A painful feeling of distress caused by an unpleasant self-conscious emotion typically associated with a negative evaluation of the self; withdrawal motivations; and feelings of distress, exposure, mistrust, powerlessness, and worthlessness.
“We can get rid of that you know. All of the stuff you think you need; we can make it really unpleasant for you to engage in” he says so matter-of-factly.
“Because you can’t have your cake and eat it too.” He continues while he looks up at the framed degrees on his wall.
I go numb.
In the softest voice I respond “I don’t want to; I love that part of me. If I don’t feed that part of myself, I am dead inside.”
“What you appear to have; is an addiction,”.” he says without understanding or empathy.
I pause and don’t say anything for a moment. Fuck this.
“Perhaps we should end this here.” I say with all my conviction, so that he knows not to even bother booking me in for another session.
later that night, my phone buzzed.
It feels supernatural at times, how he always knows when I need an ear.
I adore this man, how deliberate he is with his time, the way we can go months without speaking, and then spend an entire weekend together as though nothing has been missed.
How damn intelligent he is, how he processes his emotions, how he manages and calms me. The beautiful ugly in him. How our broken parts feel accepted when we are together.
“How are you, young lady?” – which makes me smile because we’re the same age.
“I’m okay, thank you, how are you?”
“What’s bothering you?”
“I am two women: in conflict”
“You know how much I dislike it when you are being vague”
“I feel defective.”
“I see – what makes shame so insidious is that we are unaware of it”
“I am not ashamed of this part of me”
“Aren’t you?”
And then it all hits me all at once.
A big lump forms in my throat.
I’m in conflict with myself.
I am carrying the weight of all this shame.
Catalogue of Thoughts 