Session today: Suckish with a dash of fuck. Maybe it's a seasonal thing; I realized afterward how very close we are to April Fool's Day, and remembered that Evil Session last year on April 1st, which certainly did more damage than this one, but I'd rather my therapy sessions not have their sole merit in a relatively light damaging effect. And maybe it didn't; I don't know. I just walked out so pissed off, and that pissed me off more. I understand feeling upset after a session because so much has been shaken up, and out, and I've gone through so many emotions, blah, blah, blah. But this was just frustration. Thinking, "I hate him." No, you don't. "I hate therapy." You? Ha. "Would you shut up? I hate it all." Thinking, "I don't ever want to go back." Imagining someone new. Yes, that's good, Mary; just run away. Is that what you want? Do you want to run away? "...Maybe."
I napped, taking the sharper edges off my irritation, and I did come to some conclusions, which I'm trying to remember now, as they'll be helpful, when I do go back, on Monday, as I said I would. (Though, seriously, when he asked, I wanted to say no. I wanted to be a total brat and reply, "Oh. Don't you think I'll be cured by then?" It was a serious Mood. At one point during the session, I honestly contemplated kicking him in the shins. Ayigh.) We were talking about Rogers, and this Dave Thing, this confusion over how contacts can be made, and what they can consist of, and the fact that I've been blaming myself for it (somewhat), even though I can also see my course of action as legitimate... He kept talking about how he was going to challenge the part of me that felt ashamed and believed it was my fault, and I guess what I didn't understand (and therefore couldn't explain) was that although I felt ashamed, I don't believe it's my fault. I think I felt really patronized by the "I'm going to convince you" way he was approaching me. And I had such trouble concentrating on the matter at hand that I didn't even realize while I genuinely feel ashamed, I'm choosing to blame myself. (I know that sounds ridiculously like therapy jargon, and I despise therapy jargon at the moment... I have to doubt to have real faith; hang on my friends, I'll return to my posterchild position before long.) Choosing to blame myself because the last thing in the world I can imagine is walking away from Rogers, which is an option here. At least, in the doctor's mind it's an option. He talked about how this potential flaw in their system was affecting me, and how I could choose to respond to that once I understood that it was their issue and not mine. I stayed closed because number one, "he talked", (as opposed to, "we talked" - I felt like less than a peer) number two, I was distracted by the fact that I don't rationally believe this is my fault, and number three, I will not walk away from Rogers and Rogers-people. He did say that no matter where I decided to place the fault or the responsibility for what happened, no matter how I choose to view the situation, I still have options in my next action. As in, it can be their screw-up without my having to leave them. Great. Fabulous. I repeated that back to him at one point to prove that I'd heard it. That I understood that, and yet... He decided the "and yet" was that I couldn't feel it, that I needed to take more time with why I'm feeling ashamed, blah, blah, blah.
I called him a doctor. That's a harsh fighting word, and he knows it, and I feel bad, although I do remember that he's not a friend of mine and so I don't have the same responsibility to treat him well. That is the weirdest sentence I've typed in a long time. I can't imagine having people in my life that I feel free to mistreat. And I don't feel that way about him. I guess what I mean is, the work we do riles me up, and I spaz, and he knows that. There isn't the same need for apology, forgiveness, discussion that there so often is in other relationships. I'm compelled to apologize, but it feels too much like apologizing for what I felt, apologizing for the reason I'm there.
When I came 'home', I went directly to bed, put a bear next to my face, and tried to sort it out a little. He'd asked me, just before I left, to consider - over the weekend - the possibility that it wasn't my fault. I didn't have to convince myself; I just had to consider it. And I told him no. I think I told him I couldn't do that. And he said something about how certainly I could do that, and I said, "Yes. I can do it. Of course I can do it." (Have you seen what I can do?) "But I won't do it. I don't want to." This is when he decided that I needed more time with what I was feeling, and I realized I was choosing to think it's my fault. Earlier, I'd said something about how I prefer it be my mistake because it's easier to remedy if it's my mistake, and he asked me how that was true. When I thought about it, I realized that in this situation, it really isn't the case; nothing would be more easily accomplished if I were obviously in the wrong. He said it all sounded like "woulda, coulda, shoulda, didn't" - blaming - and I wanted to say something like, "Duh. Are you in this conversation at all, or are you just giving me the stock therapy answers?" What I hear you saying... It seems to me that... I try really hard not to give the stock mental patient answers. And usually we connect, but today was an exercise in fallibility, in the very least.
So I came back, and I lay down, and I tried to determine what was possibly going on. I didn't feel like typing, but I let myself dialogue, asked why I hated everyond, and tried to hear the answer without molding it. It went something like this: "Then then have not to hurt me." They don't have to hurt me? What? I went on from there to realize that basically, I have considered running the hell away from Rogers. It's terrifying me, with all this instability, all the changes, all the mixed messages and the frightful ease with which my experience there can be compromised by what happens now. My fear of losing them, I think, is one of those double-sided fears, protecting me against my fear of staying. And it's not that I don't want to stay or won't choose to stay - I will... and that's part of the problem. I know from experience that I won't choose the pain of no connection over the pain of connection, not in this case. And so I just assume I feel that way, too. But my feelings are feelings; they don't jump to conclusions, and maybe I need to go through the motions of actually "considering it" even though it feels impossible to me.
I mean, maybe it's all about the frailty, the vulnerability of the whole thing. When I came 'home' from Rogers, I protected the experience like it was my child; for the first time in my life, I was not going to allow anyone else's perception to change what I knew was true. It was too important. It is too important. When I told him that I wouldn't entertain the possibility of it being their fault, I told him rather bluntly that I was not willing to give up what little bits I have left of the reason I decided to live. I'm just not. And I don't care if there have been more reasons, or if there should be more reasons; I don't care if I actually do like myself now...that doesn't really matter. (Problem. Problem thought but true thought.) What matters is them. He told me it's not sick to want to hang onto those people who gave me my life, who helped me transform; he told me it's healthy. I verbalized a shrug. I told him sick or healthy didn't matter. So, this is a healthy thought. I'm still ending up alone with it. ...And I know you said I don't have to walk away... but for some reason I can't understand that. Can't feel that. Probably (possibly?) because I need to feel and understand that part of me does want to run. These phone calls I've been making, the question of why I think I'm a freak for connecting the way I do, the sexuality discussion, and just the underlying knowledge that what I experienced there was not perfect, and in my fervor to protect it, I spoke of it as perfect. Now it doesn't feel like it can stand against its own reality, its own flaws. What do you do when love walks up to you and says, "You know, it's awful, but I really don't understand that one either"? When God sighs and shakes her/his head? This is like having my spirituality crumble - a core belief. Maybe because everything I believe is based in this. And if the starting point is taken away, will my beliefs still stand strong, on their own? And if I admit the flaws of my home and salvation, how will that affect me? What will that do to Rogers? I'm scared to harm it in a way I won't be able to undo.
But it's already disintegrating - somehow, some way. Something to do with this insistence that it's a miracle and the confusion of "miraculous" with "perfect", and the underlying insistence that it wasn't perfect. My head is spinning, and I don't know if I've gotten anywhere. I already knew that Rogers is miraculous, isn't perfect, and that I needed to understand and voice those two realities. So, what the hell is new in this?
That I want to run. ? That I'm afraid to admit that; I'm ashamed of wanting to run, the way I feel shame when I want to hightail it away from a friend whose sickness scares me more than I think I can bear. Why be ashamed? Don't I want to be able to move on; don't I want to be someone without this constant attachment? - at least partially? I want to be myself, and this is part of her; I know that. But I don't know that they like this, and I want to be their pride personified, everything they like and believe, all good. I've known this before, too - this being afraid to progress because I'm scared to discover parts of myself that might not have been accepted there. Completely. By everyone. But I have this nagging feeling there's something else, something I haven't understood yet, that I was trying to avoid today - which left me so uncomfortable.
I'd rather be theirs than mine. I think that's it. I can speak the alternative, and I really do like myself more than I ever thought possible (when I'm not feeling so completely ashamed) ... but when it comes down to, would I rather be myself and my own or be not-completely-myself and theirs?, I'd rather be theirs. I can't imagine giving them up; I don't know why I think it has to be a choice. Don't they want me to be who I am; wasn't that the whole point? Yes. But. It was a mixed message. Become yourself and go away. Become yourself, but this relationality...what is this? All the unspoken messages that a non-hetero-sexuality was not kosher, all the times I was kicked out because I wasn't supposed to sit around with staff just because I liked to do so. If I didn't need help or have a problem, I needed to leave. Being alone in my room afterward, crying, finally having the problem, the necessary emotional upset to win myself time with them, if only I could use it: When they kicked me out, I cried. I went to my room. I felt alone. When they told me to go home, I felt like I was being punished. Banished. And now this thing with Dave and I guess I feel that way again. I've tried so hard to prove that I'm healthy enough to stay in their lives in a different capacity; I've been so conscientious of the fact that I can't maintain relationships with them if I try and maintain the patient-therapist relationship. Which is why it's so fucking ludicrous that Dave believes that's why I was trying to contact him. I've been so cautious in keeping clear that I'm not trying to be their patient. Because I knew that if they thought that, I would lose them, and I can't lose them. Because I have a treatment team, a one-man-treatment-team at the moment but a treatment team nonetheless, here - and frankly, after today's session I have no desire to be seeing more doctors.
(Such a fighting word. I can't believe I called him that, and he knew what I meant when I said it, so there really isn't the, "Well, he is a doctor; why should he be offended?" out. I meant it as a slur, and he knew it, though I think he tried to take it as a joke. An irritated joke. And if we're going to assume he's healthy - which just makes things easier - we can take comfort in the fact that he's not obsessing over it. Maybe I will find a way to apologize, but only if it's not for being irritated. I guess I don't so much want to say "I'm sorry" for what I did, but "I never really want to hurt you." I know I was angry, and that's why I acted as I did and said what I said, and I think that's legitimate...but I would never want to hurt him. Not personally - maybe just a kick in the shins every so often. But even that passes with the anger. I don't ever want to hurt him, even when I'm angry. I just want to do something to show how explosive I feel, to communicate, be understood, and remind myself I'm not staying silent anymore. Anger is still, I think, the emotion regarding which I'm the most clueless. That's probably worth talking about.)
I think that's what happened. What I know of it so far. And this entry is seriously less lyrical, less playfully pretty than the last, but what's to be done? It's reality. Things are rough right now; even the language is crude.
At some point, I'm going to need to face the fact that some really messed-up things have happened over the past few weeks and just because they're "over" (Sara's out of the bad hospital, I'm not on the phone with her mom, Dixie's gone, and so forth) doesn't by any means suggest I'm over them. The Sara thing is hard to understand. I just thought about that night I didn't rescue her, the talk with her mom, and the emotions flooded back. Obviously, this has all been building. I guess I just assumed that each tragedy was knocking the previous one away, rather than realizing the dangerously high pressure of it all. Luckily, the doctor started talking like a doctor, and I vented enough not to explode. Exploding is messy. And explaining is hard. I want to leave him a message tonight, just to put it all away, and at the same time, I feel like I'm still confused, and'd be better off waiting until Monday. It's only Monday after all. It's not like I'm incapable of waiting; I just want to say some things and let them pass. But then, I'd like to understand those things better before I say them. I think I'll go with waiting. I can always change my mind and call. And it's possible I'll sleep tonight without going through this whole soap opera again.
The true beauty of having written this? I still have no clue what I'm going to do. Other than tell him what I've thought of on Monday... and I suppose that's appropriate. Though, really, sometimes - I wouldn't mind having a better understanding of the larger plan. I have the sort of feeling that comes up when you realize you don't know where you're walking and the group of people you're with, not realizing this, have been following you. I don't know where I'm going, but obviously I can't handle letting him lead. Completely, that is. So, peers again. We need to be peers again. The entries need to read, "We talked about" and not "He talked about" [a topic.] And I am not seeing him on April Fool's Day. So this is officially the bad appointment energy finished, ok? I have too little to count on, as is.
Count on, count on... One mental patient; ah ah ah.
~me