[14 min read] After yesterday’s massive epiphany in session I’ve been feeling pretty good today. What a gift it is to feel closer to my brother than I ever have… after he’s passed away. It’s something for me to hold on to and appreciate… to feel more connected to someone after they’re gone is a magical experience. I don’t quite know how to quantify it but my heart was bubbly and light today.
But even though I got to enjoy my evening and most of today – while I’m feeling clear and supported I wanted to swing back around to a part of yesterday’s session that still bugs me and try to break that down a little. T asked me about love. About if there are people in my life that I feel love for…. can I sense that? I can and I can’t. I rambled in an email about how there’s complexities there. There is a part, “The Loved”, that I’ve spoken about recently. This part knows what it feels to be loved in the right way and how to show it back and she genuinely cares about the people around her. She loves to make people happy and is an altruist at heart. She used to be a bigger part of the overall system… but over the years… her voice was tamped down. She was told and shown that she should be quiet… that it’s not safe for her to be the way that she is. Every part in the system started to crowd her out.. and the other parts don’t have the same capacity to care and love people the way she does.
So I feel like, these other parts have been sort of carrying the load in as far as helping me connect with others… but they can’t do it as well as The Loved… so it’s why I struggle to feel like I’m truly connected to anyone… even R. And the truth is, I married R knowing this was the truth. That I didn’t really love him the way he wanted me to…or thought that I did. I just knew that he made me feel safe and he was kind and supportive and even though our sex life died off pretty quickly, the sense of safety was more than enough for me at the time (it still is for the most part).
And, I know that part of therapy is really connecting and trusting your T enough to be vulnerable.. a part of that is a shared love (human to human, not romantic) or at least that’s my working theory – haven’t actually talked about that much. Love is a scary concept for me. And I know… and am a little embarrassed that I am still afraid of him. I’ve gone through a range of emotions about how I feel about him. I’m going to try and be honest here because I think its important but this is so scary for me…
With this particular T, he has always seemed kind to me… he seemed open and not rigid, as I’ve experienced w/ other therapists. It’s why I kept coming back. Even though sometimes I wonder if I am doing what I’m supposed to be doing (am I doing this right? lol) – I love how flexible our sessions are. I don’t typically need hand-holding to learn new concepts because I often learn quickly given the space and proper tools to process. I’ve had colleagues tell me thats like a super power of mine (adaptability/fast-learner). I attribute this to growing up w/ parents who had nearly zero education (didn’t even speak English well), it meant I had to learn most things on my own and be my own educational support.
Anyway, with my T, I’ve always sensed a vast emotional depth in him and it’s always made me smile because I feel like on some level we’re similar in that way. Of course it feels good to resonate with someone on the same wavelength. But if I’m being honest, I also always thought he was cute (I still do) hehe. But as innocent as that sounds, there’s something there that I hate to admit cause it’s shameful to me – but I know its seriously wrapped up in some other stuff. Ugh…
The reason it mattered to me at the time so many years ago, that my T was male (and preferably attractive) is that there’s always a part of me that uses sex as a tool to manipulate, self-harm, self-sooth and as an escape card (a distraction). I hate that about myself. Yes, I’m aware that is never going to happen between my T and I, but that part of me thinks that if shit really got scary or dangerous and I needed to protect myself, there’s the chance I could use sex as a bargaining chip. Basically give up my body in exchange for something; my eventual safety through eliciting a kind of perceived trust (to allow me the freedom to escape – abusers back off for a while when they get what they want). Does that even make sense? Rationally, I know its ridiculous and T is not a threat and I’ll never have to try and play that card with him….
But here’s the thing. It might be considered forbidden and he might tell me “that’ll never ever happen” for xyz reasons, but that has not stopped many, many, other men; men, who I trusted, who have been in positions of power, who were far older than me when I was only a child, who were supposed to protect me, who were far more attractive than me, who were even fucking related to me, or who I thought were my closest friends (well beyond just the stories I’ve told here). It’s not stopped any of those men from breaking that boundary and taking a piece of me, whether I offered it, or not.
That mistrust has rooted itself as a fundamental truth of my story because I’m pretty sure before I could even form solid memories, men have been using my body for their own curiosity and as I grew up, for their own pleasure.
It hurts so much to admit that.
But there’s one more thing that’s sort of an extension of that…
As a kid and young lady I’ve had a few upsetting and triggering memories at doctors offices. One was as a child, I can’t quite remember if it was before or after the incident w/ my cousin (I think it was after) but I was taken in for a “check-up” I assume. I remember the pediatrician was much older male (maybe in his 60’s I remember his head full of white hair). I remember my mom and maaaaybe a nurse was in the room and I remember being on the table w/ my pants down while he stuck his fingers into my vagina and quickly felt around (I don’t even think he wore gloves because I remember him wiping his hand off and it grosses me out just thinking about it). This memory is so engrained in me because I remember how violated I felt as a kid, that my mom would let him touch me like that willingly. It may have been part of a routine check-up, but I likely already had unsettling experience(s?) w/ my cousin… or some other experience… and so it was triggering as fuck. I just didn’t know how to communicate that as a child. It has stuck with me to this day. It’s part of the mistrust I have for her as a protector as well.
The second was when I was a young lady (late teens I believe). I went in to get an RX for birth control and it was a new nurse practitioner – a severe looking older lady. She asked me a bunch of questions with a flat expression and went on to do a pelvic exam. What she didn’t tell me was what was involved. I’d had a speculum inside me before, but this lady, literally put on a glove and pushed two fingers deep inside me and felt around. She didn’t warn me at all, just shoved her fingers in there; I felt horribly assaulted and violated afterwards and again triggering AF.
Even recently I went to a reproductive specialist, not going to get into it, but the experience left me feeling like shit – I went back to my car and cried. I’ve not had good luck in that department.
And I know therapy is not a medical office, but it bears the resemblance of being examined. I think this is a small part of why I get so nervous and uncomfortable around my T (and tbh doctors in general). There’s a bit of transference towards him in that certain parts inherently mistrust male “authority” figures – and so even though I want badly to believe he’s safe… I can’t quite do it yet. I feel so badly that I can’t because I feel like he doesn’t understand and there are parts of me that I think really really want to trust him and find him safe and supportive (that is definitely the case because I wouldn’t have opened up as much as I have) – just not all the parts think that…
In the same token, I really do want to learn to have a healthy connection with a male that isn’t based on sex…or where sex or sexual interaction isn’t an eventuality. The closest I’ve had to that were my brothers – and one of them is dead and the other struggles with the “healthy relationship” part. But that was also a motivating factor for picking a male T as well. How crazy would it be for me to actually have that kind of relationship and actually form a real trust in it?
But all that is why it gets confusing when I do have sexual or erotic dreams about him. If I had to guess it’s probably something to do w/ desire for intimacy or whatever – tbh there’s an element there of me wanting to take care of him, give back, and sex is a method I’ve learned to use in the past so there’s that weirdness too. I haven’t told him any of this directly because I know they’re just thoughts and not rooted in anything real and I have absolutely no intention of ever acting on anything at all (and even if I did I’m pretty sure he’d hold that boundary for us). Also, I fantasize about having sex with lots of other adults I meet – like almost everyone lol. Being pan-sexual does not help haha. The advantage to that though, is that I learned really early on to dismiss these thoughts because they don’t actually hold any water. That’s why I never freaked out about the rape dream – unsettling yes – uncommon for me? Not necessarily. (I actually had a dream about him beating the shit out of me too – but that’s also dumb.)
So that’s it. I don’t know what to say except that I’m not actually sure how to get over that trust block. It might just take a super long time. I gotta say I’m a little scared writing about this…I hope it doesn’t change the nature of our relationship if I do share this… but so far he’s proven to me time and time again that he won’t take advantage so I’m continuing to try and believe that’s the truth until proven otherwise.
Its just that… I know that if he asked or tried (I know how ridiculous it sounds), I would say yes, be crushed inside, and then never talk to him again. But why would I think like that? Because deep down I would feel that I owe him that… that’s why. (Ugh, that hurt to write.)
But that’s why sitting in the same room with him is so difficult for some of my parts. Part of why I can barely look at him. Other parts wish they could sit closer to him in a totally platonic caring way or give him a genuine hug or a happy high five and yet others think it’s an incredibly dangerous place to be as they feel examined and observed.
So the best I can do is fight through all of that mess, all of the voices and opinions about how I should feel in that situation or whether I should prepare for the eventuality of being crushed… I just have to ignore all of it…. I’ve had to do that my entire life. Countless times I’ve been in an office w an older male teacher or professor, colleague, doctor, etc. and each time I’ve felt that storm of feelings welling up.. and each time I’ve had to ignore them and act… normal. I feel so bad that I can’t just be normal… and it’s so depressing that I was robbed of likely ever feeling okay in these scenarios.
So I guess my fear is that I feel like my T might think I don’t trust him because of something he’s done – but it’s not that – it’s me and I’m so sad I can’t just be a better person.…a normal person… I’m so sorry. I’m trying to do better, I’m just bad at it and I’m sorry.