ambivalance | Tales of a Boundary Ninja

The “L” word Part I

February 14, 2012 Attachment Girl 15 comments

So far all of the writing I have been doing here has concerned my healing history so to speak. Stories of work I have already done and lessons learned. I’m going to deviate from that and actually talk about what’s going on with me right now. Partially because I think it would be helpful for others to hear about it, but also because I am working through this and struggling to understand what it means and how it fits in my understanding of who I am. When I talk about the past, a past about which I have had a chance to reflect, the stories can come out in such an orderly fashion, like little perfectly wrapped packages with a gift bow when the reality was actually an experience of raw confusion. I thought it might be helpful to see the raw confusion as it was happening.

I’m going to talk about the “L” word. Yes, that four letter word we avoid like the black plague in therapy: Love. Have you ever noticed that the shorter the word in English, the more confusing talking about it’s meaning is? I mean the long words like antidisestablishmentarianism have very specific meanings. But say “God” or “love” or “happy” and suddenly you have a very long, complex conversation on your hands. So one thing I do want to note is that throughout this post when I discuss BN loving me, I very much mean it as a parental kind of love, a love which seeks my good, not in any romantic or erotic sense. I don’t believe that there is an erotic or romantic component to his love for me. But if there was, I’d be the last person on the planet to ever know about it anyway. But I’ve never picked up on anything along those lines. Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, attachment theory, boundaries, dependence, feelings, love, psychotherapy blogs, safety, transference

i carry your heart

January 25, 2012 Attachment Girl 10 comments

Sorry it has been so long since my last post, life has thrown a few wrenches my way (if you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball!) and I’ve been a bit off balance (ok, try triggered as all get out) which tends to interfere with my writing abilities. I also had an ear infection and as my dear husband has to remind me EVERY time, antibiotics tend to depress me. I never, ever remember that when I’m in the middle of it. I just become convinced I’ve derailed, made up all my progress and throw in a few “I’m failing everyone and everyone thinks I’m a big selfish maw of need’ just for good measure. Cleaning out our old tape libraries can be a slow business at times. 🙂 But I am feeling better (gosh, do you think that has anything to do with finishing your course of antibiotics?) and slowly finding my balance. I also saw the Boundary Ninja and was able to deal with a chunk of what’s bothering me. We hit some stuff late in the session ( unusual for me but I needed to bring up something that scared me so badly, it took over half the session to finally go there) so I’m going back in two weeks to finish that particular topic. So thank you all for your patience.

We had a lovely interchange at one point during the session that I wanted to share, but before I tell you that story, I need to tell you this one (which also allows me to shamelessly steal from one of my posts on Psychcafe for blog content. Remember if your stealing your own stuff, it’s not cheating, it’s efficiency! :)) Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, attachment theory, commitment, dependence, disorganized attachment, earned attachment, encouragement, feelings, healing, hope, love, needs, safety

What I’ve Learned in Therapy: The Complete List

January 11, 2012 Attachment Girl 22 comments

Someone once posed the question on the forum, what are the most important things you’ve learned in therapy? I’ve actually written expanded posts on some of my answers, but thought it might be useful to post my whole list here. I’ve put links a the end for the previous expanded posts.

The most difficult thing to explain about healing in therapy is that it isn’t about “knowing” it’s about experiencing being with another person. So much of what I talk about below totally gonzo confused me when I first learned it. I used to tell BN that he was talking in Russian. But staying with my feelings and continuing to express them through the confusion is how I learned it. And I must give credit again to BN, who is really an incredibly gifted, compassionate man doing exactly what he should be. So much of my “wisdom” is actually my ability to accurately quote him. 🙂

So the full list is below. If there’s a particular item in the list you would want me to expand upon, please feel free to leave a note in the comments. Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, boundaries, commitment, dependence, earned attachment, encouragement, feelings, healing, hope, love, needs, pain, perserverence, self-worth

What I learned in therapy Lesson 5 – The relationship of love and pain

December 8, 2011 Attachment Girl 22 comments

This is lesson five of what I learned in therapy: Pain is not a part of love, love is the answer to pain.

This lesson actually came later in my healing and my work with the Boundary Ninja. I’m writing about it now as it’s been a subject that has been both coming up in a lot of conversations I’ve had lately and because I am learning to experience it as a lived truth. If forced to choose, I think I would pick this understanding as the most powerful that I learned in therapy. It is also extremely difficult to explain because at its heart is a mystery that lives at the heart of our existence. It’s not so much a truth that you understand, as much as you learn to accept. Continue Reading

Lake Loop Trail

December 1, 2011 Attachment Girl 5 comments

Hi all, sorry for the gap in posting but you’ll be happy to know I have a number of excuses reasons for why this has occurred. 🙂 Thanksgiving was a very busy weekend with lots of plans (not to mention the unseasonably high temperatures. Do you have any idea how rare it is to put up your outdoor Christmas decorations in shirtsleeves in Syracuse NY?!? We just had to take advantage of the opportunity.) Then, since it is November, I came down with a sinus infection. Actually I was two days away from making it through the month without one, which hasn’t happened in years, but didn’t quite make it. The good news was, I already had a doctor’s appointment for a routine visit set up, so I was able to get antibiotics and may have actually caught this before I go into my usual follow-up of bronchitis and kicking off my asthma. Light years to go, but my self-care is getting better! 🙂 Not to mention, one of my rare visits with the Boundary Ninja. (Ok, rare might not be EXACTLY accurate, but humor me, I’m trying to hang on to a sense of progress!) And to be perfectly honest, I am having a much more difficult time writing the next entry in my Developmental Skills series (Series? What series?! How do you call one post a series? ) then I expected. So I thought that if I wander off in another direction for a bit and write about something else, I could distract myself, so that whatever subterranean level of my brain which actually produces this stuff can proceed unhampered by my conscious mind.

I was talking about therapy with a friend the other day and how endless it can feel, when I was reminded of a story which is the perfect analogy for therapy. And that is the story of the Lake Loop Trail. Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, healing, hope, perserverence

Therapy isn’t enough

November 21, 2011 Attachment Girl 27 comments

Therapy isn’t enough. Never has been, never will be. The Boundary Ninja would often say that to me when I would bring up my pain about his boundaries. I had all the classic complaints. How could I work through what I needed to in only 50 minutes a week? How do I open up when I need to and then pull it back together to walk out? Why couldn’t he hold me and comfort me when I was in pain? Why couldn’t I see him outside of therapy and know more about him? Why couldn’t I live under his desk? 🙂

Now the first time he ever told me therapy wasn’t enough, I must confess gentle reader, that what went through my head was “What the f***?!?! If you know that, then why in hell am I here?! I have no f***ing idea what you’re talking about?!?” Took me a long time to express that (I do believe I cleaned up my language when I asked. But maybe not, I could sometimes really rip loose in the BN’s office. Mainly because the first time I ever used the “F” word in front of him, when I calmed down I apologized for my language. He informed me, in no uncertain terms, that I was never to apologize for that, adults talk that way when they’re angry, we sanitize things too much and I should express myself however I needed to. I have often wondered if he ever regretted saying that. :)) He said many times to me (he had to repeat most things to me about 13563 times as I am slow to catch on) that therapy isn’t enough, and honestly, I thought it was extremely puzzling for a long time. I mean, I heard the words, but had no idea what he meant by them. But I eventually learned their truth. Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, attachment theory, boundaries, dependence, disorganized attachment, earned attachment, feelings, healing, limbic resonance, needs, self-worth, transference

Why won’t my therapist just tell me how this works?!?

November 16, 2011 Attachment Girl 13 comments

I don’t know about anyone else, but one of the most frustrating things about therapy for me was the fact that I was working so hard to get it “right” but the Boundary Ninja refused to cooperate. In any way. He’s a very stubborn man. Or perhaps determined might be a better word.

When I started really working with the Boundary Ninja on an individual basis, I was consumed with the worry that I was being a nightmare of a patient, way too needy and that he was just sitting across from me keenly anticipating the day that I would finally leave. I was consumed with worry about how I was doing in therapy. Was I getting it right? Was I being a good patient? Was I working hard enough? Did he actually like me or was he just tolerating me for pay? I’m sure most of you could come up with a long list of your own. Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, boundaries, dependence, feelings, needs, self-worth

Another Poem

November 10, 2011 Attachment Girl 4 comments

I just saw the Boundary Ninja on Monday. I have been running into some significant transference and triggering in some relationships right now and wanted to sort through it. I am planning on writing about it at some point when it’s clearer than it is now. 🙂 I stopped going regularly to therapy in September of 2010, but have been back for single sessions every couple of months when I’ve needed to work through something that came up. This was the first time that I have seen him that I made another appointment before leaving. Usually I leave without an appointment and just email him to ask for one when I need it. Continue Reading

Categories: Boundary Ninja, dependence, limbic resonance, ambivalance, transference, feelings, earned attachment, acceptance

What I Learned in Therapy Lesson 4: It wasn’t my fault

November 7, 2011 Attachment Girl 16 comments

Therapy Lesson One
Therapy Lesson Two
Therapy Lesson Three

Therapy Lesson #4: I wasn’t responsible for the sexual abuse nor did I deserve any of it.

This was a VERY tough lesson. It’s a very tough lesson for most victims of abuse but especially so for people who experience long term abuse as children. So many of the circumstances around abuse and developmental truths about children can feed into the perception on the victim’s part that they “deserved” the abuse, they “asked” for the abuse or they are some kind of pathetic target for abuse because there is something fundamentally warped in them. We can have a very good cognitive understanding that it wasn’t our fault, but to get that emotionally? Long uphill battle. There is an almost incomprehensible level of shame around this subject, which doesn’t make it easy to talk about. But the only way to break through shame is to talk about it. Terrifying to say the least. Couple this with the fact that so many victims actually believe that if they get close to someone and let them know what happened, they’ll infect them with their “darkness.” So it took a very long time and being told over and over and experiencing compassion from so many people around me to learn this one. Continue Reading

Categories: acceptance, ambivalance, attachment theory, boundaries, childhood sexual abuse (CSA), disassociation, feelings, needs, responsibility, safety, self-worth

Why your therapist SEEMS cruel, but really isn’t

October 25, 2011 Attachment Girl 76 comments

We all know that therapy is a unique relationship, unlike any other relationship that we experience. It defies classification in that while it shares aspects of other relationships -friend, lover, parent, colleague – it is not quite any of these things. One of its unique characteristics is a therapist’s reaction to your pain.

In most relationships, when you express pain, the other person’s natural reaction is sympathy; they feel bad for you. This sympathy is often followed by some action whose clear intent is to make you feel better or help relieve your pain. Human beings (at least sane ones) do not like being in pain. So much so that we find it painful to see people we care about, and even people we don’t particularly like, in pain. So there is an almost automatic human response of answering someone’s pain with comfort. If someone is crying, we offer a tissue or a hug, if someone is scared, we offer comfort or reassurance, if someone is angry, we try to help correct whatever is making them angry. Continue Reading