The Tens, Vanessa Jones [i like reading books .TXT] 📗

no unexpected turns. But Alex leaving had upended her sense of self and stability. From her current viewpoint, the rest of her life now seemed extremely shaky. Because she’d never planned on anything going awry, she’d never developed the resilience or mechanisms to cope. Sophie fiddled with something in her pocket as she debated going down yet another rabbit hole.

‘No word from Alex still?’

Sophie sadly shook her head.

‘Where do you think he is? He must be somewhere, surely?’

‘If I knew…’ Sophie paused, unsure how to even finish her sentence. 'I don't understand why this has made me fall apart so much. I've been orphaned and still managed to never fall apart, in fact it made me stronger!'

Looking back, she should have been ragingly embarrassed by this state of comfort and foolishness. The very kind of state that almost always preludes disaster. She couldn't help but think it was all her fault that she was incredibly underprepared.

Carla screwed up her face in response and Sophie immediately relaxed into her visible empathy. 'You know, sometimes— particularly as kids— we suppress things that are the most painful to us. Especially if we haven't learnt emotions and how to process them. This incident might actually be triggering dormant pain and grief that you never had the chance to process properly.' Carla paused to sip on her tea and watched Sophie over the rim of her cup.

Sophie didn't want to believe her. Her whole life she had been waiting to "properly" feel the pain of losing her parents. She compared herself to books and movies where people had been left an orphan and had either turned wayward or felt an intense longing. But she couldn't relate at all.

'Let me ask you this. Do you remember much about your parents, particularly right before they died?'

Sophie felt uncomfortable with the question but mainly because there was nothing to retrieve. 'Nothing. It's blank.'

'Good. Good. What's your biggest fear?'

Sophie felt an immediate rage sweep through her body, pooling in her head. What an odd question. That's just resistance, she told herself. This is what therapists do. Most of their job is to push your buttons and then help you work through the reaction.

'Going insane,' she confessed.

'Interesting.' Carla scribbled down some notes but Sophie could no longer hear the scratching of the pen on the paper as her body seemed to float downwards away from her thoughts and her mouth, which felt stuck in front of Carla.

'And do you feel like you are going insane?' Carla jerked her pen to a stop and lifts only her eyes at Sophie to extract an answer, who is blankly staring out the window.

‘Sophie?’ Carla snapped at her.

‘Sorry… I… Yes, I feel like I’m going insane.’

‘What has been happening to make you think that?

‘There’s the lack of sleep, the weird things I’m seeing and hearing, my senses are changing… it’s like… I don’t know what it’s like! I’ve never experienced this before. I mean, I get that people get sad when their husbands leave them out of nowhere. But this? It’s like I have a disease. Not to mention the nightmares! And imagining people spying on me in vans? That’s just ludicrous.’

Sophie felt deflated and landed back in her body with a thud.

‘Our minds tend to tell us about this big scary thing that is going to happen in the future, which never really comes. Meanwhile, the reality is that you are experiencing that very thing— by your own admission— anyway. And my guess is that it doesn’t really measure up to how awful your mind is telling you that it's going to be.'

'Well, I wouldn't say it's exactly a dream.'

'Sure. But just to notice how it's nowhere as terrifying as the images the mind is throwing up at you when you contemplate "going insane".'

The way she did air quotations made Sophie mad again, so she tried not to look at her hands and kept taking in streams of air strongly through her nose, to stop herself from lashing out at Carla. Carla was merely doing her job and Sophie was wise enough to know that she didn't even really understand the therapeutic process and had lost sight of the bigger picture. She trusted Carla to hold up a light into the dark recesses of her untrustworthy mind and guide her out of the obscurity.

'Why do you need to know about my greatest fear?'

'There are two main reasons. Firstly, if I can shine a light of reality on your fear, it can often dissipate. You should see what happens to some people when they let their biggest fear go! I've seen clients book acting gigs, have a family, fly around the world... you get the idea. And secondly, once I know your greatest fear, I can acknowledge it and do everything I can to make you feel as safe as possible. Because in safety, healing can flourish.'

The anger bubbled away and Sophie felt grateful that Carla existed and that she was so willing to help her. It made her want to cry with a pathetic relief.

'What are you experiencing Sophie?'

'Well, lots of emotions, I guess. I'm not sure how to articulate.'

'That's okay. Just say what you can and we can talk about it more over our coming sessions. Do you commit to more sessions, Sophie?'

'Yes. I promise.'

'Good.'

Sophie quickly dismissed the thought that Carla just wanted more money from Sophie. Showing up was the biggest indicator to success with therapy, just like going to the gym. The more time went on, the more she wanted to get better for herself, not just for Alex.

'Before you go, I thought we could try a little hypnosis. Have you undergone any hypnosis?' Carla put her notes and pen to one side and lightly slapped her palms on her knees.

'Not really. Do you think that's the right thing for me though?'

'I believe so, yes. Don't worry, it's not all trances and being unable to control your actions like you see in