Solitude
Time without others which — unlike loneliness — is chosen and often needed.
How it shows up
Loneliness is a lack of contact; solitude is room for it. Someone who can’t bear solitude often fills it with people who don’t give them what they want.
What we do with it in therapy
The capacity to be alone develops out of the experience of another person’s safe presence. So for many people this isn’t a question of scheduling but an old question of attachment.
See also
Adoption
Creating a family by another route, which brings its own questions about origins and belonging.
Consequences instead of punishment
A response that is connected to the act and known in advance — not an expression of an adult's anger.
Trauma
Not the event itself but the trace it leaves — when an experience exceeds the capacity to process it and stays in the body as the present.
