The Good Therapist, Part 2

I want to tell you, I say to T, why I need  to work with you. About the reasons I can commit myself fully to this process – with you.

We met a few times several months before we really started working together, but I needed to finish some things, and you encouraged me to do that. I knew I had to go back into the typhoon, fight to stay afloat, see if the captain could get us safely to shore. She couldn’t. I knew that, but I was unable to let go, not yet. When I came to you, bludgeoned and bloody, you sheltered me. You accepted my experience of the events as more important than what actually happened. I mattered – not just details of the trauma.

The Good Therapist, Part 1

There are so many good things, and we talked about them in session. I talked about them. I wanted to tell her. I needed her to stop asking if something was a deal-breaker. If I could work with her human and imperfect self. I didn’t want to hear T’s uncertainty, because uncertainty is a crack. A place to break apart. Yes, I think, I may have a hard time trusting. But I do trust you. I don’t think you are holding out. I don’t think you are sugar-coating or feeding me bullshit. I believe you.

Googling Your Therapist

Looking for your therapist in either cyber or 3D space is all about boundaries. Both your T’s and your own. I’m responsible for my boundaries; T is responsible for hers. In general, I don’t believe it is a problem to search online for information about T – as long as everyone’s boundaries are intact.

When I was looking for a new therapist, I researched each prospect as thoroughly as possible without using a paid source. My insurance company provides name, address, sex, professional license, year and university of graduation and a check-off list of “specialties.” I wanted to know age and while year of graduation could be an indicator if it was many years ago, more recent graduations didn’t necessarily mean the therapist is young. Plus, therapists who had checked off every specialty… well, one can’t specialize in everything. It defies the meaning of the word. I looked for more info on that as well.

"Late" Is Just A Perception

I show up for my session 10 minutes early, so I wait. And wait. And wait. At fifteen minutes past our scheduled time, I've been waiting 25 minutes.

It was just last session I told T I don't like it when she's late. But, I knew she'd be late - she always is. Still, I'd told her, I especially don't like when we start ten minutes after the hour. Yes, I believed she would show up. Yes, I know she said she'd give me my time. But I didn't like it.

So, today I am waiting. She's never been 15 minutes late. I feel myself abandoned, sliding into despair. Angry. Why won't she get here on time? Anxious. Has she forgotten me? Uncertain. Is it the wrong day? The wrong time? I checked the cracks in my mind. No, I am right. T is fucking up, big time.

I start to feel tears forming under my skin. Start to breathe irregularly. I hold my breath.

Again, I think it through. What day is it? Tuesday, I'm pretty sure. What time is my session on Tuesday? My session is at 11:00. Crap. I arrived at 10:20.

 T shows up at 11:05 - "on time."

Hello, she says.
I smile and try to behave like a sane person.

Previous Therapists, Part 1

I found my last therapist (oldT) before I had even left the psychiatrist/therapist (PT) before her. PT was retiring. I’d seen her for six years – which was about how long she was in private practice. It was super-hard to let go. I knew it was coming, due to her age and Parkinson’s, but I wasn’t expecting it when she told me. She informed me just six months after my mother died, and it felt like another crushing blow.

She’d given me two months notice, so we had time to talk about it. But I didn’t. I couldn’t form the words without crying, and I didn’t want to bust out like a blubbering fool. So I avoided it as it related to us and how I felt about it. We talked about logistics. Finding me a new psychiatrist. Finding a new therapist.

The Strait Jacket

“Frankie and Alice” is a movie about a woman (Halle Berry) with Dissociative Identity Disorder.  It’s in limited theaters, and I saw it today. In the course of the “based on real life” story, Frankie ends up in the psych ward with a compassionate and savvy psychiatrist. Berry does a good job portraying the different alters and her switching is subtle yet discernible. In one scene, an alter switches and then freaks out, needing to be restrained due to her violent outburst. They put her in a strait jacket.

That’s what triggered my memory. Despite giving my psych history to numerous therapists and psychiatrists over the past twelve months, I never mentioned it. I didn’t remember. Suddenly, though, watching Frankie get forced into the strait jacket, zapped me into that same scenario. I had been put in a strait jacket. I also had fuzzy memories of being restrained, tied to a bed in that same hospital. Why? What happened that I was so out of control? Then I remembered. I tried to hang myself there. Was that one of the times? Surely, if I fought the staff. But the other? I don’t know.

Remains of a Life

I am struggling.

This is the situation: Mom died two years ago. Her husband (of six years) remained in her home. He died three weeks ago. Now I am tasked with going through her things and getting her house ready to put on the market. There’s only me and my sister, but she lives 900 miles away. I also have to deal with his kids who need to deal with their Dad’s stuff – which isn’t a lot, but which is integrated with everything else in the house. Today I came across some certificates with his name. Last week I found two unopened bottles of Listerine and an erection vacuum pump.