Unable to be myself

[BlancaLap]

My T asked me to be myself with her, to not fake. And I asked myself: is that possible right now? You see, normal people have other emotions apart from anxiety and stress, so they may feel sad and stressed at the same time, and maybe their sadness tells them to act sad or show that sadness but the anxiety tells them to not do it, so they may fake or may not. But for me, I don't have something more apart from anxiety, there is no part of me that tells me to act in any way apart from looking for "the best way to act", at least not now. So, there is no fake and no fake. Even if I wanted to, there is no other way I could act. So she asked me something that doesn't exist, something that can't be possible.

[Rainagain]

Hi BlancaLap.

You have explained it well in your post, just have to do the same with you T I guess.

Its tough sometimes to know what is a real feeling, amongst the numbing, the dissociation, the emotional surges from getting triggered, depression and anxiety its often a right muddle for me to know too.

[Kat]

I'm sorry this has to be so difficult.  I imagine you must be very frustrated.

I agree with Rain that you should attempt to explain this to your T.  It may help to write it down. 

I'm not sure if this fits your situation, but when I first started therapy I was very guarded.  My T would notice that I thought over every response very carefully before speaking.  She would gently urge me not to edit my responses.  It was so difficult because that's the only way I knew how to be. Slowly though, I became more comfortable with her and was able to express my true feelings without calculating my every word. 

You are very strong and self-aware.  I wish you all the best.

[BlancaLap]

Thanks Rainagain, as you said it's hard. I know I have feelings, I have felt them; I know I'm not some sort of monster. It's hard to feel: you try to and when you achieve it, you feel so much pain and danger that you dissociate immediately.

Thanks Kat, Glad to hear you were able to express your true feelings to your T. I guess I could do some exercises (as she told me to) to relax and low down my levels of anxiety, maybe that will help me get out of dissociation. I always thought that the only way to start feeling your true feelings is by first lowing down your stress, but I don't know if I can do it without changing my actual environment; it feels so unreal to think about it... that I can low down my anxiety without changing my environment. I mean, that's what I have been trying to do all this time! And nothing have happened... I felt a bit uncomfortable when she told me to low down my stress, it was like: "yeah, sure, all this time I achieved nothing and I'm gonna achieve it now...". There is something I need to do before lowing down my stress, but I have to figure out how.

Thanks for listening.