The writing prompt for today's sessions is: I finally understand. Now what?

 The writing prompt for today's sessions is: I finally understand. Now what?

Please tell the story of when you finally understood. And while understanding was a relief, not knowing what to do next was terrifying.

Your story can relate to alcohol or emotional safety, or to something else entirely. The topic is up to you. Please write about the emotions of understanding, but not knowing what to do with that understanding.

I finally understand that he will never understand me. 

I finally understand that he will never understand what I want and what I stand for in this relationship. I do understand that I want to be here. He does understand that I am in it for the long haul. He will never understand that I am not here for him or what he wants. 

I want to be with him. 

I want to please him. 

I want to meet his needs. 

But at what expense is this coming? 

If I say that I have no interest in coming up with something to do this weekend and you plan another errand with lunch attached, and I say yes because I don’t want to let you down, that’s not me, that’s you. 

If you tell me that I need to put more effort into this relationship one more time I am going to snap. You think the lack of effort is me. And I think it’s you. And we will never meet in the middle, but I will always tell you it’s me. It’s a very toxic situation. I will never feel anything but resentment. And you don’t see any of that resentment. You see someone that doesn’t care about us at all. I see, for the first time, me, who doesn’t want to give in anymore. 

I see me, who wants to do what I want to do, but also wants to be part of a couple. Maybe not this couple. 

You will always think you are doing more of the work than I am in coming up with things to do. You tell me you are listening to me, you tell me there’s nothing to listen to. I tell you I’m listening and I tell you I’m always trying to do what you want me to do. You tell me I’m not trying hard enough. 

The physical touch of you scares me now. You tell me we’re not having enough sex. 

I dread coming home. You don’t know that. 

There’s something wrong with this picture. I know what it is. I can’t say it outloud between us. You just don’t listen anymore, but you think you do. I say I want a job switch and I’m trying. You tell me that’s running away. 

Well maybe it is. Maybe I want to run away and never come back. In the middle of the night. Without saying a word because if I give you warning you will tell me I don’t have to go. You will tell me it’s up to me to make it better. You will try to say it’s all my fault. I will agree and the cycle will start over. 

I think I finally understand that you will never understand how unhappy I am. I think I finally understand how unhappy I am. I think I finally understand that I have no idea how to make it better without running away, in the dark, after midnight. 

I understand that you aren’t a bad person, just bad at recovery. 

I understand that you aren’t a bad man, just bad at life. 

I understand that you aren’t mean, just selfish. 

I understand that you think that I’m lazy and I think that you’re lazy and we will never understand each other. 

I think I understand that I want a do over in life. 

I understand that I want to stop thinking about this for a long time. I understand that I never will. 

I understand that my job is too cumbersome and laborious to spend any time outside of my job looking for new work. I understand that my boundary issues are larger than just home. I understand that I feel trapped. I understand that I use “I” too much, and I understand that makes me seem selfish. 

I understand that you want me to “plan” our next “date” and I have no desire to because I have no desire to spend time with you. The very thought of that makes my skin crawl. I don’t have a desire to do much of anything else right now either.  

This is definitely an example of not knowing where to go next. 

What is it trying to tell me?

 The writing prompt for today's sessions is: What is it trying to tell me?

Do you have any memories that stay with you, and you're not sure why? Maybe you don't remember much else about that period of time, the people or places that were important back then, or even the context surrounding the memory.

I was eight-years-old living in a small town in Southern Indiana when the movie, Arthur, staring Dudley Moore was in theaters. It was some kind of romantic comedy, and Moore's character was perpetually drunk. I was really depressed around that time. So much so that my mom wanted to take me to a psychologist, which was kind of unheard of back then. Especially for boys. We went to see Arthur, and we left the theater because I was so distraught, not about the movie, but about being alive. I have no other memories about me ever being depressed as a child. We never did go to a psychologist. I was never medicated. And to top it off, I have no idea why my mom took me to that movie. Every once in a while I look up the release date of Arthur to remind myself of how old I was when I left that movie theater sobbing. I don't know why I do that. I don't honesty think it is related to Dudley Moore playing a drunk. Did something traumatic happen around that time that I'm suppressing? I don't know what my memory is trying to tell me.

Do you have any memories that linger, and you don't know why? Is your subconscious trying to tell you something? Why is your brain holding on to that? Please write about it.

Here’s what chatGPT says: 

This prompt asks you to explore a memory that stays with you, even if you don’t understand why. You don’t have to uncover a hidden event or reach a definite explanation. You can write about what you remember, what you feel now, and what you still wonder.

The example is intense, but your memory can be ordinary: a comment someone made, a car ride, a room, a kindness, or a moment when you felt left out or understood.

Try starting with these questions:

• What scene comes to mind? Describe the place, people, sounds, or one small detail.

• What feeling comes with it? Embarrassment, comfort, sadness, longing, confusion?

• What makes it puzzling? Why this moment, when you’ve forgotten so many others?

• What might you say to yourself in that moment now?

You can explore possible meanings without deciding that any one explanation is true. The prompt’s suggestion about suppressed trauma is the writer’s speculation; you don’t need to adopt it.

A useful opening is: “I don’t know why I remember this, but I can still picture…”

If no particular memory comes to mind, you could begin: “When I try to think of a memory that is trying to tell me something, nothing obvious appears. What I notice instead is…” That gives you room to explore a recurring feeling, a period of your life, or even the pressure to find meaning.

When I try to think of a memory that is trying to tell me something, nothing obvious appears. What I notice instead is…fear. Anxiety. I honestly read this prompt a few times this week and nothing appeared, but I kept thinking about high school, what it was like as a student, for me. I guess this is natural, I am a high school teacher after all. (If you asked me in the year 1999, junior year, if I was ever going to teach high school I would have spit in your face) but here we are. The memory that surfaced was crying at the kitchen table with my parents trying to console me. 

I was trying to figure out something. Algebra, Biology, Physics, studying my ass off and only coming up with 83s if I was lucky on tests. Somehow feeling that this was never good enough. My father is trying to teach me math at the table telling me “it was easy” but not actually explaining the problem or how he got it. He was supposed to be a professor? I don’t recall really ever being interested in something? 

I remember doing what had to be done. I remember the following lists. I remember checking off to-do list items and feeling accomplished, and that was really the only time I was happy. I fell in love with the concept of accomplishment. I never developed interests. It was always told to me that I was going to college; I was never given the option of a gap year, or technical school, or work. Would my life have been different had I chosen to fly to Spain when I was 18? How? I guess that’s all in the past now, but I am who I am because I suffered 4 miserable years at the University of Georgia and was forced to pick a major of Education. Moving forward, I think constantly about how the seniors I’ve taught for four years are going to move into their futures. 

I’m already seeing they are entirely uninterested in reading novels and discussing their relevance. I have to have them do that, but they’d rather discuss with me the current election in Brazil and how they just turned 18 and voted absentee because their current president is a certified whack job. Actually, the way this girl described the incumbent Brazilian president sounds a lot like I describe the current American one. She cut the conversation short with me and wrote me a note, in fluent English, that said the other Brazilian girl (both of whom I’ve taught for 3 and 4 years respectfully) is on the opposite side of the political spectrum and didn’t want to hurt feelings. 

These kids are going to be OK. This is the same girl who told me yesterday “My parents said that if I don’t go to college they will kill me.” Wow. I instantly shot back to my senior year. My father said the exact same thing to me. She’s pushing back, maybe. The kids will be OK. 

I say all of this because I have invested time into this community. I know it’s just my work community. If I tell any of this to Cameron he would tell me I’m getting too close to my students and I need to take a professional step back. I do teach them the elements of literature. I do teach them how to find the central claim of an argument. They can do that. They don’t want to talk about that stuff. They know how to do that stuff. They can do that if you make it a class requirement. They WANT to talk about this stuff. They want to talk about stuff that matters. 

I say all of this because I’m torn. I don’t have a specific memory, but I’m driven to many memories of my youth daily. I don’t think I’ve ever thought about the person I could become. I think I’ve always thought about what other people expected of me. I’m in a profession that expects me to provide a service where I am providing a zillion services daily. When is it going to be my turn? What do I really want out of life? I want me.