Is Therapy Supposed to Make Me Feel Better?

It's Wednesday. Wednesday is therapy day. I like my therapist and I trust him. But so often I leave his office feeling just plain awful. Today it took me an hour and a half just to be able to look at my hands and feel they weren't someone else's.


He doesn't understand the SV. I mean, he kind of does. But he doesn't get how fully separate they are from me and from each other. I tried to tell him about Anthony and Tony and The Sentinel. He asked about them, you see. I had told him that eventually I just shoved the incident over The Wall and assigned guardians to keep it there.


So he asked about the guardians. He wanted to know their function. I told him it is their job to keep it down, to keep it from surfacing and hurting me. I told him there are 3 of them. I started to name them to him. I said, "There are Anthony and Tony." I paused. "Tony is dangerous," I added.


He interrupted me. "No, he's not," he said. "He is no more dangerous than you are. He is you."


And then I realized that he didn't get it. He didn't understand after all. He knows that I think through them but he thinks I have control over all of them to an equal degree. He doesn't know what they are capable of.


Shortly after realizing he didn't understand my SV as well as I thought he did, it occurred to me that maybe he does understand them. It was at that point that I realized that *I* am the one who doesn't understand. They are all parts of me. Everything they are, I am. He made the point very clear: I created them. I chose to create them. And so I control them, or should.


Which means that their existence is my fault and my problem. I did this; it is up to me to undo it or at the very least, get it under control. It is my fault and my problem. They are all parts of me. I am all them. Tony is not dangerous; *I* am dangerous. I am the one in control, although somehow it doesn't feel like it.


And that thought broke me. The room began to tip. It went went all blurry. I could still hear the shrink's voice but it seemed far away. The room was there, it was just that it was very far away. He was talking, but I had no idea what he was saying. As I pulled away, I know I was nodding. I looked at the button on his shirt as it blurred and faded. And he was calling me, calling me back. I didn't want to go. It was better, far away. It didn't hurt so much.


Then he threw a ball at me. I caught it, yanked roughly back into the room. Pain tore through me. He is no more dangerous than you are. He is you. I backed off. He wanted me back in the room. Didn't he see that the room was not safe? Didn't he see that *I'm* not safe? I floated back. Zombie slipped past me and I was free to go hide until the pain went away.


Zombie called me back about an hour and a half later. I watched her from my safety. I looked at my hand, the hand that wasn't my hand even though it was. Zombie pulled at me and I erupted into the arena. The sudden noise overwhelmed me.


"Pull it together!"


"Get a grip!"


"You can't sleep now. We're going to the zoo."


"I like the zoo. Can I play in the water fountain?"


"I don't want to go. I'm tired. Find a loophole."


"We can't let him down."


"Bad Mommy! Bad! Bad!"


"We need Soccer Mom."


"Soccer Mom!"


"Where's Soccer Mom?"


"Please take over, Soccer Mom, we need you."


The censors tried to coax her. The SV tried to rouse her. The censors offered her complete control. She refused to come out. Zombie drove to Mom's. At Mom's, she shoved me back into the driver's seat. I pulled out my game face but could not get it on straight. Bad Girl rode shotgun as I went in to pick up the kids, steeling myself against the impending onslaught of questions, comments, whining, giggling... whatever would greet me on the other side of that door. Bad Girl kept me from floating away. Bad Girl and I picked up the kids and headed for the planned afternoon. The SV talked, yelled, encouraged, condemned, babbled and planned in the background: business as usual.


By the time I got home, I was as I am now: dark, moody, tired, continuing on because there is no other choice. No matter what the shrink says, there are no choices left. What he claims are choices only have one viable option and that just isn't a choice. More on choices later.

I got my game face straightened out, and we went to the zoo. I continued to function adequately, although I was not successful in getting Soccer Mom to run the show.

I am so confused. (I know, what's new...) Who am I? What are my SV? I've always been proud of my Voices, scared at times, frustrated certainly, confused a lot, but never guilty. But it turns out that they are just another screw up to add to my rap sheet. I don't control them effectively and now it comes out that I should be able to control them. They are not separate or distinct from each other or from me. I should have been able to control them. I *should* be able to control them. It's all me, all the weight, all the responsibility, all the blame, all the shame are all ME.

All... me...