Erica has been married for 11 years and has two daughters.  She says  she should be happy; her husband loves her and her kids are great.  But something is obviously wrong – or she wouldn’t be in my office.

In telling me about her painful childhood, she says she learned to put on her, “I’m fine” smile.  It helped her get though high school, college, and into her marriage.  She has been “fine” for so long, she has no idea how she really feels about anything.  She then says she’s not sure if she loves her husband. 

“How could you know, since being fine must have led to numbing out your feelings.  So, how could you know how you really feel – maybe about a lot of things?

This leads her to talk about not being able to leave him, even if she wanted to, because it would upset him, his parents, her parents, and of course her children.  And, besides, she has no guarantee that leaving him would make her feel better, more alive.

“I know I could manage if I left; I’m independent, competent, have a good job.  I can support myself financially, and live on my own. But, I’d disappoint so many people.”

I asked what she would like to feel at the end of her therapy.  She said, “to trust myself.” 

That sounded like a great goal.  To do this, we talked about how she needed to understand herself and her feelings.  In one of those moments when something comes to me that sounds silly, I asked, “Have you ever had a good belly laugh?”

Apparently, it wasn’t such a silly question after all.  “No.  I always am on an even keel.  Never too up or too down – at least that’s what others see in me.  Actually, it’s what I see in myself, too.  I do kind of feel numb a good part of the time, even when I’m with my daughters.”

She got really sad, thinking about that.

She had heard about the Unique Retreats for Women Ready for Change, but wondered, “How do I know if I am really ready for change?”

After more discussion, she said, “I think a group of women, women I don’t know, who won’t judge me, might be helpful for me.  To get some feedback, but also to give me a sense of what other women really feel.  I am pretty sure now I can’t leave Paul, until I find myself first.”

Wish I could tell you it's a fairy-tale ending -- that Erica attended the retreat and had a total life changing experience.  Actually, some women do have that type of results from the retreat, but not Erica.  But, being with the other women, hearing their stories, getting feedback from them, opened her to looking more closely at her own life and how her feelings had gotten so numbed. 

"That exercise about women being trained by society to be 'fine,' was especially helpful," she said later.

Erica did not divorce her husband, but as she becomes more in touch with her feelings, she is aware he is having a hard time accepting this part of her.  She's still struggling, because she is happy to know she really does have opinions about some things, but worried that he wants his "old" numb wife back.