Am I Too Much in Therapy?

There’s a moment in therapy when you hesitate before speaking—not because you don’t know what to say, but because you’re afraid of saying it again.

The same fear. The same spiral. The same pain you already dragged in three sessions ago.

You sit there, heart racing, thinking, Am I being too much? Too needy? Too repetitive? Too broken to fix?

It doesn’t matter how many times your therapist says, “This space is for you.”

There’s still a part of you that keeps score.

A part that whispers: They’re tired of hearing this. You’re exhausting. You should be better by now.

And then the guilt kicks in.

Guilt for not making faster progress.

Guilt for needing so much reassurance.

Guilt for dreading the end of every session because it means being alone with your thoughts again.

Sometimes I wonder if I’m leaning too hard on someone who’s only supposed to hold me for 50 minutes at a time. I wonder if she can feel the emotional weight I’m putting on her shoulders—and if I’m unknowingly reenacting every old wound that left me afraid of abandonment.

And then I spiral about spiraling. Because of course I do.

But here’s what I’m learning: therapy isn’t about being tidy.

It’s not about presenting your trauma like a well-written essay with bullet points and a conclusion.

It’s about showing up messy. Repeating yourself until it finally lands. Saying the hard thing out loud even when it sounds pathetic in your head.

It’s about trusting that someone trained to hold space for the heaviness… actually wants to hold it.

I’m not too much.

I’m just someone who was made to feel like I was too much for far too long.

And every time I risk being seen—messy, emotional, repetitive—I rewrite a little piece of that story.

So if you’ve ever wondered whether you’re too much in therapy, let me offer you this:

You’re not.

You’re just finally letting yourself be all of you.

And that’s exactly what therapy is for.