hsphaven

It is Sunday and I try to dampen my good mood.

I know it is fragile,

That the higher I fly, the further I have to fall.

Tomorrow I will be seeing my psychologist, and it is the highlight of my monotonous week.

A week where, most days, I don’t even bother getting dressed.

A week where I get up mid to late afternoon.

A week where everything feels overwhelming and I live in constant dread.

This person, who I can only see for one hour a week and who I actually don’t know a lot about, is the closest I get to human connection.

I never expected therapy to have this effect on me,

But here I am, addicted to that hour like a junkie.

I am starving for attention, care and intimacy

I lick up everything she gives me.

Soon our time is up.

I must leave the safety of her office

And return to my life, if you can even call it a life.

The withdrawal hits me like a train.

I slouch back to my car,

A poor player who has had their time on stage

And then is heard no more.

Sometimes I can’t bring myself to leave

So I hang around.

I lie in the backseat of the car until after dark.

Or I shut myself in the clinic’s bathroom and scratch myself with sharp objects.

Other times I go home and search for my therapist on Facebook

Or I email her the minute I get in the door.

Being obsessed with your therapist is painful, confusing, lonely and a bit humiliating.

But addiction comes in all shapes and sizes.

I only hope that one day I will break free of this,

That I will have a life so that therapy doesn’t BECOME my life.