After years of talking about, thinking about it and putting it on the back burner, I’ve finally done it. I found a therapist.

Tomorrow morning I will sit in the office of a woman named Gina and I will begin the process of spilling my guts to her. I don’t know how therapy works, I’ve never done this before and I’m sure my vision of sitting in a comfy chair holding a box of tissues while I go over my litany of pain, of hurts, of trauma, of despair and existential crises while she takes copious notes and nods in all the right places while she comes up with ideas of how to undo the mess that is my brain is a little off base.

I’m nervous. I’m outright scared. I’ve had so much bottled up in me for so long that I don’t know what’s going to happen when I let it out. Will it be a catharsis or will it just make me feel worse? Will I curl up in a fetal position and refuse to answer prodding questions or will I spew forth everything all at once, screaming out confessions like Chunk in The Goonies?

What if we don’t hit it off? What if I feel like I don’t want to entrust her with my innermost secrets and feelings? Or what if I like her a lot, and we make a connection, and she helps me heal, wouldn’t that be something?

I know this is a long process and I’m not going to spend my first session spilling everything out at once. But I don’t know where to start. I don’t know what to tell her. I am just full of anxiety and pain and hurt and depression. How do we get to the why and who and how? Do I start at the beginning or do I start with the most recent or do I wait for cues…