Based on what she had uncovered about her mother’s punitive perfectionism in previous sessions, I was certain that being late had triggered her into an emotional flashback. In this moment, she was experiencing right-brain emotional dominance and a decrease in left-brain rational thinking. As so often happens in a flashback, she temporarily lost access to her post-childhood knowledge and understanding. This appears to be a mechanism of dissociation, and in this instance, it rendered my client amnesiac of my high regard for our work together.
