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Freedom, A Cool Wind That Burns Your Face – Part II
Tiny Tom:I’m frightened!
Bobby: As well you should be. Freedom is scary. It’s a blast of cool wind that
burns your face to wake you up.
– Run, Freedom, Run from Urinetown the Musical
This is part II of a series. For the first part, see Freedom, A Cool Wind That Burns Your Face – Part I.
I walked in and sat and BN opened with “so you’re having a hard time?” (We tend to get straight to it. Any chitchat is done at the end of the session when setting up my next appointment). I told BN I was really activated and he asked why. So I basically did a dump of what I described in Part I. Near the end of my spew, I was saying how I just wanted BN to reassure me but he was in full-on therapist mode (I totally get the need for detachment but sometimes it just feels horrible 
). He was great, he just looked straight at me and as calmly as possible said “It’s all going to be ok.” I cracked up. Then he asked me an interesting question (he’s really good at asking very hard questions which seem SO obvious once he says them, but that I would never think to ask myself.) Continue Reading
Freedom, A Cool Wind That Burns Your Face – Part I
Tiny Tom:I’m frightened!
Bobby: As well you should be. Freedom is scary. It’s a blast of cool wind that
burns your face to wake you up.
– Run, Freedom, Run from Urinetown the Musical
Greetings gentle readers,
Therapy has continued to be interesting. Sessions have been a little erratic lately, with one two-week break due to BN’s schedule and another two-week break due to me getting ill. The session at the end of the second week break was really good, although I was having mood swings for the next week. I went from feeling really optimistic then back to sad and weepy, then energized to feeling a bit lost. At times I would feel very connected with BN and at other times too distant. I think, in part, it’s becoming clear that I’m becoming more able to do without BN. It’s as if for the longest time I’ve been focusing on BN and now we’re shifting the focus back on me, where it should be. I think it feels like I’m losing him, even though I know that’s not true. Actually, I think it’s tied in with a breakthrough I made that session, but I’m getting ahead of myself. I’m going to rewind a bit. Continue Reading
Coping with Grief and Abandonment Part II
This is the second post in a two-part series on Grief and Abandonment, see Coping with Grief and Abandonment Part I.
I’m sure it will not surprise any regular reader of this blog to realize that BN was a huge part of how I coped, even between appointments. BN has a very generous contact policy, I am allowed to call him 24/7 including when he is on vacation. If I leave an emergency message with his service, he calls back within an hour. If he is on vacation and doesn’t answer the service in a certain amount f time, his backup (a wonderful, warm, empathic man) calls back, but always offers to have BN also call; it’s just a longer wait than usual. (I have higher standards for contacting him when he is on vacation but have done it. Earliest I have ever called is 8 AM and the latest is 10:30 PM although BN has made it clear that 2 in the morning is ok if I need). We very rarely do any processing during phone calls but when the grief threatened to overwhelm me, or the fears that BN would also abandon me, would rise up, then a short phone call would help to ground and reconnect me. Most of mine are under three minutes and it’s not unusual to keep it under one minute. BN once referred to my “patented one minute phone calls” when I was worried about calling too much. 🙂 Often it wasn’t what he said but just the sound of his voice and experiencing that he was there that would do the trick. Continue Reading
Coping with Grief and Abandonment Part I
GE asked the question below on the Ask AG page:
im wondering if you are wiling to share some of the strategies you used to cope with grief and abandonment feelings when things got rough during your recovery.
As I said in reply over there, this is an excellent question. Since I see grieving our losses as being at the heart of our healing, we should probably learn how to grieve, right? I have been grieving, one way or another, for a large part of my time in therapy, so this might turn out to be a bit of a laundry list, but I am hoping that everyone might find something that they can use in their own journey. Continue Reading
My first ever blog award!!
Yes, Gentle Readers, I will confess that I am very excited (and not a little flattered) that Purple Dreamer has recognized me with my very first ever blog award, the Wonderful Team Member Readership Award. First, I would like to say thank you to Purple Dreamer for being so gracious as to bestow upon me this honor as I feel like her contribution here has far outweighed mine on her blog, so now I am doubly in her debt. Secondly, there are requirements for the award, which I fulfill below.
The Rules
1. The Nominee of the Wonderful Team Member Readership Award will display the logo on his/her post/page and/or sidebar. – Look just above. 😀 Continue Reading
Tales of a Boundary Ninja 
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