TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

THERAPIST: Come on in! [00:01:46]

CLIENT: (pause) Good morning!

THERAPIST: Good morning!

CLIENT: So, thank you for your e-mail.

THERAPIST: Oh, sure!

CLIENT: It was very helpful. Also, but I like the paint.

THERAPIST: Oh, thank you. Yeah, it’s finally, now the paint is finished.

So, yeah, we should talk more about that, that experience. I really, you did say that. I really do apologize; it was a complete error on my part. It got mixed up in a group of checks that I deposited that day, so I really do apologize for that. I’m sorry if it put you out in any way. That’s not good. [00:02:44]

CLIENT: Thank you. It’s really okay. And I think in a lot of ways, it was very helpful. The experience was helpful. So... But thank you. Part of the experience was... I think being able to express that I was upset, and have you say, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that, but it happened, and I’m sorry it happened,” and have that... resolve and... So I guess I’m happy to talk more about like, the feelings during it, but I also want to talk about sort of realizations that result from it, and what the rest of the week since then has been like.

THERAPIST: Whatever, wherever you want to start. [00:03:41]

CLIENT: Okay. So I guess things... One thing that I realized, it’s a... it seems to me that... the actual incident is not that big a deal. Like, you cashed a check I asked you not to cash, a little bit early. The ramifications are very small in a practical sense. So I... I think the (chuckles) I think I’m angry, not with you, just like, I think I’m angry a lot. I had... certainly for several weeks been out of touch with that and... so in a sense this like, brought that back to the forefront. Does that sound reasonable?

THERAPIST: (affirms) And it probably wasn’t so out of mind, or buried down than you thought (chuckles), maybe, because it was, because you accessed it. [00:04:46]

CLIENT: Yeah. It was out of mind in the sense that like, I wasn’t aware of it. So I had... The previous week, I’d had some trouble getting work done. I’ve been working, but it was hard. I was not happy, but I couldn’t really say anything more than “I wasn’t happy.” Since then, with this sort of, “No, I’m actually angry,” and just... that’s a part of where I am. I’m not always angry, but it’s always there. It’s been a lot easier to work, actually. So... I... I hesitate to draw any stronger conclusion than stating those facts next to each other, but... I thought that was interesting. (therapist affirms)

(pause 00:05:43 to 00:06:16)

THERAPIST: One of the things that I thought about is just, in a general way like, coming to rely and really trust someone who then really disappoints you. In a way that feels sort of unexpected, maybe even feeling blind-sided.

CLIENT: Yeah. I mean, certainly a lot of those feelings were there and were sort of... My sense of you is as a, is very responsible in some way like, and I don’t know, orderly, but I don’t mean those as bad ways. Sometimes people take those as like... you know, overly controlling or something. But in my general... sense of you has been that you are very sensitive to... both to my needs and to my time and resources and things like that. (therapist affirms) And so, yeah, definitely a... [00:07:13]

That is not a place that I would have expected... you to make a mistake, but at the same time like, I don’t really think that you are... not human and capable of doing everything perfectly at every moment, so... (pause) I guess that’s a lot of ways of saying, yes, that that was, that was definitely a piece of it. But there is all like, even while I was angry, there was the sense of like... maybe that, maybe it was part of it. (pause) In being angry, there was this... yeah, sense of... disconnect between... where I thought you were and where... what was happening or something like that. (pause) Is this weird for you? [00:08:35]

THERAPIST: What part of it?

CLIENT: I mean, so... (pause) Again, I actually like, in retrospect, think this is not that big a deal, but we’re talking about it a whole lot. Is that... weird... for you?

THERAPIST: It’s not weird for me.

CLIENT: Okay. Great. I was just curious.

THERAPIST: And I would... like I’d feel it was, how, yeah, how might I feel it’s weird? I’m not sure how.

CLIENT: Um, you know, so you might, I don’t know what you would feel, do feel. But you might, you know, be upset that you did this thing and would continue to dwell on it. That might not be helpful or something internally. (therapist responds) That’s not to say I think you should be upset by it. I...

THERAPIST: I’m just trying to think. So, but if that were the case, that would... like, that would assume that I, like I can’t get over it, like, that I (client chuckles) you know, it’s like, that I, I’m just, I’m not really going to focus on you. I’m just going to beat myself up or something or... [00:09:45]

CLIENT: Well, that’s certainly... how Tanya responds, so there is that. That’s one of the key pieces of all this, right? Is that I could say I was upset, you could say, “Yeah, I understand why you’re upset, I’m sorry.” And then it was done like... I felt like I hadn’t done anything bad to you, in telling you that I was upset. Also I felt closer to you, in some sense, because I was able to tell you, you were able to hear it and me being upset was able to resolve, because it just... Am I expressing that at all clearly?

THERAPIST: Yeah. But you already...

CLIENT: The event (ph)?

THERAPIST: You are trying to resolve. I mean, so you, but you resolve it, but it should be over, or that we should be moving on by now or something?

CLIENT: No, no, no. I’m... so I feel like the issue is resolved, but now we’re talking about it a lot more, as if it’s not resolved, because I think it has important implications for my other relationships, so... [00:10:48]

THERAPIST: Well, it’s resolved to the extent that you don’t feel angry at me anymore. (client affirms) But then, there are all these other... But then it’s meaningful, too; your reactions and your feelings are meaningful. (client affirms) So, it makes perfect sense that we talk about it. (client affirms) To me it does. It seems actually important. I mean, you had a very intense response, you were very reflective, you wanted to share it with me. I think it’s a very good idea that we talk about it. (pause) And it also encapsulates a lot of your experience over the last few years, if not longer, but at least the last few years.

CLIENT: Yeah, I agree. I think the... the reason I asked the question is because of the role you play as a focal point for... potentially here as of other events that really have nothing to do with you other than... now you’re in this relationship with me. [00:11:58]

THERAPIST: But I mean, I can hold on to that.

CLIENT: (chuckles) Yes, I understand that, and... Good. Thank you for reassuring me to that point.

THERAPIST: I think you were worried like, I’ll feel like the fall guy. Like, is that like, a little bit or am I...

CLIENT: Something like that, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think we’ve actually covered why I... but you might feel like the fall guy, you might not be able to deal with it internally. Not that I really think either of those is true, but those are the feelings that, you know, start to come up for me as we continue to talk about the same event.

THERAPIST: Well, what I feel is, I feel like it’s, I think it’s a great idea that we (chuckles) talk about it, so... [00:12:43]

CLIENT: Thanks.

THERAPIST: (pause) Yeah, there is sort of a highlighted... Well, I mean, it may be an obvious piece of it, but to highlight it. But it also speaks to the fact that you were allowing yourself to trust and rely on me, versus having to, versus what I guess another option you could have done. I appreciate it’s not as sort of conscious and intentional as this, but just to shut yourself off.

CLIENT: Oh, no, it was fairly intentional. I mean... (therapist affirms) Maybe not in the immediate moment, but... like, by the time I sent you the e-mail, I, it was to me... I felt like we had been building trust and this thing had happened, and I could either, you know, pull back or push forward. There wasn’t sitting in the same place as an option (therapist affirms), so I... exposed myself to more risk. (therapist affirms) And I really appreciate you, you know, being able to handle it. [00:14:00]

THERAPIST: Well, and even the process of allowing yourself to trust me enough to be so disappointed is something. (client chuckles) I mean, I really mean that.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) I mean, I do trust you a lot. I have for a while, and I know that like, you might look... it certainly seems to go up and down, and it might look different from over there than it does from over here, but...

THERAPIST: Not really, actually. I don’t feel... you have different experiences within that, but I don’t feel like it goes back and forth.

CLIENT: Okay. Thanks. (pause) So I’m going to skip ahead a little bit, not because I want to leave that, because I want to sort of get everything that we might talk about on the table (therapist affirms), then sort through it. So one realization that I think is that... So I’ve been angry for a long time. I’ve never, I don’t really have the experience of being angry for... a year or years before. Like, that’s not a part of my... previous experience. And so that’s a weird thing for me. [00:15:25]

So this event was really helpful. It was both cathartic, because... the whole problem could be resolved. My anger could be resolved in a way that I felt good about. But also it sort of, I felt like it pointed to... I haven’t had that same sense of... me being angry with Tanya being resolved. (therapist affirms) You know, she has said she is sorry for what I went through before, but... There is a way of saying, “I’m sorry that you got hurt,” and there is a way of saying, “I’m sorry that I did this thing,” or something like that. I’m not exactly... the latter has a level of responsibility I’m not entirely sure I even want to attach to her, but the former attaches zero responsibility to it, and I’m not okay with that. (therapist affirms) I feel like that’s the category of apology I’ve had from her. [00:16:28]

At this point, though I don’t really know that it matters. Like, I don’t know if that... I’m not sure. Maybe it would, but... I certainly don’t see a way to say, “Look, I’m really angry with you and I don’t feel like you have apologized in a way that takes any ownership of what happened.” I don’t know that that would be constructive. (pause) So that’s one piece of the pie. And actually, that formulation is helpful. I don’t know particularly why, but... saying, “This is a thing about which I am upset,” is clarifying and helpful. [00:17:19]

So then I’m going to skip to our couples’ counseling session on Monday. So... I, you know, having realized that I was angry with Tanya, realized again that I was angry with Tanya, felt like that was an important thing to talk about, but... that’s not how we started the session. We started the session, she sort of talked about anxiety about where my job was going to take us next, so... I’m applying for jobs and post-doc positions I think, and... that might leave us here or it might take us somewhere else. But that’s been the case for a while, is the... my degree has, looked like it was wrapping up and continued to drag on for a while, so that’s left her in limbo, and I understand that, and... (pause) So we talked about that for a while. [00:18:20]

Dr. Jannis sort of... (chuckles) I think teased out of that... or suggested that it might related to a fear on her part that I’m going to leave her, and that she’s also been in limbo about that question for some time... (pause), which I thought was really interesting. We didn’t talk about it very much, but... (pause) I can’t remember the segue in that session to the next piece, but... there was one. So at some point... we got back to this... construction or story of Tanya’s having two voices in her, one that’s angry and telling her she’s worthless, and the other that is... just, you know, trying to be who she is, in some sense like... or was, or something; is more like the person that I knew and married. The other is, you know, some taskmaster or something. [00:19:45]

So we talked once about how my voice gets conflated with that other voice in her mind (therapist responds), and things that I say, she hears from that voice in some ways. So that... that was interesting and helpful, when we talked about it then. This time, though... (pause) again I don’t quite remember the... details, but I, so it had the sense that... that’s a helpful formulation, because I’m not, strictly speaking, angry with both pieces of Tanya. I’m really angry with that... taskmaster voice, because I don’t know who that is. That’s not the Tanya that I knew, that’s the person who has, in some sense, destroyed the Tanya that I knew, or something. So... maybe it’s not... I think there are problems with the construction, but it seemed... the good thing that comes out of it is that I have... some hope... that... there might be a future for us, because if there is some balance between those two voices or forces in her... the good one is not all gone. (pause) So I think that comes to the end of the pieces on the table. But I see them all as related to this other event. [00:21:28]

THERAPIST: That’s quite a realization.

CLIENT: (pause) It’s nice, in some ways. (pause) I told you... like, I think a couple of weeks ago that I wanted to leave Tanya, but didn’t think I was going to, because I didn’t think it was right. (therapist affirms) (pause) But there is something about, you know, there might actually be a future here, that makes that more okay for me.

THERAPIST: (affirms) Not just simply a matter of obligation. (client affirms) (pause) Sounds like quite a week. [00:22:26]

CLIENT: (chuckles) Yeah. (pause) So I guess at this point, I would... would be really happy to talk about any particular pieces that you... think it would be interesting to talk about more. I’m not exactly sure where to go back to.

THERAPIST: (affirms) I’m not sure either. I mean, they all seem significant. I’m not sure either. (client affirms) (pause) Maybe we can just see what comes to your mind. (client chuckles) (pause) That wasn’t a good answer? [00:23:47]

CLIENT: It’s a fine answer, it’s just, you know, it’s... I see it as one of a... as a professional answer like, the answer that someone in your profession might give.

THERAPIST: Less personal, then?

CLIENT: No, no, not so much that, just funny, because I see it as like, a particular instance of a type of... so I... (pause) Tanya and I were watching the BBC show “Sherlock” last night. There is... Have you seen it? (therapist denies) Okay, for... At any rate, one of the characters is with his therapist at the beginning of the episode. She’s very aggressive in the way that neither of, none of the therapists that I’ve ever seen... or that Tanya’s ever seen really are, when they’re any good. So she sort of is like, trying to get out of him... his particular feelings about an incident that happened. [00:25:11]

(pause) I think Tanya was sort of objecting to that, as portrayal. I said, “Well, you know, we don’t really have the... hour and a half and two sessions that it would take for her to get that out of him the normal way, which is to sit and stare at him until he says something.” So... (chuckles) So... Now we’ve gone there. (chuckles) I don’t think that’s really related to the other piece. (pause) So I guess I have this sense of like you are... watching me. We’ve talked about that like (therapist affirms), your role is diagnostician, in some sense. But I also like, am watching you a, as what you do and I find that fascinating. (therapist responds) So... That’s one of those places where... that gets in the way of what we’re actually doing. [00:26:21]

THERAPIST: Well, maybe. I don’t know. It also could be meaningful. It’s not clear where that piece fits in. (client chuckles) But you’re sort of thinking, sort of observing, being an obser , it’s sort of like you’re an observer from the outside. (client affirms) (pause)

What I started thinking about for the last two or three minutes is how we ended last week. We talked about twice a week and you know, I said, well, whatever, you know, we can keep it once a week but, your thoughts about it, I thought were very interesting, about your fears about twice a week, which I sort of linked to each other, in a sense, because there were two fears. But one of them was that you would like coming to talk to me more than you would Tanya as your wife, and that that was concerning to you. It really stuck with me.

CLIENT: Hmm. Interestingly, that is the only thing related to our sessions that came through my mind, either. (therapist responds) Then we kept, started talking about this other thing, but... So, okay. I guess we should talk about that. (therapist affirms) [00:27:37]

(pause) I’m not exactly sure what to say about that, though. (pause) I like you a lot, and I have a very high opinion of you. (pause) And I like talking to you. (pause) It’s not a contrast with how my relationship used to be with Tanya, but it is a contrast with how it is now. (therapist responds)

(pause 00:28:26 to 00:29:09)

Which, in some ways brings us back to my... sense that there are two voices in Tanya. There is one of them that I... still know and like, it’s just that that one isn’t let out that often, or is let out a lot more often now than... when it almost wasn’t let out at all. So it’s coming back, I guess, but... I think, I guess the distinction is very helpful to be able to say, “Well, sometimes she’s being this one person and sometimes this other,” because otherwise like, thinking of her as like, a single person makes it really hard to interact with her (therapist responds), because of the uncertainty as to like, what is going to happen, but... [00:30:00]

Sort of, you know, if the two person construct isn’t really helpful, her moods have a bimodal distribution and one of those modes is really hard to deal with and the other one is... much more like what I’m used to talking with. (pause) There is not any particular predictability as to which she’ll be, but... (pause) It’s sort of like, if you only get an average movie rating, but you’ve got a whole bunch of people rating it. Half of them rate it a “1”and half of them rate it a “5” (therapist affirms), but you only see the “3” rating. That’s a lot less useful information about the movie than if you can see both, see the whole distribution. (therapist affirms) Sorry for that, if that was already clear.

THERAPIST: No, no, no. That was helpful. [00:31:05]

CLIENT: Okay. So...

THERAPIST: You can’t just have the mean. You need the mean, median, and mode.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. Or, sometimes if you just plot the entire distribution, you get a lot more information, and you can just look at it. So that’s, you know... so that’s a digression now. (chuckles) But... So I feel like I have a better sense of... her not as a single valued, but as a multi-valued, and that’s helpful. (therapist affirms) (pause) I have this feeling that that is, going to that topic was safer than talking more about liking talking with you. That was one of the reasons that I did. I don’t know if you had the sense also. (therapist affirms) Okay.

THERAPIST: I did.

CLIENT: Thanks. It’s interesting.

THERAPIST: But, yeah. I guess I also feel I’m not going to push you to talk about them, or... [00:32:20]

CLIENT: I’m actually okay with you pushing me to talk about things. I don’t know that I need you to, but... I don’t think you’re going to upset me if you do. That may just not be how you want to do things, and that’s just fine, too.

THERAPIST: Well, we could start with why do you think you’d want to avoid talking about that.

(pause 00:32:52 to 00:33:21)

CLIENT: So the answer is anxiety. (pause) But about what is not... quite as clear. (pause) I’m going to go briefly to a different related thing, because it’s easier, but I’m actually curious about it, and we never quite get to it, so... Do you think it’s important to the work we do for me to not know very much about you?

THERAPIST: Um... (pause) I don’t know. (chuckles) I don’t have a strong feeling.

CLIENT: Okay. You don’t have like a general... not specific to us, but general feeling on that subject, or...?

THERAPIST: No, there are good arguments either way, so if (chuckles), you know, I don’t think, so I can’t answer like, I could see arguments either way. It’s probably the “1” and “5” distribution again (client affirms), not the “3,” because there are good arguments for and good arguments against, so... [00:34:38]

CLIENT: Do you feel like it ends up being...

THERAPIST: No, there is a... it’s a “3,” the feeling is a “3.”

CLIENT: (chuckles) Okay, thanks.

THERAPIST: Sorry, what were you going to say?

CLIENT: I was going to say, do you end up feeling like there are specific cases where it’s important one way or the other?

THERAPIST: Maybe. (client affirms) Probably if I thought about, maybe, but... (client affirms) I don’t know.

CLIENT: So, I have this general sense and I’ve expressed it before, that like, when I gesture towards asking things about you, you steer the conversation back to like, “Why might I be asking that,” which is... fine. But that gives me also the sense that like, you... you have some protective barrier for yourself. I don’t know whether that’s true, whether I’m fabricating that entirely, but... I think a piece of the anxiety is that I will like, run into that barrier in a way you’re not expecting or something. [00:35:41]

THERAPIST: (pause) Well, what I will say is in general, why I do that certainly consciously is I’m prioritizing.

CLIENT: That was another possible explanation. You know, it was particularly helpful that day that you said, “Well, I don’t know that I would describe myself as particularly chatty.” That, I guess that sort of... points towards that as... okay.

THERAPIST: (pause) But it’s certainly something that you’ve brought up before in other ways, about sort of violating some spoken or unspoken rule or, you know, it’s certainly kind of along that theme. [00:36:49]

CLIENT: Yeah, and some of that is just my like... you know, popular cultural understanding of the therapy relation in the sense of like... I mean, you know... I guess there is always a story about, you know, someone who became obsessed with a therapist and... whatever. And so, you know, one of the rules in the academic community is that you avoid, or in the like... administration community is that you avoid impropriety and also the appearance of impropriety. So I...

THERAPIST: Interesting. Never seen... but that’s true. But that’s interesting. [00:37:37]

CLIENT: So, that’s a piece of it, is... (pause) Yeah, it’s very important to me not to make you uncomfortable. I think that’s general to... my relationships with people, but it’s also specific to you.

THERAPIST: (pause) Well, what would happen if I felt uncomfortable? I’m not saying I do, but what’s the, what’s the problem with that?

CLIENT: (pause) Um, I would feel badly, if I knew. (pause) I think I would feel like I had done a bad thing, and I don’t, and I want to do good things, so... Maybe there is a deeper level than that, but that’s what I have, I think. [00:38:42]

THERAPIST: Maybe. I mean, I was thinking that it sort of implies a very linear cause and effect.

CLIENT: (pause) Hmm.

THERAPIST: I mean, if you did something, and I felt uncomfortable, there is a lot of mediating variables like, why am I more uncomfortable with some things than others. It’s not that you caused it. (chuckles)

CLIENT: Yeah, no, that’s fair.

THERAPIST: I mean, kind of like the check incident. It’s like, you tell me that you’re upset about this, I beat myself up. You know, if that happened, well, you didn’t cause me to beat myself up. There is something also going on inside of me, there is a whole mediating process.

CLIENT: That’s true, that’s true. (pause) That’s gets more complicated if I know that you will beat yourself up if I tell you that you’re (sic) upset... because, regardless of what the process is in the middle, I think, know what the effect will be. Does that makes sense? So like... exercising the cause is in some sense causing the effect, even though there is, it had nothing to do with the machinery, so... You’ve sort of objected to that reasoning before, on predictability grounds at the very least like, I can’t know with certainty that this is going to happen when I do that, but... (chuckles) But I respond with my typical risk aversion, I think. So... I avoid the, try to avoid the possibility there. [00:40:24]

THERAPIST: (pause) So this issue of your... liking to talk to me, and the feelings around that... (client chuckles) Bringing us back...

CLIENT: Thank you. I was... trying to do the same thing internally, so I appreciate it.

(pause 00:40:54 to 00:41:32)

So I think you have a number of fantastic qualities, and I think in, if this were any other kind of relationship, I would... I would be at risk of developing very strong feelings for you... which is a risk, only in the sense that I’m married (chuckles) (therapist responds) and so... that’s not unlike, that’s still not very clearly saying it, but at least I’ve started to say it.

THERAPIST: And what would the risk be?

(pause 00:42:08 to 00:42:33)

CLIENT: So... my answer to that is, the risk is that I would fall in love with you. The... but then I feel like you’d ask the same question again; what is the risk of that? (therapist affirms) And that’s really interesting, because I hadn’t really thought about that. I don’t know. (chuckles)

THERAPIST: (pause) The risk, there is only a risk, insofar as you’re married, is if you felt that it would really be competing. (client affirms) The feelings that you had would actually compete with your being married. But they are feelings, that will be feelings that we talk about, that you’d have, that you’d live with, that wouldn’t actually interfere or compete with your marriage. (pause) (client affirms) (pause) Or I guess the other risk, but then the marriage part, the being married is not as big a piece of it, is just sort of bearing feelings that can’t be acted on and maybe that’s a piece of it, too. [00:44:24]

CLIENT: Yeah, I think both of those are answers to the question. I don’t think there are other ones, so thank you for saying them for me. But yeah, I think those are the... I think that covers the risk portfolio.

THERAPIST: (pause) And I certainly don’t want to divert from you, and from us talking about it. But it makes me think about Tanya, early in your relationship, with this professor, and the fact that she developed those very intense feelings, not for another man, but for someone as an authority, as an adult figure (client responds), and what that meant. Then her risk of what she did with her risk of acting on it; developing feelings, and acting on feelings, I think are very different things. But and, that’s what I started to think about, is actually her attachment to him. [00:45:31]

CLIENT: I think that’s definitely relevant. I...

THERAPIST: It wasn’t a peer. (client affirms) Nor am I. (chuckles) And so it’s...

CLIENT: No. But if you were a peer, I think that, that that’s... I don’t think that things would change. (therapist affirms) So... (pause) Yeah, I think that’s definitely one. Another story that keeps coming, I think that’s an important piece, I actually really do. I think another story that comes, keeps coming to my mind is this, I had this friend in high school (I think I mentioned this before), that I had a really big crush on, and it was entirely unreciprocated. That was a painful experience for me, and so I think that’s related also. [00:46:36]

THERAPIST: (pause) Well, I’m really glad you’re talking about this, because this is just integral to your... emotional life, and to us, and to what I want to help you with. I appreciate it. It involves a lot of vulnerability on your part to be able to talk about it.

CLIENT: Thank you.

THERAPIST: Okay. And I’m going to really try to avoid cashing any checks you ask me not to. (client chuckles) But we do need to stop for today. Would you like to, me to reimburse you for the... whatever returned check for you, or do you want me to deduct it from next month’s statement? Do you care?

CLIENT: Deducting it from next month’s statement is just fine, if that’s, so it’s easy for you.

THERAPIST: Okay. We’ll do that, then. Okay. So I will see you next week, and again, I’m away the following week. Okay?

CLIENT: Thank you.

THERAPIST: Okay, take care. I’ll see you then, take care.

END TRANSCRIPT