...ha, ha. I don't think so...

My therapist isn’t your typical headshrinker. First, her name is the same as my soon-to-be-ex-mother-in-law (which I initially took as a sign from God that this process would not be a walk in the park). Name aside, she’s a tiny little thing with amazing tattoos on both of her arms, a nose ring, and purple highlights. She’s a fan of hippiesque flowy skirts (and yes, I know neither hippiesque or flowy are real words, spellcheck, which incidentally is also not a real word, has already alerted me to that fact, what with it's squiggly red lines and all) and black tank tops. She is, in a word, FANTASTIC.

Today, I was debriefing on a conversation I had with a friend about my inability to say “no.” I have difficulty with this word in a variety of situations…when my parents want me to come down for Thanksgiving, which is, in fact, the anorexic’s equivalent of Hell; when my son wants anything from the endcap at Target when we’re checking out; when those kids that are selling newspapers, magazine subscriptions, candy bars, you know the drill, to support their class trip to fill-in-the-national-treasure here; or when any guy, nice or not, asks me out. The truth is, Thanksgiving is not healthy for me, period; my son has broken more toys than I ever owned growing up; maybe I should give to those kids but I just don’t want to; or, and this is the most important one, I’m not ready to date anyone at present, and may never be ready.

Because I’ve recently taken a blow to the heart, I’ve been thinking a lot about the choices I make, either with intention, or by default, so today my therapist insisted we talk about my biggest default choice, my inability to say no. If you’ve never gone the therapy route, here’s the drill…

Therapist Chick: How does it make you feel when you say yes and you mean no?

Me: Angry, sad, sick…mostly sick.

Therapist Chick: What do you think would happen if you said no?

Me: I don’t know.

Therapist Chick: Yes you do. What do you think would happen if you said no?

Me: I don’t know.

Therapist Chick: Yes you do. What do you think would happen if you said no?

Me: I wouldn’t be listened to.

Therapist Chick: Why don’t you think you’d be listened to?

Me: I don’t know.

Therapist Chick: Yes you do. Why don’t you think you’d be listened to?

Me: I don’t know.

Therapist Chick: Yes you do. Why don’t you think you’d be listened to?

(sidebar, we can play the what-do-you-think/I-don’t-know/yes-you-do game for entire sessions)

Me: Because I don’t deserve to be listened to.

Therapist Chick: Why don’t you think you deserve to be listened to?

Me: I don’t know.

Therapist Chick: Yes you do. Why don’t you think you deserve to be listened to?

Me: I don’t know.

Therapist Chick: Yes you do. Why don’t you think you deserve to be listened to?

Me: Because I wasn’t listened to the night I was raped?

Therapist Chick: I knew you knew the answer.

It was at this point today when the requisite tears that always seem to work their way into our sessions made their appearance and I got yet another opportunity to sit with the pain and shame and grief that also seem to come along with unpacking this, well, crap for lack of a more precise term while Therapist Chick watched me. That’s what she does, she sits and watches, until I’m ready to talk some more. There are no words of comfort, but that’s part of the rape trauma process. In order to get past this, I have to fully feel every crappy feeling without any intervention. It’s part of the deal. The journey from victim to survivor needs to be a solitary one when it comes to the feelings thing. While we’re still in survivor mode, we spend all our time avoiding our feelings because we think we can’t survive feeling them. We numb out by starving, drinking, drugging, you name it, if it can mask feelings, we do it. As part of our recovery, we must feel the feelings fully, without anyone or anything to soften the blow because when we finally stop crying and are ready to talk again, we realize we lived through it. We realize we’re still alive.

Now, back to my friend, whom I will cherish forever because he’s still my friend, even though I’m difficult and complicated. As we talked about my latest heartbreak, somehow our conversation turned to my inability to say no. He said, “here’s what we’re going to do, I’m going to ask you out and you’re going to say I don’t think so in that way you have of laughing while you talk, you ready?” He then proceeded to say “hey baby, you wanna go out” to which I responded, “ha, ha, I don’t think so.” And a new mantra was born. I may not be there yet and who knows how many times I’ll stumble before “no” becomes comfortable again, but I’m told I’m right where I’m supposed to be and while it’s uncomfortable a lot of the time, I trust that the payoff will be worth it in the end. And also, I'm pretty sure that will make a fantastic t-shirt.