Meursault 2.0

[sanmagic7]

i haven't done anything like that, either, but it sounds interesting to me in a positive way.  since he would be coming at the issues from a different modality, i would think that you would get different perspectives, perhaps a feeling of being anchored (i've heard that the most stable is 3 points, like a 3-legged stool), and a chance to explore that male-to-male anger you mentioned, get more insight on that. 

as far as those other incidents you mentioned, those just always reinforce for me how we never know what may be around the corner.  it's what helps keep me moving forward as much as possible. 

if you decide on this new way of therapy, i sincerely hope it turns out well for you.

and, 3roses, i'm glad you're finding some value out of what was once a scary proposition.  this stuff can certainly work in mysterious ways.

[meursault]

Good point about the tri-pod of relationships.  The only other therapist I really connected with was a guy actually, but it was a limited number of sessions allowed.  When I was seeing him, I "dumped" my best friend and his wife, who was really best friend #2.  I was the best man at their wedding and stuff like that too.  They had been married over a decade, and were in the process of trying to conceive.  Three weeks after I removed myself from the dynamic, she filed for divorce.  Meanwhile the last time I talked to her she was talking about how they might need a fertility expert because they were having a hard time conceiving. 

I mentioned it to that therapist, and he pointed out how stable relationships are usually tripods.  Once I was gone, they had to directly address each other without balancing off of me.  He mentioned that the third party doesn't always have to be a person, but can be a shared interest, a pet, anything really.  In a way, in therapy, I think my "Inner Child" has been functioning as that for my therapist and I.

Part of me is really scared about what my therapist will say about me.  I guess I'm worried about hearing some negative assessment from her.  Still, I guess I should hear it if she does.  She knows me better than anybody.

She reassured me that she is not trying to get rid of me, and said she hopes we work together for a long time yet, if I feel I need it.  She told me she can just see how much I'm hurting and how urgently I feel this need for connection and affection and thinks adding another aspect to my healing might help speed things up and also provide something she is unable to provide.

When she got one of the "Share" pieces when we played Jenga, she told me that she is sometimes worried she is not good enough at her job to give me the help I need.  It was kind of humanizing for her to tell me that, and sort of allows me to see her as more of an equal, rather than some idealized goddess on a pedestal!

Anyways....

Oops, I almost forgot.  I think I understand some of the anger i have towards males.  Partially because of my Dad, I think.  How he never helped me with my Mom.  He openly said he was glad I was around because then my Mom "took it out" on me instead of him.  Then I think any time I hear something positive come out a guys mouth, there is just this spiteful anger that rises up, and the thought goes through my head:  "Easy for you to say!  Women want you!  Now #@$@#!$ off."

Still, I think I'll have to go there eventually.  My therapist is exceptionally good looking, and I thought that would be a deal breaker, but it turns out it's the opposite, so I can easily be wrong on this.  Like Three Roses, I think there is a lot that needs to heal with someone like that.

Really, I think the best dynamic for me is a female therapist of roughly my age or slightly younger.  Older women carry a lot of issues especially with the skewed power dynamic of therapy.  Older male therapists can be okay, but there is a lot of hostility from me there, plus the way men think is usually not a good fit.  I hate being told how to "fix" me.  Younger males are sort of sexual competitors, and I hate them.  Plus it kills my self esteem when I see their various failings as well, and how they are happy and have a life and women want them, and yet my whole life has been stolen, despite having as much in me that is worth it as they have.  It demoralizes me badly.  That is likely the worst dynamic of all...

Meursault

[sanmagic7]

well, meursault, i do hope you give this dynamic a chance.  i think you might be surprised.  and, that was a pretty vulnerable and courageous thing for your t to admit in front of you, that she's afraid she's not enough to help you, give you what you need.  to me that says that she is showing an example of wanting extra help herself in order to help you.  it's coming from a position of strength on her part, just like your willingness to give this a go (if you do) is coming from a position of strength on your part.

you have been through so much in the past years.  i'm glad to see that she's willing to go to whatever it takes to help you.  kudos to her, kudos to you.  i think you're a great team and this extra therapist will only be a positive addition to your dynamic.  i do believe that.  best to you with all this.  big hug!

[meursault]

Hi everyone....  I'm going to put up a couple of my poems.  The first one was written in the psych ward, four years after my Dad's death, when I first was finally able to mentally take a breath.  I'm a huge mythology geek, so most of the references would be lost on most people likely, but it all actually makes sense, even if it's inaccessible!  I actually made an annotation explaining the first one, and it took 12 pages.  I wrote the second one tonight, and they kind of work as book ends, I think....

Anyways:

Comes the Dawn – On the Death of My Father

I.
Comes the early-born, rosy-fingered dawn
Across a Zeus-fallen, mud-wet road.
Fortune wavering in sorrowed age,
Thumbing a ride bright-eyed
From drink to field.

Comes the early-born, rosy-fingered dawn
In grief and loss and Chthonic terror.
Comes a corpse-sodden son.
Comes the fattening field and drought-
Drenched mind in wine-watered loss.

Comes the early-born, rosy-fingered dawn
And shadows groping
From Eumenides long-balanced memory.

Comes the loom de-threaded.
Comes the father-slayer broken.
Comes Tisiphone in scouring dread,
Casting evil panic upon trusty hope.

Comes the scudding drift.
Comes the split-tongued sorceress's
Bewitching delicate chains;
Glaze-eyed swine queen with blackened
Heart.

Comes Poseidon's lumbering fool.
Comes the wine-black sun.
Comes the early-born, rosy-fingered dawn
Rending its Fury'd talon across forever.

II.
Comes the blackened, chaff-sparked night.
Father-burdened, Nyx-entombed,
Naiad-coupled.
Here climbs a Sisyphean boulder
To water's top-rippled edge
And tumbles again drowning.
Comes the dead and comes the dying.

Comes the blackened, chaff-sparked night.
Comes a lament from father-drowned.
And a father, Charon-bribed
Milling a son in wine-black terror.

Comes a son, father-ground.
And here there is a mill-wheel shattered.
Here a grist-shovelling soldier sneers
And baker kneading for Eumenidean feast.
Here the burning ovens.
Here the crackled loaf.
Here the dough encrusted.
Comes the blackened, chaff-sparked night.
Comes the early-born, rosy-fingered dawn.



Armistice Day - A Remembrance

How can I explain the terror,
Or the pounding that shook the world,
The disorientation
The smallness of me?
I can only say
"The War!  The War!"

I can't describe the numbing, the brokenness
Huddled in my trench
Awaiting the barrage of artillery
Creeping across the blasted emptiness
That separated the enemy and I,
I can only cry:
"The War!  The War!"

I can't make sense of the propaganda
In suspicious tone and accent
Blaring out across the plain
Ransacking my certainty
And filling me with doubt of my rightness
In my cause
And wondering at my own sanity
As I simply whisper:
"The War!  The War!"

I can't bear the loss
Of all my comrades
Who fell beside me
In the trench, or
Defected or
Were granted leave or
Sent to another posting,
As I cowered in the familiar muck,
Driven mad by the rats and fleas
In doubt and shame
The starvation of loneliness
The vacuum of touch
And the Cholera of despair
A seemingly endless sentry duty in
"The War!  The War!"

I dread the shame of reporting
The failures after failures
Of my tactics and campaigns,
As I lost ground,
Fled, broke, or lashed out at some
Phantom enemy position,
Going over the top, wildly
Desperately dashing
Vulnerable across open land
Toward strength and entrenchment
Looking the fool for my incompetence
In battle in
"The War!  The War!"

I can't bear the anguish, as
I see the faces of those who stayed behind and
Made lives and loves and grew into this world.
Who found connection and meaning and joy and peace
while I lost so many years in an arena which
Taught me to speak a language they do not understand,
Far away in
"The War!  The War!"

So I talk of tyrants and butchers,
Majors, Generals, and combat assaults,
Creeping barrages, Enfilades,
Triage, misery of cold and
Imminent death and disfigurement.
The devastation of divisions lost, routs,
Disease, discomfort, and powerlessness,
Scars, madness, and amputations,
Annihilation of squads, platoons, companies
Battalions,
A terror so powerful every cell exploded
In a different direction
With each falling shell,
As they speak of the same time --
Of the same place --
In a different language, and
With different emotion and call it
"Family, childhood, playing, growing, learning,
School, first dates, jobs, houses, lovers, children, and
Optimism of the future, while I can only
Mutter dumbly:
"The War!  The War!"

And now comes the dawn,
Comes the early-born, rosy-fingered dawn,
And now a strange silence,
The last echoes of
Bombs fading in the
Crisp new morning
Bouncing a diminishing
Repetition around me
"It's Over!  It's Over!
The War!  The War!"

[sanmagic7]

pretty powerful stuff, meursault.  i did get a few of the images, but not all.  still, it did not diminish my overall understanding of what your words were saying to me.  your courage and strength shine through the terror and tragedy of your experiences.  nicely done.   big hug.

[jdcooper]

Anybody else ever do something like that?

Yes. About 8 months ago I got into my first relationship with a female therapist.  It's been harder to trust her.  I have always had male therapists.

So glad you were offered a job after two years of not working.  I haven't worked in two years - and I know it will feel wonderful to have that sense of purpose again when I get a job.

I admire you for going on those solo trips for all those years.  What a great experience.  I used to hike for hours with just me and my dog in a beautiful state park with hardly any people around.  I felt so content in nature. It feeds part of my soul.  I need to do that again.  I keep putting it off.   Despite your trauma you are doing things that are healthy like yoga.  It sounds like you have a good therapist too.  That's all very inspirational to me.

[meursault]

I gave my therapist the go ahead to schedule a session with the new guy.  She told me she won't charge me for her time, which I feel kind of guilty about, since she does so much for me.  She said it will sort of be like she and I interviewing him, and him interviewing her and I.  She is so careful with me, and was very reassuring me it will be SHE AND I, not me alone.  So I guess I'll give a guy therapist a try.  That wont happen for another week, though.

Meursault

[Three Roses]

Hey - how are you? Just wondering if you have had that meeting with the other therapist yet, and if so how it went.

[meursault]

It happens next week.  I am feeling somewhat ambivalent.  But, I've been busy everyday doing yoga, and going to the gym and prepping for this years kayak trip...  I haven't been checking things out online much.

Thanks for asking Three Roses.  Hope everyone is managing okay.

Meursault

[sanmagic7]

good luck with the meeting, meursault.  hope it goes really well.  big hug.