Posted by Skittles on January 12, 2005, at 3:59:31
In reply to Re: Called T - VERY, VERY BAD » Skittles, posted by judy1 on January 11, 2005, at 18:16:26
A big thank you to everyone. You are all so helpful, validating, thought provoking and supportive. I am grateful to have found you.
Update:
I wrote a short note and dropped it off at my T's office this afternoon. In it I siad that I founnd myself becoming more and more uncomfortable with what happened, and while I hated to ask to talk with her again, I felt like I really need to. I gave her my cell number and told her not to freak out if I couldn't answer! I thought this was too much to leave with a secretary - thus the note instead of a message. My next appointment is Thursday, but I was afraid I'd lose her completely if I didn't talk to her before then. I think I've worked too hard to get this far to let that happen. But I didn't think I could stop it on my own.
She called me this evening and it really wasn't a great call. I tried to let her know that I understood why she said what she said, though I worry that I failed miserably. She told me that she guessed she was thinking out loud when she said that, that it just occurred to her that her words could have been perceived as a threat and that wasn't her intention, but that she couldn't promise me she wouldn't have called the police if she hadn't spoken to me. Yuck!! Basically she told me nothing that was the least bit reassuring. I never thought she meant it as a threat - but now that she brought it up, I wonder if deep down she might not have meant it as one.
She told me that she looked me up in the phone book to be sure the number she'd called was my home number. That she wished she'd had my cell because her next step would have been to call that. I explained to her that in this situation it wouldn't have helped us any because I was with my husband and if that's the case, I'm not going to answer because he gives me a hard time about the frequency of my appointments and my dependency on her. I told her that the only time I'd ever call her was if I was alone and that if, in waiting for her to call back, I lost that privacy, I would not answer. She said it helped her to know this before our next appointment because she could be brainstorming about how to get around that. Asked if, based on our time on the phone I'd be okay with things until Thursday, I said yes (totally didn't mean it) and we said goodbye.
Another not so great call. I know I'm partly to blame because I didn't mention a lot of what I wanted to say, particularly about the facade and how threatened it had been. But I didn't feel safe to do it. Not now. My one safe place has been obliterated. I've lost the most important thing I have. I felt like we were standing face to face, my arms outstretched to her, and suddenly she was sucked a million miles away.
Thoughts: I can't even begin to organize all this, so I'm just gonna throw it out there. Expect to be confused.
1. Her voice on my machine was awful, like an unpleasant stranger. She usually sounds so wonderfully kind and soothing and this was so painful to hear. It was new and ugly and I don't know what it meant. Was she panicked? Frustrated with me? Stressed? Angry? I've never heard it before, so I don't know. Regardless, I can't get it out of my head. Would it be too much to ask that she call and leave me another message so I'd have it to listen to over the weekend (she's going to be out of town from Friday through Monday)? Maybe she could say that we will work it out and be okay. Any other ideas what might be helpful to hear?
2. Why did this happen? Why did she think I was in such bad shape? This I think I might understand. I was at my most suicidal a couple of months ago, but to her it looked like I was improving. I didn't let her see on the outside anything close to a true reflection of the inside. She commented a couple of times when I was dressed up how nice I looked. What she doesn't know is that on those days I was going straight from her office to an attorney who was working on my will. She was pleased to see I was reconnecting with people. What she doesn't know is that I was seeing them "one last time." Currently I don't feel anywhere near as low as I did then, but I'm letting her in more and showing lots more emotion so I'm sure it seems really serious to her. But now I'm afraid to tell her any of this.
3. What's really lost here? I hate to say I don't trust her because really, given the circumstances, I don't think she did anything wrong. But it still hurt and now something feels drastically different. Could it be that now it's unsafe to trust her? Are safety and trust two different things? Is it possible to lose trust when nobody did anything wrong? I'm trying to name what has changed, but it is so hard.
4. Maybe everything is okay when it's the two of us together in a room. Maybe it's the addition of a thrid entity (the service, in this case) which neither of us can control that is the problem. If we could fix that, would she not be sucked away anymore? Would I be able to feel her again? She told me "that" night that she usually returns calls within 15 minutes and if she doesn't, I should call the service again. But if I lose my privacy in the meantime and can't answer whenever she calls back, calling the service again doesn't help anything. Might even make her MORE worried because now there's more than one call from me. She said she'd be thinking about this, but I have been too. Here's what I've come up with. I can keep calling the service every 15 minutes until either I hear from her or no longer have privacy. Assuming she'd allow me to dial her cell and has the ability to accept text messages, once the privacy is gone I could text her and let her know. And perhaps for her sake, she'd have something specific she'd like me to say to let her know how safe I am. That way, if I didn't answer, she could check her cell before freaking out. What do you think? Other than the obvious of not wanting me to use her cell number, any thoughts about problems she might have with this idea?
poster:Skittles
thread:440519
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050111/msgs/441029.html