Feelings are strange

Therapists are assumed to know all about feelings. I have feelings jet lag. Or maybe that’s the wrong metaphor. First I get angry and depressed and think crazy things which are probably true but then later I realize I’m sad. Like today I realized I’m not such a loser with a shitty life. I’m sad about my dad being scammed and living out his old age with the love of his life he’s been with since age 25 or something. They’re almost married 70 years. He’s 95 and she’s 94. And he doesn’t get to be with the real version of her. She’s got Alzheimers and Lewy Body Dementia. And he’s been in and out of the hospital last year. My siblings just saved from a huge scam and now thankfully he’s not in charge of his finances. He got scammed before. The weird thing is if things were opposite and my mom wasn’t sick she’d never get scammed because the normal her didn’t trust people quickly and could smell a bad person from miles.

I’m lucky to have them at all but it’s heartbreaking. It wasn’t such a bad visit.

It feels like all my clients are going through crazy things. Very stressful. All the secondary trauma. And in one case the client is in trauma and secondary trauma so crazy I got a text from her and called her right after. It was the right thing to do. I go out of my way to an extreme extent compared to other therapists, but complex PTSD is intense. It feels good to be effective. There are people out there who haven’t been seen and valued for who they are or have been used so much they believe they’re damaged.

There’s a line in Noah Kahan song:

“Don’t let this darkness fool you
All lights turned off can be turned on.”

It’s called “Call your mom.” I listen to it a lot; it’s probably very depressing to most people but there’s so many experiences in it I relate to like my friend who’s gone. and finally realized I used to call my mom when I was in the darkness. She was always there. And when other people called her when I was in trouble in my 20s she’d get on an airplane and be there in 8 hours if it was that far.