Posted by antigua3 on June 4, 2009, at 8:10:04
In reply to Re: To All.. Sorry, but very, very long.. » antigua3, posted by Daisym on June 3, 2009, at 23:44:10
Thank you Daisy. I do need camp comfort now. I'd like to be on a warm beach at the end of the day with a cool breeze so I need a blanket to keep me warm.
I decided this morning that I just need to work through this like you suggested. To go ahead and feel the pain and not try to hide from it.
I think there was just too much going on in the session. It started with a discussion of how fragile life really is, which is an important point my pdoc brought up about keeping myself safe, and I disintegrated to the point that I believed, rightly or wrongly, that my father figure thought my little girl needed to die, that she had integrated, really, but the message was still clear, that she had died. It was too threatening to me at the time, dangerous, really, and that's a signal to just slow down.
The little girl can hide if she needs to now. I think my pdoc pushed integration too quickly on me. He has done this before in the past, and while we may have made great strides, this is one area that I think he needs to let up on. I'm clearly not ready, but I do see how he thinks I am. He thinks I'm so much stronger than I am, he really does.
You nailed the "threes." I tried to articulate that to both my T and pdoc, that the number represents the triad of father, mother and daughter, but we need to work on this. Sometimes I think it would be best if we were all in one room (scary thought) so my "parents" could fight this out instead of me running to my mother figure all the time. I feel like I'm always telling on Daddy to my T and she always stands up for me. Interestingly enough, I never run to Daddy to tell on Mommy.
My T was away the past week and that's important,too. She has been unavailable a lot, and I thought we had an agreement that she would let me know when she left town, just so I could know. Well, she called me on Saturday to reschedule our appt this week and told me she was packing. I was angry, silly as that sounds, that she hadn't told me she would be away. I'm sure she thought she did (she's more scatterbrained these days which is difficult), but she didn't. I should have left her a message telling her I was angry, because it's important I do tell her these things, but I couldn't do it. She is too important to me, and clearly my unavailable mother issues aren't being resolved. But as an adult, I keep thinking she has a right to her own life etc. But I know I'm protecting her and not telling her how I really feel. It's hard to feel anger toward someone who has been such a great mother to me, but if I'm going to get better, I have to learn to articulate the anger I do feel. That means facing my own mother with my anger and there's just no way I'm going to hurt her that way.
I will take care of myself. I feel badly that I react so negatively to my pdoc, but that's part of the process too. It's painful because he doesn't let me hide, and as someone said here, since I've just started to really trust him, there will be bumps and mishaps along the way. You know I picked him because he is such a strong person and it's hard to see sometimes that he is using that strength to be an advocate for me, although I know what's best for me, and I have to stand up for myself when I think he's pushing me too hard. Remember, to him, this is "brief therapy." Poor guy, he really has had to adjust his expectations with me. But he hangs in there with me now and despite the venom I throw his way (which I didn't do this time), he just keeps going, trying to help.
The somatic memories and bringing them forth IS extremely painful and getting swacked upside the head with them can be upsetting and very surprising. But they do exist, and they are coming forth, just like you said.
Grieving is important, but this is more about protecting the good part of me, and not letting him take this away from him. Maybe I'm holding on too tightly to a fantasy of that little girl and what she represents to me, but it felt like a huge threat to the core of my being. I understand integrating her, but I still really believe that she needs to be freed from the terror and the fear. That may never happen. It's hard for me to accept that, but if it is to be, I guess integrating her is the way to go. It's not that I don't possess forms of these characteristics in my life today; it's just that if she is free of the terror and fear, I think I will become a whole person. Is that such an impossible goal? She deserves to be fully present in my life with all of her qualities. Maybe she is, but the fear and terror are holding us both back, and I don't think letting her go is the right answer. But is it impossible to beieve that I will never be free from this? That I have to learn to accommodate and live a life that is re-built on shattered pieces, instead of becoming whole? I don't think that's a life worth living, but then again, my life needs to begin again; I can't keep waiting for something that may never happen. I just don't think that's a life worth living. It's just all so confusing, but I'm going to try not to think about it so much. To slow down as everyone has suggested.
Thanks for your kind thoughts Daisy, and for making me think differently, which is what you always do.
antigua
poster:antigua3
thread:899140
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20090515/msgs/899354.html