I verbally slapped a client today.
The words were out before I could catch them. Not cruel, but sharp. A line too direct, a little too unfiltered. Immediately, I scrambled into damage control:
“Are we good?”
We are.
And yet—I’m in my head about it.
I used to get caught in this spiral far more often post-session. Wondering if I’d damaged the relationship beyond repair. My inner critic would suit up and take center stage, wielding a mic and a mallet, making a mess of me.
But today, I’m holding back a bit.
Cooling myself down.
Giving myself space to breathe.
Because I know I’m not in my clearest state of mind. Not yet. I’ll wait. Let the dust settle before deciding whether I was wrong or just human.
What I do know is this:
I hear my clients.
I really hear them.
I hold their dreams, hopes, and whispered longings like pocket stones—precious gems I tuck away and bring out when they forget what matters.
The wish for meaning.
The craving to be seen by someone they love.
The ache to be respected at work.
To live with intention.
To stop pretending they’re fine.
“Remember this?” I’ll ask.
And I’ll turn the stone slowly in my palm, thumb brushing its surface—earthy grime, glowing ember, iridescent under the right light.
They lose sight of it. Of course they do.
History has littered the path with betrayal and wounds. Barriers so old they look like landscape.
And so their vision dims.
The dream becomes just another pebble in the gravel.
But I don’t forget.
I carry it for them.
And when I see them act in ways that contradict what they truly want, I feel it.
Their sadness.
Their stuckness.
Their disappointment.
And I wonder—to what cost will they keep paying rent in pain?
I know that feeling.
I’ve lost time. So much of it.
Time spent distracted. Dissociated. Running from myself.
And when I finally came back, it felt like getting slammed into the present by a semi-truck.
I had to grieve all of it:
The years.
The quiet relationships that went untended.
The version of my life I never got to live.
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 