I asked J about the Purell. He said his hands felt kind of dirty. I told him that every single week the minute I walk in he Purells. He asked me if I don’t want him to do it anymore, and I said, no, it’s ok. He said he is always touching stuff on the desk and the keyboard and his hands feel dirty. I think he has ocd personally.

You know what I noticed? I just realized it today. He doesn’t say, “So what are we talking about today?” anymore. And he’ll mention something we talked about the week before. These are things I’ve written about on my blog that have been bothering me, but I haven’t mentioned it to him. I wonder if he is reading my blog without showing up on the statistics. It’s easy to do that if he is using an rss reader, like Google Reader. And later on in the session he mentioned how I express myself so well on my blog and in email. Interesting…

So first he asked if I am still thinking of leaving and going to Iowa, something we talked about last week. We talked about that a while, and how I know I would never do it, it is just a fantasy. But I did tell him that I am going to beach as soon as the session is over. I told him that I packed all of my meds. The whole stash. We talked about that for a while. He said sometimes people will bring him their meds to hold for them. But he didn’t ask me for mine, and I didn’t volunteer to give them to him. He asked how I would feel if I didn’t have my stash. And he asked how often I take more than I should. I told him I never take more than I should and he scoffed. He didn’t believe me. He said that there have been times when I have emailed him and told him I took too much. I said that is not true, I emailed him once when I took some extra, but it was still less than the therapeutic dose. I take 1mg of klonopin per day right now. He asked how often I take more than the usual amount and I said never, I haven’t done that in a long time, like almost a year. And I told him that my plan does not involve overdosing, but I just like to have my stash.

Then he thought of an analogy of being trapped in my marriage, my family, my life and trapped in my thoughts of suicide. We talked again about being good enough, and he compared it to our country (the United States) and how it is a pretty good country, but it has its flaws. And he said everyone has flaws and he has flaws (hmm, I have to think of his flaws. List to follow). This is an ongoing topic for us.

We spent time discussing my guilt over going to the beach, and spending the money especially since the hospital bills are coming in from my visit to the er a few weeks ago. And that was a good chunk of cash and there wasn’t even anything wrong with me. If there had been something wrong with me it would feel better somehow. He said that there must have been times when I have saved money, so that offsets the times that I spend money. He said I have probably thrown away $2000 worth of lunch meat in my lifetime. Then he told me a story about getting his air conditioner fixed. He started to tell me, then said, never mind, but I said, no tell me. So he did.

He tried to convince me that I deserve this trip. He asked who I was going with and I said no one. That I used to go with a friend, but we aren’t friends anymore.

And we talked about how I didn’t have the discussion with my husband that I wanted to have. And the envelope that my husband didn’t open. J said I should email my husband and ask if he read that info yet that came in the envelope. He said in his experience counseling couples that he recommends some of them communicate via email, and that would be good for me (since I express myself so well in my blog and in email to him). I said, you know it’s not even so much about whether my husband read the information. I want to know why he didn’t open the envelope. J said that my husband feels that is my “department”. He said that in relationships there are precedents, and these habits become ingrained over the years and then are hard to change. I asked how a parent could be so uninterested in their child’s college education. J said maybe he is interested, just not in the paperwork. I said, “So he is interested in parents weekend and football games?” And J said maybe he is.

I said that I want him to be the kind of person who would open the envelope. And J said, “So you want him to change.” Yes, exactly. But that isn’t going to happen, is it? And discussions initiated by me aren’t likely to happen either. But we didn’t really get into why that is.
Lots of surface stuff this week, which is fine. I left afterwards and drove to the beach, which is where I am now. Staying in a very cute bed and breakfast one and a half blocks from the beach. Unpacked, changed, went to the beach for a couple hours. Sitting on the beach suddenly realizing I am alone. And I felt lonely. I read. Got some French fries. Then came back, changed and went for a long run. I ran down an interesting looking road and came to a state park right on the beach. Very desolate. Perfect place to commit suicide. I had been looking for a place like that at home. It put scary thoughts in my head.

I also ran by a cemetery and walked around in there for awhile. There were people buried there who were born in the 1800s. Then I came upon a little grave, for a baby who was 6 months old. And she was a twin. There were small rocks on the grass in front of her headstone and they were painted with sayings like “We love you Megan”. I sat and looked at that for a while.

I had been thinking suicidal thoughts prior to getting here. What it would be like to die here instead of at home. Much better. But I’m not going to kill myself. I just think about it all the time. Like all the damn time. Something needs to change here. J says I only think about the negative – of myself, of my life. Never the positive. Or I notice the positive, but it is fleeting. The negative sticks forever. Is this a choice I make, is it part of my personality, what is it? Is it something I need to get to the root of, or is there a way to change my thinking?

It seems like J loves to work on this day to day stuff, and maybe that is what I need. I’m always trying to get so abstract and that obviously hasn’t helped much.

So anyway, he told me to enjoy the beach and I deserve to be able to go and have a good time.