Posted by daisym on July 9, 2005, at 14:21:03
In reply to Re: Need help figuring out feelings..... please? » Daisym, posted by LittleGirlLost on July 8, 2005, at 22:31:58
*****I know exactly how you feel! It does feel like survival, and I can't tell you how many times I've called her after a session, feeling very little, and asking her if I was going to die - because it felt like it. I told her it felt like I was too little to be left all alone and that I thought I was going to die. Ugggh! And it's not just vacations, I go through this week after week. Sometimes I worry and wonder if it's all worth it. Especially if something happened to her! Why is it so scary to be attached to someone? To need them, and even (can I say this?) love them?*****
I had this weird experience last night as I was reading your post -- of feeling intensely young and lost and sad. Like you said, too young to be on my own. It didn't help that a video was on TV of "Concrete Angel". I haven't felt so intensely young, wanting to cry out for my therapist (where are you?!), in weeks. When I feel this way, I bounce between intense embarrassment and intense longing to stop struggling, and call him.
I know the historical reasons it is scary to get so attached to anyone. Intellectally I can tell myself they don't apply here. But this doesn't really help, does it? I wish I knew what the right answer was/is. Is the way through this to MAKE yourself sit with the feelings and then they will go away? Does admitting them and giving in to them make them worse? How exactly does one work through this stuff? I've tried to let myself move toward reaching out and sharing this fear and hurt more. It didn't seem to make it better. Of course, I want everything to happen quickly, like right now!
I was surprised that you wrote that you can't cry with your therapist. You seem so attached and comfortable with her. Is crying hard for you in general? When I was young tears were really against the rules. I would spend a great deal of energy fighting them off in therapy, retreating into silence. But my therapist helped me a lot with this, he would say, "isn't it OK to cry here?" and my response was usually, "it is against the rules and not productive." His response was "the rules are different here, you need to cry and I want to see your tears." I needed this overt permission. I still fall back into fighting them off, often out of frustration, but I allow them more now. Maybe you can talk about crying when you don't actually feel like crying as a way to gain your own permission.
I want you to know that this conversation is really helping me clarify my own feelings. It is confusing to want something so much and yet not want it at all. Naming it hasn't helped. Fighting it hasn't helped either. I'm at a loss as to what to try now.
I hope your weekend is going well.
poster:daisym
thread:524903
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050706/msgs/525482.html