Where I am, how I got here and how I plan to get somewhere else. PART ONE

Four years and four months ago, Old Guy a.k.a. the Dream Mother, who I loved and trusted as my therapist (and I still love him so very much), failed me horribly in a painful event that I have blogged quite a bit about since the dissociation around it crumbled in November of 2007. Yes, I still talk to him every other week. He really, truly and deeply regrets what happened. He is not a bad person. He never purposely wanted to hurt me. He's not that kind of person. He did face up to his mistake and he tried to help me work it out. And he has helped me work it out to a great extent. Especially by not finding some reason to end our relationship prematurely to avoid the issue. I really feel that he tried his best. And yet... I think we are just a little bit too different. And I really do still think that the painful event between us could not have happened if he did not have the default position of 'just get over that now' rolling around somewhere in the back of his head. And I say this because he does occasionally say little things that bring me right back to the pain of that old event between us. Things that make me believe that he wants me to 'just get over it', with 'it' being my own personal traumas that I very much need to work through. He says that the 'get over it' is not what he wants and most of the time I believe him. And I also believe that he does not want that consciously, but I never know when he will get to feeling just a little bit differently about it and say the wrong thing to bring me right back to that awful event between us and the terrible devastation it brought me. I also know that my worry of him saying the wrong thing is beginning to spread out onto others around me who are also sources of emotional support. I have to make this stop. And I can't even explain how painful it is to realise where this has ended up. And no, this is not me refusing to try to work through a relational issue with a therapist. I've been trying for almost three years now. And so has he. He really, really has. And he hasn't been doing it to make himself feel better, this much I know for sure. He tried because he really and truly wanted to help and I know he would like to see me doing better. I know he wants this for me. I want it, too.

And I have discovered a terrible secret buried deep in the heart of this whole issue with the Dream Mother and it breaks my heart to see the truth of it. It's this - deep down, I am afraid to deal with my stuff and I have been using the Dream Mother as a 'human shield' against my own memory and feelings. I am afraid to face things because I fear those wrong words from him. And parts of me are using that fear to keep the other parts quiet because their memories and feelings are so frightening and painful. My heart hurts writing this because I know the Dream Mother would not want me to be trapped this way. And I feel for me AND for him because I know it could not have been easy for him to have a phone client who presented with simple anxiety suddenly reveal herself to be a frightening train wreck with one lone voice on the telephone as her sole source of professional help. Does my understanding of his position and my love for him make everything all better? Again, it hurts me so much - but no, it doesn't make everything all better. I have to change something and it has been making me cry a lot to realise what it is that has to change. You know the irony here? I think the Dream Mother knew about this before I did. I think that is why he has been so supportive of New Guy and why he tried to bow out gracefully in January. I don't know exactly what New Guy was making of all of this before this awful realization smacked me in the head, but he was understanding when the tale of the Dream Mother emerged. And he understood my distress, the love I have for the Dream Mother and that I was quite conflicted about it. And now he is being supportive of my feelings around my need to make a heartbreaking change.

There is one very important thing the Dream Mother gave me that can never be taken away. Before the painful incident between us, he was the first person to ever show me that there was a better way of living than what I had. There was a better way than just whipping myself to keep on going with no regard for what came before and what it has caused. There was a better way than denying myself all the way to physical disease, which is what I had done. I had no idea of any of this. It was an entirely foreign concept. The door he opened for me is the very one I walked through to help cure myself of arthritis, hypoglycemia, chronic infections, too many allergies and a destructive benzo addiction. And all of these wonderful things happened WITHOUT MEDICINE. Love, acceptance, empathy, sharing, TRUTH and even ANGER... these were the catalysts of my personal miracle (sans gods). This door he first opened for me is the same one I need to walk through now when I tell him goodbye. And I can't stop crying because of it. I know I've said it a hundred times if I've said it once on this blog, but... I hate irony. It makes me cry. I can't seem to stop crying. I love him so much. But I love me, too. And I hurt so much. So. Fucking. Much. I just don't even know what to do right now. All I can do is cry. I wish the bad incident between us had never happened. I wish things were different. The little girl loves this mommy that she was cheated out of having all those years ago. He was a good mommy. The best ever. Until that day when he sounded just like the original and the bottom dropped out of her safe new world and dropped her back into the dungeon regions. That was/ is a very scary and lonely fall. I have to make it stop. I need to trust that the husband, New Guy, my online connections and I can break the fall and that no little girl bones will break in the process. I have to go get her and bring her back into the daylight. I'm scared. Very, very scared. And so sad. I'm going to bed now.