Updated 7-8-2026.md (markdown)

+- Asked if he knew other parts. It did. I asked if it knew the suicide/executioner part. It did. Laughed. Said something to the effect of "That guy has no idea what's going on."

+

+## Sunday Morning IFS

+

+- Dreamt about Garrett and Erin during the night. Themes mostly around rebuilding normalcy / friendship. Also, one part where Erin pulled me aside to say something meaningful in private, but that's when I realized it was a dream, got really sad and the dream ended.

+- Next morning (Sunday) weighed down by longing for Erin. Decided to IFS it.

+- Found familiar part missing Erin and longing for her. Pretty much hit a dead end when I acknowledged it's feelings and thanked it for sharing. That didn't cause it to calm down or change in any way.

+- Started asking more questions. "Have you always felt this way about Erin?". "No".

+- "When was a time you didn't feel this way?". Kinda pictured times around 2017-2018. It hadn't really taken hold at that point yet.

+- "Could you ever feel this way about somebody else?". "Yes"

+- "Could you ever feel this way about Jessica?"... Another part piped up: "No!"

+- Acknowledged the other part. It spoke up and kinda had a strong stance that Jessica was not a candidate. I thinked it, asked if I could talk to the other part. It kinda backed down.

+- Repeated the question "Could you ever feel this way about Jessica?". It seemed at that point it just got really sad, and asked it that meant losing "Erin". I said, "No. Nothing's happening to Erin". It responded reluctantly that it was possible, maybe. The whole while this other part was present putting pressure.

+- Returned to the part that did not want to develop feelings for Jessica. Got into an old problem that I've been trying to solve, and I think this part holds the key. Was picturing, with this part, holding intense eye contact with Jessica. It flared up and was super uncomfortable, rejected it. Was repulsed by it.

+- I started to dig into why. We pictured long eye contact with others, including Erin, but even with other women I know to whom I have no real emotional connection, beyond friendship. In all other cases, it felt pretty neutral, or in a couple cases, calming and welcome.

+- Returned to the experiment with Jessica. I asked it why it felt so uncomfortable. It presented imagery of Anthony Hopkins channeling reptilian energy as he stares into the camera for Silence of the Lambs. Deeply unsettling. Kindof explored this for a while. Ultimately, it felt like the best explanation the part liked was that with these other people, there's a warmth and connection there. Sometimes welcomed, sometimes not. But it's very human and relatable. In the case of Erin, it pulls me in. It gives as much as it takes. But with Jessica, there's something desperate and unfamiliar about it. She wants something from me, and there's something in me that notices the cold-blooded instictual lock that a cat has on a mouse, or that a snake has on it's prey. I will get nothing out of this. But I sense that if I allow myself to be vulnerable, she'll take and hurt along the way. Or something. Couldn't really identify a specific thing I was afraid of that she'd do. But with the part, did identify that somehow or another this part had identified her as not trustworthy of being vulnerable. Other parts have theories. But for now I'm just leaving it at the fact that this part doesn't trust her and has a basic low-level caution around her.

+- Interestingly... on a conscious intellectual level it's kinda confusing. A lot of the talk around the situation, especially from Jessica would have me reason that the cold-blooded reptilian emotional vampire is Erin, who was doing whatever she did motivated purely by need for attention and validation, knowing that it was going to hurt me eventually. Don't know how to reason on this. Can't really know the truth. But it's worth noting how strongly my nervous system leans in the other direction.