Monthly Archives: December 2011

Dec 31 2011

Out with 2011, In with 2012

I was thinking that 2011 wasn’t a very good year.  My cousin attempted suicide and I basically was her sole caregiver for weeks, and then I had cancer.

Then I was thinking that 2010 wasn’t a very good year either – I was suicidal that year.

2009 wasn’t a very good year, I was about to turn 50 and my daughter was leaving home, I was very depressed.

How can every year be not a very good year?  Maybe this is life?  Little bits of good year interspersed with long periods of bad year?  Why is it so easy to remember the bad, and so hard to remember the good?

Happy New Year everyone.  I hope everybody’s 2012 is a happy one, or at least not a not very good one.

Dec 29 2011

Owning One’s Problems

I was listening to a vegan podcast today, and the woman podcaster was telling us how last year for Christmas she sponsored animals for each person on her gift list, rather than giving material gifts.  Sponsoring an animal involves sending money to a sanctuary or a humane society which contributes to the costs of caring for the animal.  You can do this in honor of someone, and that person will receive some kind of certificate of a photo of the animal.

The podcaster said that there some people in her family who rolled their eyes at this gift, and some that just didn’t like it at all.  But she felt this was an important thing for her to do, and if her family didn’t like it, it was their problem, not hers.

This has come up in therapy at times.  If someone says a hurtful comment to me, perhaps it is because they are feeling xyz when I mentioned abc, and the problem isn’t mine, it is theirs.  Or if I try to do something nice for someone and they don’t act appreciative, the problem is theirs, not mine, so I should not feel hurt by that.

I can see this being the case sometimes, but as for gifts, I don’t get it.  Why would one give a loved one something that they wouldn’t like?  Sure, animals are important to me, but I won’t go sponsoring animals in honor of my friends and family if I know they don’t care about animals or sanctuaries.  When I give a gift to someone, part of the enjoyment of it is finding something that I know is special for them, and that they will love.

When you give gifts, do you choose things that are important to you, or to the recipient?  Do you think this podcaster’s attitude about who is owning the problem is correct?

Dec 27 2011

Therapy Recap 12/27/11

After I asked J how his Christmas was, he immediately asked me how it went with the family therapist.  First I had to find out if J was a friend of Dr. C, but he said although he has met him once or twice they are not friends.  I basically told him my impressions, the good and the bad, and then said that I am having second thoughts about seeing a family therapist.

We discussed that for some time.  J is really encouraging me to do this family therapy, he never said anything like, “If you feel it’s not right then don’t do it.”  I guess he thinks my son, and my husband and I, really need to move forward or we’ll be 90 years old, my son will be 60 and we’ll all still be living together.

At one point we went off on a tangent.  J was saying that there are certain things your kids have to do, that there is no wiggle room.  Like getting vaccinations, you don’t tell your child “It’s ok, you don’t have to get shots today.”  Well, that is exactly what I did with my son, and I thought that J was saying it is a bad thing, but when I explained what I was doing he said I was using a good strategy, and what he was talking about was saying to the child “You have to get shots today….you have to get shots today….oh, ok, you don’t want shots?  OK, you don’t need to get them today.”

What I did with my son, because he had and still has a horrible needle phobia, was to tell the doctor that if it is time for vaccinations we would come back for them.  If my son knew he was getting shots he would be in a panic during the whole exam, and he would be unable to talk to the doctor, even unable to stand on the scale sometimes.  Needless to say his pulse and blood pressure were off the charts.  When he knew that no needles were coming he was calm and relaxed and was able to have a complete exam and talk about any concerns with the doctor.  Now, I did not do this when he was a baby or toddler, it was later in his childhood.

I find that this happens somewhat often, and I know it is something that I do.  I latch onto something that J says and go off on a tangent, this time it must have been about 10 minutes of talking about this.  I get angry at myself later for doing this, because really, discussing this had nothing to do with the topic of the family therapist and why I am having negative thoughts about proceeding.  I think I do this to avoid talking about the real issues?

J and I talked more about how I believe it is my fault that my son is where he is today, and I don’t want to do anything else that will end up being my fault.  I wasn’t very happy that Dr. C didn’t engage my husband more, but J said he was probably just observing the family dynamics at this point.  J also says that nothing was my fault, and I said “You weren’t there” which is how the conversation always goes when we get to this topic.  I told J that I don’t want any of this to be about me, I want the therapy to focus on my son.

He also started in with what I should say to my husband, and to the therapist, and I just looked at him.  He said, “Do you think you can say those things?”  I told him that no, I could not.  He asked how a therapist might figure out that my husband was not too involved in the raising of the kids, and I said that when the therapist asks us a question, I won’t answer.  Of course my husband won’t be able to answer.  When the therapist sees that my husband can’t answer, I’ll do the answering.  J said, “So you will hint as to the relationship you and your husband have with your son.”  I said that if he is a good therapist he should figure it out pretty quickly.  J said that as I get more comfortable with the family therapist I can mention how I feel about my husband’s lack of involvement.  But that is not something I need to think about now, now I just want to find someone that we are all comfortable with.

The next therapist interview isn’t until the middle of January, and this one just wants to see my husband and me.  I’m curious as to how that will go.  Dr. C was very focused on my son and asking him questions.  Without my son being in the session my husband and I won’t have that buffer, the therapist will just be talking to us, and asking us questions.  It could be very different.

So that was about it, and I won’t see J next week because I am going on vacation to the Dominican Republic with my husband.  Another couple that we are friends with are joining us after the first three days.  I am so looking forward to this vacation.  Right now though, I am feeling somewhat overwhelmed – I need to get all of my summer clothes together, they get packed away every winter and I have to find some to take with me, and my daughter volunteered our house for her horse barn holiday party on Friday night, which means cleaning, organizing and cooking.  Ack.

Dec 26 2011

Family Therapy Recap and a Christmas Hike

Last Thursday my husband, son and I met with the first family therapist that we are interviewing. I wasn’t particularly crazy about him on the phone, he kept referring to himself as Dr. C, even when he called me back he said “This is Dr. C.” No first name, and his last name is an extremely common name, as a matter of fact I have another doctor named Dr. C. He also has a voice similar to my son’s old therapist, and the photo of him on his website reminded me of my son’s old therapist as well. But I thought we would give it a try.

His waiting room was small, but decorated very nicely. One of the walls was painted a terracotta color, which was really attractive. He came out to get us and shook each of our hands saying, “Hi, I’m Dr. C” each time. His office is beautiful, large and with color and comfy furniture. No beige at all. He did remind me a bit of my son’s therapist, but he was dressed like an adult, unlike how my son’s therapist dressed. He had on a collared shirt with a nice sweater over it, dark pleated wool trousers, dark socks and dress shoes.

Dr. C asked what brought us there and I told him that my son seems to be having a case of “failure to launch”.

He spent a lot of time asking my son questions, and I thought they were good questions. It turns out that he has the same kind of dog we do, but his is a 6 month old male. He even told us the dog’s name, and we talked wheaten terriers for a while. I tried not to talk much, I wanted my son to talk, and even though I didn’t have high expectations for it, I wanted my husband to talk. Of course he didn’t say much, and he didn’t exactly say what he felt. For example Dr. C asked me why my son doesn’t drive, and I said I thought it was a combination of his anxiety, panic disorder, poor fine and gross motor skills, and spatial issues. I said, “But that is just my opinion, my husband thinks differently.” So Dr. C asked my husband why my son doesn’t drive and he answered, “I don’t know, he started out driving when he was 16, but then just stopped. I don’t know why.” Which is bullshit, because he always said the reason my son doesn’t drive is because he is lazy.

Dr. C said that if we do decide to use him as our therapist he would like to meet with our son a few times alone. He wants to establish some trust with him, and he feels that my son perhaps isn’t answering questions honestly because “mom is in the room.” Nothing about dad of course, just me, I am the reason my son can’t be honest.

Another thing that bothered me is that Dr. C belonged to the same synagogue that we did. He was close to the rabbi, as a matter of fact the rabbi married he and his wife. I was close to the rabbi because I worked in the preschool at the synagogue. Then the rabbi turned out to be a pedophile and went to jail. Dr. C said he visited him in jail.

My failure to get my son what he needed in school despite having him tested and having many many school meetings came up in the conversation. Dr. C tried to make me feel better by saying that our county is notoriously difficult to deal with when getting services for a student. I said that, no, I was just unable to get him services because I wasn’t assertive enough, and I wasn’t knowledgeable enough, and I wasn’t smart enough. My husband couldn’t participate in this conversation at all because he was not involved in my son’s education in any way. He had no clue what went on for the 7 years I was trying to get my son an IEP. I did all of the explaining to Dr. C about my son’s educational difficulties.

Dr. C said this would be hard work, and we’d all have to step out of our comfort zones, but that he would support us in the difficulties.

We all thought he was nice enough, and my son said he would think about whether he wants to meet with a therapist on a one-on-one basis. My concerns are that he didn’t draw my husband into the conversation much, he didn’t ask him any questions, and I will be the one dealing with all of this while my husband flies under the radar, which is how it always is. I’m having second thoughts about family therapy. Maybe things aren’t so bad the way they are. I don’t want our situation to get worse, and if it does it will be my fault. Dr. C also lives near us (I googled him) and that might be a little close for comfort.

We meet family therapist #2 in the middle of January.

Yesterday was Christmas and I went on a hike up a local mountain with 17 people I didn’t know. I found the group on meetup.com. They were all very nice people, I chatted with two or three of them for a while. It was a beautiful day, sunny and not too hot or cold. The hike ended up being 8.5 miles, and we were out there for 5 hours, but actually walking for three. I’m sore today, I guess I’m not used to climbing mountains, even little ones like this one is.

I was observing the other hikers, and they all seemed to be alone and/or lonely. I guess if a person has nothing to do on Christmas it might mean that they are alone in their lives. No one talked about a spouse or children. A couple people had moved to the area recently and didn’t seem to have many or any friends. I’d like to hike with them again, hiking seems to be a good activity for introverts like me.

Dec 21 2011

Therapy Recap 12/20/11

Me: So…

J: So, what are we talking about

Me: So….sometimes I wish…..well…I only want to talk about this for 5 minutes or so….I think it would be helpful to know…..more about your therapeutic techniques and what they are supposed to do. I know they are secret, and you don’t have to tell me all of them, but maybe when you are using one you can tell me what I am supposed to get from it.

J: They aren’t secret. And I don’t come up with therapeutic techniques ahead of time, I don’t see you coming and say “Oh, I’m going to use this technique on Harriet today.” (He said this a lot more nicely than it sounds typed out.)

Me: Well, sometimes we are in the middle of something, and I know you are doing something, but I’m not sure what, and then because of time limitations we end and I leave not knowing what just happened and what conclusion I was supposed to come to, and then it never comes up again.

J: I believe that if things are important they always come up again.

Me: I mean right away.

J: Just now I was at my computer and I saw your car pull in and I thought “I wonder how Harriet’s five dinners last week went” but I don’t bring that up because maybe you want to talk about something your sister did, for example.

(I am always a little freaked out that he can see me outside, but I can’t see into his office because of the way the blinds are tilted. I am also glad that he said he was wondering about my dinners because it means he remembered what I told him last week and he was curious about how it went. I think it might be hard for therapists because clients start something one week, and may not get back to it, and the therapist is left wondering what happened.)

J: Can you give me an example of when this happens?

Me: Yes, I certainly can. Last week we were talking about how my husband didn’t ask me about my appointment with the oncologist and that hurt my feelings, and you said maybe he was in a meeting, or had important things on his mind, and it was my fault because I didn’t worry enough about the appointment so he didn’t think it was important and I didn’t even call him after the appointment to tell him what happened. So I know you were trying to be unsupportive, like I feel other people in my life are sometimes, even though I know it’s because my expectations are too high, and you wanted to get me to react the way I react when other people aren’t being supportive, and how I react is not to say anything, so I didn’t say anything when you were being unsupportive and I don’t know how that could help me.

J: I don’t purposely play the part of other people in your life, and I don’t try to be unsupportive and I didn’t want you to think this was your fault.

Me: So it was just an accident? I thought you were being mean on purpose. I’m sure they had that class in school – Mean 101.

J: I think I missed that class.

Me: You weren’t really mean, I am exaggerating.

J: Trying to get you to react sounds awfully manipulative.

Me: Exactly, but I can kind of understand if that is what needs to be done.

J: (Blah blah blah, he lists my issues, we all know them) When you are thinking negatively about yourself I try to play devil’s advocate.

Me: Well when you tell me reasons people do things like my husband did, I understand it in my head but I still feel the feelings of being let down.

J: You could say that to me.

Me: I can’t say “What you are doing isn’t helping me”. I wouldn’t go to the doctor for knee pain and tell me he isn’t helping me when he takes my temperature. He is a professional and knows what he is doing.

J: (Something about how we are on this journey together….) Last week you did say to me right away that I was taking your husband’s side.

Me: Yes I did. But you continued on.

J: When you said that I knew that you weren’t in a place where you could hear logic (so why did he go on and on? I might be confusing this part of the conversation, but I do remember being confused right here.)

Me: And you couldn’t tell that I didn’t want to hear that stuff just then?

J: I don’t know. I think you could say something like “I understand what you are saying in my head, but I still feel my feelings.”

Me: Maybe instead of me having to say all of that we could have a code word.

J: Asparagus?

Me: Sure, and if we aren’t in a vegetable mood we could use banana.

J: Why do you think you still feel the feelings even though you get the point intellectually?

Me: Either I something or something (I gave two reasons that made sense, but for some reason I can’t remember them right now.)

J: Maybe it is because you shut down emotionally because it is difficult for you to be emotional here.

Me: That is true.

J: You are an intelligent woman, but I think you do a lot of thinking and not a lot of being.

Me: Yes, that is true, I am introspective and I analyze things in detail. I can’t change that I do that, but maybe I could change what I am thinking about.

J: Why might it be bad to overthink and analyze things?

Me: Because I come to conclusions that could be totally wrong and I am convinced of my beliefs.

J: (Telling me the story he has told me before about passing a test and thinking you are great, and failing a test and thinking it is the teacher’s fault. Or passing a test and saying it is easy and failing a test and saying you are a failure – which is me) It’s good to be somewhere in the middle. I know you think a lot about what we talk about during the week.

Me: Yes, you told me that you don’t know anyone who writes out their therapy sessions like I do, but there are plenty of people who do that, and even write out their thoughts about their sessions every day – you can look on the internet.

J: Yes, I’m sure there are.

Me: And maybe some of your clients do it and you just don’t know.

J: That could be true.

Me: I know most of your clients come in and talk about their week. How many talk about things like we are talking about right now? What percentage?

J: Maybe 10%. Why do you want to know how many?

Me: I want to know if I am normal.

J: There is no normal, everyone’s therapy is different.

Me: There are times when I do talk about things in my life, like when I had my medical issues. I don’t want to talk about therapy in therapy all the time, but I like to know what is happening. Are you getting away from psychodynamic therapy and more into cognitive behavioral?

J: (Squirming…a lot) It really depends on the person, if someone comes in for smoking cessation, or substance abuse then I do a lot of behavioral stuff with them. And for some people it gets mixed together. Your issues (and he lists them again) aren’t like a substance abuser’s issues.

Instead of 5 minutes, this went on for 30 minutes. I remember him saying something about his training, and something about projection (which I definitely can see), and the way he and I relate, etc.

Then I changed the subject and I told him that I had talked to two of the family therapists that he recommended and we are seeing one on Thursday and one next month. I am not crazy about the one on Thursday just based on our phone conversation, but I like the one we are meeting in January. We talked about why I picked them, and how I think it will go, and how I know it’s not just me that needs to click with the therapist, that there are three of us. The one I liked on the phone seems warm and fuzzy and nurturing, and I like that, but my husband probably wouldn’t. So we need to try out a few.

I brought up that going through my son’s old school records and psycho-educational testing and school meetings for his IEP brought back bad feelings, but we didn’t really talk about that.

I think this session was productive, I think I expressed how I feel about the therapy itself, and how maybe it could be better for me, and J was very cooperative and I felt connected. I think I should tell him to give me a warning when he is going to try to change my viewpoint like “I’m going to play devil’s advocate” or “Let’s see how we can look at this another way” rather than jump right in with “Well that person did this because of abc and you didn’t do xyz….” And maybe if I am not in the mood for devil’s advocate or looking at it another way I can say so right then. Which doesn’t mean he shouldn’t continue, because I know I have to do things and hear things in therapy which are difficult, but maybe if he knows I am feeling resistance we can incorporate that into the process.

Dec 17 2011

Validating Feelings

I received a comment on the blog the other day concerning the issue of validating feelings. J had told me a long time ago that he does not validate feelings. I have written about this in the past, and I thought I would repost some old blog posts.

12/08:

J gave me two or three examples of things I’ve told him that have been very valuable and he acknowledged that those things must have been difficult for me to talk about. I like when he acknowledges that instead of just trying to resolve things or explain things, it’s nice to hear “that sounds like it was difficult for you.” I guess I need to have my feelings validated every once in a while, which sounds ridiculous. They are my feelings, what difference should it make whether anyone validates them? But, that’s the way I am.

5/13/09

Other thoughts I have are that I am wishing J was more like therapists on TV and in the movies. But I guess what I am realizing is that therapy is not a pity party for me. I don’t tell him my problems and he kindly says, “How difficult that must be for you,” or “I can see that makes you feel sad.” No, I tell him my problems and he tells me my thinking is wrong, or I’m not being logical. Well, yes, those things are true. And maybe if what I need is a pity party I should be talking to someone else. I don’t have any else to talk to though. I’m feeling like I need to have my feelings validated rather than challenged though. But just the fact of needing that makes me ashamed.

5/09

J does validate feelings sometimes though:

I wrote to J telling him I can’t write to him about my problems because it sounds like I’m whining. He responded by saying, “No problem. If writing makes you feel worse, don’t do it.” I thought that was nice. He didn’t try to convince me that it’s his job to listen to people’s problems and that he doesn’t consider it whining and complaining. So I sent him an email thanking him for acknowledging my feelings and not trying to give me logic. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to talk to him about my problems, but it’s nice having my feelings validated.

6/09:

But J said he understands – I am feeling hurt and unsupported, I’m feeling strong feelings, and now I want to run away. Which is nice that he understands, but how is this supposed to help me?

That time he did validate my feelings and my response was “How is that supposed to help me?”

I know I’m difficult, but this is ridiculous!

8/09

I did finally confront him with this at a session we had in August 2009. I said “it seems that whenever I mention an instance where my feelings are hurt you come up with excuses and reasons why they would say whatever it was they said. It makes me feel like my feelings are wrong, and you say that feelings aren’t wrong or right, they just are.” He said, “It’s true, feelings aren’t right or wrong.” Then he said a bunch of stuff, about why he comes up with reasons that people say things, he could say they are rude or ignorant, or he could just say nothing and let it be. I said, “What would be wrong with saying nothing and letting it be?” He said that he thought I needed to hear reasons in order to make things more logical, but there is nothing wrong with saying nothing.

8/25/09

I think he really gets that I am passionate about things, and he gets that I am sensitive about things, and I appreciate that. He doesn’t make me feel weird or unusual for feeling strongly about my values, and I appreciate that also. But when someone makes me feel uncomfortable and I tell him about it, I don’t really want him to give me reasons why they would say that. I guess I want him to validate my feelings, and maybe later when I’ve processed my feelings about it, then I can logicalize the situation. I don’t know, does that make sense?

1/5/10

J and I talked about how he doesn’t validate feelings. He asked me what validating feelings looks like, he gave me a couple of examples which weren’t validating at all. I told him that not only were they not validating, they were actually invalidating. I know he knows what feelings validation looks like, and I guess he wanted to know what it means to me, but I think it means the same to everyone, doesn’t it?

I didn’t press the issue and just told him what I thought a good statement would be to validate someone’s feelings: “That must be hard for you.” Not: “You’re not a bad person, you do x, y and z, and you should do a, b and c to make yourself feel better.” I hate that. Then not only does a person feel bad about something, but they feel wrong about feeling bad. What’s wrong with saying, “That must be hard for you.” I told him that a statement like that makes me feel that someone has empathy for me, that they understand I am feeling badly, that they are not judging me, and that they are there for me. All that from six words.

J said he doesn’t validate feelings. He says it doesn’t serve any purpose to validate feelings; I guess in the long run it doesn’t fix anything, but it can make a person feel understood. That’s something, I think.

And we talked about whether it is necessary for a person to have their feelings validated, I said I didn’t think so, it’s just a nice thing. He said I could validate my own feelings. It’s something to work towards.

1/9/10

J has said many times that feelings are not good or bad, they just are. I always wonder whether I have the “right” to feel a certain way, and I think he would say that it doesn’t have anything to do with rights. If I feel something, I feel it. It is what it is and it’s not right or wrong. I read somewhere else that “feelings aren’t facts.” I kind of like that.

J likes to explain reasons why someone might have said or done something when I say they hurt my feelings. If a friend says to me, “I would never let my daughter take a fifth year of college” after I say that my son is going to need a fifth year of college, I will feel hurt because I think she is criticizing me. However, J says that perhaps my friend is saying this because she is anxious herself about whether her daughter will need a fifth year of college, and my comment brought out her anxiety and she needs to make herself feel better. I’m still hurt, and that is my feeling, but if I can see the bigger picture perhaps I can let it slide more easily and dismiss the hurt more quickly.

The problem is when he goes too far with this technique to the point where I believe that he is actually INvalidating my feelings. We had a conversation once in which I was expressing how miserable I was being tall when I was growing up. I was taller than everyone in my family and taller than all of my friends. His response was, “I would think everyone would want to be tall.” So not only was I feeling miserable about being tall, I am now feeling like I was wrong to feel miserable about being tall because everyone wants to be tall. But I was miserable being tall, and I can’t change those feelings. It would have been nice for him to say, “That sucked.” Once he said that, he could move on to say that everyone else wants to be tall, or at least they think they want to be tall. But I think: what difference does it make how other people feel about their height? I was miserable, no matter how they feel.

Dec 14 2011

Therapy Recap 12/13/11

J asked me if any of the referrals he gave me worked out, and I said that I only had called one of them so far because it was a crazy week.  I asked him if he had actually talked to the people that he referred me to, and he said he put out a post on a listserv describing what he was looking for and these people responded.  I don’t know why that surprised me, there are listservs for every group of professionals, it just seemed weird that he was posting about me on the listserv (even though I know he wasn’t posting about me, he was posting about needing to refer someone to me).

So then I pulled out my list of things that went on during the week and read it all to him.  Then I said “So which one of these things do you like?”

We started by talking about the cancer scare, and how my husband didn’t ask me about my appointment.  J started making excuses for my husband.

Me:  Why are you taking his side?

J:  I’m not taking his side.

Me:  Yes you are.  It’s because you’re a man right?

J said that since I wasn’t really worried about the oncologist appointment I didn’t make a big deal out of it so my husband didn’t really think it was a big deal either and that is why he didn’t ask me about it.  Or maybe he had an important meeting to go to and had other things on his mind.

I did get J to admit that my husband should have called to see how it went, but he didn’t think it was so bad that he didn’t.

Then he asked me why I didn’t call my husband to tell him what happened at the appointment.  I explained that I thought it would be best to tell him in person and I was just going to wait until he came home from work, but then he texted me to say he was going out to dinner and would be home late.  J asked if I was punishing him or being passive aggressive.  I said I was just waiting for him to come home so that I could talk to him, but when I got his text and he didn’t mention the doctor I got angry.

Later on in the conversation J asked me again why I didn’t call my husband.  I repeated the whole reason again.  I told J that I was hurt that my husband didn’t ask me how it went, and that this is not the first time he has done this.  I have told J about similar experiences in the past.  I asked how can I think I am a worthwhile person and that I have value if people forget about me.  He asked if my husband cares about me, and I said that he does.  I said that my husband also forgets things about our children, and J asked if my husband cares about them.  I said that yes he does care about them, and J asked how I know.  That is a hard question, I told J that my husband does not show any overt signs of caring, he doesn’t say “I love you” or give hugs.  He enjoys being with them though (although he didn’t enjoy being with them when they were little).  We agreed that my husband is a bit clueless, that if something isn’t right in front of his face it doesn’t exist, and that he drops the ball at times.  But that he does care about me and the kids.

We talked about my race Sunday and how I thought I did really well, and the connection between the running and the cancer scare.  I somehow thought they were connected, but I don’t really know.  Perhaps I would have run just as well if I hadn’t been told that I had cancer, maybe I’m just finally recovering from the surgery and I’m back to my level of fitness from before.

We talked about my feelings about cancer, and how they have changed since the appointment on Thursday.  That maybe the first time I was in denial, and now I really feel like I had cancer.  I said that I don’t think it is so bad to be in denial, for some people, I think it can be a good coping mechanism to get through hard times.  Obviously criminals and child molesters should not be in denial.
We talked briefly about my mother’s email and how she said “Let’s all move along and get on with our lives and be together as a family” and “Don’t take this the wrong way”.  J didn’t seem too interested in this topic, but I think it was so representative of my mother’s attitude toward feelings, and how if anything goes wrong it must be my fault.

Then I mentioned how I have five lunch/dinner/parties to go to in the next week and how that is stressful for me.  On Friday my husband’s firm is having their holiday lunch and he sent me an email of the menu.  It was pretty much full of meat.  Meat, fish and lamb.  I said to my husband that maybe I just shouldn’t go, but it turns out that he asked the office manager to check with the restaurant to see if I could get a vegan meal.  The restaurant said that would be no problem.  J thought it was very “sweet” of my husband to do that.  (He uses that word a lot, and I think it is kind of weird.)  He mentioned some other “sweet” things that my husband has done and I agreed that he has been doing things lately.

J said that I frequently talk about my marriage as though my husband and I are roommates, that we don’t have any common interests, we don’t do anything together, etc.  But maybe things aren’t as bad as I make them out to be, since my husband does these nice things for me.  I think J wants me to reframe the situation and see it differently.

I think that was about it, I did say that I don’t want to forget about the email I sent him last week saying that I think therapy should focus on why I can’t talk openly to people rather than on the actual words I should say, but that topic didn’t seem relevant right now.

Dec 11 2011

Too Much To Say

I have so much to talk about. I don’t really want to write about it here, except for maybe bullet list issues, because when I write about things I don’t talk about them in therapy. So I’ll just start with this:

• My husband forgot about my oncologist appointment and never asked me how it went, he actually went out to dinner with his buddies and got home late. Needless to say when I told him that it didn’t go well and the cancer came back, it got his attention.

• Friday morning I planned to run, but I was so despondent about the cancer having come back (this was before the “oops” phone call) that I could barely get out of bed. So I ran Saturday morning and I had a great run.

• I saw a movie with a friend Saturday afternoon (The Descendants – it’s good) and went out to dinner with my husband Saturday night.

• I ran in an 8K race this morning and got my best time of any 8K I have run before.

• I see the kidney doctor tomorrow; my husband is coming with me.

• I had an email exchange with my sister who told me that I can’t make peanut noodles for our family Hanukkah party. It seems all of a sudden someone in her family has a peanut allergy. So I told her I would use cashew or almond butter instead and she said that would be great. Something about our email exchange bothered me.

• Something happened to me when I was told that I had a recurrence of the cancer, and something else happened to me when I was told they made a mistake. Emotionally I mean. All I will say now is that for the first time, I feel like I really had cancer. I feel different.

Dec 9 2011

False Alarm

I got a call from the oncologist’s assistant this morning. The radiologist looked at my scans and determined that the nodule is not a cancer recurrence. It is a normal piece of tissue that has relocated, it was on my last scan but it was in a slightly different place.

What a wild ride for the last 24 hours.