T yesterday at 9:30 a.m. Went back and he told me to wait before sitting down. He wiped down where I usually sit with Lysol wipes, saying his previous client had a cold and he didn't want to take any chances with me getting it. Me: "Uh, thanks." I sat. He was wearing not penguin socks, but the black ones with big red roses on them. Me: "I've been awake less than 2 hours, so no guarantee how my brain will be working." T: "OK." Me: "Oh, and I'm totally sober right now--I usually have a beer before session." T: "Does that mean we should schedule more sessions at this time?" Me: "I don't know, let's see how things go..."
Discussed some stuff about D. T then asked how I was doing processing the ex-MC stuff. Me: "I'm still doing OK, actually." T: "You sound surprised by that." Me: "I am. I really thought I'd be reacting more. I'm kind of confused." T put his hands around his mouth and whispered, "Maybe it's that you're getting well." Me: "Maybe? I guess I just was dealing with stuff with him from most of the time I was seeing him and then since the rupture and termination. Maybe I just needed the email and the last few sessions to process it?" T: "I think you've probably been processing it all along." Me: "Hm, good point, even if some of it was subconscious."
I checked clock--we had almost a half hour left. Me: "So...there's something I kind of want to bring up, but I told myself I wouldn't." T: "OK, you don't have to talk about it." Me: "I know, but if it's something that I'm worried about talking about, maybe that means I need to talk about it? But then I'm thinking, it's almost Christmas, so..." T: "It's up to you." Me: "OK." T: "Do you want to say what the topic is? You don't have to." Me: "Well, it's partly the fact that I feel like I can't talk about certain topics, that I worry about how you'll react to them. And I hate that." T: "You don't have to worry about how I'm feeling." Me: "I'm more concerned about what you'll say to me about it." T: "Why do you think that is?" Me: "I don't want you to feel uncomfortable with me." T: "You don't need to consider my comfort." Me: "It's more my reaction to what you'd say about it." T: "OK."
Me: "Like with the stone...I hate to bring that up again, but." T: "It's fine." Me: "When you said that it felt creepy or weird, that made me feel really bad." T: "I want to clarify that I wasn't saying that *you* were creepy or weird. I want to make sure you know that I don't think that about you. Because I don't." Me: "OK, thanks. I guess I just don't want you to think about me in a negative way." T said something about nothing I've done made him think that way. Me: "Maybe that I use too many tissues?" T laughed.
Me: "I guess the thing I want to talk about is from something you said last session, like when you were suggesting the Man Speak stuff to say to H." T: "OK." Me: "Maybe I shouldn't talk about it..." T: "It's up to you." Me: "OK, I probably should if it's on my mind. So you said what to tell H to make him feel better about ex-MC. Things like I don't love him. But...I'm not sure if I'd be lying? I mean, I'm not sure that I love him anymore, but a year ago, I did. Though I guess I'd just be talking about what I feel now, so..." T: "OK."
Me: "And then...what you said I could say about you, where you said, 'I don't feel anything at all for Dr. T." T: "I don't recall saying it in those words, but OK." Me: "OK, maybe just something similar. But I realized I couldn't look at you when you said that. I think because it's not entirely true. And I know I've brought some of this stuff up with you before...and you seemed OK with some of it. So...I guess I was just afraid of what you meant when you said that. Like were you trying to send a message or were you just suggesting something to say to H." T: "Just something to say to H. I didn't mean anything else by it. You know, you often give me credit for having put more thought into something than I did." Me: "OK, so it was just something to show H you aren't a threat?" T: "Exactly." Me: "OK."
Me: "Because, I mean, like I said, it's not like I don't feel anything. I can be more specific if you want." T: "There's no need for specifics, we can leave it vague." Me: "OK. I mean, it's not like I'm in love with your or wish I was married to you or something." I started laughing. Me: "OK, that came out a bit more harshly than I meant it to!" T (smiling): "It's OK."
I said how at one point, I *did* feel those things about ex-MC. T said it's not surprising because of how caring he was toward me. I said was a bit confusing because some of it was paternal and some was like, "Well, H isn't giving me this but MC is." T: "It makes sense that those are qualities you'd want in a parent or a partner or anyone you had some sort of relationship with." Me: "Yeah, I mean, I know I was idealizing him. Because he couldn't be like that all the time in everyday life. I think I told him once that if he was, it would probably be annoying!" T: "Yeah, like 'stop holding me with your voice!'" Me: "Exactly." T: "If you know someone in real life, you learn more about them. Like everyone has bad breath, everyone has to sit on the toilet." (Me, in my head: I will not think about my T pooping...) Me: "Yeah, with ex-MC, when I was first meeting with him to discuss transference, a friend suggested I ask him to tell me all his gross habits. He said he could tell me, but I opted not to know." T: "It would have been an interesting thing to have held over him." Me: "Yeah. And ex-T had told me, I probably could have spent 10 minutes on the phone with his wife--she was still alive at the time--and I'd learn what it's really like to live with him."
I said how I felt I didn't have the idealizing thing with T. T: "Maybe it's because I haven't always been accepting of you." Me: "Hm, that makes sense. I feel at times how that's actually probably better for me. Because with ex-MC, he was showing an unrealistic example of a relationship. Like I'm not going to probably find someone who is that accepting of everything and caring all the time in the real world. So then that just left me attached to him and not wanting to leave."
T said that from the outside, it seemed inevitable that ex-MC and I would have had a major conflict. Because all relationships have them at some point. T: "And most people are able to work through them, just as I think we have." Me: "Yes." T said the thing he's said before about how working through conflicts can make a relationship stronger because you know you can get through it. That he hopes I realize that with our relationship, too. That we've worked through things before and will work through them again when something else comes up. I said I guessed that could help me more with outside relationships, and he agreed.
T said how he thinks I've been dealing with conflict better recently, whether with him or other people. And that I seem less affected by people saying negative things to me, like on PC threads. How before, if someone made a comment, I'd be more likely to agonize over it. While now, I'm less likely to take it to heart. Me: "Yeah, I think you're right. Is that the LT filter you've talked about?" T: "Partly, I think so." I said I felt like I'd been doing better handling conflicts with H and with friends, too, and he agreed. How it's partly that I'm not assuming I did something wrong. Me: "Yeah, sometimes I realize it's the other person, too." T: "But it doesn't have to be anyone doing something wrong. People are just different, so they have conflicts. I can't think of anyone in my life who is exactly like me. So I'm going to have conflicts with them, just because of the differences." Me: "Hm, I hadn't thought about it that way before." T: "Some people choose to avoid difficult topics, and they end up with rugs that are really high because they swept everything under them, and with elephants and gorillas sitting around the room." Me: "My mom is kind of like that..." T: "But it's generally better to talk about it." Me: "Yeah or the elephant or gorilla just keeps getting bigger." T pointed at me: "Exactly."
At some point in the middle of that, after we started discussing therapeutic relationship, T asked me, "Does all this feel OK?" And I said yes. Then he checked in again with me at the end. Which I appreciated. And it really did feel OK.
When we had 5 minutes left, he was still talking about the conflict stuff, referencing Gottman (who did research on marriage) and some other things. I said a couple times I knew we had to stop soon, but T kept talking and wasn't making moves to stop. So I went with it. We finally stopped at the hour mark, and I still had to schedule and pay. He confirmed Thursday, said he'd be in some Sunday and Monday, that I could just text him to schedule. Me: "I know, because we're over time." T: "That was my fault." Me: "OK." Went over and paid. Shaking hands, T said, "Happy Holidays!" Me: "Same to you." T: "I hope Santa brings you whatever you want." Me: "Thanks! Uh, you too?" T: "Take care." Me: "You too."