage wanes with time? I mean there's the childhood stuff & the adult stuff & then more adult stuff. Something that transcends the lack of time left & does not contain the optimism or drive of youth, probably because of years of living experiences & more trauma. I don't think in retrospect I wished I survived some of it. In that way finding an inner child or speaking up seems to have little bearing on the 'now'. But probably explains the feelings of futility in striving for a voice.

 

[Tinyflame]

I'm sorry if I offended you @stillstanding2 courage is a choice. Affected by factors, of course, but still a choice.