Couch Potato

I've been seeing a counsellor. 

She thinks that I need to work on acknowledging my emotions. She thinks that the putting-things-into-boxes-then-ignoring-them strategy may not be a sustainable approach in the long term. She thinks there are too many boxes now, and the things inside the boxes are banging to come out, and the boxes are rattling and the lids are coming up and oh my god it's like that scene in Poltergeist where all the bodies start bursting up out the bottom of the swimming pool and and and....

Even writing about the boxes opening makes me feel a bit panicky.  I've spent my whole life boxing. Why would I stop now? 

Well yes, there is the small matter of the breakdown. Of the being tracked down by the police. Of the escorting to hospital. Of the nearly being sectioned.  That. 

I insist on referring to it as a "meltdown". Somehow that isn't as scary, and makes it sound rather wry and perhaps more like a tantrum or a bad day. As I explained to the emergency psychiatrist, I'm not mad: just sad, scared, lonely and really fucked off. 

Three months on, I don't feel any different.  Most of the time I don't feel anything at all.  If I open myself to those feelings, it will be horrible, won't it?

"Have you tried writing things down?" she asked me.  That's when it really struck me how far I was from myself. Three months of seeing a counsellor and I hadn't even told her I'm a writer.