B
Bofado
This is not like me. Well it is like OLD me, but I thought I was over it now.
My therapist is awesome. She supports me really well. She encourages me to call when I am struggling hard to manage myself with intrusive memories, stuff like that.
It's taken me a long time to be comfortable calling, because I have a big fear of being too much of a problem - for anyone - and them abandoning me. This therapist is the first one I've been able to connect with about my past, and we've been working together for a while. We have doubled down on doing trauma processing, and so she is extra clear that I need to call her if I'm struggling, or starting to dissociate. She considers it part of the treatment protocol.
So I've been working to do that. And I've gotten much better at not judging myself so hard when I need to call her.
Here's what happened: in session last week, after some trauma stuff, I told her a very specific little fact about my childhood, something upsetting to me. I wanted her to know about it because she had been talking about that fact in relation to her own life, totally innocuously, and I wanted her to know that I have a slightly painful reaction to that subject. ALSO, I was assuming it was another example of something my parents did that was wrong, and she has always been helpful in confirming when they were and were not acting like parents. So when I brought it up, I thought she would confirm that it wasn't right, what they did, and I thought she would ask a little more about it.
She gave me a look I've never seen before - a look of disbelief, like judgemental disbelief, like "OMG, you are lying to me!"
And then she did not address what I told her AT ALL. She talked about it in context of her experiences with it, in general, and how basically she had never heard of what I said, happening.
So I left feeling really, really bad - and scared. Like she didn't believe me. OR, like I've been wrong about this thing, that really my parents did it right, and it was my fault I was getting hurt. But mostly, that she didn't believe me.
I got in touch yesterday because I was feeling afraid that she thinks I've lied. I was clear that I wasn't in crisis, but I could maybe benefit from checking in, if not yesterday, then today. Didn't say what it was about.
SHE NEVER GOT BACK TO ME, which is totally not like her at all.
I wrote again today, forwarding the message from yesterday, and asking if checking in today could work, and for her to respond regardless so I knew she got the message.
She did, finally. Just with a time we will check in. Nothing about the other message.
I'm FREAKING OUT. Does she think I was lying???? Should I bring this up??? It's really a topic for a session, but we don't have one for a week, and TBH I'm not going to cope with it for that long, I can't.
My therapist is awesome. She supports me really well. She encourages me to call when I am struggling hard to manage myself with intrusive memories, stuff like that.
It's taken me a long time to be comfortable calling, because I have a big fear of being too much of a problem - for anyone - and them abandoning me. This therapist is the first one I've been able to connect with about my past, and we've been working together for a while. We have doubled down on doing trauma processing, and so she is extra clear that I need to call her if I'm struggling, or starting to dissociate. She considers it part of the treatment protocol.
So I've been working to do that. And I've gotten much better at not judging myself so hard when I need to call her.
Here's what happened: in session last week, after some trauma stuff, I told her a very specific little fact about my childhood, something upsetting to me. I wanted her to know about it because she had been talking about that fact in relation to her own life, totally innocuously, and I wanted her to know that I have a slightly painful reaction to that subject. ALSO, I was assuming it was another example of something my parents did that was wrong, and she has always been helpful in confirming when they were and were not acting like parents. So when I brought it up, I thought she would confirm that it wasn't right, what they did, and I thought she would ask a little more about it.
She gave me a look I've never seen before - a look of disbelief, like judgemental disbelief, like "OMG, you are lying to me!"
And then she did not address what I told her AT ALL. She talked about it in context of her experiences with it, in general, and how basically she had never heard of what I said, happening.
So I left feeling really, really bad - and scared. Like she didn't believe me. OR, like I've been wrong about this thing, that really my parents did it right, and it was my fault I was getting hurt. But mostly, that she didn't believe me.
I got in touch yesterday because I was feeling afraid that she thinks I've lied. I was clear that I wasn't in crisis, but I could maybe benefit from checking in, if not yesterday, then today. Didn't say what it was about.
SHE NEVER GOT BACK TO ME, which is totally not like her at all.
I wrote again today, forwarding the message from yesterday, and asking if checking in today could work, and for her to respond regardless so I knew she got the message.
She did, finally. Just with a time we will check in. Nothing about the other message.
I'm FREAKING OUT. Does she think I was lying???? Should I bring this up??? It's really a topic for a session, but we don't have one for a week, and TBH I'm not going to cope with it for that long, I can't.
