A counselling course can bring you together with your course mates in a way that perhaps other courses don’t. You tend to end up opening up more than you probably would usually. You talk about deep stuff because other people “get it”. More is allowed perhaps, than in other circumstances. It can feel like a bond and a closeness that is special. But, I’m not really sure it lasts much after the day you finish your last class. Don’t get me wrong, there will be the few that you feel closest with who you will stay in touch with and who you may still keep talking to, but the closeness as a whole group dissipates the moment the classes stop. Despite the talk of needing to be friends forever, the very same people don’t send a single message.
And then it happens, the group meet up. And, don’t get me wrong, it’s happening and I’m looking forward to it, but it brings up so many other things. It has only been 4 months since the last meet up. I’m not sure what to expect and how it is going to be with people. In some ways many things have shifted. And for me, in many things, things have not changed at all. And I’m not sure I really know these people anymore, or that they really know me. So many challenging things have happened since we last met that most of them do not know about. I just haven’t felt like telling them. And in many ways, I have no doubt that many things will have happened in their lives that I have no clue about. And I have to wonder, do I care? For people who I haven’t heard from since the last meet up, who there hasn’t been a single message exchanged, what do I want to know now.
Except I know the nosiness and almost competitive nature that comes out. The questions about what happens now, what has been happening since qualifying. The discussions on setting up private practice, getting clients, getting a job, making an online presence, getting yourself out there as a fully qualified therapist. And, it doesn’t feel like it’s friendly or nice, it just feels competitive. Like, what is everyone else doing and am I doing enough and who is doing something that I should be doing. And why haven’t I done more? Why am I still just content with volunteering and not moving on when I should be doing what everyone else is doing? What happens when I get left behind from everyone else?
I’m not sure I want the conversations and the questions. These are people that I used to be ok being open with… but 2 years on and I feel like I should be better than this by now. I don’t want to admit that things are still difficult and messy. I don’t want to have to say that everything still feels too screwed up to really know what is happening next. That all I can do at the moment is focus on me and surviving each day. I have had panic attacks about meeting up because these people that I am meant to be close to and trust and be friends with, now just feel judgemental and in a weird way, hostile. And it’s not that anyone has really said or done anything, it’s just the simple knowledge that others are moving forward and I’m not able to do that yet. And I know it’s sensible to take my time. I need to get things in my life more stable again and my anxiety spends its time in overdrive, all the time. The others in side me still have stories to tell and pain to process and they need the time and space to do so, and I need to honour them and give them that.
Comparing myself to what others are doing isn’t helpful, and I know that. And yet my brain is not listening. And I want to look forward to seeing people that I once felt so much more for, but that now just bring panic. And I can hope that all the anxiety is lying and it will be fine when I get there, and yet I can’t help but think that the panic will set in as soon as the talk of private practice starts and I will freeze up. And it will be for a few hours, and then it will be over and I will regret not enjoying myself more.
Fragmented Therapist 