All happy families are
alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. ~ Leo Tolstoy
I mentioned in an
earlier post that I've started going to a therapist. I've now been to
see Alan 3 times. Each time has been unique, and at any given moment my mind
might have changed about how I feel about the endeavor overall. But if you all would indulge me, I’d like to
share some of my thoughts about it.
My first visit I had no
idea what to expect. The Bishop told me to go so that we could determine
whether or not I have anxiety and, if so, get me some medication to fix the
problem. I was pretty sure I didn't have clinical anxiety, but why not
check. I then proceeded to have one of the worst, most anxious and
stressed out weeks of my entire life just a little while before going in for my
appointment. It was really superlatively awful, but it sort of primed me
to think that maybe I DO have prescription-level anxiety issues. So I
went in incredibly nervous about so many things. Alan was very nice, but
nevertheless, I left feeling absolutely emotionally disheveled. I felt as
though I'd just spent an hour having someone poke and pick at me and try to
break me down into my constituent bits and I absolutely hated it. Full
disclosure: I sat in my car and cried for several minutes afterward, and spent
the entire drive down to work fighting to regain my composure.
I tried to figure out
what made that first visit so stressful and unpleasant and I came up with a few
ideas. I kept fixating on this one moment as I was leaving when Alan
patted me on the shoulder and said “you did great”. The sort of thing you say to someone who is
clearly on the verge of melting down (which, annoyingly, was basically what I
did as soon as I left his office). He
had said it because he could tell I was barely holding it together. But why was I barely holding it
together? Why had I been so
nervous? I decided that I shouldn’t be
nervous. I decided that I should take
charge on my next visit. I wasn’t a
person who struggles to hold it together.
I’m not a person who cries in my car.
He hadn’t really seen the real me.
So next time I was going to go in there and make it very very clear who
the real me is, and let him know that I’m really a normal, well-adjusted
human. And that is exactly what I
did. I told him I was fine, things were
fine, the world was fine, and his time would probably be much better used
helping people with actual real problems.
And at the end of the visit he basically told me “If you actually want
to work on anything then I’m more than willing.
But if you don’t then why come in again?”
That was a very good
question and I thought about it for the two weeks till my next
appointment. And the more I thought the
less I knew. On the one hand, I am by no
means so arrogant as to think that I am the one person on earth who wouldn’t benefit from going to
therapy. And I certainly do have my fair
share of issues I’d like to figure out.
On the other hand, I was having a really hard time understanding how
talking to a random guy I’d met twice before in my life was going to help
me. What was he going to tell me that I
hadn’t already thought of? In spite of
these doubts, I decided to go back for my third visit. And in deciding I also decided to commit to
opening myself up more like my first visit.
I just saw an episode of Blue Bloods where Frank goes to see a therapist
and after several attempts the therapist says “Frank, you’re a very intelligent
man and I have no doubt you’d be able to successfully evade my questions all day.” In my case, it proved nothing to sidestep
questions, and refusing to be at all vulnerable would shut me out from any kind
of growth. So I committed to letting
myself be at least a little vulnerable.
And I did. I went back for my third visit this
week. I talked through many of my
concerns and doubts about continuing to come.
Alan was able to explain to me more clearly the format he adopts in his
sessions. He believes that there is
value in simply experiencing emotions with someone, and then understanding the
whys and hows of those emotions and growing from them. Very very foreign approach to me. But I figured that if I was going to try then
I had to trust him. And perhaps his
style, so very very different from mine, will be good for me.
Alan’s format is, rather
than to ask specific questions or address “assignments” from before, to have me
simply tell him about my life and my concerns and what has been bothering
me. I was kind of shocked by how hard that
ended up being for me. Some of my
friends, like Matt or Kara or Caleb, know that I can definitely vent when someone
or something is annoying. But to simply
start talking to a relative stranger about all the negative things that I had
thought and felt for the previous two weeks?
It was unexpectedly formidable. And
even though I’m trying to trust Alan and his system, I am still having a hard
time reconciling myself to the idea. To
me, it feels like I am indulging in the worst aspects of my nature. The parts of me that I should be working to
change. If I give voice to them then
that is giving them that much more legitimacy.
When I brought this up
to Alan he had some explanation, but he also said that I don’t have to worry because
he knows I’m a good person and nothing I say is going to make him think
differently. When he said it I had one
of those uncomfortable moments of realization that yes, in fact, I am exactly
like every single other human out there.
Everyone worries about making themselves look bad. You don’t share your secrets with strangers
because you don’t trust that stranger to judge you rightly. So Alan was giving me the assurance that I
didn’t need to have that worry; that he was going to judge me rightly.
But on the other hand,
that didn’t feel like the whole problem.
I understand that this is Alan’s job and that he knows how to listen to
people without judgment.
But what about me?
If I start telling
someone else all my struggles and all my emotions then how can I continue believing that I am a good
person?
You know that feeling
that they say we all get, that we are pretending in a world full of people who
actually have it together? That voice,
telling you that you are a pretender, it is the voice I am so afraid of. It is the constant conscience who will not be
silenced. The one who evaluates
everything you are and finds it wanting.
The one that hears other people praising you and whispers “but they don’t
really know…”
All of the things that
Alan wants me to share, they are the fodder for that voice. If I keep them locked up and never allow them
the life of another person’s hearing then I can keep the voice quiet enough to
ignore most of the time. I can go on
believing myself to be strong and intelligent and sensible and together. Yes, I have this endless litany in my head of
all the ways that is not true, but I never speak them, I never let them
out. I never dignify them with
acknowledgement. I am terrified that if
I do I won’t be able to ignore them anymore.
I’m not worried that
Alan will think I’m a bad person, I’m worried that I’ll finally believe that I
am.
No one wants to think
that there is something wrong with them.
We all want to be well-adjusted, fully functioning human adults. But ultimately I don’t think there is any
person so normal and so happy and so sensible that if you look closely enough
you won’t find that they are a little bit broken somewhere. I know this.
So I guess talking to a therapist is supposed to reconcile me to it in
myself. They say the first step is
admitting you have a problem…
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