Therapy Tales

I have been writing on this blog for about six years now, and I rarely go back through old posts, but I was looking for a poem, and came across a post that I had written a few days before my first suicide attempt. I shared it with my therapist this week. I cannot even count the number of times that she has told me that if I didn't allow myself to feel pain, I would also be unable to feel joy. I wasn't sure that I believed her, but I now realize that all of my suffering was caused by my attempts to deny my feelings. My feelings often overwhelm me, and the depth of my emotions can be frightening, but I'm grateful to be alive. I'm grateful that she didn't give up on me, because she was right...even with the pain, there is an abundance of joy, and I'm blessed to still be here to feel every bit of it. 

Here is the post that I wrote~

I step through your door, into the safe familiarity of pictures and books...the window where I've watched the rain and snow, protected from the bright glare of the sun chasing after me. We have talked, and sat in silence while you wait for my words, of which I've run out. I nod when you speak, agreeable and compliant, because my decision is to resign. I've tried to tell you, but you won't give up, when I've all but begged you to, and yet I continue to cast shadows on your floor. 

"I will believe for you, until you can believe on your own," 

you say with such compassion that my throat constricts, and I cannot seem to swallow so much pain. I tell you that I feel an overwhelming need to apologize. I call you on the phone, but you say that you cannot work with me like this. I'm a petulant child, an angry adolescent, and you refuse to play my games. I'm sorry that I do this, that I reach for you, and then become volatile when you attempt to help me. I reach, I push, I run, I hide, and every week I return to the shelter of you, because I'm afraid that if I don't show up, I'll lose all sense of time. 

You are the touch point within the moments, hours, days that get lost, hoping that you will find me before I fade away.