"Contrariness"! 11th October 2021.

The room is 

cold.

Air filters...breathe out 

glacial air.

Like being on a space ship.

He talks about 

disinfecting 

surfaces.

[Definitions of contrariness. Deliberate and stubborn unruliness and resistance to guidance or discipline. Synonyms: perverseness, perversity.]

There isn't a good way to describe this session

It began well enough - but that was deceptive,

The intent was not good, not good at all!

He had made a list of subjects I'd suggested from our emails:

•  Symbolization. 
• Emails and contracting.
• And 'script analysis'. 

He said that he was becoming aware of a theme...

And in particular, he wished to talk directly about emails and contracting.

I am lost and bewildered. Why he is asking me this? In level 2 it often felt as if we talked about nothing else! I remember having to make myself learn contracting as a script. For the life of me now, I have no idea why it seemed so difficult. I guess training works! He explains the standard use of emails in a counselling contract, and I'm confused. I feel chastised, why is he mentioning it now? I've emailed him most weeks to say what might be useful to talk about. This has been right from the first weeks. And it began because he emailed me after our first sessions - and I thought...oh, that's not what we were taught...this means that he is thinking of me. And at that moment he was really unattractive.

What changed?

Calling me a minx...that transgression hit me like a freight train (to quote Bob Dylan).

But here now?

The floor cracks and shifts, I'm dropped into a hell of thinking I'm going to be asked to leave. He must know how I feel about him? This must be the session when I'm told to stop it! To go. 

And again he says that I'd given him a task - to talk about the assignments - and that he wasn't able to do it because of the tangents. 

Right now I feel crushed, and I'm scared. 

I defend 'tangential'.

I tell him that exploration is the point. 

Following divers paths, no fear of being lost, enjoying the journey...

And then he repeats my words from last week  "Theory being used on you"

I try to explain that I don't want to talk about it.

I talk about it.

Why did I do that?

This is what I explain: That therapists have a theoretical underpinning to their work. This determines the words we echo back from the client, it alters our tone of voice, it determines the questions (if any) that are asked.

Unfortunately many therapist's forget to hear that what is happening to a person is happening in the here and now. There is an automatic assumption that the present is not working because of the past (rather than because of the present!) and extrapolate from the present into the past; that looking at what isn't working now, and its relationship with the past will free the client from repeating old patterns. I once believed this to be both plausible and useful. But the more I think about it, the less plausible it becomes for me - the present problem looks as if it is a replay of thoughts and feelings from the past because everything we see is seen in terms of our past. 

The art of my work is enabling a person to find a new and preferred way to react to the present. And to seek resolution through action. First step is to name what is really happening by seeking an overview. This helps us to know what we are really dealing with. Then we name our resources, understand our resilience, and start paying attention to those moments when things are better, and then do something different...and then, if possible we start to seek actions that use the past to make a better future. 

Healing one's past is something to do during good times. Because even understanding the present with an understanding of the past cannot stop the present being as awful as it really is. An awful present can be changed - by doing something different - but just understanding wont be enough. 

When I first saw a therapist  - I was studying level 3 at that point - my 'presenting issue' was my husband's personality change (he spoke to me like his dad spoke to his mom). 

And that was a problem because? 

His dad was a bully, his mom a victim of coercive control. I couldn't 'be her' but it was as if he wanted me to be, so he could bully me. Four years later I discovered the reason! His personality had changed...because he'd fallen for someone else. I mean of course that isn't a reason to be vile to anyone! But that is how he rolls. The interesting part is, the memory from my past that kept replaying, was of being 'shut out' because that provided a metaphor for how I was feeling in the present, it is what was actually happening. So this perception was crystal clear - but the time frame was wrong. 

But hey, yes, the inner child work the therapist did with me? At the time I thought, wow - this person has qualified - and that seemed such an immense task, I was in awe of her! And don't get me wrong, her work with me was beautiful and kind. But it consolidated my self-blame, because it didn't confound my certainty that my messed up childhood was entirely to blame for the changes in my husband.

But think about it?

How could that actually make any sense?

Second therapy, my issue: son, drugs, sectioning psychosis violence betrayal. Perhaps 'inner child' makes more sense? No, really, don't make me laugh. The outer-child was taller than I am and swinging heavy objects at me if I said the wrong thing, or failed him in totally inexplicable ways. And yes, the inner-child work was memorable and a wonderful diversion. And the therapist was so, so compassionate and kind. But the only session that I found to be helpful was when we discussed my feelings about SSRIs. 

And he tells me that I seem angry...

Directly dismissing my account of the experience! Experience that indicates to me a real problem with therapy. And this is somewhat important, as I'm training to be a therapist!

Me -  "I'm not angry with the therapists, I am frustrated at the lack of common sense. And for people living in that situation, to make out that it's all them, and to patch something that happened to them as a child is not going to help them. At this point they need a conversation about what they are doing that helps them, and what can get them through.

He tells me that I didn't get what I wanted from the therapists (!)

I replied that what I got just wasn't useful - and that I think when someone is in a life threatening situation, obviously under terrible emotional stress, a useful therapy conversation would be preferable!

He reflects the key word - useful - 'and what you got wasn't useful' but it doesn't sound like a question. Regardless! I answer as if he is actually seeking information.

Me - "Not really, no. I didn't find anything I didn't know before. And did it help? No, of course it didn't help. Help was learning that when you call the police they don't press charges and give 'service user' a criminal record! I didn't know that. A therapist isn't expected to know that. But at those points where things were too much? No help - just developmental theory! I have answers now - Wim Hof method means I have practiced panic, I understand how to use breath, and I now know that a lot of how panic feels, is due to CO2. Nothing to do with childhood. I mean you know how we think anxiety must be a mind thing, adrenaline and racing heart - I hadn't understood until I practiced Wim Hof Method. It gave me control, through practicing physiological stress"

And then he says that it is refreshing to see the mask come off!

I am now bewildered, and feeling invalidated, hurt and betrayed by him, and this will be the truth of the future. I say "Well that is who I am! This one has always been here too! And it has taken me a lot to get back to here. Mainly it's been getting back to college. It isn't a mask, it's not a mask... OK, if you want to use the term 'mask' let's do Jung!"

He asks me if I like to be, or feels a need to be, 'contrary'

 At this moment I am terrified, because I am not strong enough yet to cope with this. I feel as if I've been placed in a trap that no one can escape by opposing - like one of those woven finger traps, or a spider's web; struggle will make things so much worse!

Possibly reading my emotion at this point? He begins to explain that he means the term mask in an ordinary sense. But I'm not having it. I interrupt! I'm the one who has studied Jung -  but why should I listen to someone who clearly isn't listening to me tell me, about me - or even about Jung for that matter!

Me - "No, I deny it absolutely. If you are saying that interaction between people should be genuine, authentic and totally natural all the time, that's incorrect. <Socially it would be a disaster!>"

Ah just as well he isn't me! I hope I'd have replied with - what would be so disastrous about us both being genuine, authentic  and natural!

He asks about my problem with answering, 'how are you?' I explain that the question is only problematic in a therapy situation! Because it relates to the level of interaction, and who am I talking to! He tells me that it is an ordinary question, I say yes but therapy is not an ordinary interaction!"

Emotional honesty and open vulnerability, the prerequisites for authentic and genuine, healing dialogue are not ordinary. But on the other hand, as I'm not going to talk about how the lack of emotional honesty from both of us is a nightmare! I fire up the philosophy core once more.

Me - "But there is also the problem that you are talking to a person who is Buddhist - here and now, still breathing."

Meaning, think! 

I view reality as a construct. 

How I am depends on how you are!

And you are missing!

We go round the same well worn silly arguments about self/no self once more until he says, 'See it's happening now'. I reply, or is it that what you are seeing is me defining something, to get to clarity?. His reply is instant - 'no, it's contrariness, because whatever I say you will find a problem with it'!

I'm missing out that he's hurt - he doesn't want me to 'find a problem' in everything he says. But, we don't have that level of relationship because he wont talk to me about what he feels, and I certainly wont tell him that I'm in love with him! So we end up intellectualising - as the only safe place we can meet! 

The self argument continues until he says that once he'd used the term self and I'd said, 'of course there is a self' and so therefore there is no problem with the question how are you! In retrospect this conversation is hilarious. 

But it doesn't feel hilarious to me at this moment!

Me - "The problem with the question 'how are you' is  I will reply with 'I'm fine thank you' because I'm OK - which doesn't mean everything is OK and that I'm fine! I need an invite to talk about the not OK things - and I'm not OK at this moment."

His reply is therapy cliché, 'you can answer however you want, where is the problem then'

I have just said "I'm not OK at this moment" and I need an invite to talk about 'not OK things'.

Eventually he asks me, what is going on emotionally? 

And describes me as  'particularly angry '

Angry? 

I'm crushed almost unable to speak. 

Despair is so close. 

I need, I want this relationship to be us, worked out between us as human beings. To be human. I need so much to step out of the inhumane language rules guiding this interaction. 

But I'm trapped and I'm stuck. Client and therapist - I can't be truthful - I'm not supposed to want him.

And if I said it, I am certain that he'd treat it as an artefact, fail to take it seriously. And he would tell me that it must be transference. And to be told that, offered clichés, have my feelings and intelligence insulted that way, to experience yet again someone I love dismissing my feelings and my ability to understand myself? 

It would destroy me.

This session today is bad enough - he has told me that I wear a mask. That when I contradict, I'm being contrary. That when I change a subject I'm being tangential. That when I'm in almost more pain than I can take - apparently I'm angry. 

A direct insult would be at least straight!

But, I want to know what is going on with him.

Me - "Because this whole session seems to be about your frustration actually. So I'm not sure what we are doing. I'm not angry in particular, and I don't think I have a problem expressing anger, I just don't feel angry. It feels like being stuck in mud, cold, thick mud - unable to move" 

I am not going to say this is despair, I'm not going to let him know, I dare not!

He asks me how we get out. I'm exhausted and running on empty. I say 'to go back to the beginning, clarity. So emails. What do you want?'

He explains that he doesn't want emails that are emotionally charged. The curious thing is, I had emailed him before - ages ago with 'emotionally charged' phrases such as ' we are sacred mirrors, opposites reflecting each other' to allow him to glimpse my feelings. 

So that was OK? 

My recent emails had been about theory, and I had addressed his diagnosis of me as tangential, and this seems to be 'it', the 'real issue'.

I explain - "I felt that my attempts to build knowledge were dismissed as 'tangential' so I sent you a mind map to show how the ideas fit together. and I wrote to you about debating theory, I like that idea, I think it has life in it! I asked for continuity. Lack of continuity may be an artefact of person centred counselling, I wouldn't ask a person if they wanted to continue with a subject the following week, and I'm not too sure why. And right now I feel as if I've been put on 'the naughty stool' "

He says that this wasn't his intention.

So I'm wrong then - to feel this way - because it isn't his intention?

The implication of his words...that I'm to blame for being so close to breaking down in tears of frustration, my sense of powerlessness and of feeling completely misunderstood, it is entirely my own doing! OK. so if I ran over next door's cat, I could say that the cat isn't injured because it wasn't my intention to drive over it!

What?

One of us is not sane...

Me - "Regardless of intention, it's the way it's come over. I'm not saying that you have done it on purpose, I'm not saying anything other than this is how I feel"

Rather than talking about how I feel, he returns to the game of philosophy.

And I have no wish or ability to play. I'm broken. My reply (see transcript!)  'no, no.' was said in despair, it is my response to the game. But foolishly I'm like someone with a broken leg trying to walk, if this is as close as we can be, I will try. I metaphorically manage to stand. I try to engage on the intellectual level, but my emotions are fractured, and unable to support me. 

I'm still trying to fathom how he seems to believe that it is only when words are spoken from an intent to hurt, will hurt!

No one is totally in control of how someone else will receive their words or intentions! But there is still a responsibility to help the other if our words inadvertently hurt them, surely?

Curiously, my ability to play philosophy when my guts are in ribbons seems to shift us closer to the truth of what happened. 

He says that in the last email I'd written to him, after he'd accused me of being wilfully contrary and tangential (as if those are a bad thing) I'd used the word 'accused'...which of course I had!

The smoking gun - at last! This is why this session has been this way. The word accused has created all this! I'm suffering from his reaction to that word, this has caused the underlying energy of this awful session - really? This is madness!

Me - "Yes! But I thought you knew that I like to use emotive language! It wasn't like 'oh no you have accused me' it was 'Ah ha!!!! you have accused me :-)"

He - "See this is one of the problems with email" 

I hear relief in his voice.

Me - "I thought you would realize that there is no reason for me to use the word accused in a bad way -  about you! Why on earth would I feel that way!? But if you want me to sit here and accept everything you say, that isn't going to happen...it's like you imagine a linear path through a subject. But you don't know the destination! And it seems to me, looking at this from a third person perspective, that you have mistaken my emotional content as tangential. But it isn't 'going off at a tangent' it is part of the whole thing - what things spark is part of it!

He is feeling confused and unable to do whatever mentoring is..he want's to know what this is all about. I sympathize, but to know what this is all about? Well that would require an essay...but my answer expresses my crazy, unasked for, deep and for me, a drowning love for him.

Me -"That you have experience that I don't, and I gain it from you. Not from what you tell me, but from your attitude"

I've just said I love you. It is implicit in my tone of voice and in the meaning of the words. It is not explicit - because I'm supposed to be a client. But love has been implicit in all our communications, regardless of who or what I'm supposed to be!

His reply makes no sense to me!

I am completely at sea now. Unable to say can't you see what's happening in this room between us? In response to his word - question - I answer as if he has asked me a question. But I have no idea why he has asked it! I've heard the word question - so there must have been a question here? I don't understand...it is about communication, the intangibleness of real, human interaction. How could he pose a question about it's importance? Obviously it is important!

Me - "No, how honestly is that a question? One implication is that all a person needs to do is to sit in front of a computer, a program that runs Rogerian dialogue (Eliza)  and answer the questions and we know that probably isn't true. The whole thing about therapy is the people, it is the room and the atmosphere, it is all of it..." 

His reply 'see this is why I say that you are contrary. You took me to mean the word question in a way that I didn't mean it in order that you could then question the word question."

Again, I've misunderstood his intention and he defends his position that he has no responsibility because it wasn't his intention? I hope someone else would have said "Oh, you thought when I said 'it's a question' I meant it was a question' I see - totally understandable! He had used the word question three times - I feel accused of saying that therapy could be done through a computer program!) I say - "But no, it is the importance of the people, the room the atmosphere versus is therapy the words the therapist uses. To quote you, 'is it the words that matter or the therapy as a whole'. Why are you asking that"? He says that he wasn't asking a question, simply restating something I'd said! Now I am feeling angry. I ask - So why do I need that fed back to me!?" 

And he asks, 'what are we doing' I say 'we are having an argument' and he says that nothing he can say will be the right thing!

I don't say all this, simply because I used the word accused in an email and you panicked!

I say in all honesty that I'm sorry he feels like this and he asks me, 'I wonder what's going on for you'?

I don't reply with - that you wont engage with me as someone who likes to explore ideas; that you have called me tangential and contrary. That something about the word *accused* has really got to you!

But I think I've caught sight of the 'smoking gun', something about how important it is for him not to be seen as responsible for other people's misunderstandings. 

"Accused"...is the key word here.

I don't think it would be wise to ask, 'what was so catastrophic when you were accused of', well of something because whatever it is it has completely wrecked your ability to deal with someone misunderstanding you!? And I'm being made to suffer because of it!

Me - "That I asked you for continuity - in an email - and I've not got it"

He - "What does continuity mean in this context?"

Me - "So - within that email I explained what the in-continuity was"

He - "Tell me..tell me here."

I get my phone to search for the document.

He - almost wails... "No not on your phone, communicate with me!"

Wow, a lot of emotion in that!

And if I had? 

If I'd said that I needed and yearned for us to really communicate - to get out of this one-sided therapy prison' how would that have gone down? And underneath this I needed so much for us to have the promise of a continuity 'on the other side' years away from my course and this situation. 

And if I had said it? 

I think he would have turned red in embarrassment, and blocked me further, shut me down more, used more and more words to prove how right he was and how wrong I am. And then yes - I would have thought of suicide. 

This was my life and death in the balance - my feelings red raw, and still bleeding.

I needed to get much stronger before I could face this

The severed lines of thought, the fractured lines of love, the red hot and tangled lines of meaning; all my reasons to remain alive, so newly mending, so fragile, were so nearly ruptured by this afternoon's session. So yes, I did well to get through without breaking down, and yes it was important not to trust him, important not to let him know yet that my heart and soul were already his - for so long as he didn't know, he couldn't accidentally kill me..

Session 11th October 2021.