Related articles

• As I stand on the doorstep for my weekly appointment I notice that the pot plants have been weeded. I had remarked a few sessions ago that I was tempted to weed my therapist’s plants as I stood there. Why would I do that? To find something useful to do with my moment’s wait? To rescue her ailing plants from strangulation? To make things neat and tidy? Why did I even mention it? I said that I’d left them alone as it was none of my business. It was up to her how she wanted to keep her plants or present the front of her home. I had confessed that I didn’t care for the plants outside my home adequately either. I walk past them each day often without looking, occasionally berating myself for not nurturing them, but then doing nothing about it.

  Now the plants are free from competition, but are in desperate need of some food and drink and a protective layer of fresh compost. I tell her this with a glint in my eye as we process to the therapy room. We both laugh.

  I have been feeling a bit frustrated with our sessions. I do not feel as though I am any further forward. Week after week I talk about the relationships I have with the significant figures in my life. I am bored of the sound of my voice. I have gone through it all before in my head, in my diary and with any friend who has the patience to listen. My version of events and my well rehearsed interpretation. 

  There’s the father of my children with whom I am inextricably linked for the rest of my life. He still drives me crazy as I perceive him to be undermining what I do, well at the very least not standing alongside me in the shifting sand that is parenting teenagers. Then there is the man I am having an on/off relationship with. He has let me down on a number of occasions too, and I don’t seem to be able to get over that. And yet I can’t let go of him either. And, of course, there’s my mother and father. I can tussle with that tangled ball of string for hours, unable to find a beginning or an end. What can I learn from these relationships? Do I have too high expectations of myself and everyone around me? One thing’s for sure, it’s easier to talk about than what’s really bothering me. It allows me to avoid the thing that causes me pain – my son Michael’s rejection of me. I know that I am being resistant. I’m trying to work out what my therapist is doing. I’m not sure yet whether I trust her.

  I leave the sessions feeling as though I have been hit by a moving object. I expect myself to get behind the wheel of my car, go back to work, carry on as if nothing has happened. I try to remember what little she has said to me and I struggle. I am trying very hard to listen, but little seems to be going in. Do I not want to hear? Am I incapable of hearing? She probes me for further explanations. She is trying to make links. But as yet there are no eureka moments.

  I know that if this is going to help I have to stop observing and throw myself into it. I know I have to talk about Michael.

  It’s just raw pain, coming from somewhere deep inside me. It is something that can’t be put into words. I cry for the first time. We talk about the things that I’m accused of doing that have resulted in Michael’s rejection. We talk about my rejection of my mother. Do I fear that he feels the same way about me as I do about her? Yes. That’s why I’m here. I’ve tried to do things differently, to be the mother I would have liked.  And yet, here we are – history repeating itself.

  She tells me that it’s all mixed up for me, advice and parenting, doing the right thing and the need we have for approval. Like me telling her what to do with the pot plants. Oh, right. I feel exposed for the first time. I hadn’t seen that one coming. Is this what they mean by the therapeutic relationship? Am I transferring what I do in relationships over to her? I have no place to hide. If I want more understanding I have to be who I am and be prepared to expose all the different sides of me, offering them up for examination and interpretation. I will be forced to accept all the sides of me, good and bad.

  As I get behind the wheel again, I mull over what the pot plants might be telling me. Is there some kind of power game going on between us? Or perhaps I want to be useful… or assert myself as an equal… or do something in return for what she is doing for me? Or is it that I just can’t resist giving unasked for and unwanted advice, even if my motives are pure? I’ll bring her a brand new pot plant next week. I wonder what she will make of that. 

   

• Some details have been changed to protect identities.