THERAPIST B IS
CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE SO THIS RESPONSE IS FROM A
PERSON-CENTRED COUNSELLOR WITH
EXPERIENCE OF WORKING WITH CHILDREN AND FAMILIES
Two things come across very
strongly to me from your dilemma. The first is that you
seem to be under a lot of pressure from your workplace,
your partner and from the expectations of your friends
and family, but mostly from yourself. The second thing
to come across is that you are seeing the solutions as
black-and-white i.e. you have to either go back
to the job you left a year ago or you have to
leave it, you have to decide whether you want a
life in France and stay or you have to leave and
go back to the UK. Either way, I can't hear your voice
in there anywhere, I can only hear fear that you might
make the wrong decision and fail other people's
expectations and perhaps lose something precious if you
choose wrongly.
Maybe it's time you
stepped away from all the pressure and gave yourself
some serious head-space. What's the worst that can
happen if you don't go back to the job in England?
What's the worst that can happen if you give yourself
time-out from your partner? It sounds as though you may
be someone who has always had pressure to do what others
want, to keep people happy and to be a "good girl".
Maybe you started along this road because you thought it
was what you wanted and now that it hasn't worked out so
well, you can't remember what the original feeling was.
That is often a clue that you hadn't listened to
yourself properly back then, only to what you thought
you wanted?
Perhaps you could be more
assertive with work and with your partner as they are
more likely to respect you if you say what you want.
Tell them that you want to have some thinking time
before you can give answers to life-changing decisions
and that they will know the answers as soon as you have
had time to make your decisions.
We are often afraid to
say what we want in case other people disapprove or
won't like us as much. You say you aren't often
depressed but are depressed here - my hunch would be
that you are feeling depressed because you are trapped.
Only by giving yourself space so that your voice is the
only one talking will you be able to hear what you are
really saying and what you really want. |