Do you ever want to opt out of a therapy session?
To simply send your inner child to therapy without you?
That’s just what I want to do. I don’t want to be witness to the messy work that my inner teen needs to do.
I’ll drive her to therapy. I’ll even wait in the waiting room for her to finish, but I’ll send her in on her surly big-little own.
I think she can get along just swell with my therapist if only I wouldn’t intervene every minute and remind her not to embarrass me. Maybe without the ego police guarding every word she’ll have the freedom to be herself. And even more importantly, I won’t have to be mortified watching the interactions.
Don’t think I didn’t try getting a child-only slot. But my therapist says she doesn’t treat clients that young, and I have to come along. In fact, she says that the work needs to be done collaboratively.
What’s she saying there?
How is this fair?
And I’m wondering if I am really capable of bringing this teen with me.
We don’t get along that well, and being in a room together means a constant battle. Every word that comes out or stays in is a battle of wits between me and that teen. We fight so much, that much of my therapy session is spent in silence, waging wars in my brain.
So I’m not sure what to do.
Bring her along and fight the good fight?
Leave that teen at home and then put up with her tantrum when I return?
What would you do?