You’re not a bad person for wanting to hurt him back. You’re just a person whose emotional system is trying to solve a problem it doesn’t have the right tools for.
Emotional Bytes Theory - Friendships - In the Therapy Room - Melanie Doss
In the Therapy Room: When Apology Gifts Feel Like Emotional Hostage Situations
Tessa arrived in my office carrying an invisible weight I recognized immediately—that specific hypervigilance that comes from having your trust demolished and then being asked to trust again. She was seventeen, recently relocated, and caught in that particular teenage purgatory […]
Friendships - In the Therapy Room - Monica Dean
In the Therapy Room: Navigating the Complexity of Human Connection and Emotional Honesty in Friendships
I met Tessa in a café on Deansgate, where she’d cornered me after overhearing a conversation about emotional honesty. She had that look I’ve come to recognize—someone who’s been running the same mental loop for weeks, desperately trying to solve […]
Breakups - Friendships - In the Therapy Room - Sophia Rivera
In the Therapy Room: Healing from Betrayal When Your Ex Takes Your Friend
💔 When Your Ex Takes Your Friend (And Your Friend Takes Your Ex) She was sitting in my office, skin drawn tight over her cheekbones, the weight loss obvious and worrying. Not the healthy kind you see after someone finds […]
Friendships - Identity - In the Therapy Room - Lucian Blackwood
In the Therapy Room: Manipulative Relationships and Reclaiming Personal Sovereignty
🔥 A Case Study by Lucian Blackwood. The ritual chamber in my office—a simple space with black walls, red accents, and carefully selected symbolic objects—has witnessed countless moments of transformation. Yet few stand out as vividly as my work with […]
Friendships - In the Therapy Room - Monica Dean
In the Therapy Room: Toxic Friendships and the Difficulty of Setting Boundaries
🌪️ When Friendships Feel Like Quicksand I remember Rachel vividly—a bright 28-year-old with kind eyes that couldn’t quite hide her exhaustion when she first walked into my consulting room. She sank into the armchair with a mix of relief and […]
Jas Mendola - Women’s Issues
Therapy Confessions: The Body Armor of Female Friendships andBody Image
She sat across from me in my office, fidgeting with the edge of her cardigan. The late afternoon sun cut through the blinds, laying stripes across the carpet between us. Ava was strong, competent in her corporate role, but today […]
Heartbreak - Sophia Rivera
Therapy Confessions: Friendship Breakups and Shame Spirals
💔 The Emotional Mathematics of Friendship Loss Let me tell you about the emotional mathematics of friendship breakups: they hit with approximately 3.7 times the force of romantic ones, yet receive about 0.02% of the cultural sympathy. Everyone prepares you […]
Jas Mendola
I’m Thinking About My Friends More Than I Admit
He sat at the wooden bar, staring at the amber liquid in his glass. Two missed calls from Mike glowed on his phone. Three months had passed since they’d spoken. It was his oldest friendship. Twenty years. He thought about […]
Dating - Lola Adams
I’ve Watched Countless Female Friendships Implode, and I’ve Come to a Stunning Realization
There’s a particular breed of social warfare that happens when female friendships implode, and watching it unfold is like witnessing a carefully choreographed demolition. The precision is almost artistic—every social connection severed with surgical accuracy, every mutual friend recruited as […]