Therapist: How is the warmth? How is your body temperature?

Me: I’m not feeling cold and I’m not feeling cool either. I’m feeling like- you know when you get that feeling internally but it’s on the inside of your skin? That kind of cold yeah. It’s not like it’s the outside of my skin cold, and it’s also not like in my heart kind of cold, but it’s just the inside. It’s like it’s between my skin and my bone, that kind of cold.

Therapist: Yes. And the feelings that are around inside, where are they located?

Me: I don’t know whether I’m feeling a lot of emotional feelings. They feel very pulled forward.

Therapist: That sounds like there’s that internal, between blood and bones, an internal sense of a cooler temperature that’s not necessarily about out here, because your body is doing some work right now.

Me: What’s it doing?

Therapist: We’re very gently figuring that out. Sounds to me like the energy and the movement, which is what can happen when we feel an internal coldness, is being directed- you mentioned kind of up here. Then there’s been a bit of shifting, a bit of the sticky glue, maybe smallness, and quieter as you’ve been observing that; and that as the organs, the nervous system, the cells tend to all kind of congregate like this and direct the energy towards where the body and brain are saying “something’s happening here”, and especially through the limbs that can cause a sense of coldness. It’s the opposite of the sympathetic drive when we feel everything rush out to our limbic system, that is a more parasympathetic process which tends to be a part of a healing or repairing process when what’s happening inside gets thicker, fuller, we don’t necessarily have the words for what’s happening but there’s it’s like a kind of digestion. It also can give us information about what happens, where happens and how unique to you it feel.

Me: It feels like I’m just waking up, kind of thing. It feels like being able to remember my dream from last night and just kind of being pulled through the time that has been a couple of hours of actually being awake this morning, but to me now being awake Like that, yeah that’s kind of how it feels at the moment.

Therapist: So you’re holding this dream and the snippets of it, would you like to share any of the dream?

Me: Partly yes but I feel like by sharing it like that’s me being vulnerable or whatever. I had a dream last night and I can’t remember what prompted me to wake up from it, but it was a dream where I think there was part of me that was trying to prove what [abuser] had done. But a large part of the dream had to do with- I was still young, like I was still a kid and I was trying to find the magazines above [abuser’s] cupboard shelf thing, and me looking through those magazines and and also the DVDs that were there. It was just one of those vivid kind of memory dreams where you can tell the different thickness of the magazines, and the colors. It was just a very vivid dream. I think maybe Mox is around at the moment because there’s an element of discomfort around me talking about that

Therapist: And just let Mox know it’s okay that they feel that way, it’s okay to feel a bit uncomfortable that you’re talking about this.. Discomfort isn’t a bad emotion but it doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t share this. It means nothing about you, or Mox, or anyone else, and who you are.

Me: I think it’s a feeling of embarrassment about that-

Therapist: About seeing the magazines and DVDs? About the feelings?

Me: I guess yeah the feelings that came along with seeing or reading some of the content in the magazines. Or about- not seeking those magazines out but once knowing that they were there, looking for them, looking at them on different occasions. So yeah there’s that feeling of embarrassment about that or-

Therapist: What just happened then?

Me: Me just trying to get Mox to-

Therapist: You’re wanting them to give you space to talk about this?

Me: Yeah

Therapist: Okay. Are they worried about something? Do they need any kind of reassurance?

Me: I think they just get uncomfortable whenever I bring up- Like it’s one thing for me to just be like “I was like sexually abused as a kid” or whatever, but whenever I actually bring certain things up then there’s that discomfort from them, or embarrassment. Shame I suppose, or guilt? Probably more shame, not necessarily guilt but yeah.

Therapist: Okay, yeah. Sexuality can feel really exposing and it’s often shamed that when we find- when we have moments in childhood when we find adults or parents pornography secretly and experience excitement or arousal, it can often be accompanied with feeling bad or embarrassed.

Me: Yep

Therapist: I would expect that some of that would be in there. It’s very normal amidst something that was not normal, so I know there’s complications here. I’d just like to reassure that the ‘normal’ expected part of it was the kid part finding something, feeling something, going back to look at it again, and now experiencing a bit of “it feels embarrassing to share this”.

Me: Oh my God, words… I feel like I keep on just getting pulled back through like the dream into memories.

Therapist: It’s doing a lot of processing.

Me: As a result I just don’t get any sleep. Not restful sleep. The other night I woke up maybe like three times but each time it was from a nightmare

Therapist: Okay. How were you feeling each time you woke up?

Me: Physically I was feeling gross and sweaty. Mentally I felt quite disoriented. I’d remember bits and parts of the dream. Usually I wake up in cold sweats and just feeling clammy and gross.

Therapist: Is that familiar for you in your life?

Me: Waking up in sweats?

Therapist: Yeah

Me: Yeah, especially when I would wake up in the middle of the night and I would be yelling, like just on repeat being like “Mom mom mom” . I would wake up, usually it would be mom shaking me awake because I’d be saying that, but not actually like awake

Therapist: And when you woke up this week, can you remember anything you were thinking? Or emotions that were around? Or were there?

Me: I think most of them- I was quite just disoriented but other times I was… Fear. Yeah usually fear. Or dreams like last night- this morning, whatever, just a sense of arousal I guess. Um, but very trapped in the time as if I was younger and back then, kind of thing? And when I reorient myself with the here and now, I would just be like “ew, okay”. I’m angry at myself. I’m angry at myself for being embarrassed about it. I’m annoyed at myself

Therapist: It makes sense that embarrassment is around. It’s okay for me that it’s here. I understand. It says nothing about you. When we start to tell secrets that have been held for a long time it can feel embarrassing, exposing, scary. Secrets that were really hard to keep and very disorienting.

Me: It’s so silly though because I’m even like “honesty is an important part of the thing so I can continue to discuss-”, I just feel silly or like you’re you’re incorrect by saying that because there’s that repeating thing in my head from like what? Two? Three? years ago- Mum just being like “No, that’s not correct” and I feel annoyed at myself that that statement got to me so much.

Therapist: Sometimes relatively good parents do bad things and what they can’t know, they try to convince their child they don’t know. And because that dependence, and that connection, and that attachment is so great, the power of that projection is huge. You needed a mum who believed you then, and who believes you now. And none of that is your fault, not one part of it.

Me: I feel like I’m losing my footing and the existence that is now.

Therapist: Okay. Do you want to get some footing back?

Me: Yeah I think that would be good

Therapist: Okay so just to start can I ask you just very gently must turn your head to the left as much as your neck and head will let you move, and then slowly moving it to the other side to the right… and let’s go once more back to the other side, letting your eyes look down or look up and around. Just keeping it moving, not too fast but not too slow. Remembering to breathe…

Hey. I have been wondering a bit about the bracelet that’s on your left wrist, did you make it?

Me: Yeah. It’s a quote from Mean Girls, “On Wednesdays we wear pink”.

Therapist: It’s quite perfectly matched with all of the colours.

Me: Yeah, I put it on this morning so it would match with the pink.

Therapist: How are you doing?

Me: I’m fine

Therapist: Okay. Nice to see you. You don’t have to say the same.

Me: I was hoping perhaps you wouldn’t notice

Therapist: Oh. How is it that I have?

Me: I don’t care

Therapist: Okay. Of course I’m going to notice you

Me: Am I supposed to take that as a compliment?

Therapist: You don’t have to. I’ve been wondering a bit this morning if I might get any time with you.

Me: I wasn’t intending to be here. Trying my hardest not to at the moment, but I’m here. Joy.

Therapist: Why are you here?

Me: I don’t know. I don’t know and I don’t particularly want to be.

Therapist: How come? I mean, I know what you’ve told me before why you don’t want to be here, is it the same?

Me: Is it the same what?

Therapist: Well, the way I understood it previously was that it was just kind of therapy across the board “I don’t like it. I don’t want to be there. We don’t need it”, and maybe a worry that I might- not a worry, trepidation, that maybe I try to trick you into something. Is that the same?

Me: I don’t think that’s changed.

Therapist: Okay.

Me: It feels like you’re asking questions to analyse me. I’m being scolded for being rude.

Therapist: You?

Me: Yes

Therapist: By me?

Me: No.

Therapist: By who?

Me: Someone

Therapist: Okay. Yeah some folks have some very strong feelings about how you should all behave. Do you ever want to be anywhere?

Me: I don’t want to be here. I want to be back then. I don’t want to be here, now, the present, this existence.

Therapist: Mila what do you like about back then?

Me: That it’s not now. I like being treated, I wouldn’t necessarily say “like a child” but I like being a child. I like being treated as though I was more mature I suppose… I don’t like that there’s an overlap of the two of us and that you’re sharing things I have similar thoughts about. One of us is trying to be more open with the idea of therapy and sharing things and one of us isn’t, and that is frustrating for the other one to be sitting with. And this is why I feel like therapy is a trap. It’s like she’s falling for it. She’s falling for the trap of talking about emotions, talking about how she’s feeling, talking about like “oh let me come around to the idea that this thing was a ‘bad’ thing that happened. This person was a bad person”. Blah blah blah. It’s stupid. It’s not the reality of things it’s and I’m annoyed.

Therapist: Would you be willing to tell me your reality of things?

Me: The reality of things is the opposite of things. The reality of things is I’m pretty sure we discussed what the last time I spoke to you reluctantly-

Therapist: We did Mila and you are very very clever, and that does not go unnoticed by me. Very clever, so you have a way of picking words. Yes we talked about it, and it was also kind of vague. And it’s all right, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I’m actually curious. Because you’ve got strong beliefs, you’ve got a strong presence, you’ve got a fierce personality; so tell me if the others can’t handle it. Tell me what’s the reality.

Me: The reality is simply that they’re wrong. That every one of them is wrong, that’s just the reality. The reality is that it wasn’t this concept of grooming, it wasn’t that. It wasn’t coercion, it was something that I wanted, and they just can’t get it through their thick skulls that it’s something that I did want- they did want. And it pisses me off, and I’m annoyed that I’m even sharing that in general with you.

Therapist: Okay. It pisses you off, all right that you wanted [sexual abuse by abuser] ?

Me: Yeah, yeah it-

Therapist: And that maybe they didn’t?

Me: They’re the same person, I’m the same person. I, in general, wanted to sleep with him. I wanted to have sex with him. I enjoyed it and they’re out there pretending as if it was something bad. Pretending as if “oh this is coercion, molestation, pedophilia, rape” like all of this bullshit when-

Therapist: Okay, what’d you like about it? What were the good parts?

Me: I feel like this is a trap. I feel like using my emotion and my anger and how I’m feeling about that at the moment is a trick because if I’m against them then I’m going to discuss things with you, and I’m not going to

Therapist: Okay. You can test me. You know, I have a hyper um attuned part of me who looks for tricks, being tricked. I’m not saying in any way that I think they’re the same, or that we’re the same, but I mean it when I say I respect it, and you have a right to question, test, push, okay? I am never ever going to override that. You earned that and that’s a great quality. You might not have earned it the way you thought you did.

Can you see that we both know when you’re here? Because she’s at your feet

Me: Yeah, not sitting on me.

Therapist: Mhm, she’s close but she’s not encroaching

Me: … I feel like my brain is like wading in and out of just all these different little facets of me as Mila. Like, my brain is just shuffling through all of these things at the moment. Yeah it’s just this weird shuffle through of those five, but then also I don’t know, like two or so other bits off of that that are also around that I didn’t really notice when was doing the-

Therapist: Yeah there are more hey?

Me: It just feels like when you have the colour wheel thing and you just spin through it. You know, the paper one? That’s what it feels like at the moment and it’s odd. I can’t say that I really experienced that much of a- It’s like there’s these colours that I didn’t really notice that were there. So it’s kind of like a little-

Therapist: Yeah. I’m envisioning shades as you’re saying that we’re. Or like “Oh I thought there was just purple and then pink. Nope, there’s 17 in between those two”.

Me: Yeah it feels like that. It just feels like there are all these little like chipped off bits in between. It kind of feels like, I don’t know whether you’ve ever seen the movie Everything Everywhere All At Once?

Therapist: Yeah

Me: I don’t know whether we talked about this last week. I don’t know. But yeah it kind of feels like that. It feels like there’s this Mila and then there’s the one that’s only one tiny decision off of that one, and then there’s one that’s a little bit more different but like only two decisions off of this one.

Therapist: Yes

Me: That’s what it feels like. Whereas when I think of Mox or whatever, it’s like that’s not even on my same tree of things. That’s just another character in the story. It’s like yeah there’s Mox, but like all these different Milas.