It has been nearly two years since I last saw my therapist.
The why of this is difficult to explain. At our last meeting, I got angry. I got offended. I got defensive.
So, I walked out and decided to not go back.
What she had said to me was not true, I decided. Therefore I did not need to return.
Two years Later, I am returning to her office. Defeated. A little Ashamed. Changed and Unsure.
I hope I will be able to tell her that any hint of "I told You so" will be roundly smacked back. I can not bear that. I can not bear being wrong when I have committed to something so fully. When I have set aside my perpetual cynicism and opened myself and believed, only to have it all fall down around me covering me in fine grey ash, I can not hear how I should have known better, should have listened, should have heeded.
All of these things I know.
I emerged into the world knowing these things. The machine of my lesson learning is well oiled and fine tuned.
I live in a place where the rock is ready to be rolled back up the hill and my refreshment is always just a little bit further....
Reality is not my downfall. Real things, real work, real sacrifice and struggle and discomfort remain my burlap lined silk. These things I know.
What I need are reminders of why I should bother with anything else.
Two nights ago I had a puzzling dream that left me sweaty and tangled in my sheets.
I was in a dorm room with two females I didn't know. I still occasionally walk the halls in my dream universities, a strange mixture of places I have known and mixed up corridors.
There was some kind of interview being filmed with one of the other people in the room. I walked behind her and my hair caught in some cobwebs. As I reached up to brush the cobweb away I received the first bite.
Knocking off what had bitten me, I saw it was a black widow spider. I felt the zing of outright terror - that body reaction to knowing that something you utterly fear is on your body. Has touched you. Has intimate knowledge of your skin.
The cameraman alerted me that there was a second spider just as the second bite came. It too was a black widow spider and I yelled at the camera man to kill it! Get It OFF of me! Just KILL it!
The adrenaline pumped through me. I was genuinely terrified. I had felt two bites. Spiders had been on my skin and tasted me. I knew Black widow spiders could kill you, and I had two bites. I knew that antidote is not carried in every hospital.
That is when my mother appeared in my dreamscape. She told me I didn't have to go to the hospital, despite the swelling of my face. She told me that black widow spiders weren't really that dangerous and that I shouldn't worry.
Even then, even in the height of my panic knowing I had been bitten and that these were indeed poisonous spiders, I entertained her option. I wavered. I wanted to believe that they weren't poisonous, despite what rational ( and obviously watching far too many documentaries) dream-thought told me. I wanted to believe that everything was all right, despite the poison swelling my face. I considered pretending everything was perfectly fine, despite the clear knowledge that these bites were going to kill me
That is when I woke up.
That afternoon, I called my therapist.
The why of this is difficult to explain. At our last meeting, I got angry. I got offended. I got defensive.
So, I walked out and decided to not go back.
What she had said to me was not true, I decided. Therefore I did not need to return.
Two years Later, I am returning to her office. Defeated. A little Ashamed. Changed and Unsure.
I hope I will be able to tell her that any hint of "I told You so" will be roundly smacked back. I can not bear that. I can not bear being wrong when I have committed to something so fully. When I have set aside my perpetual cynicism and opened myself and believed, only to have it all fall down around me covering me in fine grey ash, I can not hear how I should have known better, should have listened, should have heeded.
All of these things I know.
I emerged into the world knowing these things. The machine of my lesson learning is well oiled and fine tuned.
I live in a place where the rock is ready to be rolled back up the hill and my refreshment is always just a little bit further....
Reality is not my downfall. Real things, real work, real sacrifice and struggle and discomfort remain my burlap lined silk. These things I know.
What I need are reminders of why I should bother with anything else.
Two nights ago I had a puzzling dream that left me sweaty and tangled in my sheets.
I was in a dorm room with two females I didn't know. I still occasionally walk the halls in my dream universities, a strange mixture of places I have known and mixed up corridors.
There was some kind of interview being filmed with one of the other people in the room. I walked behind her and my hair caught in some cobwebs. As I reached up to brush the cobweb away I received the first bite.
Knocking off what had bitten me, I saw it was a black widow spider. I felt the zing of outright terror - that body reaction to knowing that something you utterly fear is on your body. Has touched you. Has intimate knowledge of your skin.
The cameraman alerted me that there was a second spider just as the second bite came. It too was a black widow spider and I yelled at the camera man to kill it! Get It OFF of me! Just KILL it!
The adrenaline pumped through me. I was genuinely terrified. I had felt two bites. Spiders had been on my skin and tasted me. I knew Black widow spiders could kill you, and I had two bites. I knew that antidote is not carried in every hospital.
That is when my mother appeared in my dreamscape. She told me I didn't have to go to the hospital, despite the swelling of my face. She told me that black widow spiders weren't really that dangerous and that I shouldn't worry.
Even then, even in the height of my panic knowing I had been bitten and that these were indeed poisonous spiders, I entertained her option. I wavered. I wanted to believe that they weren't poisonous, despite what rational ( and obviously watching far too many documentaries) dream-thought told me. I wanted to believe that everything was all right, despite the poison swelling my face. I considered pretending everything was perfectly fine, despite the clear knowledge that these bites were going to kill me
That is when I woke up.
That afternoon, I called my therapist.
5 Baleful Regards:
I'm sorry now that I was so flip in my comment to your FB post about your dream.
I hope she is a therapist deserving of you and therefore avoids any hint whatsoever of told ya so.
Oh NO Becky - one of my oldest friends! Your flip and funny comment was perfect.
And it was a strange fucking dream - taking place partly in the cabins of GORP.
I am still figuring out what it all means. I am just knitting all these pieces together and trying to figure it out.
No apologies needed, my dear
I hope your therapist can help you figure out the things you're considering. And if she can't, or if she makes you feel bad about yourself, I hope you don't let her dissuade you from the process-- there are other therapists in the sea.
I'm glad you recognize the need to take care of yourself.
Thanks my dears. I am actually OK, really. Much better than even a couple of months ago.
The dream remains a puzzle. Other than my desire to believe non-truth as potentially true, because it is comforting.
Plus - as I have said before, it is when I resist therapy the most that I know I need it.
I've gotten my body healthy, now it is the minds turn.
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