The week following Session 5, I remember it being a rather simple week where not much happened. There wasn’t anything to get frustrated about, so at that point, I wasn’t sure if I had truly made any progress with my frustrated part. I felt that I had, but I couldn’t say for certain.

At the start of the next session, Ryan told me we could go back to the Frustrated part and the Fast part we’d met before, or if something pressing had come up, we could go to that instead. He assured me I was the one driving the session, and that I should go with what I think is best. I decided to go back to the Frustrated and Fast parts to find out more about them and try to help them since they were the ones that controlled me a lot during that time.

I entered my meditative stance, and, instead of guiding me back to the Frustrated and Fast parts, Ryan had me invite them into a neutral room. I visualized a simple classroom look with a table in the middle. At first, I struggled to reach out to them because I was simply calling out to them. I wasn’t being creative with my call to them, so they didn’t come. Ryan then told me there are many ways to get a part’s attention and gave some examples, like sending a text to the part or talking to them through some sort of speaker. Since it was a classroom-like setting, I imagined a loudspeaker from a school and asked for them to join me.

When they joined me, Ryan encouraged me to keep the place comfortable for them, so I imagined us all sitting on beanbags in a circle and talking. He told me it was important to give them both enough time to talk and mediate as needed. We decided to give the Frustrated part a chance to talk first.

The Frustrated part told me the Fast part always pushed me forward, even when it’s not working. The Fast part kept making me doing the same thing over and over, which only makes me angry or annoyed that I am struggling with a problem. When my Frustrated part did his job of making me frustrated to pull me away to calm myself and find a new solution, my Fast part keeps me trying to finish the problem without setbacks like stepping away. This was annoying/frustrating to my Frustrated part because his job was to help keep me from getting too heated or angry to solve a problem. The Frustrated part has always pulled me away to help me calm down and go back later to figure out a solution to a difficult problem, but the Fast part makes his job much more difficult to do when he pushes me forward.

After that, the Fast part spoke and more or less said the same thing as the Frustrated just from the opposite point of view. The Frustrated part pulled me away when the Fast just wanted to finish something and get it over with. He doesn’t like the stress and the anger the Frustrated part would put on me when I struggle with finding a solution to a difficult problem. Also, the Fast part found it embarrassing when the Frustrated part would affect me. I’d get overly angry around people, or do something weird (like one time I placed my head on the floor and spun around while counting out loud during math homework in front of my family). He just really preferred pushing me forward to take the problem head-on until it’s done so I could go back to doing the things I liked to do.

After both parts said their peace, Ryan encouraged me to come up with a solution. Up until this point in my therapy, he had done a lot of the talking to help me with my parts, but now he wanted me to do it so I could practice being Self-led.

I decided to address the Fast part first. I told him while I do agree facing the problem is important, he pushes me to do the same thing over and over while continuing to fail, only with slight modifications. There have been many times while playing video games that I continued to push forward and died/failed in the game because I was stuck on one solution with only slight modifications. It was only after the Frustrated part pulled me away that I was able to come back with the actual solution that was much different than what I had been trying previously. Sometimes, I need space from the problem to find the solution. He said he was willing to allow me to step away when it was the right thing to do.

I then addressed the Frustrated part, saying I understood why he would do what he did, but it was affecting me in a negative way. These angry and frustrated emotions would cause me to feel bad about myself or lash out in a certain way. Sometimes, I did need to put my head down and push forward even if it was difficult. He said he was willing to allow me to continue with problem solving sometimes, even if I was having trouble, if it made sense to do that.

Then I addressed both parts and thanked them both for their openness and helping me in their own way. Ryan pointed out, as he will more in the future during disagreements between parts, they are two sides of the same coin. They both wanted to help; they just had different ways of going about it.

We worked to compromise with these two parts and find a solution they both felt worked for them. We decided that to stop the Fast part from pushing me to no avail, the Frustrated part would ease up on getting me so angry and heated it would rile up my entire system. The Fast part would in turn allow me to step away and come up with a better solution. They would continue to do their jobs to help me/protect me, but both would ease up so they wouldn’t be taking it to the extreme and affecting the other.

That next week, I noticed I got way less angry at my struggles through problems. It was a bit mind blowing for me and surprising; while I did believe in the work I was doing, I couldn’t believe I’d have results that fast. It did take several sessions, but a problem I had my whole life of pushing through difficult times and then getting increasingly angry to the point I couldn’t function for a bit was fixed to be healthier. I’m not saying I don’t feel frustrated or a push to continue forward at time, but the feelings aren’t nearly as strong. I’m still very thankful for my therapist and my parts for being willing to work together to help me with this.