TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

CLIENT: Nothing.

THERAPIST: Thank you.

CLIENT: It wasn't even grilled, by the way.

THERAPIST: It's still warm.

CLIENT: Do you think I could find a fucking parking place?

THERAPIST: No luck, huh?

CLIENT: I was going places I never knew existed around here.

THERAPIST: And all the handicapped ones were taken, too?

CLIENT: Yep. But I rode around and I rode around. I figured eventually somebody was going to move. I got one down the street, near the corner but down towards almost the end.

THERAPIST: Did you pass the post office and the FedEx place?

CLIENT: Yeah. I'm right in front of the FedEx place.

THERAPIST: And is it a meter or is it a handicapped spot?

CLIENT: No, a meter. I don't have to pay with my handicapped thing anyways.

THERAPIST: And there wasn't anything on Story this morning, huh?

CLIENT: No.

THERAPIST: Yeah, people are saying the other place was a lot easier to park. [00:01:10]

CLIENT: What's on the fourth floor?

THERAPIST: I think it's a therapist up there and somebody that studies the religion or something like that.

CLIENT: I was coming down from the fourth floor and he said, "Come on up." I said, "No, you go because it takes me a while." He said, "Yeah, I know. My knee is killing me since I started coming here." I said, "Hey."

THERAPIST: (chuckles) You know the feeling.

CLIENT: I've got two knees that are killing me.

THERAPIST: And you've got the surgery this Wednesday?

CLIENT: Next Wednesday, the 16th, and Deborah's better half has surgery on the 17th. I said, "Deborah, what are you going to do get roller skates so that you can go out the door, fly out to the elevator, get off on the third floor and fly down to her apartment? You're really going to be running crazy, Deborah." [00:02:13]

THERAPIST: She's going to be nurse to two, huh?

CLIENT: I said, "Listen, she's got fucking family. Your mother doesn't, so your ass is staying here."

THERAPIST: What happened between the two of you since we last spoke?

CLIENT: She came down and I said, "Listen, where do you want to stay? Where do you want to live?" "I want to live here with you." I said, "Okay, we're not going to have any sarcasm from your mouth. We're not going to do this and do that. You will be up," and I said, "You won't have a stitch of clothing here because everything will go in garbage bags and will get dropped off at Dolores's door." "No, I want to live here." [00:03:13]

THERAPIST: How did that hold?

CLIENT: I think she might stay (chuckles) one night in my apartment. Dolores has no TiVo, so do you know how much this is killing Deborah to have no TV? Wait until her shows start coming on. We'll see how long that will last.

THERAPIST: What has it been like for you to see her spend so much time with Dolores? How do you spell that?

CLIENT: D-o-l-o-r-e-s, Dolores. I don't know. I'd just like to know what the hell is going on between the two of them. Yesterday they came down to watch the football games. They were in the TV room downstairs, but the neighbors kind of think it's poor that Dolores's right there next to Deborah and you know. [00:04:26]

THERAPIST: Like they could be a couple or something.

CLIENT: Yeah. I'm not a football fan unless it's the playoffs and the Patriots are playing. Other than that, forget it. I'm out there and they're kissing.

THERAPIST: Oh, really? Has she ever experimented with women before?

CLIENT: No. I was going to play that song by Katy Perry, "I kissed a girl and I liked it."

THERAPIST: how was that for you? That must have really been a jolt to you, huh?

CLIENT: Yeah. Deborah stayed in the house until about 11:00 and then they went upstairs. Deborah came downstairs today and I said, "A little kissy-kissy there?" She goes, "Where?" I said, "In the doorway there, you and Dolores, that's where." "Oh." Didn't say anything. She came down Saturday night with a pair of white lace panties that Dolores bought her with a little ribbon on it. When Mark came over I showed him the panties. I said, "These are for Deborah's wedding night. She's going to wear these." [00:06:06]

THERAPIST: What would you think of her dating well I guess there are two sides to this. One is a woman and another is Dolores specifically.

CLIENT: As I say, Dolores is definitely the dyke, definitely the guy. As scrawny as she is she's like 5'7" and she looks like a pencil she's so scrawny.

THERAPIST: I see. What does she look like? How does she dress?

CLIENT: Sweat pants, baggy sweats. She never looks nice unless they're going out; and then she'll dress in like Ellen DeGeneres men's' clothing, you know?

THERAPIST: I see. She dresses more in a masculine. [00:07:10]

CLIENT: Yeah. She wears a cap because she wears that damned do-rag on her head.

THERAPIST: What's her ethnicity? Is she white?

CLIENT: African-American. Oh, yeah. She's dark.

THERAPIST: Oh, yeah. That's right. You mentioned her skin color. Right.

CLIENT: (chuckles) I'm quite sure when I tell Mark that I caught them kissing, he just gets right on Deborah, right on her.

THERAPIST: What does he say?

CLIENT: He'll tease the hell out of her. "I knew you were going to go for that, Deborah. I just knew that. What does she got that 12-inch dildo strapped onto herself? And is it black? You know my friend, Albert? I wanted to fix you up but, shit, he's a hell of a lot better looking than she is and you didn't want to date him?" (laughs) Oh, yeah. He pulls no punches. [00:08:24]

THERAPIST: He's not shy in the same way.

CLIENT: The Deborah will say, "You had him start it, didn't you?" I'll say, "Who, me? No." She buys Deborah clothing. She bought Deborah a nice suede dress, dungarees, underpants.

THERAPIST: She's really courting her.

CLIENT: Skechers sneakers. Deborah's wearing a ring. I said, "Deborah, is that my brother's ring?" She said, "No, this is Dolores's ring."

THERAPIST: Which finger is it on?

CLIENT: On the pinky.

THERAPIST: Left hand?

CLIENT: Yeah. I don't know. Does that mean something, on the left hand?

THERAPIST: Well, I was thinking the wedding ring would be on the ring finger of the left hand; and maybe it didn't fit on her ring finger.

CLIENT: It wouldn't fit on Deborah's finger because she's kind of... [00:09:38]

THERAPIST: I was thinking maybe Dolores had that right and wanted to put it on the wedding ring, but it could only fit on the pinky.

CLIENT: I said, "Deborah, is this going to be a black and white thing? Is this going to be just plain black?" "Yeah." "Okay, just let me know when I have to start planning it, Deborah, because on the menu will be fried chicken and watermelon for dessert, some cornbread and some collard greens. Oh, yeah."

THERAPIST: How did she take all of that? What did she say?

CLIENT: "Ha, ha, ha, ha." "I'm just wondering, you know? Fried southern steak." She said, "What the hell is that?" I said, "You take the steak and you dip it in the eggs and the breadcrumbs and you fry it up." "Oooh. But I did try collard greens, and those weren't too bad." I said, "I know. I love those," which I do. (chuckles) I do like collard greens. Aww, shit. That's from my days of dating Rob, 12 and 13 years ago. All the meals I had at his mother's house. [00:11:08]

THERAPIST: His mother cooked?

CLIENT: Oh, yeah.

THERAPIST: Collard greens, sure.

CLIENT: So she said, "Do you think Rob can walk me down the aisle and Mark can be the best man?" I said, "Hey, Mark can be the matron of honor. Really get in the mood there, Deborah."

THERAPIST: What is it like for you for her to be dating somebody that's African-American?

CLIENT: I don't mind that part. I date Mark. [He's an immigrant] (ph?) Her daughter dates a black person down in Florida.

THERAPIST: Dolores's does?

CLIENT: No, Deborah's. My granddaughter.

THERAPIST: Oh, is that right?

CLIENT: She's been dating a black boy for the last nine months. [00:12:11]

THERAPIST: Has she ever dated a black guy before?

CLIENT: Darla? Deborah? No. She's had a lot of them hit on her, but she just never was interested.

THERAPIST: What do you make of Deborah's interest in Dolores?

CLIENT: Marijuana. (singing) Mar-i-jua-na. Because Dolores is stoned from first thing in the morning until she goes to bed. She has a medical script for it. She goes through maybe $50 worth of pot a day.

THERAPIST: Whoa. Wow. [00:13:08]

CLIENT: She's stoned constantly. If she's up at 8:00, light that joint.

THERAPIST: Where does she get money from? Dealing?

CLIENT: I don't ask.

THERAPIST: Do you think it's dealing?

CLIENT: Oh, yeah. It's from selling pills because she's on, I think, disability.

THERAPIST: She sells from her own stash or something?

CLIENT: No. I think she buys more. I think she buys like a pound.

THERAPIST: And then sells it?

CLIENT: Yeah. But she hasn't been able to get it to sell lately, so they've been getting it from this person which the girl that they were getting it from if you got $50 worth, you're not getting $50 worth. It's good shit, but it's not a $50 bag. The bags aren't very big or anything.

THERAPIST: This is the pot?

CLIENT: Yeah, the pot. And when Dolores gets it, it's green and the bags are really big.

THERAPIST: She gets it from the actual...?

CLIENT: I don't know who she gets it from, the stuff that she has. [00:14:32]

THERAPIST: She gets prescription stuff, though?

CLIENT: No, because she hasn't been to Rhode Island to get it. She doesn't travel down there. I said, "Shit, I'll drive you, Dolores."

THERAPIST: Why, does she give you some?

CLIENT: I buy some for Mark, besides what Deborah steals; then she's got to pay me back.

THERAPIST: And Deborah might be taking some of your pills and giving them to Dolores to sell. Do you think that?

CLIENT: No, because I finally found a good hiding place for my pills. And whatever I have, Dolores has stronger; like she doesn't have the Percocet 5's, she's got the Oxycontins 20, 40, 60, 80, you know? She's got a lot more. My stuff is like taking a baby aspirin to what she takes. I guess you can still take your regular prescription meds like methadone, Oxycontin and Percocet, and still get a script for marijuana; so we're going to have a little talk with Danny boy. [00:16:04]

THERAPIST: Oh, yeah? What are you going to get it for?

CLIENT: Chronic pain.

THERAPIST: For chronic pain. Does it actually help with the pain?

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: It does, yeah?

CLIENT: It does. I mean I'll smoke it, but not ten joints a day.

THERAPIST: How much do you end up using?

CLIENT: I might smoke one to a half a one. If it's good stuff, that's all you need is a half a joint. A couple of tokes and then you start choking, you know you've got some good stuff.

THERAPIST: You'll smoke that in a day half a joint to a joint?

CLIENT: Yeah. It really helps a lot. We're going to have to see. (singing) Oh, Danny boy. [00:17:04]

THERAPIST: How long have you been doing that amount would you say?

CLIENT: The last couple of years.

THERAPIST: Is that right?

CLIENT: Yeah. I don't do it all the time. I might go two nights without smoking it and then I could go six months in a row once a week.

THERAPIST: What are you doing nowadays? Is it a daily?

CLIENT: No. I smoked yesterday. We shared a joint Mark, Deborah, Dolores and me so you know I probably got about three puffs out of that one joint. If it was just Mark and me, we probably would have smoked most of it and had a little bit of a roach left that we'd give to Deborah to smoke in her pipe. Dolores's got bongs. It's like being in one of those houses where they have all the bongs. [00:18:24]

THERAPIST: Like a head shop?

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) (reading) "When you're done, bring back the car because she needs to drop off her sister to get her car." Okay. Yeah, going out riding around; going joy riding.

THERAPIST: It's Dolores's car you've got now?

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Don't get pulled over.

CLIENT: No, don't get pulled over. So that's it with marijuana.

THERAPIST: Yeah, it eases the pain.

CLIENT: Yeah, it helps a lot.

THERAPIST: I was just thinking there's been a lot of pain going around for you.

CLIENT: [...] (inaudible at 00:19:34) the pain here, the pain there, and there's a pain there, my eye is still infected. The next bit of conversation will go to Mark, who was over Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, seven days. And he's not over just once during the day. He comes back maybe three or four times. First he'll come with the dog, then he'll take the dog home, then he'll come back himself, and then later on he'll go bring back the dog again. He'll call on the phone, "Put something sexy on. I'll be there in about five minutes." So I run around the house getting the cats out of the bedroom and dit-dit-dit. Oh, yeah. [00:20:40]

THERAPIST: Have you guys picked up sex since Deborah's been upstairs?

CLIENT: Oh, yeah. I get a kiss when he comes in the door. I get another kiss and then I'll get another kiss. I said to him yesterday, "What's the story? Why are you being so nice to me?" He said, "It's not that I'm being so nice to you, but Deborah's not here."

THERAPIST: Like you've been [vacant] (ph?)

CLIENT: He won't even kiss me in front of Deborah.

THERAPIST: How has it been? How has the sex been?

CLIENT: Terrific. Terrific.

THERAPIST: How so?

CLIENT: He's more caring when we're having sex. He wants to know if he's hurting me, do I need a rest? I'm not sure I'm all right. I said "I'm having fun. Everything is okay." He's really been attentive to my needs, my wants. I don't know. He's turned a new leaf over that way. We haven't argued once. We're back to having discussions with each other. It's nice. [00:22:13]

THERAPIST: You have a little more space to have that.

CLIENT: We don't have Deborah sitting on the couch interrupting it with her opinion of what's going on. He'll say, "Deborah, I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to your mother." Fine by me. I've had no problem with Mark at all.

THERAPIST: I was thinking, too, that you kind of laid out to Deborah hey, where's it going to be, Dolores's or my place? I was thinking if she comes to your place, that's going to cut off Mark and you having privacy together. [00:23:07]

CLIENT: She can stay at Dolores's all day long as far as I'm concerned during the daytime.

THERAPIST: What about nighttime? What concerns you about the nights?

CLIENT: Nothing. Mark generally doesn't go out during the night but, if he does I'll just say, "Deborah, scoot. Go up to Dolores's," if she's downstairs.

THERAPIST: So she still wants to sleep at your place?

CLIENT: Yeah. She'll come down at midnight and go on the couch.

THERAPIST: Is that where you'd prefer her to be, too?

CLIENT: No. She can stay up there. She stayed up there last night and the night before. [00:24:01]

THERAPIST: But she's got her clothes in your place? I've got it. Okay.

CLIENT: She'll come down and change, shower down at my place. I said, "Okay, whatever." All I can picture is Dolores stark naked.

THERAPIST: Yeah, what about it?

CLIENT: You need three or four bags to put over her head. Her body I don't know what you could do with that, get a couple of lawn bags or something?

THERAPIST: She's not attractive?

CLIENT: (chuckling) No.

THERAPIST: Skinny, lanky, is that what you said?

CLIENT: Yeah. I think you could see her ribs; and she must eat like crazy from smoking all that pot. Deborah made lunch yesterday. We all had toasted BLT's and then she cooked supper down at my place plus it's all my food. Deborah fried up chicken cutlets and we had rice and string beans.

THERAPIST: What about that? [00:25:35]

CLIENT: Fine by me. [She has pizza by Dolores's most other places.] (ph?) They're always going to McKenna's Meat Market and buying meats.

THERAPIST: Cooking up there?

CLIENT: Yeah. Saturday night she cooked Deborah fillet mignon.

THERAPIST: She's really courting her, isn't she?

CLIENT: Oh, yeah.

THERAPIST: And your take is it that Deborah is in it solely for the pot?

CLIENT: I think so. I don't know. Who the hell knows? But I have more people in the building asking me what's going on with Deborah and that head.

THERAPIST: They're two peas in a pod.

CLIENT: I said, "I don't know. Ask them. It ain't my life. Ask those two." We'll see where that goes. It can only happen to me is all I can say. Other than that we talked about Deborah, we talked about Dolores, then we'll talk about the big fight I had with my cousin, Mary. [00:27:16] She was over Wednesday night. She's been over almost every night this week. Thursday night she said to me, "We'll go out tomorrow. I'll take you out and we'll go Christmas tree shopping," and this and this and this. By 3:00, she's finally calling me on the phone to go out. I said, "Mary, I don't go out this late in the day to go jumping from one store to the other. I don't want to be in the store come 6:00 because then my TV programs are on and I ain't going out when they're on." So she says, "All right. I'll get up early Saturday and we'll go out." I left a couple of messages on her machine and she never answers. [00:28:15]

THERAPIST: Saturday morning?

CLIENT: I waited until like 2:00.

THERAPIST: She doesn't show up, doesn't call?

CLIENT: Finally she calls on the phone and I ain't picking up the phone. She writes, "I'm on my way over." I didn't answer it. "I'll be there in a few minutes. I'm up at the end of the street." I still didn't answer. She rang my buzzer and rang it and rang it. I didn't buzz her in. She got somebody else to let her in the fucking building, which I get pissed off when they do that.

THERAPIST: When somebody else will let someone in?

CLIENT: Yeah. [...] (inaudible at 00:29:00) . I hear this bang, bang, bang. I ain't answering it. I don't have the TV on because there's no news. She was out there for a little while. She texts me back, "I was at your apartment and I was knocking on your door, but you wouldn't let me in." "Tough shit, ain't it?" I wrote back to her. I said something about why don't you pretend I'm not related to you anymore either? She'd gotten my last message, so I think that's what she was really angry about. [...] (inaudible at 00:29:49) I don't want anything to do with you. Don't call me. Don't text me. Leave me the fuck alone. Then she was coming in on Friday night. She talked to Deborah first and got some drugs off of Dolores. She got some [...] (inaudible at 00:30:18) and as she was coming in... [00:30:18]

THERAPIST: This was before the Saturday that she was supposed to pick you up?

CLIENT: Yeah. And as she was coming in, Deborah said she had a bug on her coat. She's still going through this bedbug routine where she lives. She doesn't have any; it's the landlord that has them. Deborah said why did she have on her coat then? She said to Deborah, "No, that wasn't a bedbug. That was just one." Yeah, okay. Deborah doesn't want her in the house to begin with because of the fucking bugs. I said, "Yeah, I don't blame you, Deborah." [00:31:09]

THERAPIST: I think this has kind of been part of the difficulty about her relationship with Susan is that she's so absent-minded. I think even on top of that, to you especially, not really saying I'm sorry, apologizing, or being reliable in any way or recognizing how unreliable or saying hey, I'm late or I can't make it nothing. My sense is that you were trying to convey to her how upset with her you are. When you say to pretend like you're not related, it's almost as if you're saying "It's as if we're not related anyway. That's the way you've been treating me." [00:32:12]

CLIENT: She writes back, "I didn't go to sleep all night long. I didn't go to sleep until 5:00 AM." Well, good. Text me before you go to sleep at 5:00 AM and say, "Listen, I stayed up all night. I'm just going to bed now." But, no. I said, "I don't know what drugs you're doing that you can't go to sleep." She always worked the night shift. Are you in that pattern? I don't know why, you've not been working the night shift for the last three years. I don't know. What's her whole problem? Christmas, when she was over for Christmas dinner, I even had to give her $20 for cabs. I said, "What did I do, pay your way here?" I can't win. (chuckles) That's the story of my life, so good luck to me. [00:33:53]

THERAPIST: How do you mean?

CLIENT: Now she's become my problem. So, of course, I didn't hear from her all the rest of Saturday, all day yesterday. I think I watched Tom Selleck and all of his TV series about where he was a cop someplace; and I watched Dick Van Dyke. He was a detective. One right after the other. [00:34:28]

THERAPIST: How about that? What was the day like?

CLIENT: I love just sitting there watching those movies and things. It doesn't faze me. One came on at 1:00 and then it's bad where it's fucking 5:00. I think I knew the words to the whole show. I could have played a part in it. I could have played the receptionist who's a part-time cop also.

THERAPIST: You said that she's now somebody how did you put it? Mary is your responsibility?

CLIENT: Yeah. She's talking to Adam around Christmastime and Johnny said, "Do you still see Louise?" Mary said, "Yeah." Then she said to me the other day, "Do you think Johnny is not talking to me because I talk to you?" I said, "Who knows? Why don't you just not talk to me and find out?" So now she can honestly say to Adam, "Listen, Louise's not talking to me. Can we be friends now?" [00:35:50]

THERAPIST: That whole side of the family has been one of a distant memory now. The boys, Devon, Ginger, Adam.

CLIENT: Um-hmm. So what can I say? I don't know where Mary is going to be going to drink her two beers every night; probably over at her friend's. I just sit out in the car in the driveway and drink the beer.

THERAPIST: She's really changed over the last few years. [00:36:47]

CLIENT: Fuck. And not for the better.

THERAPIST: She really relapsed.

CLIENT: And the, as I say, sometimes I don't know if it's because of the brain tumor that she acts this way or if it's all the freakin' meds that she takes that she shouldn't take. Is it drinking the two beers every night? And then she drinks a couple of nips, too. I don't know. One day she had five nips, and she drinks the big, big, tall cans and I mean the big ones. [00:37:43]

THERAPIST: Ever since the psychiatrist left, she's really gone downhill and it sounds like there's a hell of a lot of pain she's going through herself that she's trying to obliterate, I guess, with all these drugs and drinking.

CLIENT: For somebody who was an alcoholic, went to AA meetings for 16 or 17 years, was a counselor to other people who joined the group she was their sponsor to now go back to drinking... "It's only two beers." Two beers and five nips, yeah. I said, "Your two beers equal maybe three small cans of the regular sized ones. I don't want to hear it." I can drink one can small can of beer and I still have the same can of beer; and she's knocking off the second one. That's how much of a drinker I've turned out to be. I just don't crave it. (chuckles) I'll say, "It would be nice to have a beer with the pizza." I pour the beer and it's still sitting there. [00:39:23]

THERAPIST: But it's also that you and Mary have really I know she always was kind of quirky and kind of wrapped up in herself in some ways, but she was also much more present. She was much more of a friend.

CLIENT: Oh, yeah. I was [...] (inaudible at 00:39:46) when she has no money. I'd give her the gas money and then take her out to lunch or something; but it's like I've never seen such awful manners when it comes to eating. Wednesday night I made meatloaf, rice and string beans. She was in that bowl of string beans. "I never had these before." I said, "Mary, in 63 years you've never had string beans before?" "No, I've had them, but not like these. These are delicious." I didn't think she was going to stop putting them on her dish. I had a spoonful of them and then she cleaned the rest of the bowl on her plate. The same with the rice pilaf. She sucked that down. The meatloaf, her face was in the plate, whether she's eating or falling asleep in it. (chuckles) You would have sworn it was her last meal that she hadn't eaten. [00:41:10]

THERAPIST: I think with Mary and Deborah there is a way you feel that they'll keep taking until there's nothing left.

CLIENT: I know that Mary doesn't eat where she's living.

THERAPIST: You sort of see that as very legitimate that they really don't have much, but it's complicated for you because it also means that they take whatever little that you have.

CLIENT: I mean no wonder you don't have money for food, it's because you've gotten drugs. That's why. And then you say that when you buy them I mean she has to pay for her prescriptions because she still has no insurance. She says, "Now he's calling me on the phone because he wants one of my Ambiens. And if I give him one, he wants ten. He wants my dilaudeds (ph?), he wants my" this. I said, "Susan, you can afford to give them to him, then [...] (inaudible at 00:42:28) " I've had it with buying pot for Deborah. Now I buy it for me and Mark and that's it. I can smoke a joint a day. I mean there are days that he'll just smoke himself and hey, fine by me. That's that in a nutshell. That's the story of my life. You think I can get a bestseller out of it? [00:43:06]

THERAPIST: Yeah. There is a lot there.

CLIENT: I can just write about the [Ashtons] (ph?) and there would be a lot to be said.

THERAPIST: That's quite right. There is a lot to be said in all of this. Again, I see one of the things that you're grappling with and what I also think that you're trying to make more known is that, despite these people having little in their lives, they take away whatever little that you have and it's very, very upsetting and, in some way, isn't doing them much good anyway. In some way you're trying to show, I think, both Deborah and Mary the impact that they do have on you whether it was what you told me on the phone this week about the interaction you just said it about Deborah. You can't act this way around the house any longer. [00:44:20]

CLIENT: You can't threaten to kill me.

THERAPIST: You can't threaten to kill me. It's got to stop. Mary remembering that you're a person that isn't just waiting around all day for her to show up.

CLIENT: I'm not going out at 7:00 at night when the stores close at 9:00. It makes no sense to me. It's a challenge to get out the door by 10:00 in the morning and be going our way up to x, x, before... (tape ends)

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