My therapist asked me how I wanted to focus my time. I chose to revisit the narrative I wrote, and I wanted my therapist to start at the beginning again. Something about the first two pages feels unresolved. Each time she read the pages out loud, I experienced the seemingly unbearable but expected feelings of sadness and anger and had honestly articulated those previously. Yet, there was something more that hit me like a brick each time. I was avoiding it but knew I needed to go back and face it. I thought maybe it was embarrassment and shame that just needed to be addressed, nothing big, but the more I focused on the sensations and attempted to label emotions at the moment, the muddier it seemed to get.

My therapist’s experience of the session was me being disconnected. I know that must be true because when I later reflected, I could remember the words spoken, sensations noticed, and emotions felt but not the relational aspect of the conversation. I felt very much connected to my own experience without opening the door of that experience for my therapist to experience with me. I was trying, but I was frustrated by the inability to work through my thoughts. I needed to talk…and keep talking until it made sense.

“I feel out of control…”

“I want to know what emotion you’re feeling.”

“I really don’t know.” I was frustrated but understood what my therapist was doing. It was just too much of a jump for me in the moment.

It felt like panic and fear. Maybe anger too? My body was tense, and I was trying to relieve the tension by moving my hands, feet, arms, and legs. The muscles were responding, but each movement felt difficult and stiff. It appeared controlled but didn’t match the mental movement I was trying to carry out. My heart was racing at about 140 beats per minute, and I was really hot. I could feel the blood draining from different body parts and resting instead in my cheeks and chest. The deafening pounding in my ears was also matching the emerging migraine. What do these sensations tell me? What is this emotion? When have I felt this way before?

I think I felt absolute despair—no-holds-barred sadness. And shame. And embarrassment. And…? I was so cold. My skin was hurting, my eyes, my throat. Do I have a fever? Did I get sunburned? What do these sensations tell me? What is this emotion? When have I felt this way before?

Everything was fast and slow. My body was both hot and cold. I was engaged and disconnected.

I had to run an errand about an hour from my therapist’s office. While driving, I returned to the basic sadness and anger I have both labeled and felt. While in that space, I noticed the lurking emotions that still have no label. Sadness and anger are expected, but this ugly, sticky, tangled mess below the surface of those emotions is some different kind of fresh hell.