The Black Box.

Non engagement , 'keeping one's dignity' in the face of outrageous adversity, not ' feeding the trolls ', keeping your head held high, and 'not letting the b******s grind you down, are each a time honoured strategy used to maintain one's power.  Except it turns up as a client struggling with self attack and self abandoning . Silencing oneself because it is supposed to control others, often comes from anger. A feeling of anger indicates a need to protect oneself, playing dead - avoiding/disengaging - is a serious level of autonomic (dorsal vagal) affect.  As an off the shelf answer it is avoiding your answer. Silence as a strategy to control others is a cold anger portrayed in movies as strength, yet it so often contains contempt, and it is dehumanising... I don't see strength there. I see a mouse overwhelmed by fear and paralysed, but not running away when fight flight (self protection) kicks in.  Silence, a paralysis framed as neutrality, isn't ne...

2020. I trusted the therapist . I trusted that he'd follow me into my account of my experiences and be a calm, compassionate witness as I began the work of building a bridge for me to cross from the terror and despair of the previous five years, to the safety of the present. The need in me for such a witness was raw, a wound. I had the task of transforming my memories or I'd stay trapped in the pain of my son's psychosis and attempted suicide, and my husband's choice to betray our marriage. I needed to be able to cope with the pain and devastation. And I thought that I could trust the therapist to track my emotions and to see... For this is what I needed so much. My feelings for him began when I received an email from my course leader saying that as the therapist was not accredited he wasn't experienced enough to see students. This made me feel hot and cold, and panic. I couldn't bear the thought of losing another person. Certainly I was shocked by the depth of...

When I took this photo I was waiting for my friend, sitting with my back to a tree. Half an hour before, I'd joined the circle with a group of pagans who had fed me mead and apple cake.  I still hadn't made up my mind what to do though. So I sat by the tree waiting. My friend and I stood at the centre of the circle and as a man walked past us, I asked him ' it is a yes no question' could you answer for me? He took out of his pocket a purple disc marked with a golden, Chartres type labyrinth, 'Labyrinth means yes...' I said. And it fell. Labyrinth face upwards. I hit send... I didn't feel better straight away. I felt panic,  I looked up at the grey sky, felt the rain, heard the wind rushing through the trees. Everything changes. Later the man returned to the circle and gave me the labyrinth disc. Back home, messages from the 'witches' at the Rollrights inviting me to their Samhain meeting. Messages from therapy 'sisters' of support. Curry cook...

I've only experienced one serious rupture with a therapist, once before.  I had said that I needed to go directly into the three states of autonomic nervous system stress; I needed to be able to report back from dorsal vagal 'lock-down' so that together we could get a coherent image of the landscape.   And I said that I had a way to do this experiment. My metaphor was mapping. Terror, could be redefined as terra incognito, a land I could map and prepare to navigate. And this seemed pretty important to me! My son wasn't as ill as he was going to be, but already I was experiencing the awful, dark, bloodless and cold paralysis I associate with a dorsal vagal state.  My husband's first known infidelity had just come to light.  I was in a bad way. I said that I had three safe ways to enter each of the three vagal states , represented by the three landscapes in games I played. The Endless Forest - represents upper, human, synchronising  non-verbal, safe communi...

19:29.8/9/25. Got a notification from my phone,  The moon was eclipsing . I was writing a letter. To be sent at the equinox? The basis for an article? It takes bits from my previous blog posts, this is why writing this blog has been useful... Dear 'Kit', This is a complaint, and this email is the first and the last time that my complaint is linked by your name to you. If I was a client, I would tell her, I would tell me..that when a person who is supposed to help, ends up hurting you, the damage can cut even deeper, causing deep emotional and psychological harm. I would also say that it is institutional betrayal because this isn't just someone you trusted, this therapist is someone you were told that you should trust, by a system; by their ethical body, by your college, by their qualifications. Therapists are supposed to be the safe ones; trained, receiving supervision - so if something doesn't feel right it is easy to second guess yourself; and you were grieving, you h...