I can’t believe that I’ve already been seeing Emily for four weeks; it feels like five minutes ago where I was emailing her for a consultation and sh*tting my pants a little about rehashing all this emotion. But so far it’s been well worth it. As much as it’s a bit all over the place, I do feel like I’m learning a lot about myself and also a bit about how other people behave and potentially why.

I went into todays session feeling already drained; I’d been at work all day and didn’t have a great nights sleep (shock). However, I knew how much this session would benefit me as I’d been feeling sad the night before. Throughout the week I’d written down in my notes any talking points I wanted to raise with Emily so I wouldn’t forget – this really helped because sometimes you can forget those small moments that you want to unpick and they seem almost insignifiant as the days go on until you delve into it a bit deeper.

As always, Emily asked how my week had been and I told her a bit up and down; I’d been triggered a few times and I could feel I was being really guarded again which always makes me quite sad. I want to be open with people and trust that people are good, but it’s difficult when sh*tty things have been done and it’s scary to put yourself in that vulnerable position again.

I felt close to tears throughout this session, but didn’t feel like I could let myself succumb to the emotion this time. I’d been upset a fair bit the previous night and I don’t know whether I wanted to open those flood gates again as I genuinely felt drained. I’m not sure if holding this in will come to bite me in the ar*e or not but I have to go with how I feel in that moment, whether it’s the best thing for me or not.

I voiced how I felt a lot of anger at the moment and she explained to me that you can’t get closure when there is still a negative emotion attached to that situation. She told me that you have to find a lesson in what’s happened and that will help you to accept it and ultimately let it go. I’m working on finding the lesson and figuring out what positives I can take from certain situations; despite it not feeling like there are any on the surface.

I spent a lot of this session just spewing out my feelings and thoughts and what I like about Emily is that she takes it all on board. But then she challenges me. She asks me difficult questions and pushes me to really think about why I think or act certain ways and this gives me the opportunity to build on my self awareness even more. It also helps me take accountability for things in ways I might not have thought of, and reminds me that some things are within my control and I need to utilise that.

It’s very surreal going into a therapy session and not talking about anxiety as a main issue; I’ve spent so much of my adult life being dictated by Ben and it feels good to have somewhat of a hold on that right now.