So the next week I returned for my third session. Again, I was filled with dread. I would have rather been anywhere else but there. I bumped into the woman who had completed my initial assessment in the reception and she asked how it was going. I lied and told her that I felt I was benefiting from the sessions and that I liked Bernadette. I felt a stab in my chest as I contemplated how at ease she had made me feel in my initial assessment and I longed for her to wrap me up and tell me that we could bin off Bernadette and she would make me okay again. Of course that didn't happen. Rather, she invited me to a party that the organisation was having to raise funds. I agreed to consider it whilst I inwardly scoffed at the idea. Why the fuck would I want to go to a party with a load of raped women and the people who were all probably doing an equally crap job of trying to fix them? I didn't understand what was in the mind of the genius who came up with this idea. The woman said I could bring a friend and the temptation to ask if there was a prize for the person who was able to identify correctly who the victims of abuse were and who were just their friends. I instantly hated myself for even thinking like that.
And then there I was back in the teeny weeny therapy room with Bernadette. I hadn't kept a dream/nightmare diary and I hadn't bought in the letter that I had already written *for* my mother. I wasn't failing at counselling, I was failing to try to succeed at unpicking my past and righting myself. She didn't react to my obvious unwillingness to try.
She asked if there was anything specific that I wanted to discuss in that session and I said that there wasn't as a million topics to work on flew through my brain. She picked up where we had left off last week and I continued to be verbally abusive about my own mother.
When that subject dried up and I didn't have anything fresh to say on the matter she began to ask me about the relationships with other members of my family... And that's when she got the play dough out. It was brand new and perfect and she wanted me to model it into something that depicted my relationship with each immediate member of my family. I am the least artistic person on the entire planet and I felt asking me to mould shapes out of play dough was incredibly demeaning. I'm 21 fucking years old, not 3... I rebelliously took a chunk out of each play dough ball and smushed them together to represent myself. The dirty, damaged, imperfect one. I then rolled the remainder of the individual play dough colours into a single ball to represent each other family member. Clean, untouched, seemingly perfect. At least that's what my mother wants the world to see... Perfect little family where nothing bad ever happens. It was probably a hell of a lot more meaningful then I ever intended it to be. I felt stupid for going along with the game and making something representative out of fucking play dough. When I realised how stupid I had been I smushed all the play dough together and threw it at the table. The thwack of it landing echoed around the room.
We sat there in silence. "I'm sorry," I whispered, "I don't know what came over me." Bernadette said that there was no need for me to excuse my behaviour and it was this constant concern over displays of unacceptable behaviour and the desire to be socially acceptable that was stunting therapy. She explained that there was only so much she could do if I wasn't willing to engage. She asked me if I felt ready for therapy and I replied with honesty that I didn't know. It was nearing the end of the session so she asked me to go away and think about it and decide whether now was the right time. It wasn't a rejection, at least not on her behalf, but it felt like one.
I left the room not feeling entirely sure of what conclusion I would draw.
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