I ended up having two sessions this week. Honestly, bless my therapist for noticing I needed the extra support without me asking for it, because I wouldn’t have asked. The fact that she even checked in and offered was emotionally loaded in a way I wasn’t prepared for. I think I cried more over that offer than I have cried over most of the trauma I carry. There was something about being seen before I had to wave a flag. Something about someone noticing I was struggling and cho

I’m not doing good. My ex gave me four days’ notice that she is moving out this weekend. She has to do what is best for her, and I get that. At the same time, it’s pulling hard on the reality of losing her, and that’s difficult. Especially because her partner does not want us to be friends. I have to respect that, which means I won’t really be able to have her in my life anymore. That’s gut-wrenching. I knew this was a possibility. A lot of monogamous people are not comfortab

You ever wonder why your attachment system gets activated with certain people and not others? It’s a question I’ve been sitting with. I’ve been paying closer attention to the different parts of me and how they react to different dynamics. The part that is hardest for me to cope with is the anxious part of myself. It’s the painful part. The part that feels unworthy, less than, not good enough. I still haven’t exactly figured out what the underlying factor is. What causes me to

It didn’t hurt any less today. Every step I took replayed in my head on the drive to donate plasma. I hate who I was in those moments. I was caught inside a perception that felt completely true. A reality I couldn’t see beyond. And by the time I realized it was only one lens among many, the damage had already been done. I don’t know when I’ll be able to escape the shame of that. Or if I ever really will. There are versions of me that haven’t existed in over a decade that I st

I keep wondering if there will ever be a point in my life where I can just exist without some part of me wanting to disappear. I know how that sounds. My first instinct is always to downplay it. To tell myself I’m being dramatic. To remind myself that other people have it worse. To list all the reasons I should be grateful. But if I’m being honest, it’s exhausting. Not because I spend every waking second wanting to die. I don’t. Most days I go to work. I pay my bills. I laugh

I’ve been waking up a lot in the middle of the night lately. Luckily I didn’t have to work today, so I was able to sleep on and off until I finally caught up on some rest. That was nice. One unexpected benefit of donating plasma is that it forces me to hydrate and eat enough to meet the requirements. Part of me doesn’t mind that my appetite hasn’t fully been there because I’m losing weight. Another part of me knows that not eating the way I should probably isn’t doing my ment

Grief is sitting with me heavy tonight. I can’t bring myself to write it out. To let it live beyond my mind, because I fear it’ll hurt worse. As I typed that, it felt more like a need to let it out, but I’m filled with fear of opening that door. When I came into my room tonight, my mat was hanging on the wall. The poems I never took down from my bathroom sink are still up, untouched. They remind me of one of the moments of kindness shown to me throughout our work together. A

My body still feels the imprint of conversations it longs for. The absence of people who matter. The goodbyes said and the ones that never got to happen. My heart still aches for people who are still alive. I was never prepared to grieve the living. How painful that kind of loss is. How the mind and heart can continue holding someone long after the shape of the connection changes. So many of them. And still, hope lingers. Hope that eyes could meet again. That words could stil

I am having some really intense relational anxiety the past few days. I’m trying to sit with it and not immediately take medication just to make it stop, because I know relying on medicine every time I feel overwhelmed isn’t going to help me build any tolerance for discomfort or emotional pain. I know the goal isn’t to never need help, but to slowly learn that emotions can move through me without completely destroying me. It’s hard though. The feeling of wanting to break down

Have you ever wondered how well we actually know people? The truth is, we only know people as well as they allow themselves to be known. And maybe even more unsettling than that: people can only allow themselves to be known as deeply as they know themselves. So the idea of truly “knowing” another person, or even knowing yourself, feels forever shifting, moving, incomplete. I don’t know… I find that both intriguing and terrifying. To think you know someone. To think you know y

My writing lately hasn’t felt like me. I don’t really have the cognitive ability to sit with too much at once right now. I’m fluctuating between needing Klonopin to calm me down enough to function and alcohol to numb me enough to fall asleep. And somewhere in between those states are periods where I feel completely disconnected from myself, like I don’t even know who I am anymore. My life crumbled quickly over the past year. Too many changes at once. So much loss. Too much gr

Im feeling really overwhelmed after therapy today. I couldn’t really feel anything or reach much of anything inside my head. Being like that is hard for me. It’s hard for me to know something is there and not to be able to access it. It feels like I’m wasting my therapists time when every-time I go to speak it’s like the words just disappear before I have a chance to say them. I know the last part of the session I was able to access a little bit of history but I think it floo

Talking about my attachment in therapy today opened something up in me. A lot of grief. Fear. Crying. Just… a flood of emotion. What’s weird is that the fear isn’t really centered around her suddenly leaving me. That fear was really intense with past therapy relationships, especially my first one, but it feels quieter now. I don’t know if that’s because I trust her more or because I understand now that there’s ultimately nothing I can do to prevent endings if they happen. Wha

I just had a moment with a customer that was so endearing. I had published my blog post and was still reflecting on last night and feeling pretty vulnerable and anxious. I’m alone in the shop today and just doing my job like normal when this woman walked up to me and said she just wanted me to know that I’m a really sweet guy and I have good energy. I’m having a hard time taking it in and feeling like I deserve to be told something like that and at the same time, hearing thos

I had a really good night last night. I met up with some people, who are also poly, for some drinks. It was nice to be around others, talking and listening as they shared their own stories about how they realized they were poly, as well as their journey through the years of being poly. To be surrounded by others who just get it left me with a feeling of resonance. I was more engaging and open and talkative, and while I enjoyed that part of me in the moment, I am struggling wi

There are moments where shame stops feeling like an emotion and starts feeling like an identity. Today feels like that. Everything keeps replaying in my head... every mistake, every loss, every moment where I was too much, too emotional, too dysregulated, too needy, too intense. I keep trying to understand why I react the way I do, why I struggle so much to regulate myself when emotions become overwhelming. Part of me thinks if I could just find the answer, maybe I could fina

I had a dream about my second therapist last night. I don’t know why, but whenever I dream about her, she’s always a teacher. Usually, I’m a student in her class, and she’s really angry with me and won’t talk to me. The not talking to me part makes sense, given everything that happened. I just wish I wouldn’t dream about it, because it wakes up a deep grief that I don’t really feel unless I have dreams like this, or something reminds me of the work I did with her, or I start

I had therapy today and the session was a mixture of crying, laughing, and everything in between. I am starting to feel some attachment form, and that scares the absolute shit out of me. I’m nervous to let myself be open enough to feel attachment again. I’m scared my own attachment feelings become too overwhelming for me to handle. I’m going to have to have a really vulnerable conversation next session, and I’m not sure that I’m ready for that. (I don’t have to, as in I’m not

A lot of days lately have been heavy, hard, and honestly just overwhelming in a way that I haven’t been able to handle well. Today is a day where I’m able to reflect, experience joy, and notice all the nuances of what I am experiencing and living through right now. I know it is important to really take these moments in when they happen, because when the bad days return, it’s helpful to have been present for the good ones—to have some felt sense that the bad won’t last forever

My morning started out rough. My night was filled with nightmares from my childhood and some things happened yesterday that are still weighing on me today. I was overwhelmed and having a hard time getting started with work and regulating enough to feel like I could function enough to work. Someone at work has been inviting me to feed the squirrels with them in the morning and I always struggle to get myself to go but once I’m there my whole existence is just being with the sq