I Know Sadness

Wow king... it sounds like you are making great progress. That's fantastic! I can relate to that feeling of being "on the verge of a breakthrough" although I have not felt that for an extremely long time. But, your description of it brought back the memory of it for me.

I actually found that eye contact was getting me into trouble because it came off as staring and all I would get was dirty looks. I was probably doing it wrong.

There's nothing really that bad about my past. I talked a little bit about it with the therapist (until I shut down for not explainable reason). It's just that with generally being so unhappy with myself, I am finding I tend to want to distance myself from who I was (i.e., my past)... I guess it's a lame attempt to emerge as a "new and improved" person, if that is even possible. It's not something that I am intently doing; it just seems like I might be. I don't know if I am really punishing myself; it's actually something the therapist and my mother said to me, independent of each other. I really don't know (or think) it is true. I don't know, maybe it is to a degree, but it doesn't really make much sense. I don't really feel guilty about anything... but... well... I mean I resent that I allowed myself to deceive myself into thinking how happy I was being super-independent of human interaction only to recently discover I actually wanted contact all along, but was unnaturally frightened of being rejected. Oh wow... that kind of just came out. I almost want to erase that until I can think about that some more, but I am going to leave it in (and probably regret it later). Then again, maybe this isn't that big of a revelation anyway; I've probably known it all along and may have even said it out loud before. It just feels like it is suddenly crystal clear and could be one source of my sadness (which would be a "real" revelation if that's true).

I feel vulnerable because I seem to be desperate for contact. And, mostly I am trying to regulate that in my interactions. I think I need to aware of my vulnerability, but coming off desperate is only going to sabotage what I am trying to achieve. My main focus is to interact with people honestly and authentically and not be concerned about what they might think of me because to your point, they probably don't give a shit anyway. I guess this all sounds like a big contradiction: "I feel desperate, but I don't want to come across that way." "I want to be authentic, but I am acting as though I am not desperate." But, I think it's really about learning how to make interactions work when in the past, I have always been the cause of them failing. For once, I am starting to feel like maybe I am not really deficient; it's just that I have not known how to act appropriately because no one in my life ever really cared to guide me or cared enough to realize I needed that kind of guidance. I don't know... maybe that's a deficiency in and of itself. I know I am all over the place here. I need to sort all these feelings out; I usually don't do well in expressing my feelings at all.

By the way, I am not or never was a bully. Nothing I ever did seemed to fully meet my parents' expectations, but lately I have been wondering if they even had any expectations for me. But, I am no longer want to be a hostage to any injustices in my past (whether they are real or imagined). I am focused on my goals, forward - regardless of the outcome! YEAH!!! [<-- me, not being docile]

Congrats on econ math; a B is impressive! And, that's great that you were able to help your patient. You do have a real gift in terms of being understanding, mindful, and encouraging while lighting a dark path forward.