Tag Archives: daughter

Dec 24 2012

Another No-Send Email to My Old T

I’ve been writing a lot of these, this is the latest.

Dear J,

I’ve been thinking so much about my therapy with you and why it was so wrong. I keep reading my blog from the end of 2008 through 2010 and it seems like we rarely connected. I don’t know why I kept coming back and why you didn’t suggest that I needed another kind of therapy. I wish I knew what I did wrong so that I don’t do it wrong again this time.

And now it is Christmas eve and I’ve been packing and spackling and painting, and getting ready to sell this house, and having a terrible relationship with my husband, and I picture you so happy with your family and your dog and your Christmas tree and your kids waiting for tomorrow morning for their presents and it seems so nice.

Things aren’t terrible though. We went to my mother’s yesterday for our Hanukkah celebration and it was very nice, all the kids and both husbands were there, and the football game was on so that was a good distraction. My sister and I got along very well and talked, but just about surface stuff of course. And naturally my husband doesn’t talk to my mother or sister, but they didn’t comment about that.

And tomorrow my husband’s sister and her family, and his parents, and our niece and her husband and baby are coming over for another Hanukkah celebration and the kids will be very happy to see each other. My daughter hasn’t seen anyone for the last 4 months so everyone is happy to see her. It’s great having her back, of course, she spent a few hours with us and now is out with friends, but that’s ok.

I don’t know why I am ruminating so much on our therapy. I know you say it wasn’t bad and you can’t do therapy wrong, but I know that you know that I didn’t do it like most people do. But it is ok with Art T that I don’t talk about my week, so if I had known that there were different kinds of therapy in the beginning, and if I had known which kind I wanted and needed, it would have made things a lot different. I would have known that therapy with you wasn’t the kind for me. But I didn’t know any of those things, and why didn’t you? Why didn’t you tell me?

Nov 7 2011

Reiki & Writing

Last Tuesday night I had a Reiki session. My last two sessions were 30 minutes, but I booked this one for a full hour. I love Reiki, and my Reiki therapist is wonderful. She is about half my age, but somehow or other I can feel her energy, and she can feel mine, as well as where my energy is blocked. Last week she said my lower body was very balanced, most people have trouble on one side or the other, maybe mine is balanced from running. But she said there was energy stuck in my shoulders, so she worked mostly on the upper body.

I felt good enough when I got home to attempt to write a story for my writing class reunion. It is about the 43 days that I had cancer. And you know what? It is awful, I hate it. Just really bad writing. I don’t know whether to trash the whole thing, or try to rewrite, or not even bother. It was disappointing, because I thought I had some good ideas, but the story was just bad.

I knew I couldn’t write any more, but I thought I would give it a try. Back when I was writing I really enjoyed it, so if it’s not enjoyable and what I write is pure crap, I don’t think it is worth it to even try.

One part of the story was really troubling to me though. I wrote that except for my mother, no one from my family came to visit me during my recovery from surgery. I don’t know why that upset me, I knew it was true, but somehow seeing it in print made it more true.

On a happier note, my husband and I went to visit my daughter at college this weekend, and we had a great time. Sometimes she gets cranky, but she was in a good mood, and my husband and I got along really well. I did have to nap every day, but I wasn’t as tired as I thought I would be. It was great to see my daughter, and she’ll be home again in just a few weeks for Thanksgiving. It’s hard having her so far away.

Feb 23 2011

Therapy Recap 2/22/11

Since I haven’t been writing in my blog, I must give a rundown of my week, otherwise the therapy recap won’t make sense. So my week in a nutshell:

Tuesday night: fight with daughter
Friday: grocery shopping trip with boss’s housekeeper (who is now my friend) – really fun
Friday night: daughter tells me she is sick with either mono or strep, she is 1000 miles away at school
Sunday morning: send mean email to boss
Sunday mid day: send email apologizing to boss
Sunday afternoon: cousin calls to tell me she has attempted suicide twice in the last two months and doesn’t know what to do
Monday: telephone to aunt to discuss situation with cousin

That’s about it.

I just started talking from the events on Friday until the events on Sunday. It went something like this:

“So, on Friday I went grocery shopping with my boss’s housekeeper. I really love her, we get along great and we have a lot of fun when we go shopping. We laughed a lot. Then we were pushing our carts back to the car and she said, ‘I’m so happy, just doing this.’ And I said that I was just thinking that too. But I felt really badly that I hadn’t said anything, that I never would say anything like that and I wish I could. Then Friday night my daughter called to tell me she was sick and I got anxious about that and I felt bad because we had had a fight Tuesday night and she said she felt sick all week and Sunday morning I sent my boss a mean email, and then I sent another one later apologizing, and he said ‘no problem’ then half an hour later he sent another saying ‘I’m sorry you have a sick child far away’ and then a couple of hours later my cousin called to say she tried to commit suicide twice in the last two months and she doesn’t know what to do and she talked for 50 minutes and she asked me if our aunt knew about my issues and I said she didn’t and my cousin said she was surprised because she thought my aunt and I were so close and I said we are, but I don’t talk about things like that, and then Monday I talked to my aunt and I told her that I don’t know how much help I can be to my cousin because I’m not in such a great place right now and my aunt said, ‘well you’ve never tried to kill yourself’ and ‘I know you have issues, but you’ve never been as bad off as cousin is’ and that made me feel bad because I have never opened up to her about my problems even though we are close, and that’s about it, why are you being so quiet?”

I looked at the clock, and only 10 minutes had gone by since I walked in, but it seemed like I was talking for at least 30 minutes. How did this happen?

J said that was good and he was being quiet because I was talking, now can we go back through the whole scenario and talk about emotions? So we did that.

I told him that I recently heard the term “emotionally unavailable” and I feel like that describes me. He asked me where I got that term from and I said it’s on google, mostly referring to men, but I think I have it. And these things that happened with people this week made me realize just how emotionally unavailable I am. Someone had once made a comment about my writing, saying, “She doesn’t put her feelings in her writing, so it’s kind of flat” and I remember this and thought it is probably true and also a sign of my “emotional unavailability.”

J took a different approach than what I thought though, in that he tried to convince me that I am not emotionally unavailable and I have high expectations of myself in this area, as in most others. He said when I was grocery shopping with my friend, that just because I didn’t come out and say “I’m so happy this is fun” it doesn’t mean I wasn’t emotionally there. I was laughing, and joking, and having fun and she could see this. I told him that is true, but I want to be able to express emotions. He said it’s easy when you are having fun, and people like to hear that you are having a good time with them.

Then he said something a little creepy. He said “I don’t mean to be crude, but [and I can’t remember exactly what went here, either he saw this on tv, or read about it, or someone asked him] how to talk dirty in bed, and the answer was ‘you just do’”. Hmmm….I don’t have a problem talking about sex at all, not that we ever have, but this just seemed a little off the wall to me. I think he could have used a different example, that’s all.

He said, so when you are having a good time you just tell the other person. There are no barriers. And I said, “Yes there are barriers!” He asked me what they are, and I told him they are the fact that I don’t trust anyone, and I don’t like to vulnerable. He explained that if I tell someone I am having a good time, or I am happy in their presence they are unlikely to say “Well, I’m not!” Even if they aren’t having such a great time, or aren’t so happy with me, it will likely make them feel good to know how I feel in that moment, so they will give a positive response.

He asked me more about the fight with my daughter, and I explained that, it really was just a typical teenager type thing, but I felt bad because we didn’t resolve it before we ended talking for the night, and then Friday she called to say she was sick. J asked me if I was upset about having fun with my friend that day because my daughter was sick, did I feel guilty about that? I told him I did not feel guilty about that, should I feel guilty about that, the reason I was sad about the friend thing is because I want to be able to express emotions like she did. And he restated that he really doesn’t think it is a problem that I didn’t say anything, because I was displaying emotion in a different way.

J asked me about the “mean” email, and I explained to him what had happened. My boss emailed me that he is having angst about becoming an empty nester, and that email just happened to come when my daughter was sick and my email back to him was all about “just you wait, it gets worse, wait until you have a long distance fight with your kid, and then they get sick and there isn’t anything you can do about it…..on and on.” And he replied “Thanks a lot.” I felt so ashamed of myself, I know I was triggered by his comment and it came at a bad time, but I wasn’t empathetic at all and basically I tried to one up him. But J said the fact that I sent an email apologizing, telling him that he caught me at a bad time and I shouldn’t have taken my anxiety out on him, and then my boss sent me back two emails, the first saying “no problem” then the second saying he was sorry my daughter is sick, was really good and we both expressed our feelings and worked it out. And I spend the whole day Sunday thinking he would fire me, but my boss moves past things really quickly, and when I saw him Monday the whole thing was forgotten. I told J that I suppose things worked out ok, but I felt that my boss and I kept missing each other, emotionally. (PS – my boss expresses emotions very freely, and to everyone he talks to).

I’m not sure we got to the suicidal cousin (PS – I went to see her last night, I wanted to make sure she is ok). J said something about getting my emotions out on my blog (not sure I do that according to some of my readers) and I said that I miss my blog. He asked me why I’m not writing in it (I didn’t remind him that we already spoke of this). I said it was because I thought I was using my blog as a replacement for talking to people in real life. He asked if I am now talking to people in real life, and I replied that I feel like I am talking more to him, and he agreed. He wanted to know if it is such a black and white thing, the writing. I told him that I do write occasionally, but about less important topics, like recipes, and it isn’t very satisfying. He asked if I set a time limit for not writing on the blog and I didn’t, and he said maybe soon I can go back to it. He asked when my writing group is meeting next, and I’m not sure, but I said I don’t write stories for the group that are anything like what I write on my blog anyway.

I think he tried to reassure me that things in the past week went better than I made them seem, and I told him that it seemed like it was one event after another showing my emotional unavailability and each time something happened it made me more sad. I believe I used the phrase “emotional unavailability overload” and he brought up the How To Talk Dirty In Bed For Dummies thing again, which was just as creepy the second time.

I’m a bit confused. I want to open up more to people, be able to express my feelings verbally. But J is making it seem like I don’t need to do that, that my expectations of myself are too high. Does he think I will never be capable of this? That I should just accept things the way they are? He knows my goal is to have better relationships with people and to connect more with people, and I thought to do that it would be good to be able to express myself emotionally and be more vulnerable and open with people. I have a lot of questions for him next week I suppose.

And another thing. I few times during the session I got teary eyed, and I think my voice got wavery or breaky once or twice, and J just continued on talking as though nothing was happening. Is that a normal t thing to do? I’m frankly not sure what t’s are supposed to do when a client gets emotional, or even cries (gasp). And I don’t even know what I would expect or want him to do. Say “Are you ok?” or “Why is xyz making you sad?” or ignore it, which is what he does. He just continues on with whatever he is saying. Which I guess is ok, not making a big deal out of anything, he knows I don’t like to draw attention to myself, which is pretty difficult to avoid in the therapy room when one is being stared at like a bug. I don’t know, just wondering what other t’s do.

Later in the day I checked the voter registration website for my state, because I was thinking of changing my political party to an independent one (I am currently registered for one of the two major parties), and I learned that anyone could enter anyone else’s name, zip code and birthdate and see the results which include their full name, address, polling location, and registered political party. So I entered J’s information, just for kicks, and, gulp….he is registered in the party that I am not. I won’t say which one of us is which, but they are the two major parties, and I didn’t like what I saw. It’s ridiculous, his political views have nothing to do with my therapy. Besides I should have known his views based on the cars he drives. Not that one’s choice of cars is a definite determinant of their political viewpoints, but sometimes it is. I was surprised, and I’m still trying to figure out why. Another interesting psychological puzzle.

Jan 23 2011

Weekend Update

Hi! I’m still here. Life has been progressing. Here is what is going on:

1. My daughter IM’d me Friday and said she dropped out of sorority rush. She did not get invited back to either of the two sororities that she wanted, but she did get an invitation back to a house that she was not interested in joining. So she dropped out. She said that many of her friends also did not get invited back to their first or second choices, so they also dropped out. There were more girls than usual rushing this year. 600 girls went through rush, and 450 got bids. This year’s freshman class is very girl heavy. Most universities in the US are girl heavy, but this year’s class at her school is even more girl heavy than average. She seemed sad, although that could be my perception. It is hard to judge emotion through aol instant messenger.

2. I spent the day yesterday and today going through old photos and scanning them, uploading them to flickr and facebook. What started this was an email from my writing class teacher – tomorrow is our meeting and one of the topics is to write about a person in our life. This is good because I had already written a story about my grandmother (I posted it here a while ago). The teacher mentioned that if we do tackle this subject that we bring in photos of the person we are writing about, so I have been weeding through many many albums and boxes of photos that I have in my house. I ended up not only scanning photos of grandma, but other relatives and lots of pics of my children. This led to lots of conversation on facebook with relatives and friends. Kind of nice. My daughter, who is not my friend on facebook, saw the pics through my son’s facebook, with whom I am a friend on facebook. She requested that I open my photos to “friends of friends” so that she could see all of the photos and tag herself.

3. This led to me looking at her photos, which she has open to “friends of friends” and I noticed lots of pics of her and her friends at school, including one with a boy. They are sitting on someone’s bed and he has his arm around her. Hmmmm….. She has many photos of herself with lots of girls, and few boys. I’m glad that she has a strong social network, especially considering the fact that she did not get into the sororities that she wanted.

4. One thing particularly bothering me about the sorority situation is that one of the sororities that she wanted is a Jewish sorority – an official Jewish sorority. The fact that they deny entry to girls who are not pretty enough, or not popular enough, is bothering me. It is one thing for a purely social sorority to do this, but an official religious sorority excluding people because of their lack of random qualifications, is troubling to me. Maybe it is sour grapes, I do not know.

5. Therapy is coming up in two days. There may be snow, so perhaps I won’t be able to get there. I have been thinking about therapy this weekend, how a few weeks ago I showed J my slideshow and told him my feelings about how my life has changed since my children have grown. I felt very connected to him that day; he seemed to really understand what I was saying. But the next two sessions didn’t feel as connected. The first session after the connected one was a “problem solving” session – where J told me his ideas about what I can do with my life (volunteer until I become a grandmother). Last week’s session was about my view about aging, and I felt he was somewhat judgmental and that he didn’t understand me at all. This is sometimes a pattern with us – feeling that connection one week, and then a total disconnect for a few weeks afterwards. Is this me or him? Is he intimidated by the connection, and sabotages it in order to keep his distance? Or am I intimidated by it, and I sabotage it in order to keep my distance? Of course, I think it is him. But I am at the point in therapy where I know that this could totally be me and not him. I am, unfortunately, not at the point where I can tell the difference. I had told J last week that I was going to send him some stories I had written about growing up with illness in my family, and about my nephew’s illness, so that I could explain my feelings about sickness and aging. But I didn’t send him those stories. Why? I am afraid of what might happen if I send them and he still doesn’t understand. If I don’t send them, I have a good excuse for his not understanding my issues. But if I send them and he still doesn’t understand I will have sadness and frustration and emotional pain. So I will revert to my default mode – which is denial. I think this might be something good to talk about in therapy, but on the other hand I am afraid J will not want to talk about this. That he wants to talk about my “real” issues and my weekly experiences, not about my feelings about therapy and about him. Sigh. I want to go back to two weeks ago when I felt understood and even relief about having shared a painful part of my life with a positive result.

6. Tomorrow is writing class reunion. I am looking forward to it. I will share the story of my grandmother and pass around some photos of her. I found a photo of her with me as a baby, and I have selected a couple of her as I remember her – in her 80’s and 90’s. My mother’s cousin K, whose father was a brother to my mother’s father, and I had an email exchange today after I posted pics of her on facebook. He related some stories and feelings that he had about my grandfather, who died when I was 6 months old, so I don’t remember him at all. K was 10 years old when my grandfather died and he loved my grandfather. He said he was his favorite uncle, and his father’s favorite brother. I sent him the story I wrote about my grandmother and he wrote back right away saying he read it and how much he loved the story – that the love I had for my grandmother came through in every word. K lives in Canada, and I haven’t seen him in years and years. I would love to go visit him, of all of our family members I think he and I have the most in common. I should plan a trip to see him.

Dec 17 2010

A Conversation With My Husband

Tuesday night I had a talk with my husband about our finances and the gambling that I suspect he is doing. Normally when he comes home from work it goes like this:

“Hi.”
“Hi. How was your day?”
“Fine.”

And that is it for the rest of the evening. But Tuesday he came home and he was so talkative, in a good mood. He was telling me about how another guy at work went to the Verizon store and they have a special deal going on and I can get a new phone even though I’m technically not eligible for one until March, blah blah blah……

I thought this would be a good opportunity to talk to him, and since I just had my therapy appointment that day it was all fresh in my mind. I started by asking him what we are getting the kids for Hanukkah – discussed that a little. Then I told him about the call I got that day from our car insurance company, saying that they hadn’t received our payment yet. I asked him what was going with our finances.

He said he was having trouble paying the bills, but he has money coming in the next couple of days and he’ll pay it then. I asked why he had trouble paying the bills, and he said we’ve always had a lot of debt. I told him that the situation seems worse lately, and since I have been working I’ve been paying for a lot of things. He said that was good. I said it doesn’t seem to be making a difference. Then I asked him if he was gambling and he said, “That’s not the problem.” I asked if he was betting on football, and he said “A little, but it doesn’t make a difference.”

Hmmm, seems like if he is having trouble paying the bills he shouldn’t be betting on football.

Then I asked him about the hockey tickets he allegedly sold and the money in his paypal account. I asked him what hockey tickets those were, and he lied. He said that he had sold a bunch of tickets over time and the money was just accumulating in his paypal account, so he transferred it to his checking account. But I know, from looking at his Stubhub account, that the tickets he sold were a pair for the Winter Classic.

I asked why there were so many payments on the checking account statement to Bank of America (twelve payments in three months). He said he has a couple of credit cards, and our mortgage is with that bank. Well, I know what a mortgage payment is, and it’s not $300.00 Besides the mortgage payment doesn’t say it is going to Bank of America, it is a different department and has a different name. I looked in his wallet and there are no credit cards from Bank of America. There was one visa, but from another bank.

I told him I could help if he doesn’t have money for the bills. And before I started working for the new guy, my husband would put money in my account every month, and whenever I asked. I had told him he didn’t need to do that anymore but he said, “No, it’s fine.” So I told him again, “You don’t have to put the money in my account” and he said he would skip this week.

I’m not sure if it is better for me to help with paying the bills, or if I should be stashing the money. And I’m going to have less if he doesn’t put the usual money in my account.

I also told him that I called our cousin, the jeweler, to find out how much I could sell the diamond in my engagement ring for. It wasn’t as much as I thought it would be, but it was a good amount. My husband told me that I didn’t need to sell my diamond.

I asked if he could pay our daughter’s tuition for next semester and he said, “I hope so.” I hope so? Huh? He hopes that $15,000 is just going to appear from nowhere? If he does anything to jeopardize her ability to stay in college I am going to be extremely upset and angry.

I felt good that I was able to bring up the subject in a non-confrontational manner, that there was no conflict, we just discussed the topics. However, he did lie to me about the hockey tickets and perhaps about the credit cards, and so how can I believe what else he said?

Nov 16 2010

Therapy Recap 11/16/10

Wow, what a day. I left home at 8:15am to see my orthopedist, and didn’t get home from work until 8:15pm. I have so much to do. I just finished making my finger food (it’s not really made out of fingers) for the reunion tomorrow night, but I don’t think I’m done with my story yet, I still have some revisions to do on it.

So therapy was ok I guess. I thanked J for the voice mail he left, and said it was nice of him to say such nice things about me. We talked about whether or not I believe what he said, and I told him that I believe that he believes it. I said, “Yep, I pulled the wool over another person’s eyes, aren’t I clever!” I told him that I do agree with some of the things he said, for example that the people I work for value me. There are things that they either cannot do, or don’t have time to do and I can do those things. But these are menial things – getting stamps at the post office, making up a chart in Excel. Anyone can do them if they had time or learned, and regardless, these have nothing to do with me as a person.

We got into one of the discussions we have had many times in the past – is a person valuable because of what they do, or who they are? I don’t think our abilities should determine our value. I asked him if there is a disabled person who can’t work – are they worthless? He was telling me about a war veteran he was reading about in the paper who had all of his limbs amputated. And this person has a lot of character and perseverance, and he has value. Well, that is what I am getting at, “Hello!!!!” He asked me what is the criteria for being a good person, and I thought about it for awhile and said that I don’t really know what the criteria is, and maybe that is why I don’t know if I’ve reached that level.

Then I told him that he was wrong about my family, they do not value me. And this is not my opinion, it is true. I talked about my father and how he valued me. He was proud of my accomplishments, but he would have thought so highly of me even if I wasn’t high achieving. I added, “Well, he was kind of clueless, but it was nice at the time.” I told him how my mother doesn’t think anything I do is good enough, but her second husband was “very impressed by me.” That is what she used to say all the time. She would call me and say, “Husband #2 is so impressed by you.” She would sound surprised. Since he died she hasn’t said it. Now his four kids are somewhat unimpressive, so maybe his standards were lower.

I told J about a sample of a book I downloaded onto my Kindle, called “Will I Ever Be Good Enough?” It is about women whose mothers are narcissists. I told him that the description of these women really resonated with me, I can totally relate, but that my mother isn’t a narcissist, so I don’t know if I am going to buy the book.

I told J about what my mother thought about me working on the hotline – she didn’t approve. But when a friend of hers told her that her daughter is a rape counselor, suddenly my mother thought it was ok that I work on the hotline. J said that as long as what I do reflects well on her she is supportive. That is a form of narcissism. He said he doesn’t think she had a narcissistic personality disorder, or anything that severe, but it is a sign. Then he talked about the whole good enough mother thing again, and good enough for one person may be different than good enough for another.

He told me about people who let all of these neurotic things roll off their backs, like Buddhist nuns. I said, yeah, I’d probably be as happy as a Buddhist nun if I dissociated all day and didn’t pay attention to anything that is going on the world. That is just ignorance. How can anyone be happy considering the state of the world. We talked about whether these people really just let things roll off their backs, or if they process stuff. I told him I obviously think it is important to process things, otherwise I wouldn’t have been coming to therapy for over two years. He said he would check with the Buddhist nuns. I said, “The next time you visit the monastery?” He said he gets acupuncture from the Buddhist nuns. That’s just weird.

All of this time I have been trying to tell J that I am too sensitive, but he never agrees. Now he says I need to develop a Teflon lining, to let what my mother and husband say roll off of me. Then he said maybe I need to do battle with them. I asked him what that is. He said if my mother criticizes me or asks something like, “Why would you want to work on the hotline?” I can answer something like, “It makes me happy. I enjoy it. Blah blah blah….give reasons.” He said I don’t have to defend myself, but I can respond and let her know how I feel. I told him I didn’t think I could do that. Firstly, I don’t like conflict, and secondly, I don’t talk about feelings with my mother, because she doesn’t and she can’t.

Later on I was thinking “Why do I have to do battle with my mother and my husband in order to get them to value me? My mother chose to have me, I wasn’t an accident. My husband chose to marry me, no one forced him. And now I have to do battle with them to show I have worth? I don’t want that. I just want them to love me.”

J asked if my mother makes me feel like a child. I said, “She tries to.” He said, “I know. But do you?” I said, “I don’t really know what it feels like to be a child. I wasn’t even very childlike when I was a child.”

J started another sentence, but it was getting late, we only had about five minutes left. I asked if I could interrupt when he finished his thought, and he just shut right up. I told him about calling my flying therapist and how I thought I should have checked with him. He had no trouble with me calling her, he wanted to know all about why I called her and what my anxiety is about. But he didn’t get it. He somehow decided that I am anxious about my daughter flying, because she is traveling alone, and the body scanner stuff is bringing out my anxiety about that. I told him that is not true, she has been flying alone since she was 15, and I am not an anxious flyer anymore. I am strictly worried about the body scanner/pat down stuff and the thought of her going through that is very upsetting to me. I don’t think he believed me. He told me that this weekend his wife and little daughter had to go somewhere and they had a long drive home and weren’t going to get home until 1:00am and he was very worried about them traveling. He said that is normal with family. He told me that he looked at the clock at 8:00pm and he felt tired and he didn’t know how they would make it home so late, but his wife had another adult and another child in the car and they talked, and she called a couple of times on the way, and she made it home. Frankly he missed the point, and I didn’t appreciate the story much. I hate when he tells me stories about how much he cares for his wife and children, because my husband has never done the things that J does at home, and it makes me feel like I missed out on a lot.

He also said something about how the “body dysmorphic disorder” is definitely playing a part….I don’t think I heard anymore. Body dysmorphic disorder? Huh? Dr. “I Don’t Like Labels” throwing that out there in the middle of a discussion? I don’t have that. I have a very realistic view of my body. Just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean I have a disorder!

We didn’t have much time to discuss this though. Then it was time to leave. As I was walking out the door I remembered the papers from my little box. I stopped and asked him if I could have the box. He said, “You want the papers from last week?” Good guess, I wonder what he was thinking and what he thought I was thinking. He gave me the papers and I left. Do you think he’ll ever ask why I wanted them back? Do you think he knows why I want them back?

This session made me miss my dad a lot. It will be 13 years in January since he died. I think he was kind of a buffer between my mother and me. Even though her personality was 1000% stronger than his, just that little bit of encouragement and feeling of value that he gave me was important. Now I have no one who does that. I told J that as much as I appreciate him telling me I am valued and I am a good person, it is nothing like having a parent or a husband say it.

Nov 15 2010

Body Scanners

Today I did something and I probably should have checked with J first. I’ve been ruminating about the body scanners that are making appearances at airports here in the US. All three of our local airports have them, and the airport in my daughter’s city has them too. The last time I flew I was pulled out of line to use the scanner. Most people still go through the regular metal detectors, but random people are being chosen to use the scanner. I wasn’t aware of what it even was when I used it, but now I know.

So you stand in this thing, with your legs apart and your hands above your head. Then it takes a picture of you from all angles with your clothes off and sends the picture to someone who is sitting in a supposedly windowless room somewhere. And your face is supposedly blurred. And the person who is looking at your naked body is not supposed to copy the pictures and send them to his facebook or text them to his buddy at home.

If you don’t like the idea of this, you can “opt out.” If you opt out you will be subject to the “pat down”, which isn’t exactly a pat. It is a “slide”. Open palmed, over your entire body including private parts, supposedly by someone of the same gender as the person being fondled. Supposedly in public.

I know this will sound crazy, but I am crazy so it’s ok, I would rather have the pat down than the naked scan. This is due to my irrational body image issues of course, and I realize that. But I would rather be touched with my clothes on than seen with my clothes off. The problem with the “pat down” is that the TSA “officials” (aka people who don’t want to work in McDonald’s, so they work for the TSA making minimum wage) don’t want to do pat downs, and they are “punishing” passengers who ask for the opt out. They frequently make them wait up to half an hour, claiming that they don’t have enough personnel, or they can’t find a woman, or a man, or whatever the situation is requiring. And you can’t leave until you either go through the scanner or get the pat down.

The chances of being chosen randomly are slim, right? I guess not, I got chosen the last time I flew and I don’t fly very often.

My daughter is flying home Friday night, and I am sick about the thought of someone seeing her naked pictures. I know she is 18, but she is still a child to me. I won’t even tell her about the opt out, because it also makes me sick to think she might get a pat down.

Oh, and if you “fail” the metal detector or the scanner, you automatically get the pat down. Even if you are a child.

This has been bothering me quite a bit, and more and more news stories are coming out about crappy TSA behavior. I know that what, 80 or 90% of the population could give a fuck about this. They just want to get where they want to go, and they don’t care if anyone sees them naked or touches their genitals. I wish I was one of them, really I do! And I like to think of myself as a good American citizen, and I know we have to give up some rights in order to be safe. Or we could all just stay home, which is what I might do from now on. It sucks, because I have finally become something of a comfortable flyer.

So I called my flying therapist today. It was so good to hear her voice and she is so incredibly nice. We never really talked much about feelings in flying therapy, it was all CBT and logical and changing thinking and using coping strategies. We didn’t need to talk about feelings, we all felt the same – afraid of flying.

But she was asking me some questions about why I was uncomfortable with these new security procedures and the body image stuff came out. She asked me if I was seeing her therapist friend, since a while ago I had asked her for a reference to a therapist. I told her that I decided not to see her friend, but to stick with my current therapist. At that point I realized that maybe I should have checked with J to see if it was ok before I called her. I told her that I do plan to tell my t about the call, and that maybe this is something I need to work through with him.

She asked me a lot of good questions, and we talked it out, and she asked me what I was afraid would happen if my daughter or I went through the scanner, and I told her all of my worst case scenarios. And how someone told me I’m naked at the doctor’s office and it doesn’t bother me, but I’m not naked at the doctor’s office, I have on a gown and the doctor usually only looks at a small part of me at a time. And she or he went to medical school and is very invested in his or her profession and is making more than $7.00 an hour.

And she said we get naked in store dressing rooms, and I said I don’t! I take off the minimum necessary at a time in order to try on whatever it is I am trying on. I frequently buy things and take them home to try them on actually.

I asked her if any of her clients are feeling uncomfortable about this, and she said no one has mentioned it, but most of her clients aren’t at the stage where they are flying yet. She did say she would be willing to dedicate one of her group therapy sessions to this issue if people are interested. She could contact prior clients, ones who fly, and see if they are interested. I thought that was a great idea, and I was so grateful to her for thinking of it. And if it turns out no one is uncomfortable with this, maybe I’ll realize that I don’t have to be uncomfortable either. But I doubt that will happen.

I asked her if she ever got my email that I sent six weeks ago, I had sent her the story I wrote about getting over my fear of flying. She told me that her email account was hacked, and she had to give it up, and she lost her whole contact list in the process (she isn’t very computer savvy). So she did not get it. I had been thinking she either didn’t like the story, or was ignoring me. But she asked me to send it to her new email address, which I did.

It was great talking to her, but I don’t feel any better about my daughter flying Friday. I’ll only feel better when she gets here and tells me she only had to go through the metal detector. Then I’ll only be anxious until the day she leaves, when I’ll go through it all over again.

Oct 11 2010

Random Randomness

I had a lovely time visiting my daughter at college. The flights were fine, my husband and I got along well for the most part, my daughter only found me annoying two or three times. We went out to dinner with one of her new friends and she was a really cute girl. The weather was perfect – 85 degrees with low humidity, unlike when we were there in August and it was 100 degrees with 90% humidity. We shopped and ate and walked. Did I mention that we ate? Ugh. I gained three pounds. Why can’t I just focus on the fun time and not the constant calories in/calories out. I enjoyed the beignets, I really did. I eat them once or twice a year, so why can’t I enjoy them?

So I came home last night and this morning I went out to run 8 miles. I really watched what I ate today and stopped eating at 5PM. Now I am just having a glass of wine. I’ve got the Livestrong My Plate open and I documented my food and activity for the day. So far 1247 calories in, 812 calories out. I might have another glass of wine. Another thing I did? I poured my glass of wine into a measuring cup because I’ve never known how much wine I have actually been drinking, but now I know. One glass of wine = 9 ounces. Maybe if I buy smaller wine glasses I’ll drink less wine?

I went to the doctor today to get a prescription for my sinus medication and I refused to be weighed. The nurse said, “Why don’t you want to be weighed, you are so slim?” I said, “Well if you think I’m slim then I guess I don’t need to be weighed!” I’m sure she wrote a nasty note in my chart “Patient refused to be weighed.” Oh well. I think if I really watch my diet for the next few days I’ll be ok. And that doesn’t mean restricting – it means good healthy eating. Fruits, vegetables, low fat protein, whole grains. Three meals a day plus snacks. And lots of water.

I bought an acorn squash the other day and I think I’ll roast it tonight to have tomorrow. Yum.

Aug 30 2010

College Life

We called my daughter Saturday afternoon from the car – speakerphone so we could all talk to her, my husband, my son and me. She didn’t really have much to say. My husband kept pestering her about eating breakfast (she has never eaten breakfast past the age of about 2) and that got a rise out of her and she yelled at him. But otherwise she sounded kind of flat. Everything was “fine” and “good” and we had to ask really specific questions to get any info. It didn’t make me feel good.

But tonight she IM’d me and told me she went to an Equestrian Club meeting. If there is anything that can cheer her up it is horses and riding. She wants to join the Equestrian Club, and I need to send her some supplies like her boots and helmet and chaps and some riding jeans. Oh, and since I’m sending her things can I send oreos and goldfish?

I sent her homemade oatmeal chocolate chip cookies on Saturday and they arrived today! That is fast for 1000 miles. Gotta love the US Postal system.

So I’m going out to the barn on Thursday to get her things and ship them to her. It’s so nice to hear her sounding excited. She said she met other girls on her floor who ride because they had a floor meeting last week, and I guess they talked about things they did at home. Girls who ride horses just seem to have a connection, and it’s something that I was always grateful for, despite the cost. It’s an expensive hobby, but she has made close friends, developed a great sense of responsibility, and is able to relate to people of all ages through her experience with riding.

So in about 10 days she is going to go to the barn near the university and have an evaluation to see what level she is at, and maybe sign up for lessons and a riding team. It’s not a competitive riding team, which her school does have, but I don’t want her doing that, and I guess she knows it. She was never a fan of competitive riding, even though she did do it. She had a lot of anxiety when she showed. But I think riding just for fun will be great for her at school. I’m feeling so relieved.

picasso

And my son starts his classes at the community college tomorrow. Wow, so much growing up going on!

Aug 25 2010

Random Thoughts

I went to work today. I was very busy at work today, which was good. This morning my boss, R, sent me an email asking if I had a recommendation for a psychologist for his son. Guess whose name I gave him? Yep, J. I think J will be perfect for his son, since he works with many adolescent boys. R’s son doesn’t have any drinking or drug problems, but he wants someone to talk to. His parents had a messy divorce, and since J does a lot of couples therapy I think he will be good for R’s son. And his second office is very close to R’s house. I think J will be better for R’s son than he is for me actually.

I’m wondering – those of you with t’s. Do your t’s ever ask you:

How much you are drinking
Whether you are abusing or using too many prescription or illegal drugs
Whether you are self injuring
Whether you are having suicidal ideation
If you are socializing
How much time you spend in bed
If you are taking care of your personal hygiene
How much time you spend crying

My pdoc asks me these questions, but just so he can gather information to convince me to take anti-depressants. J never asks me these things. How does he know how I am doing? I certainly don’t volunteer this information, although one of the little slips of paper in my box in his office is about how I am isolating myself. We haven’t pulled that one out of the box yet.

I’m still confused about why we didn’t pull any slip of paper out of the box yesterday. I thought that was what the box was for. I’m still obsessing about my session yesterday. I think this may continue all week, and then it will get out of my system and when I go in next week I won’t have anything to say.

So I don’t want to write every day about what I am missing about my daughter, but tonight when I left work I texted my son to see what he wanted me to pick up for dinner. Usually I have to go to two or three places to get food for my family on the nights I don’t cook, but tonight my husband and son got food from the same place. So I only had to get food for them, and not my daughter. Little things like that, and coming home and the house not being messy, those are the things I’m noticing.

I’ve gone in her room a couple of times, and it really needs to be cleaned. But right now I’m only doing two things. Working and being in bed. That’s all. Oh, and I’m im-ing with her. She doesn’t have much to say so far. And I don’t want to push.