Telling my therapist about the voices in my head
One summer night, things got out of control and I didn't even know it. As my ex-best friend told it, I switched, and became this angry person, and told her I hated her and didn't want to be around her. I stomped off in the middle of the night.
I have absolutely no memory of this. The only thing I remember about that night is suddenly finding myself outside, the middle of the night, back by a dying bonfire. I dont even know what time it was, but as I "woke up" from wherever I was, I was crying so hard I could barely see straight. I had no idea what was going on, or why I was outside. I was terrified.
I was appalled that I would ever think,let alone say, anything so mean and hateful to my best friend. I'd go hide in the bathroom and cry, trying to figure out what had happened, how in the world I had managed to disappear so far inside that I didn't even know I said something so terrible. I figured she was telling the truth, because people were ALWAYS telling me I did things that I didn't remember about. But, this was getting ridiculous.
A couple days later at the airport, I watched from far away as an 8 year old boy took over my body and followed my best friend around the airport, unsure of where to go, and unable to read most of the airport signs, having to sound them out, with all the skill of a 2nd grader still learning phonics.
Terrified. I was a teacher. I had qualified for early entrance to college in the 8th grade. I had top scores in my class, every year, all years.
I didn't know what was going on.
I needed to tell someone.
(*shakes head* oh,boy)
I'm not sure of the sequence of events at this point. All this happened in the summer. I think that I wrote my therapist a note, or a letter, and told her the truth. I do remember sitting there on the couch next to her, too scared to breathe as she read it, being positive that as soon as she finished it she would call me crazy and kick me out of therapy right then. I just knew that as soon as she read about my dissociating and hearing voices and turning into different people and forgetting how to read and everything else, she was going to kick me out, end of story. I was on pins and needles. I respected her so much, and it was going to be so hard to say goodbye to her.
Instead, she took a deep breath and turned to me and said "Whatever this is, we'll deal with it."
You could have knocked me over with a feather. Inside my head, there were about 8 sighs of relief at that moment.
This was the beginning.
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