Wiping the Dust Away
on starting therapy again...
I grew up on a dirt road, and every summer, the sea breeze carried fine particles that clung to windowsills and everything nearby. A quick wipe of a tabletop or a bag slammed down in frustration was all it took for the specks to resettle. Eventually, the town paved half the street. Now, it’s mostly dust and pollen that drift in.
I flopped down on a worn-out couch across from a new therapist. This time around, I started therapy without Ativan, without it being a secret. The tears came in five minutes, not five years. My chief complaint was neatly summed up: “I know I’m not broken. I used to think I was, but I’m feeling that way more often again, and I don’t want to live like this.”
Until the day she died, my mom reminded me to wipe down the dinner table after we ate. It infuriated me and felt belittling. I had a master’s degree, and as a parentified child, I’d been responsible for far more than wiping down the table. If only cleaning up crumbs after a meal had been my biggest responsibility.
The ticker in my mind had been running as fast as the one in Times Square. While the messages hadn’t entirely switched over to self-loathing and hopelessness, “You’re too much” and “They don’t actually care” were showing up more frequently than I liked. My ability to let them scroll by without attaching to them—dosing them with self-compassion—was weakening. “I’m just exhausted,” I told her. “And I know it doesn’t have to be like this.”
I wiped the dirt and dust off the baseboard. As I pulled the bed away from the wall, dozens of empty nip bottles tumbled to the floor. I’m not sure whose responsibility it is to clean out your brother’s bedroom after he dies, but it felt like it shouldn’t have been mine. I was grateful he chose to kill himself in his new apartment, not this house.
“I don’t want to harden,” I sobbed. “I lived like this for so long, and I had no idea there was a way to move through the world openly, softly. But then I did, and that’s who I really am.” She scribbled my words down on a piece of paper and highlighted them. There must be some targets in there, I thought, recalling the vocabulary I’d picked up after sitting in on a weeklong EMDR class the previous summer. I silently chastised myself: Just be the client, Maggie.
The cigarette ash and sticky beer turned my stomach as I wiped the kitchen counter. Aside from the sizzle of my egg hitting the pan, the house was quiet. “You’re in my way,” my dad said with a heavy sigh as he appeared, searching for ibuprofen in the cabinet next to me. I slammed the spatula down and exploded, “Couldn’t you at least say good morning before biting my head off?” My dad’s response came straight from his greatest hits playlist: “Life isn’t fair.”
Even in my pain, I was excited to see if something as simple as following a ball with my eyes, side to side, actually held up to the hype. Confident in my ability to discern when I was overriding emotions with my mind, I was at least proud of the foundational work I’d done. As I did laps in the Walgreens parking lot to regulate before diving back into my day, I thought, Maybe this won’t be as uncomfortable and painful as I anticipated.
The slosh of tea narrowly missed my phone. As I wiped up the puddle of chamomile in a rushed circle, my phone lit up with a message from my friend: “Aww. I’m sorry. I’m not surprised, though.” My brain reminded me that birthdays weren’t a big deal in our house, so it was silly of me to expect my only living nuclear relative to wish me a happy birthday.
I don’t make my new therapist endure any small talk at the start of our session. Before both ass cheeks even landed on the sofa, “I have parts that are screaming, ‘Stop intentionally kicking up this dust, Maggie. Stop poking around,’” tumbled out of my mouth. A few minutes later, my body felt identical to how it did when I punched a wall as a teenager. The sensation didn’t last long before my brain took over. “I’m completely shut down right now,” I said as the golden ball slowed. My head fell into my hands and I muttered, “This is more uncomfortable and harder than I thought it would be. What a concept—consenting to someone triggering you. I think my brain is too messed up to even let this work.”
I turned the key in the ignition and wondered why I was even doing this. I looked up and caught a glimpse of my tear-stained cheeks in the rearview mirror.
Because, in your heart, you know you are worthy of more than wiping things up.
Always wanted to journal but the thought of getting started makes you feel like you just stepped on a LEGO?
I want to see you over at Promptly Heal. The fun begins soon.
