Slightly floundering

Yesterday, I had my final counselling session. 

It’s just typical that it had to come during a week where I’ve felt my mood dipping a bit.

Had it been last week, I think I’d have been totally fine with my therapy finishing. I was feeling better than I have in months. Mission accomplished. But to end at a time where I feel like I could go either way doesn’t feel right.

My counsellor agreed. It was obvious to her that I had slipped back a bit since my previous appointment. She said it wasn’t a good place to stop. Especially as in literally the last few minutes of the session, I had a bit of a breakthrough and said the words that I have been keeping in.

I feel guilty all the time. I am not good enough.

More to the point, I realised that I have always felt like this. Always. Even at my happiest, there has always been that sense of underlying guilt, shame. It’s why I dwell on every single past mistake and failure. Why I can’t forgive myself for anything. 

It’s frustrating. Deeply frustrating, to finish counselling at the point where I felt like a piece of the jigsaw had just slotted into place. And now I’m left feeling lost, floundering, abandoned, almost. I imagine that this sense of – of loss, I suppose – is fairly common after finishing a course of therapy. I feel on my own again, with nowhere to share and explore the feelings that I’m still struggling with.

Counselling has been more than an outlet; it has given me a wake-up call. Given that I almost didn’t go back after my first session, I have been amazed at the truths I have discovered about myself, my life and why I am the way I am. As my counsellor said, ‘Counselling doesn’t create feelings that aren’t there.’ Those feelings were always there, but consciously or unconsciously, I was keeping them buried. 

So, what are my options? I could pay for open-ended counselling, but that would be with a different therapist, and I really don’t feel I can start the process from scratch again. I can draw a line under it, accept what I’ve learned and get on with living. Or I can go back to the GP and ask if I can be re-referred to the same counsellor. That’s my preference right now, but then I don’t know. Although I feel unfinished, I know that dragging the process out and continuing to ruminate over every little thing could, in the long-term, be unhelpful. Maybe, having got to a certain point of recovery, this weekly navel-gazing is almost justifying my depressed state and stopping me from moving on. 

Honestly, I’m not sure what to do. I don’t feel ready to give up that safety net, that security blanket, but will I ever?

Perhaps I just need a break of a few weeks, to see how I get on without counselling.

To see if what I’ve discovered about myself is enough to keep me going.

To just ‘live’ for a bit and see whether this new normal is normal enough.