Posted by Racer on July 25, 2006, at 21:07:51
In reply to worried..., posted by sunnydays on July 24, 2006, at 19:03:35
Hi, Sunny. I didn't have time to read all these answers, so I apologize if someone else has already suggested any of this.
First, are you sure what you're feeling is fear that your T is angry with you? If you're not used to feeling, you may not be on a first name basis with your feelings, and may mistake one for another. FallsFall showed me "Emotional Confetti," which is really helpful. Cut up a sheet of emotion names, into individual emotions, and then dump them on the floor or a table. Pick them up, one by one, and ask yourself if that's what you're feeling? Put the things that you are feeling on one side, the others elsewhere. That way, you'll get some practice with identifying what you're really feeling. You'd be surprised -- I thought is was just silly, but I found out that I really wasn't identifying my feelings very well. And even while doing it, I can pick up an emotion and think that's what I'm feeling, only to find that another emotion fits much better once I find it. Maybe being able to name your emotion better will help you cope.
It's kinda like one of the things people with chronic pain are sometimes advised to do: think about and describe your pain. Feel it, concentrate on it, what exactly are you feeling? It sounds counterintuitive, but it actually does help reduce the subjective experience of pain.
Also, it sounds as though you might be experiencing a sort of transference. Could it be that you've been blamed in the past for bad things that other people did to you? Maybe you're just expecting him to be angry, because someone else was? Or maybe he really was angry, and rather than telling you that he was angry with whoever hurt you before, he tried to hide it. The problem with doing that is that women, especially, who have been the victims of abuse can usually "feel" the emotions in a room. You'd be able to feel that he was angry, even if it wasn't at you.
I hope that helps. For crying, sometimes you just have to let yourself go. It's hard for me sometimes, because I feel as though if I don't hold on to those tears, I'm going to drown in them. I'll cry until I can't move, I'll be too vulnerable, I'll never come out of that pit of sadness. Now, that doesn't mean I don't cry at the drop of a hat, but it does mean that I hold back from crying with commitment to it.
Good luck.
poster:Racer
thread:670121
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060721/msgs/670509.html