Session later today

I've barely slept this week. All thoughts of Father, grieving have been transplanted by therapist and the impending abandonment when sessions end in a few weeks. Its as though my entire being vibrates with pain, sexual and from weeping. The feelings that everywhere you look, that the object of your love is there, right there...you can see him with closed eyes, feel his being, recall his shape and facial features. If he wore cologne I would smell it without him even being near. His fingers are exceptionally long, his hands like my Father's were, large, warm though I've never touched them, I catch myself staring at them during session.

The pain at times is a relief, to know I am still alive, a woman while death would be preferrable to love or feel what is the only form of love I know since childhood, unrequited, unattainable, unfulfilled.

Fcuk Freud

If you cannot love, you might as well be 6ft under. Its like living in a desert.
I actually forgot what a woman can feel like, kept saying I'm too old now to think about anything but preparing for end of life. This has less to do with illness than just feeling like a failure at relationships and never finding someone to return love. There's always been someone who NEEDS me to lean on me, marriage or otherwise, but love... if we might define it as a feeling that has no ulterior motive except that widening of the heart, the feeling that the heart beats faster, that you want to be in that persons arms, that this love fits, feels rights.

 I think part of the problem is, therapy wise, we, therapist and I are mentally/intellectually compatible, he's stronger than I am afraid, and there've been times when I say something so spot on, he leans forward and catches himself before actually touching my hand etc. He's called me 'dear' I'm sure with no intention other than he is kind.

Since this kind of behaviour is so foreign and I am so starved for it, I would like to say fcuk Freud and the concept of transference and note that I actually love this man. I know I cant marry or be with him, he's too ethical for that-but he represents everything in a human male that I've never been blessed to live with, as a father, uncle, husband.

So as ridiculous as this may sound, I'm not sure I want to discuss 'transference' any further with staff because its denying what I feel and calling it something else to make everyone comfortable. Why cant we call it what it is, and go on from there? I'm crying for days as if my heart is breaking and this poor man has done nothing except be kind....
 

Memoir

The study admins know I'm in the process of writing a memoir-an initiative for me to do this study was to be able 'fix myself' by focusing on buried years and develop ability for healthy attachments. Its never been a problem to write about or for other people. I love my cats, but I also have children that need a healthy mother to spend some time with so they know they're loved, were loved and were not abandoned.

As for my parents...can any of us say we ever did NOT know as children when something was off? I recommend to everyone, Augusten Burroughs book, A Wolf at The Table-more troubling than the brutality a violent parent can inflict is the mixed message the other parent sends by telling us our perceptions are not what they seem, that Daddy didnt mean to touch you there, he was playing, or Daddy didnt mean to cut your mother with a glass bottle, she got in the way of the flying glass...so that after awhile your sense of reality short circuits. The other parent protects the savagery with their lies, for equally complex reasons. Co-dependency has become a cliche, but even today its difficult for women to pick up and run with kids unless she has family welcoming her or has money to fall back on. And some women cannot feel or function unless they are connected in some way, even dysfunctionally, with a man.

Maybe I knew extra early because I saw him sober and was his 'handler' as soon as I could walk and speak.
I was never allowed to bring classmates home or go to other children's homes. Never. It was a very small world, the sense of miniature and feeling safe inside are primary underlying factors of agoraphobia with me.

Roethke the poet writes about his drunk father waltzing him around as a small child, terrified as he tries holding on for dear life, his tiny feet on the tops of his father stumbling shoes--we know, we always know. But what name it had, what was wrong I didnt know until some years after he died and I had begun studying psychology etc.
The word alcoholism put some of the puzzle together but there is so much more involved, on both parents' sides.
 

Between sessions

I left this week's session after briefly discussing transference w/ therapist as directed by program director-slight point to be made-I'm not normally a person to do as directed simply because I'm ordered, there's always room for me to ponder and decide what's 'really the right thing'-that is a major problem, not always being able to decipher what IS right, but its a learned survival behaviour, trust no one to know more than you. Professionally this had been critical in being a minor success and retaining academic employment, shy sheep have their place but eventually got canned.

So instructed to bring up transference was humiliating when at those moments my emotional self is telling me if I could just get scooped up and run away with therapist all would be right with the world forever after. And he's tall, built like a football quarterback and my age but with even less hair than me. But when you're blind with transference passion (lolol) looks mean little, too bad I'm usually the one experiencing the transference.
Being the professional he is, as well as just a compassionate person, he actually didnt laugh, scorn or mock in any way. We talked as two adults understanding these feelings are part of a normal therapuetic process, but I left there and spent until Friday weeping like I was drowning.

 I have not had sexual feelings or even a hint of caring for adult men for many years. Its surprising that this capacity even exists in me.

The study antidepressant couldnt make a dent in what I was feeling-alone, abandoned, terrified about sessions ending in a couple of months, its all going too fast. The program director told me when I was there doing paperwork that the Psych would call me, but he didnt call and I thought well they're all confabbing about my sick thoughts about therapist and are just going to let the poor guy deal with it all.

By Friday the weeping, went from crying to nonstop flood was making me physically ill. When no one called I realized late in the evening that there was actually NO ONE going to rescue me, which is what I keep looking for, in partners, teachers-any authority figure, even females. As soon as this lightbulb moment happened (okay, maybe its just a nightlight light bulb, but it meant alot at that second) the ache for my therapist lifted, the onus is on me to do the rescue work, but jeez how many time have we all discussed this issue here and in other boards and while we may get it in our heads its doesnt seem to trickle down and take effect, at least this has been my problem.

I realized-okay pay attention, this is key-that I've portrayed my father, the grief subject I'm in the study for-in a romanticized manner, I'm pining for a man who in reality was a monster, that was our nickname for him, dear mother and I when whispering in the kitchen how to get some needs funds for her out of him....how to deal with the monster. So I've spent 7 weeks describing a man who repeatedly threatened to shoot and had slashed up my mother, threated her lovers w/death, drank to drunnkness every night as the only person who actually loved me. In fact he did, but only he knows why because this attention was not shown to my sister, we were like 2 orphans thrown together, total strangers who instinctively disliked each other.
I felt as if I had cheated and lied in the study and before going back wanted just to be sure this was the right place for me to be to work on these things.

Not 15 minutes later the Psych called...now paranoid as I am, imagine how this played out in my brain. Therapist gets call from me, doesnt know yet why I've called but we delved into transference last week so he's clearing a return call with psych before calling me back...according to Psych the program director had sent him an email he had only read late friday, it was actually a coincidence, or they're both good actors...I explained to psych why I called therapist and was concerned about the entire portrayal of my father as a misunderstood lonely guy who needed my love blah blah blah, he said come in next week, lets have a round table and talk this out and decide if you are placed right to continue. He said he would contact therapist because therapist is concerned about me and would want to speak to me before next week. (i still smell rat...do you?)

Therapist called 2 hours after finishing with another patient at office. This man keeps telling me I astound him with my general insight, honesty and striving to confront the issues of this therapy, so while I was expecting to hear, you know D. I think it might be best if we review everything and see if there isnt something more suitable therapuetically.

During the time I waited for his call back I realized that to sever this therapy mid stream would be the worst possible thing-I've discussed things I've never told ANYONE and to leave the dirty laundry out there unsorted is perhaps more damaging than pushing forward. He listened to why I was calling and said I am right where I belong, exactly-I'm just pushing myself so hard and fast, faster than he would suggest that I need to be more gentle, he reminded me of what I said to him the first week-dont be so soft and kind I'm not used to this its not good for doing this kind of work. (my kids tell me I walk too fast with my cane as well, gotta get there, gotta go home-get'er done)

 I apologized about the depiction of my father and said I felt almost as if I'd wasted study time or did the wrong thing....he responded with such kind words you wouldnt believe even if I wrote them here, but essentially said despite my disclaiming love, as my therapist he knows me well enough now to disagree with my assessment, indeed I loved my father and have a huge capacity to love others, its needs channeling. And no, no one is going to throw me out of the study, nothing happened, in fact its another break through.

As I write this, snowflakes are falling, covering pine boughs outside my front windows and Vladimir Horowitz is playing Chopin...if only the world could stay like this forever.

My landlord said I could bring a piano into the apartment. instead of this unexpected agreeable situation bringing me the joy it should my reaction was,how will my kids be burdened with an old piano when I'm dead?

Break thru, break down, just broken?

...even going into the study with what I thought were honest intentions, this evening while reading a book wholly on another subject, a thought occured, I've recreated a father in my imagination that was caring, loving and attentive even though the reality of it was he was violent, kept a gun, threatened our lives daily, was a full blown out of control alcoholic that had to be carried out of restaurants and piled into taxis which we then piled into to haul him home in total silence.

Then the doorman helped us get him into the apartment, and then it was my job at 5-6yrs old to put him to bed, sing him a song, remove his shoes and socks, his belt. I dont know what my mother was doing during this time, I had my assigned task and did it.

No matter what we said, offered, begged or pleaded, he got stinking nasty drunk.

A father who really loved, who was capable of 'love' would not have left one family to start another only to be so abusive for so long to so many. A sane father would not have taken his 6 year old to bookmakers, race tracks, had me pour shots or fetch fresh cold water to wash down his scotch or tried to kill my mother repeatedly, another monster in her own right.

So as of this evening, maybe there is no breakthrough maybe its a breakdown because I'm totally confused.
But what I am sure of is that once I admitted this mess to myself the feelings of transference and obsessing about my therapist came to a halt.

Feeling angry and feelings of hate for being a child pawn in a sick game between two sick adults and never finding shelter or aid from any authority figures i.e. teachers, guidance conselors etc, seems more normal than fantasizing about grief over a dead man that wasnt really a father at all.

Week 7, Transference kicks in

In the 3-4 week of CG sessions I had in the back of my mind that I would have to inevitably deal with separation; this is always like a death/mourning for me. As mentioned previously, it happens with colleagues, years while mourning the separation of my children...and my father, the reason for participating in this intense study. However, the concern over separation slowly warped into a different situation last week when I had an assignment to take my father's death certificate, inside an envelope, and go to a nearby place, take out the envelope keeping the cert inside and just 'be' with my father's certificate, then go home.
To start, I got lost, even though my therapist was kind enough to print out traveling instructions and the address. I'm too new here, but got lost coming out of every subway station in NYC:-0
A very nice woman walked me to the correct bus stop, I had pretty much walked the trip just in the opposite direction and never would have gotten where I was to be.

When I got home I sat to think, was very tired and realized I had rushed to complete this assignment, not for myself but for the praise I would receive from my therapist. His approach to is softly praise every effort, be it in session or the homework. When we began working together I asked him not to be so gentle, I'm not used to this and it was hard to take seriously. In effect I needed to be disrespected and feel abused by another authority figure, as with my parents or employers.

 He didnt budge and by this past week I found myself doing things, and so many assignments each day to  complete, alot of writing, listening to a long tape we make each week, recording emotions and where and when they occur, learning self awareness and learning to reward myself when a thing is done and done correctly.
So I caught myself in two ways; firstly, my dreams became sexual in nature which is very unusual for me. Second was the realization that my desire to please him was more important than understanding what each assignment meant to me and then grieving prematurely because I felt I was wasting precious time having transference issues instead of being fully into the therapy.

I had the psychiatrist scheduled for today and had made notes and actually did not want to bring transference into my CG therapy, to avoid causing embarassement for either of us or conflict with our work; I thought the psych would hear me out and get me back on track.
Well both therapist and I got the schedule wrong last week, the psych was NOT in today, but the program director had to speak with me about release forms and once I was in her office cried me a river and explained what was going on.
She said transference is completely normal, after all it IS therapy and very intense and intimate in this form. She suggested I do bring it up and talk it out with the therapist. And so we did, spent about 1/3 of session time (2.5-3 hrs)
discussing and my explaining that while in my mind I get it, its not sex/love what he's become for me is a substitute father and his being warm and gentle only makes it worse to deal with.
He explained as well that the therapy is very intense and he has had patients who cannot have the kind of attachment or feelings that I have, that they anticipate in a healthy person desiring to heal is an innate craving for human attachment to others, that is indeed the hope of the program. He said something very kind, "..that if you did not have these feelings, this would not be the R. that I know and have come to know, because I feel and have read and heard your humor and wisdom."

my marching orders long term is learn how to be more gentle and caring for myself as he has been to me.