“Out there”—she gestured out the window, then the door—“me and you are friends. We talk about everything. You laugh, and you smile, and you are a very likable person to be around. But then we come in here, and you’re not just resistant. You’re combative. Every question I ask, you answer aggressively. And I want to know why. What happens when you walk through that door? Why does just sitting here with me and talking about your feelings make you angry?”
Guilt roiled around in my gut, a familiar sensation I knew like the back of my hand.
There were few people in this world I cared for more than Rhiannon. Even fewer I respected as much as I respected her. The last thing I wanted to do was offend her. “I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be aggressive or combative.”
“You don’t need to be sorry, but you do need to think about that.” Rhiannon studied me. “What do you feel when you sit down here to talk to me? What emotion do you feel?”
Biting my lip, I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
“Then what does it feel like in your body?” She looked me over, watching every move I made. “What does it remind you of?”
That, I could answer easily. “Like when I was a kid, and I first started performing. Like I can feel everyone’s eyes on me, and I don’t want to screw it up.”
I don’t want you to see how much of a shitshow my head really is.
Rhiannon’s stiff expression softened. “There’s no pressure to perform here, Gwen. I’m not judging. I’m just trying to help you.”
“I know that,” I said. “And I appreciate it. I’m just not good at this. I don’t know what’s broken in me that I’m supposed to fix.”
“Who said you were broken?” Her voice sounded softer now too. “I don’t think you’re broken.”
“Then why do I have to do this? Why do we have to sit here and talk about my feelings if there’s nothing wrong with them?”
“Because you need to be able to identify what they are, Gwen.” Deep lines etched her forehead, suggesting she was as confused as I was. “You need to be able to have a feeling and name what it is.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why do I need to name my feelings? They come, and they go, and a new one comes, and it goes. It’s a never-ending cycle. I feel something, and I fix it, and I move on. What else is there to do with them?”
For a few heartbeats, Rhiannon just stared at me. Confusion dissipated as she nodded. “We might be getting somewhere here.”
“And where are we getting, exactly?”
“What you just said there, aboutfixingthem. That’s the root of a lot of your problems, kid.”
Blood sloshed between my ears, throbbing harder and harder. I rubbed my temples. “You’re gonna have to explain this to me like I’m two.”
“You think that feelings are problems that need solving.” The beads in Rhiannon’s braids clinked with the shake of her head. “They’re not. A feeling might point to a problem, but if you can’t feel that feeling, then name that feeling, you’re not going to get to the root of the problem.”
“I thought you said trying to fix them was the root of my problem.”
“It is,” Rhiannon said. “Our goal is not tofixthem. If you don’t learn to feel your feelings, name them, and search for the root of them, you’re just gonna bury yourself. You’ve done it before. When you were with Troy, the first time he put his hands on you, he hurt you, and it scared you, but you resolved the issue at hand. You two kissed and made up, because that was easier than dealing with the fear. You solved the simplest problem in front of you instead of the root problem.”
“Alright,” I said, sinking back in my seat. “A valid point.”
“The very first time he hurt you, what was the root of the problem on your end? Not whatever reason he gave to justify it.”
The words were sour leaving my lips. “He used violence to control me.”
“And what was the healthiest way for you to solve that problem?”
“Leaving.” I fought the urge to squirm at the unpleasant chill that ran down my spine. “But I did that, so I don’t see what your point here is.”
“Just that getting to the root of that problem is how we progress as people.” She leaned in again. “That’s why I asked about your mom. Not to judge her, but to understand what happened in your life that makes expressing your feelings so hard. Did you ever talk about your feelings with her?”
I went back to chewing my cheek. “Not really.”
