Status: Weekly updates - planning a rewrite for the earlier chapters soon
Wilted
Spider Plant
“How are you feeling with your current arrangements?” Dr. Humber asked.
We had agreed to a bi-weekly meeting due to James being a nurse and not aptly equipped to fully treat me successfully. Well, that’s what I had told Dr. Humber, but really, I just felt he was creepy and the less time I could spend with him the better. I was required at least 10 hours a week of therapy sessions, according to my court sentencing, so I had to compromise and see Dr. Humber rather than sit in self-isolated boredom which is what I would vastly prefer.
I smiled. Try and be polite. “More comfortable, thank you.”
Dr. Humber smiled in response, his wide nose spreading to half his face as he did so. “I’m glad, Kat. I feel CBT will be fantastically beneficial to you.”
“What is CBT?” I paused. “Well, what does it involve, I guess would be a better question.”
Dr. Humber seemed pleasantly surprised in my interest. “It’s to do with altering that inner voice, I guess would be the simplest, albeit crudest, way of describing it.”
“Sounds like torture.”
He laughed, “Not in the slightest. You know that voice you hear, the one which tells you that you’re awful, you should hate yourself, no one likes you,” he looked at me with a raised eyebrow for a moment, “you should hurt people, we take the way you interpret that voice and make it healthier for you.”
“So, you’re not altering the voice, it’ll still be there?”
“Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. It’s different for everyone. But the point is that when you feel like beating yourself or someone else up over what it’s telling you, you’ll be able to pause and think that it’s not something you have to listen to. That you can choose how to behave, and you don’t have to do what it says.”
I thought it over, running the memories of my ever so vocal inside voice through my head.
“But what if I like what it tells me to do.”
Dr. Humber sighed and looked me in the eyes, “We have a long way to go, Kat.”
He nodded towards the door. I thanked him politely, and stood to leave.
“Kat.” Dr. Humber called as I was about to shut the door behind me.
“Yes?”
“Remember what you were like when you got here and then try and tell me again that you liked what that voice made you do.”
I nodded and shut the door, and with that slammed door the wall that I built up around those things I did began to crumble at the edges.
We had agreed to a bi-weekly meeting due to James being a nurse and not aptly equipped to fully treat me successfully. Well, that’s what I had told Dr. Humber, but really, I just felt he was creepy and the less time I could spend with him the better. I was required at least 10 hours a week of therapy sessions, according to my court sentencing, so I had to compromise and see Dr. Humber rather than sit in self-isolated boredom which is what I would vastly prefer.
I smiled. Try and be polite. “More comfortable, thank you.”
Dr. Humber smiled in response, his wide nose spreading to half his face as he did so. “I’m glad, Kat. I feel CBT will be fantastically beneficial to you.”
“What is CBT?” I paused. “Well, what does it involve, I guess would be a better question.”
Dr. Humber seemed pleasantly surprised in my interest. “It’s to do with altering that inner voice, I guess would be the simplest, albeit crudest, way of describing it.”
“Sounds like torture.”
He laughed, “Not in the slightest. You know that voice you hear, the one which tells you that you’re awful, you should hate yourself, no one likes you,” he looked at me with a raised eyebrow for a moment, “you should hurt people, we take the way you interpret that voice and make it healthier for you.”
“So, you’re not altering the voice, it’ll still be there?”
“Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. It’s different for everyone. But the point is that when you feel like beating yourself or someone else up over what it’s telling you, you’ll be able to pause and think that it’s not something you have to listen to. That you can choose how to behave, and you don’t have to do what it says.”
I thought it over, running the memories of my ever so vocal inside voice through my head.
“But what if I like what it tells me to do.”
Dr. Humber sighed and looked me in the eyes, “We have a long way to go, Kat.”
He nodded towards the door. I thanked him politely, and stood to leave.
“Kat.” Dr. Humber called as I was about to shut the door behind me.
“Yes?”
“Remember what you were like when you got here and then try and tell me again that you liked what that voice made you do.”
I nodded and shut the door, and with that slammed door the wall that I built up around those things I did began to crumble at the edges.