Successes And I Confessed To My Lie Its All Good
I came in and she commented how nice it’s getting. Yes, very nice. I sat down and smiled. She asked me what’s going on. I told her I’m going to be Catholic for today – or at least a little bit. She listened. I told her Catholics go to confession. She said I do, too. I said yes and she said for the whole year. Yeah. I told her that Catholics confess to Fathers. She said she can be sister Her Name. So I started, “Sister Her Name,” and then asked her if she has any idea what I was going to say so I don’t have to say it. No, she has no idea. Really, no idea.
First I said it has to do with what we did on Monday. She still had no idea. So I tried to say it, hard but I did. I told her when we went walking I didn’t have to go to the bathroom. “That’s it?” I guess she expected more. I told her it bothered me that I lied to her. It’s not like me to do that. She agreed it wasn’t my style. She said she was just happy it was successful to me. That’s what she cares about. I told her that I wanted it to be successful, too and that’s why I did it.
I asked her if she knew. She said she only knew I went a lot longer than I usually can and I didn’t have the urgency I usually do. She just figured I had more time. Then she said it made me feel better to confess. Yes. No big deal and that I am really glad. I really thought she knew, I did. But she didn’t. Makes me wonder if I can lie about this again and she wouldn’t even know. But that wouldn’t be right. I just wish I could be like I’d like to be. And I’m really glad that lying was no big deal to her. I’m not a terrible person for it and she’s not mad. The walls did not come tumbling down. I’m sure she understood why I did it. I guess it’s OK to lie sometimes. Very nice of her.
I told her I want to do it a little at a time. The first time one time around the circle. The second time two times. The third time three times and so on. Because I know I can do it. She asked me if I want to do this when I have to go to the bathroom. Yes. She said to let her know when to go today. But she wants me to be careful because sometimes I push myself too hard and she wants me to have successes. I told her I do because I want to be able to do it and I think I can.
She told me she was listening to NPR again (she listens when she’s in the car off and on). She heard another show about someone who wrote a book who had migraines that lead into seizures and spoke in front of people. Sometimes she would have a seizure when she spoke in front of lots of people. “Can you imagine what that would be like?” she directed at me like my problem isn’t so bad. And she said how they loose all control of bodily functions then. I nodded. I didn’t say but that’s what I do with pee without the seizures (thank you God). But her point was she got into some relaxed state and acceptance of her problem. Acceptance – I’m working on that we both very much agreed. I asked her if the headaches and seizures then got better. Yes.
I told her that both exposures we do are exposures but they are different. With the throw up ones I want to get to the point, like she says, that I will get tired of looking at it and then it won’t bother me at all. To keep doing them again and again. She laughed and said, “So you like to torture me!” I laughed as well and told her that she’s the one that can look at it longer – not me.
So I said that I have a can of soup with me and special crackers that I wanted to do today and I also want to talk about things as well. So I asked her how she thought we should do this. I didn’t want to happen like last time. She thought a second and said maybe we should do the walking first and then the throw up exposures. She thinks I get too hung up in the throw up ones and then I can’t be successful at the other. I told her I didn’t need to go to the bathroom yet. So I said we’d talk about what I wanted to first and then see. That’s what we did.
First, though I told her my grandson had something at an art fair that we went to last night. We walked around and looked at the artwork from grade school, junior high and high school. I took a picture of one, I told her as I took my camera out of my purse. It was fear, anxiety and shame. But I wanted her to see what the shame was. She looked at the whole picture and said how interesting it was that a high schooler did that. But she couldn’t see what the shame was. Then I showed her the close-up one. She saw the persons hands covering the private area. I told her it validates what I feel about my problem. It is shame about it. She said it was but you can also interpret that as someone who had been molested. True. It’s different for different people.
I then pulled out my paper and we first talked about what was on the NPR I found. I told her that they mostly talked about the 1918 encephalitis which was lethargy encephalitis. Lots & lots of sleeping. I think I slept a lot (if I remember my Mom saying) but not all the time like in a coma. I was only 2. They did talk about depression, OCD, withdrawal from people and really bad behaviors. I don’t have any of that. No and she said I was in that lucky 1/3 without those lasting effects. But they did say it may damage the basal ganglia or hypothalamus. She said the basal ganglia has to do with OCD but she didn’t know about the hypothalamus. I told her it controls the body temperature (I am always cold), blood pressure, weight, hunger & thirst.
Then I went on to say the anterior hypothalamus as well. I looked at my paper and read more about the nuclei and the region is anterior, the area is medial (she didn’t know what that was), the nucleus is medial preoptic nucleus and the function is urinary bladder contraction. So we are wondering if the encephalitis effected that area of the brain and with the bladder contractions. She did point out that it doesn’t say anything about the size of the bladder. No. We didn’t elaborate. We know mine is smaller. She said it would be nice to see a doctor who specializes in this because maybe there’s a medicine that would correct this area of the brain. Yeah – maybe.
Then I went on to the movie Temple Grandin I saw all but the first half hour. I told her I wanted to relate it to me although I don’t have the same problem as she does with her autism. But we both have obstacles to overcome with it. She agreed. First the girl talking to her Mom said she’d never be able to do something. Her Mom said, “I know.” Well, that’s acceptance. I know there are things I will never be able to do and I want to just accept it, too. She said I am – I’m working on it. Yes, I am.
Then she said how the door is open and she went right through it. Overcoming obstacles and having success and leading open to new worlds. That’s what I want to do. I’m so tired of the place I’m in. She said I’m ready to do this, even using her hands. Yes. Then she said she’s not cured – she’ll always be autistic. Same with me. I may never be cured but I still work at getting better. And I think I am – most of the time. She just listened.
She said she’s different but not less of a person. That’s what I want to be like. She wrote that down (other things too but I really noticed this one). And I said that along with that is that she’s good in other ways that others aren’t. We talked about her drawings and how good she was visually. And me, that I’m good at things others aren’t. She said how I have a lot to offer people. Then we talked about that squeeze machine! She said that was something. Yes, and I knew it was for comfort and hugs. She explained that people with autism can’t be hugged or hug because it’s uncomfortable for them. This pressure soothes them. I wondered what I, everyone has things that sooth them, do since what I used to like, I don’t like them as much anymore. She said it would be interesting to explore and wrote down that, too.
Then I said how she’s weird. She is. You can tell. I don’t want to be looked at or treated as if I’m weird. She said with me you can’t tell I have my problem. Hers is very obvious. Then we laughed when I said how many cows there were! Moo…. Yes, she agreed and I said about the one that almost drowned - that was sad. Yes. She told me earlier that it is a true story about someone. She also had asked me if she could have a copy of the paper I brought in. Yes and there’s writing about other stuff on it.
Then she switched back to the brain stuff. She said her light bar works with the hypothalamus. We need to do more of that. I told her how the last time we didn’t finish for some reason. She said that she got to take some big professor (Harvard ?) of Trauma to the airport. He was just standing there and she offered and she got to be with him and talk to him in her car for 20 minutes. She thought that was awesome. But I forgot what she said he said. I think it was about the EMR light bar and such and she was pointing out how we should use it more.
She also related something to the Toyota recall. How they fix the pedal but customers say it isn’t really fixed. That’s it’s not the pedal. It’s an electrical problem and the problem is never solved. I told her maybe that’s the same with me why the medicines don’t work with me. Maybe mine is a neurological problem. She said yes, maybe that’s right. But I do know she wants me to get it checked out. I’m scared to but I don’t tell her. I don’t talk about it.
Then I needed to go to the bathroom and told her. “OK,” and she got up out of her chair. I took a deep breath and hesitated a moment. “Are you sure? Do you have time?” Yes, I did and I wanted to do this. I took the bag with the can of soup and such out of my purse. I asked her if we should take my bag of clothes. Yes and she got them out of her drawer. She started to hand it to me and I told her I’ll hold the food stuff while she holds my bag. We started to go out and she asked me if I wanted to take my ‘sweater’ – it was a brown light-weight hoodie jacket (I almost forgot). Yes, it is still cool out. I grabbed it, put it on while we went out of her office and down the hall where she got her black sleek jacket out of the closet and put it on.
We walked out and down the stairs. We saw an older lady and man go into the CPA office. I commented that she had red hatter colors on – red & purple. She said how they got dressed up to go to their CPA. We walked on. I told her, “Just talk.” She did when we got outside. She said how the weather is warming up and going to be in the 50’s this weekend. Yeah! She said they are predicting one more snowstorm. I said how many of the bigger snowstorms come late in the winter. We walked around the circle. We got to the point where we could have gone further to the other half and I said, “Are we there yet? Are we there yet?” kind of laughing and really joking. But I think she thought I was really needing to go or starting to freak out about it. She answered yes and we did not walk the whole circle and she told me to go in and then we’ll do the rest after I get back.
I didn’t fight it. I too wanted a success and didn’t want to push longer and didn’t tell her I was half kidding. I know I could have done it, though. I did want to go the whole circle. I gave her the bag of food goodies to hold. She gave me, in exchange, my bag of clothes. I started to say I didn’t need it but then stopped myself and thought that maybe I did. I didn’t know because I wasn’t all the way at the bathroom yet. So I went. I did perfectly fine. I came back outside. She was at the far end of the parking lot on the side waiting for me, just walking slowly with her back to me. I don’t think she heard me coming. She turned around. I motioned with my hands and said, “Yes!” She knew I was successful and boy were we both glad. I needed that! I did tell her I didn’t think we did the whole circle. She said it was all good like not to worry about that because I did it.
So now it was time to make a bagful. I got out the can of vegetable soup and opened it. I got one plastic bag, opened it and asked her to hold it open while I poured half the can in. Then I said we had no water. She said we can put snow in. I commented about the dirty snow. She walked over and put 2 small handfuls in. I knew that wasn’t enough so I put about 5-6 more in while she still held the bag. Then I poured ½ the bag of special crackers in. When we were done she gave it to me. I squished the snow around trying to get it to turn to water. I commented how I was doing this and touching it but not really. Then it was time to throw it on the ground. She said we’ll do 1,2,… OK and I asked her to say it. She said, “1,2,3” and I threw it. Yuck.
It was all lumped up because it didn’t have enough liquid in it. So I took a long skinny stick and tried to move some pieces around. It wasn’t working that well so I took a shorter thicker one and that was better. She just watched. She asked me on a scale of 1-10 how was that for me. I said an 8 because I know it’s food and it’s not real. She stared at it while she talked about the zoo scenario. How it could have been my grandson, or my granddaughter. It happens just like that with little kids sometimes. And how he would be upset and crying because it’s upsetting. I would have to comfort him and clean him up. And that I may need to buy him a soda. I shot back, "And then he'll do it again!" She said I may have to settle him down. And maybe even have to buy him a new zoo t-shirt and pair of shorts. I started to say, "Or a stuffed toy," and then I caught on.
She talked about how strong I am to do this. We just looked and looked and she talked. She looked a lot, as usual, too. Just before I looked over at the store’s parking lot and there was a truck with the name of the city she’s from. I told her. And about the basketball games we’ve been going to and that team is really good. She said they are and it’s a Catholic school. After looking for a while the older lady owner and a guy from the store next door came closer to get into a car. After that she asked me if we were ready to go. Yes.
I got the rest of the stuff I had put on the ground and we left to go inside. I told her that was the owner older lady in her driver. I wonder if they wondered what we were looking at. She asked me if she’d know me. I said no. I only know the son and not that well. Before we walked inside I told her that no one was downstairs. So we went into that bathroom. It smelled – kind of like sewer. I told her. She said it’s more real with the smell. Even later she looked and she said that bathroom needs some work. I prepared another bagful. I told her I’m getting to be a pro at this. She helped me keep it open and such. I poured the rest of the soup inside, the rest of the special crackers and went over to the sink to put water in it. I then came back over to her while I was crunching up the special crackers.
She asked me if I was going to spill it on the ground. Yes, where? She said more inside the far stall. So I squatted down and did. More water came out and I had to try several times to squeeze out more veggie chunks. She just stood and watched. It took a bit. Then I had to look at it. And I stood up and looked at it. Pretty gross – especially that round part with more pieces. I asked if it looked real. Yes. It was hard to keep looking. I did the best I could. Then it was time to clean it up. That was hard, too.
I went over and got 2 long pieces of paper towels. I told her I was going to put it inside the toilet. The lid was up and I got some on the rim on accident. She said that was good – more like real because we knew I would have to clean that up, too. I had to get more paper towels. I asked her again why we are doing this in a little sarcastic way. It was like to get me stronger and more used to it. She was very encouraging through this whole thing. Once I held out one strip of paper towel and asked her if she wanted one – jokingly. “No,” she flat out told me. So I cleaned up the floor. I told her it’s a good thing I don’t use this brand of vegetable soup or I might not want to eat it again. I did that on purpose. She said it’s a good thing. She said there was a little piece by my foot by the wall. I got that, too. Then I went over and put water on more paper towels because last time it was slippery. Cleaned that up, too.
OK … now time to dump the rest in and look at it. It was really hard. It was really gross. I think I was saying, “Ewe, ewe,” the whole time. In fact I said that a lot during this whole thing. She commented how good I’m doing and how hard this is for me. I asked her if it bothers her. She said it’s not pleasant but she’s not afraid. I think she talked about scenarios again. Yes, because I told her I wouldn’t clean it up if it was real. “You would leave that for others behind you?” “Probably. I don’t know any of those people.” So I did manage to dump it in. I think she counted again. But again, I couldn’t look as I was dumping – still can’t do that. After she told me to take the bag away because it was still dripping. I did. See – I couldn’t see that because I wasn’t looking at that point. Now I had to look and then flush. I did. Whew, that was really hard!
I gathered my stuff to put in the bag and throw away in the trashcan in the bathroom. She went out the door and I told her I wanted to wash my hands. I did and she waited for me down that hallway by the stairs like she normally does. Then we walked up both flights of stairs into her office. I told her I think one of the pictures I brought in has it on the rim of the toilet similar to this one. Yes, she remembered. I don’t remember any other conversation. Maybe there wasn’t any. She hung her coat up in the closet and I scooted by her to go back into her office. She followed me after.
We talked about it. How hard it was. How gross it was. She said how well I did. She said to try not to think of the image. And if I do try to throw it away. I said out the window. Yes. She did an “I see, I hear, I feel” exercise with me starting with 5, then 4, then 3, then 2, then 1 time each. That was good. She said next time we can go walking again but maybe we can also start working more on the light bar. OK. I told her that it may be rainy next week. If so maybe we can just walk around the building estimating the distance.
She asked me if she gave me the dates for February. No. She gave them to me on paper. She had also just before that copied my paper and gave me the original back. I also asked her if it was OK that I didn’t do the full circle around. Yes, it was a success. Yes. I told her I knew she had to go to the doctor the end of February. How did that go? Great – she checked out fine. I asked her what tests she had to take. She said none – except a blood test she doesn’t have back yet. Was it her surgeon? No, oncologist. Great she’s OK! I left and she told me to have a great weekend. Her, too. She made no mention of my late night phone call late Tuesday night/early Wednesday morning. Just had to talk a couple minutes because I couldn’t sleep.
I went into the massage therapist. Very relaxing laying down. I asked her about the energy sweeping she does. And she told me about the energy fields and such and know how close or far away to get. I told her how I can sense things – I’m very good at that. We talked a while. Some when I was sitting on the table and some when I was standing. While I was standing I needed to go to the bathroom. After a pause I told her I’m going and then I’ll write her check out. She said it’s OK to just go now and leave my stuff there. I did. Hope she doesn’t know a thing! I want to be able to trust my therapist she didn’t tell her anything.
Those laying down massages are so relaxing, I want to do more but I don’t. Both money and I’m really scared to. I’m so afraid I’ll have to go to the bathroom during if it’s longer or relax so much and not pay attention and go. I’ve talked to my therapist about it at the beginning of going there and once when I went longer with the other massage therapist. I hate to start talking about it again. I’m afraid she’ll think I’m making too much of it. So I don’t do it – I don’t have the longer massages.
First I said it has to do with what we did on Monday. She still had no idea. So I tried to say it, hard but I did. I told her when we went walking I didn’t have to go to the bathroom. “That’s it?” I guess she expected more. I told her it bothered me that I lied to her. It’s not like me to do that. She agreed it wasn’t my style. She said she was just happy it was successful to me. That’s what she cares about. I told her that I wanted it to be successful, too and that’s why I did it.
I asked her if she knew. She said she only knew I went a lot longer than I usually can and I didn’t have the urgency I usually do. She just figured I had more time. Then she said it made me feel better to confess. Yes. No big deal and that I am really glad. I really thought she knew, I did. But she didn’t. Makes me wonder if I can lie about this again and she wouldn’t even know. But that wouldn’t be right. I just wish I could be like I’d like to be. And I’m really glad that lying was no big deal to her. I’m not a terrible person for it and she’s not mad. The walls did not come tumbling down. I’m sure she understood why I did it. I guess it’s OK to lie sometimes. Very nice of her.
I told her I want to do it a little at a time. The first time one time around the circle. The second time two times. The third time three times and so on. Because I know I can do it. She asked me if I want to do this when I have to go to the bathroom. Yes. She said to let her know when to go today. But she wants me to be careful because sometimes I push myself too hard and she wants me to have successes. I told her I do because I want to be able to do it and I think I can.
She told me she was listening to NPR again (she listens when she’s in the car off and on). She heard another show about someone who wrote a book who had migraines that lead into seizures and spoke in front of people. Sometimes she would have a seizure when she spoke in front of lots of people. “Can you imagine what that would be like?” she directed at me like my problem isn’t so bad. And she said how they loose all control of bodily functions then. I nodded. I didn’t say but that’s what I do with pee without the seizures (thank you God). But her point was she got into some relaxed state and acceptance of her problem. Acceptance – I’m working on that we both very much agreed. I asked her if the headaches and seizures then got better. Yes.
I told her that both exposures we do are exposures but they are different. With the throw up ones I want to get to the point, like she says, that I will get tired of looking at it and then it won’t bother me at all. To keep doing them again and again. She laughed and said, “So you like to torture me!” I laughed as well and told her that she’s the one that can look at it longer – not me.
So I said that I have a can of soup with me and special crackers that I wanted to do today and I also want to talk about things as well. So I asked her how she thought we should do this. I didn’t want to happen like last time. She thought a second and said maybe we should do the walking first and then the throw up exposures. She thinks I get too hung up in the throw up ones and then I can’t be successful at the other. I told her I didn’t need to go to the bathroom yet. So I said we’d talk about what I wanted to first and then see. That’s what we did.
First, though I told her my grandson had something at an art fair that we went to last night. We walked around and looked at the artwork from grade school, junior high and high school. I took a picture of one, I told her as I took my camera out of my purse. It was fear, anxiety and shame. But I wanted her to see what the shame was. She looked at the whole picture and said how interesting it was that a high schooler did that. But she couldn’t see what the shame was. Then I showed her the close-up one. She saw the persons hands covering the private area. I told her it validates what I feel about my problem. It is shame about it. She said it was but you can also interpret that as someone who had been molested. True. It’s different for different people.
I then pulled out my paper and we first talked about what was on the NPR I found. I told her that they mostly talked about the 1918 encephalitis which was lethargy encephalitis. Lots & lots of sleeping. I think I slept a lot (if I remember my Mom saying) but not all the time like in a coma. I was only 2. They did talk about depression, OCD, withdrawal from people and really bad behaviors. I don’t have any of that. No and she said I was in that lucky 1/3 without those lasting effects. But they did say it may damage the basal ganglia or hypothalamus. She said the basal ganglia has to do with OCD but she didn’t know about the hypothalamus. I told her it controls the body temperature (I am always cold), blood pressure, weight, hunger & thirst.
Then I went on to say the anterior hypothalamus as well. I looked at my paper and read more about the nuclei and the region is anterior, the area is medial (she didn’t know what that was), the nucleus is medial preoptic nucleus and the function is urinary bladder contraction. So we are wondering if the encephalitis effected that area of the brain and with the bladder contractions. She did point out that it doesn’t say anything about the size of the bladder. No. We didn’t elaborate. We know mine is smaller. She said it would be nice to see a doctor who specializes in this because maybe there’s a medicine that would correct this area of the brain. Yeah – maybe.
Then I went on to the movie Temple Grandin I saw all but the first half hour. I told her I wanted to relate it to me although I don’t have the same problem as she does with her autism. But we both have obstacles to overcome with it. She agreed. First the girl talking to her Mom said she’d never be able to do something. Her Mom said, “I know.” Well, that’s acceptance. I know there are things I will never be able to do and I want to just accept it, too. She said I am – I’m working on it. Yes, I am.
Then she said how the door is open and she went right through it. Overcoming obstacles and having success and leading open to new worlds. That’s what I want to do. I’m so tired of the place I’m in. She said I’m ready to do this, even using her hands. Yes. Then she said she’s not cured – she’ll always be autistic. Same with me. I may never be cured but I still work at getting better. And I think I am – most of the time. She just listened.
She said she’s different but not less of a person. That’s what I want to be like. She wrote that down (other things too but I really noticed this one). And I said that along with that is that she’s good in other ways that others aren’t. We talked about her drawings and how good she was visually. And me, that I’m good at things others aren’t. She said how I have a lot to offer people. Then we talked about that squeeze machine! She said that was something. Yes, and I knew it was for comfort and hugs. She explained that people with autism can’t be hugged or hug because it’s uncomfortable for them. This pressure soothes them. I wondered what I, everyone has things that sooth them, do since what I used to like, I don’t like them as much anymore. She said it would be interesting to explore and wrote down that, too.
Then I said how she’s weird. She is. You can tell. I don’t want to be looked at or treated as if I’m weird. She said with me you can’t tell I have my problem. Hers is very obvious. Then we laughed when I said how many cows there were! Moo…. Yes, she agreed and I said about the one that almost drowned - that was sad. Yes. She told me earlier that it is a true story about someone. She also had asked me if she could have a copy of the paper I brought in. Yes and there’s writing about other stuff on it.
Then she switched back to the brain stuff. She said her light bar works with the hypothalamus. We need to do more of that. I told her how the last time we didn’t finish for some reason. She said that she got to take some big professor (Harvard ?) of Trauma to the airport. He was just standing there and she offered and she got to be with him and talk to him in her car for 20 minutes. She thought that was awesome. But I forgot what she said he said. I think it was about the EMR light bar and such and she was pointing out how we should use it more.
She also related something to the Toyota recall. How they fix the pedal but customers say it isn’t really fixed. That’s it’s not the pedal. It’s an electrical problem and the problem is never solved. I told her maybe that’s the same with me why the medicines don’t work with me. Maybe mine is a neurological problem. She said yes, maybe that’s right. But I do know she wants me to get it checked out. I’m scared to but I don’t tell her. I don’t talk about it.
Then I needed to go to the bathroom and told her. “OK,” and she got up out of her chair. I took a deep breath and hesitated a moment. “Are you sure? Do you have time?” Yes, I did and I wanted to do this. I took the bag with the can of soup and such out of my purse. I asked her if we should take my bag of clothes. Yes and she got them out of her drawer. She started to hand it to me and I told her I’ll hold the food stuff while she holds my bag. We started to go out and she asked me if I wanted to take my ‘sweater’ – it was a brown light-weight hoodie jacket (I almost forgot). Yes, it is still cool out. I grabbed it, put it on while we went out of her office and down the hall where she got her black sleek jacket out of the closet and put it on.
We walked out and down the stairs. We saw an older lady and man go into the CPA office. I commented that she had red hatter colors on – red & purple. She said how they got dressed up to go to their CPA. We walked on. I told her, “Just talk.” She did when we got outside. She said how the weather is warming up and going to be in the 50’s this weekend. Yeah! She said they are predicting one more snowstorm. I said how many of the bigger snowstorms come late in the winter. We walked around the circle. We got to the point where we could have gone further to the other half and I said, “Are we there yet? Are we there yet?” kind of laughing and really joking. But I think she thought I was really needing to go or starting to freak out about it. She answered yes and we did not walk the whole circle and she told me to go in and then we’ll do the rest after I get back.
I didn’t fight it. I too wanted a success and didn’t want to push longer and didn’t tell her I was half kidding. I know I could have done it, though. I did want to go the whole circle. I gave her the bag of food goodies to hold. She gave me, in exchange, my bag of clothes. I started to say I didn’t need it but then stopped myself and thought that maybe I did. I didn’t know because I wasn’t all the way at the bathroom yet. So I went. I did perfectly fine. I came back outside. She was at the far end of the parking lot on the side waiting for me, just walking slowly with her back to me. I don’t think she heard me coming. She turned around. I motioned with my hands and said, “Yes!” She knew I was successful and boy were we both glad. I needed that! I did tell her I didn’t think we did the whole circle. She said it was all good like not to worry about that because I did it.
So now it was time to make a bagful. I got out the can of vegetable soup and opened it. I got one plastic bag, opened it and asked her to hold it open while I poured half the can in. Then I said we had no water. She said we can put snow in. I commented about the dirty snow. She walked over and put 2 small handfuls in. I knew that wasn’t enough so I put about 5-6 more in while she still held the bag. Then I poured ½ the bag of special crackers in. When we were done she gave it to me. I squished the snow around trying to get it to turn to water. I commented how I was doing this and touching it but not really. Then it was time to throw it on the ground. She said we’ll do 1,2,… OK and I asked her to say it. She said, “1,2,3” and I threw it. Yuck.
It was all lumped up because it didn’t have enough liquid in it. So I took a long skinny stick and tried to move some pieces around. It wasn’t working that well so I took a shorter thicker one and that was better. She just watched. She asked me on a scale of 1-10 how was that for me. I said an 8 because I know it’s food and it’s not real. She stared at it while she talked about the zoo scenario. How it could have been my grandson, or my granddaughter. It happens just like that with little kids sometimes. And how he would be upset and crying because it’s upsetting. I would have to comfort him and clean him up. And that I may need to buy him a soda. I shot back, "And then he'll do it again!" She said I may have to settle him down. And maybe even have to buy him a new zoo t-shirt and pair of shorts. I started to say, "Or a stuffed toy," and then I caught on.
She talked about how strong I am to do this. We just looked and looked and she talked. She looked a lot, as usual, too. Just before I looked over at the store’s parking lot and there was a truck with the name of the city she’s from. I told her. And about the basketball games we’ve been going to and that team is really good. She said they are and it’s a Catholic school. After looking for a while the older lady owner and a guy from the store next door came closer to get into a car. After that she asked me if we were ready to go. Yes.
I got the rest of the stuff I had put on the ground and we left to go inside. I told her that was the owner older lady in her driver. I wonder if they wondered what we were looking at. She asked me if she’d know me. I said no. I only know the son and not that well. Before we walked inside I told her that no one was downstairs. So we went into that bathroom. It smelled – kind of like sewer. I told her. She said it’s more real with the smell. Even later she looked and she said that bathroom needs some work. I prepared another bagful. I told her I’m getting to be a pro at this. She helped me keep it open and such. I poured the rest of the soup inside, the rest of the special crackers and went over to the sink to put water in it. I then came back over to her while I was crunching up the special crackers.
She asked me if I was going to spill it on the ground. Yes, where? She said more inside the far stall. So I squatted down and did. More water came out and I had to try several times to squeeze out more veggie chunks. She just stood and watched. It took a bit. Then I had to look at it. And I stood up and looked at it. Pretty gross – especially that round part with more pieces. I asked if it looked real. Yes. It was hard to keep looking. I did the best I could. Then it was time to clean it up. That was hard, too.
I went over and got 2 long pieces of paper towels. I told her I was going to put it inside the toilet. The lid was up and I got some on the rim on accident. She said that was good – more like real because we knew I would have to clean that up, too. I had to get more paper towels. I asked her again why we are doing this in a little sarcastic way. It was like to get me stronger and more used to it. She was very encouraging through this whole thing. Once I held out one strip of paper towel and asked her if she wanted one – jokingly. “No,” she flat out told me. So I cleaned up the floor. I told her it’s a good thing I don’t use this brand of vegetable soup or I might not want to eat it again. I did that on purpose. She said it’s a good thing. She said there was a little piece by my foot by the wall. I got that, too. Then I went over and put water on more paper towels because last time it was slippery. Cleaned that up, too.
OK … now time to dump the rest in and look at it. It was really hard. It was really gross. I think I was saying, “Ewe, ewe,” the whole time. In fact I said that a lot during this whole thing. She commented how good I’m doing and how hard this is for me. I asked her if it bothers her. She said it’s not pleasant but she’s not afraid. I think she talked about scenarios again. Yes, because I told her I wouldn’t clean it up if it was real. “You would leave that for others behind you?” “Probably. I don’t know any of those people.” So I did manage to dump it in. I think she counted again. But again, I couldn’t look as I was dumping – still can’t do that. After she told me to take the bag away because it was still dripping. I did. See – I couldn’t see that because I wasn’t looking at that point. Now I had to look and then flush. I did. Whew, that was really hard!
I gathered my stuff to put in the bag and throw away in the trashcan in the bathroom. She went out the door and I told her I wanted to wash my hands. I did and she waited for me down that hallway by the stairs like she normally does. Then we walked up both flights of stairs into her office. I told her I think one of the pictures I brought in has it on the rim of the toilet similar to this one. Yes, she remembered. I don’t remember any other conversation. Maybe there wasn’t any. She hung her coat up in the closet and I scooted by her to go back into her office. She followed me after.
We talked about it. How hard it was. How gross it was. She said how well I did. She said to try not to think of the image. And if I do try to throw it away. I said out the window. Yes. She did an “I see, I hear, I feel” exercise with me starting with 5, then 4, then 3, then 2, then 1 time each. That was good. She said next time we can go walking again but maybe we can also start working more on the light bar. OK. I told her that it may be rainy next week. If so maybe we can just walk around the building estimating the distance.
She asked me if she gave me the dates for February. No. She gave them to me on paper. She had also just before that copied my paper and gave me the original back. I also asked her if it was OK that I didn’t do the full circle around. Yes, it was a success. Yes. I told her I knew she had to go to the doctor the end of February. How did that go? Great – she checked out fine. I asked her what tests she had to take. She said none – except a blood test she doesn’t have back yet. Was it her surgeon? No, oncologist. Great she’s OK! I left and she told me to have a great weekend. Her, too. She made no mention of my late night phone call late Tuesday night/early Wednesday morning. Just had to talk a couple minutes because I couldn’t sleep.
I went into the massage therapist. Very relaxing laying down. I asked her about the energy sweeping she does. And she told me about the energy fields and such and know how close or far away to get. I told her how I can sense things – I’m very good at that. We talked a while. Some when I was sitting on the table and some when I was standing. While I was standing I needed to go to the bathroom. After a pause I told her I’m going and then I’ll write her check out. She said it’s OK to just go now and leave my stuff there. I did. Hope she doesn’t know a thing! I want to be able to trust my therapist she didn’t tell her anything.
Those laying down massages are so relaxing, I want to do more but I don’t. Both money and I’m really scared to. I’m so afraid I’ll have to go to the bathroom during if it’s longer or relax so much and not pay attention and go. I’ve talked to my therapist about it at the beginning of going there and once when I went longer with the other massage therapist. I hate to start talking about it again. I’m afraid she’ll think I’m making too much of it. So I don’t do it – I don’t have the longer massages.
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