TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

THERAPIST: What's on your mind? [00:02:28.07]

CLIENT: I'm frustrated that I can't cry, like I want to. (pause) What's on your mind? (pause)

THERAPIST: Nothing. I couldn't hear what you said. [00:04:33.26]

CLIENT: What do you think about it? (pause)

THERAPIST: Well I imagine that you are wanting to cry in order to sort of show me and share with me sort of how you've been feeling. And I'm not sure why, what gets in the way. [00:05:29.14] (pause)

CLIENT: [inaudible] that's not basically [inaudible]

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: [inaudible]

THERAPIST: All right. I'm actually, if you don't mind, I'm going to change the [inaudible] ticking of that clock's kind of distracting me a little. It's ticking more than usual. [00:05:57.16] (pause) [inaudible]

CLIENT: Yeah, it ticks an awful lot.

THERAPIST: It yeah, it didn't used to.

CLIENT: It didn't?

THERAPIST: No.

CLIENT: That's weird.

THERAPIST: I'm not facing [ph] you as well?

CLIENT: What do you mean?

THERAPIST: Well I mean right now I'm not, but I didn't know what you had in mind.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause)

THERAPIST: I have the impression that you may be a bit annoyed with me. [00:09:41.28]

CLIENT: Why? (pause)

THERAPIST: Why [inaudible] annoyed or what gives me that impression?

CLIENT: The second one. (pause)

THERAPIST: I'm not sure. I mean I'm really not. Something's [inaudible] all about your manner or tone and (pause) I wouldn't always think that about your being quiet as you are, but today I it's part of how it seems to me. [00:10:57.05]

CLIENT: I'm not sure. (pause) I'm confused about what to do. (pause) Last night I had a very raw, heavy, heavy heart and felt it so directly and without much resistance. And it was so painful but I my heart isn't that way at this moment. And {inaudible] I should talk to you then. [00:12:08.25]

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: I come from a weekly [inaudible] talk. And I didn't really want to go to the talk, but I just wanted to be at the center [ph] and be in that have the spirit of that sort of thing come over me. (pause) And the talk was about forgiveness, which at the beginning I didn't feel like I had any strong relationship or feelings about forgiveness in my life. But I had a lot of thoughts about Jeremy and forgiving himself. And that was my angle. But it became really, really clear that (pause) there is a war going on inside me and it doesn't really matter. [00:14:46.13]

THERAPIST: Is it clear what for?

CLIENT: For experiencing anxiety and for being so naive about it and for experiencing that [inaudible] and for spending so much energy in the last year on all these different things. For not for I'm mad that it hasn't gone away and it meant that it meant both that I haven't figured out how to make it go away and I don't mean I guess I mean everything that feels foreign, everything that [inaudible] foreign. I'm mad that the foreign things haven't gone away. [00:17:11.19] And I'm also mad that I haven't accepted them yet.

THERAPIST: You're still struggling with them.

CLIENT: Well I'm still struggling I'm resisting them so much. Either of those things seems better than how it is. But what do I gain out of thinking so much about how it's not. (pause) So I haven't forgiven myself for [inaudible] intervention that's here. [ph] [00:19:30.07]

THERAPIST: My hunch is that some part of this has to do with the difficulty, letting yourself not be in control, letting go with me of your feelings and a fantasy that you ought to be more in control of how you feel or at the very least how and when you express what you're feeling. [00:21:26.01] And I'm not sure why. I think it might be at least part of it might be because you're terrified of feeling dependent or of how dependent. You can feel sometimes how much that affects you.

CLIENT: That's a lot of things. [ph] They sound manageable. [00:22:45.24]

THERAPIST: I think that's something you've been trying to manage with me since before you knew you were trying to manage it with me. And that when it comes up, comes up just like this, leaving you feeling very upset and with a very heavy heart and very raw. And at times when you're not here and then it's difficult you feel and get at it and see about [inaudible]

CLIENT: There's so much else going on here. [00:24:22.03] It's really hard having feelings for you because I mean in one sense it I think it's helping things ripen. But in another sense it gets in the way of a whole bunch of stuff because I'm pretty focused on you when I'm here.

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: And not that much on myself. I mean I am right now but the whole Jay theater is about you.

THERAPIST: Addison, [ph] that may be partly by design.

CLIENT: I think so. [00:25:27.07] I think the part of that thing is ripening [ph] is really important. I think it wouldn't work if it weren't like this for me. But if you ask me why is it hard to get with what's happening when I'm here it's because it feels to me like I'm worried about a lot of other stuff. Or I'm preoccupied.

THERAPIST: There's all these ways you were so sure it's going to be better to present yourself.

CLIENT: I can't help it. [00:27:04.13] I don't think that much about whether I should present myself or not. It's like I have to try really hard not or I have to make it an object of, I don't know, concentration or meditation or something to let the fantasies...

THERAPIST: The party dreams, I think, speak to this or sort of highlight this, I think, pretty well. That sense of energy and excitement and a certain sort of connection among people. And a nice one in some ways. But also so that it excludes other things. I'm not saying it's bad. [00:28:16.20] I'm just saying I think it captures that kind of exciting probably performative connecting in a certain way, sort of, feel.

CLIENT: I got really mad about tissues recently, there being tissues here. [inaudible] I don't mind [ph] tissues.

THERAPIST: Why not?

CLIENT: I don't use tissues. I don't like them. I like using my sleeve and I like using water. So Jeremy says that some people like using tissues. [00:29:26.24]

THERAPIST: Well, I think it makes you feel like passive and set up that there are tissues here. Or if I'm being more accurate that I set you up and I sort of put you in a passive way in relation to me that you really don't like and find also find [inaudible]

CLIENT: I don't know. [00:30:49.02] It feels like it takes a lot of effort to not think to not fantasize about who I should be here. [inaudible]

THERAPIST: You mean your inclination whether you're here or not is to fantasize [inaudible] about who you should be.

CLIENT: Yeah, and not just when I'm here. In for most for a lot of things. I fantasize about what will happen and what will I feel like and what will I say when I walk into our apartment. We talked him and I talked about this recently. [00:31:55.12] I think there's I mean I think it's related to fantasies happen when I'm feeling excited and anxious and scared. And that's something. So it's a way to feel in control or to explore the various possible outcomes so that I'm ready for them or something. But my mind is highly anticipatory. This is how I relate to future events. Even ones that aren't that scary on the surface. But especially ones that are. [00:33:06.17] (pause) Also, I miss you, so I think about you a lot. (pause)

THERAPIST: I think that [inaudible] have about how you should be here are to do with being a certain way so that it feels like you and I are connecting with a lot of intensity, and that without that it doesn't feel like I'm here with you in the same way. [00:36:06.19] It feels like a missed opportunity. And like you're more on your own.

CLIENT: I don't know. I don't know about that. It feels like a missed opportunity, yeah, but I don't know that fantasizing about being here when I'm not here helps me feel like you're more with me when I'm here. It helps me feel like you're more with me when I'm having when I'm thinking about it when I'm not here. But I don't know how much it changes what I feel like when I'm here. [00:37:06.04]

THERAPIST: I guess I had the impression or what I meant was [inaudible] not how it is, that it's a little like gearing up to be on, like if you were playing in a softball game or in a jazz concert or something like that, where you want to feel like you're sort of geared up [inaudible] really there and you're really kind of on. And you sort of hit it. And if it doesn't feel like that happens here it isn't because of you or me or something. I think it feels like we're not as connected.

CLIENT: Yeah, that's true.

THERAPIST: And then a level of honesty [inaudible] and intensity that (pause) [inaudible] makes [inaudible] makes us feel more connected [inaudible] The problem, I think, is that that's sort of the channel for connecting, and there are other very important channels [inaudible] really, really sad that involve connecting in a very different way. [00:39:24.07] (pause)

CLIENT: It feels like it's missing the point a little bit. The point feels like what do I do when I'm with you and what do I do with all of this energy I have for wanting to seduce you. These are states of unrest that [inaudible] and fantasies about what goes on here and what kind of what it could be like and what it will or should or might be like even to provide me some relief for those two things. [00:40:41.04] It also might be a channel for connecting, but I don't think that's the whole story. If I could find relief in some other way I would not spend so much time thinking about how it should be here. (pause) Because I would have more trust or something. (pause) Like this wouldn't be this huge chance to find relief. There would be some other ways to find it and this could be something else. Or some chance to find relief but also I don't know. [00:42:06.13] (pause)

THERAPIST: You're right. I think I was [inaudible]

CLIENT: I think you I think that is part of [inaudible] That's not how it feels to me why I spend so much time fantasizing about being here. I would love to connect with you spontaneously, without any preparation or premeditated script or plan. I think, actually, my script and plan and fantasies tend to never even the ones that I can make happen, they don't tend to happen because I just they're not important any more when I get here. [00:44:14.01]

THERAPIST: They're important for when you're not here.

CLIENT: Yeah, I guess.

THERAPIST: [inaudible]

CLIENT: They're not great friends. [ph]

THERAPIST: What have they been recently?

CLIENT: The fantasies? I think a lot about you as a dad. I think about what happens when you enter your house and [inaudible]

THERAPIST: What do you imagine? [00:45:46.27]

CLIENT: Little girls coming to hug you. I don't know, I was I've thought about it so many times I think I've imagined every possible thing. No one's hugging you. I think a lot about who cooks dinner. I think about whether you masturbate and how and when. I think a lot about the sex life of people who have children in general. And yours. [00:46:57.10]

THERAPIST: What do you imagine [inaudible] scenarios?

CLIENT: Well it just is so mysterious to me. When are you alone? When are you alone with your wife? How much hunger is there for sex? I don't know. [00:48:15.14]

THERAPIST: I feel so far away.

CLIENT: To me? Yeah.

THERAPIST: [inaudible]

CLIENT: [inaudible]

THERAPIST: Without you and without even telling you.

CLIENT: Yeah, [inaudible] Well you do spend [inaudible] time with me. [00:49:22.05] I think it is with me, but yeah, you don't tell me about the other parts.

THERAPIST: And I don't think it feels like I spend a lot of time with you when you're thinking about some of the things you're telling me you're thinking about.

CLIENT: Yeah, I can imagine spending all the time with you, so compared to that this is not this doesn't even [inaudible] grasp. (pause)

THERAPIST: I think something else that's [inaudible] is if it is a lot of it is about how I'm loved and maybe also how I want to be, which I imagine, again, in those moments you're feeling very on the outside of. And it's like what could be more about wanting to find a way in than wanting to know things like that. [00:52:06.18]

CLIENT: Yeah. I guess I also think a lot about why you do this and why you're here and how often do you really get to see the art. Most of it seems about the craft. (pause) It's really it must be really rewarding but it also maybe it's really isolating too. [00:53:33.27] And I wonder if it isolates you from your family and giving them all of you. (pause)

THERAPIST: Like being preoccupied?

CLIENT: No.

THERAPIST: Or like connected to other people.

CLIENT: You have such a I mean this is a practice. This is a practice of a certain way to be with people. And that's not the way that people are for real. [inaudible] love each other except here. So how do those two practices share the same body and mind and soul and [inaudible] words and yeah. Also, I imagine if you think that there is do you think there is a way to honor this when it's no longer around? [00:55:33.00] (pause) Are you carrying around all these different art craft hybrids? Or is there a is it lighter. Is there more lightness to it. Like you can honor them without having them follow you around or without having them burdened. And I guess I mean honor not only when it's not when it's no longer around but also when it is around. [00:56:37.12] (pause)

THERAPIST: I imagine it heartbreaking not to know these things. [00:58:05.01] I mean what the hell is that, to love someone and not know the kind of things you're talking about. I think it really hardly even makes any sense at all. [00:59:11.27]

CLIENT: Except that I trust you. (pause) But no, [inaudible] doesn't make any sense.

THERAPIST: Does it make you feel when you're here that you're really only here with a particular part of me? [01:00:17.03]

CLIENT: Less so the more I'm here. But yeah, I imagine there's a little bit of protection you to do to get through [inaudible] Or I mean you aren't [inaudible] so there's something.

THERAPIST: [inaudible]

CLIENT: There's something.

THERAPIST: And I guess the first thought is that in order to protect myself and be able to do this.

CLIENT: I think it's to protect your family and to protect me. [01:01:41.22]

THERAPIST: How does it protect you?

CLIENT: I don't know. But I think it does. This is where the blindly trusting you comes in. Jay.

THERAPIST: What?

CLIENT: It's a heavy day for you, too, to be here with me. [01:02:42.26] I guess another way of putting it is you were feeling the weight. I am feeling compassion for you. [inaudible] compassionate Jay.

THERAPIST: Yeah, I have this sort of heart rending image of you feeling so much on the outside, like so close on your side and so much on that side from mine. It's just devastating. And (pause)

CLIENT: It's really bad. [01:04:25.04] (pause)

THERAPIST: I mean I think it's sort of ultimately digestible [ph] and workable but that's not what it is today. Not that we're not doing work on it, but I think what is today is awful.

CLIENT: I mean for you it's today but for me it's all days. [01:05:32.10]

THERAPIST: I know I guess I do know that this is something that we're trying out here today that I'm clearly feeling the weight of today and you feel the weight of most of the time, for months now. (pause)

CLIENT: Today I feel the weight of feeling angry with myself for feeling out of control for about a year. And that came up for the first time ever last night. [01:07:20.17]

THERAPIST: Right, you had [ph] the talk.

CLIENT: Yeah. I am also feeling the weight of feeling really, really outside the world, your world, one of the worlds, one of your worlds. I don't think that they're so separate from each other but this is really different from how I am [inaudible] I think it says something about how I love [ph] people. I really like to know all about them. It seems useful to you that I tell you more about what I wonder about you. [01:08:48.28]

THERAPIST: I think it does help me understand what's going on.

CLIENT: I wonder if your wife knows my name. I wonder when and how you separate it from your marriage in the way that I feel I separate it from mine. And I wonder if you think about (pause) what aspects of me you might like to see in your children as they grow, you know.

THERAPIST: Know what?

CLIENT: It's an awfully sweet and innocent and sort of self (pause)

THERAPIST: There are many of your qualities I would love for them to have, absolutely. [01:11:03.09]

CLIENT: And I wonder about the world they live in. How can you be a parent when you spend all of your days dealing with what other people's parents didn't do or did do? That's like totally a lot of pressure. But maybe it relieves all the pressure. I don't know. I don't know what a good enough dad looks like. Maybe a good enough dad is the same as a good enough mom but he hasn't been written about as much. (pause)

THERAPIST: One of the last ones I can answer. [01:12:38.18] I don't know how much it will help, but me and most therapists I know, I find it [inaudible] easier. I really don't worry so much. I kind of do this or that or do what this book says, that book says or oh my God, if I do this you [inaudible] you do that are part of your personality. You probably couldn't control that much anyway that are going to cause your kid trouble. And the things that you don't know what you're doing to them [inaudible] kind of sort of do your best. [inaudible]

CLIENT: I think I have this idealized impression that you are aware of everything, which is false.

THERAPIST: I assure you. [01:14:17.09]

CLIENT: But it seems really hard as a daily meditation practice [inaudible] the way that you behave here, that that much could get by you.

THERAPIST: But many people in my life might tell you otherwise. I mean I'm (pause)

CLIENT: I think a lot about how hard it would be to be married to you. And how easy it would be. We should talk about how psychoanalysis needs to improve two things. One is how it takes care of the partner of this patient. [01:15:32.29]

THERAPIST: That's very interesting.

CLIENT: The second is its general how the public views it and doesn't know what the public doesn't know and what the public does know. I am really stressed about our future because my attitude about it is so unpalatable with him. Not because so my attitude about us and about our future is so unworkable and unpalatable to [inaudible] and that is very stressful.

THERAPIST: What...

CLIENT: I am like pretty much not open to any discussion about anything that involves reducing putting a time thing, kind of boundary on this, or like reducing the number of sessions per week. [01:16:51.21] So that's really hard for him. And he's hurting a lot and it's straining us. I don't think my insurance approved me for three more months. [01:17:17.26]

THERAPIST: I had sent them another [inaudible] end of March, which they have not gotten so I resent it with a note.

CLIENT: So that stirred all this up. It's in my mind all the time but for him I think he just prefers not to remember that this is something that I'm completely unreasonable about. Or until a letter comes or I...

THERAPIST: I see. Almost like a [inaudible]

CLIENT: Yeah, so there's that, which is whatever it is, and then there is joining the PPO at the end of the year. And he got so mad that I was talking about something six months from now.

THERAPIST: I mean that part does solve the financial problem, assuming the recording continues. And even if it doesn't I think that would probably address a lot of the financials but in a way doesn't quite sound like [inaudible]

CLIENT: No, I think it's why can't I act like a normal why can't I act like I do around other stuff around him. [01:18:47.04]

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: He's not sure that the PPO will reimburse for more than once a week. Is that true?

THERAPIST: The PPO will reimburse for more than once a week. I mean I've seen people 3, 4, 5 days a week who have a PPO and I mean for years.

CLIENT: Cool. Do you have patients that you see five days a week?

THERAPIST: Mm-him.

CLIENT: How long has your longest patient been with you?

THERAPIST: I feel like I shouldn't answer that one. I don't mind having [inaudible] five days a week but I guess I feel a little bad. [01:20:21.26] My point was just to sort of say the PPO covers stuff.

CLIENT: Yeah, but I'm not going to ignore...

THERAPIST: I know [inaudible]

CLIENT: ...all the other implications.

THERAPIST: I know.

CLIENT: Were you going to say something?

THERAPIST: Yeah. It is tricky. I mean certainly myself and my colleagues [inaudible] and other people I know in the field have done analyses. It is tricky. It can be tricky in a marriage. Sometimes it's more about the money and the times [inaudible] intensity or having this other figure [inaudible] who becomes important. It's a very interesting point about [inaudible] taken care of the partners. I don't recall having seen anything written about a particular [inaudible]

CLIENT: He was critical. [01:21:41.28]

THERAPIST: You have about five minutes. What do you think it's about for Jeremy? Is it about...

CLIENT: He thinks I made a mistake in coming back. The whole thing isn't hasn't sat well with him. He would rather me fall into the reasonable category. He's really reasonable. I mean he's not the [ph] reasonable but he really likes things to make sense, and this doesn't make a lot of sense. And I am a way about it that is totally unattractive and sort of scary and weird.

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: It's not unlike me. I mean I my mom I talked to my mom briefly about my relationship to boundaries and she's like oh yeah, you have never responded well to boundaries. In fact you do not hear you just can't hear when there are boundaries trying to be placed around you or on you that aren't fitting with your vision. She said that I [inaudible] I have a long way to go. She said I don't know why you need to analyze it that much. I always at some point I just said well, this is part of your personality. [01:24:07.02] (laughs)

THERAPIST: What?

CLIENT: You have a lot going on in response to that.

THERAPIST: Well (pause) yeah, I have a lot of thoughts. (pause) One I mean [inaudible] in a way we were talking a few minutes ago about boundaries and you feeling on the outside as a result of that. And I don't think that's a good thing here. That has I could be wrong but I have the impression that's something you've felt before probably with your parents. I'm not saying it doesn't also have cause here.

CLIENT: [inaudible]

THERAPIST: And I suspect quite painfully, before, as well, at times. And it makes me wonder if that has something to do with your like a piece of your reaction to boundaries that she's referring to. But you're not here because you woke up one morning and decided you wanted to change your personality. [01:26:28.20] You're here because you really have struggled with, beginning maybe a year ago, [inaudible] some other times in your life before that, in ways that were painful and difficult [inaudible] separations. There's a lot that still doesn't make sense to any of us, best I can tell, about this for you. I guess [inaudible] stop and we can talk more for a few reasons, the first of which is I'm not starting to get worked up because I don't think it's mostly because I wanted to defend this. I think it's mostly because I wanted to defend you doing what feels right to you and what you want for yourself. However, I really don't know enough I mean that's not what I should be doing. [inaudible] really trying to help you with what's going on [inaudible] defend, which it sounds like it's causing you [inaudible] and a lot of stress. And I don't know enough yet to really say anything useful. [01:28:19.04] If there's anything useful I can say [inaudible] In other words, it's sort of easy for me to get up on a soapbox and talk about how your emotional [inaudible] really important and we should do what's going to be helpful to you, but that's not really the point. The point is you're telling me there's this stressful thing happening in your life and I should listen to more about what's going on.

CLIENT: We should talk about it more. I if I were making the decision in isolation, just listening to myself, I would have I'm not stressed out at all about this or where it what the future is for it. [01:29:26.21] I mean it's very stressful for the reasons for other reasons that we talked about, that we always talk about, but it this the role in my life that this plays and my level of comfort with how uncomfortable it is and my level of comfort with the intensity with which I interact with you and how much of a how much space and time you take up for me, all of these things feel right. They feel very, very right.

THERAPIST: Good.

CLIENT: So yeah, there's nothing...

THERAPIST: Right, it's not about that, it's about the stress it's causing between you and...

CLIENT: Yeah, and maybe what can I bring to that part of our relationship that might be less infuriating.

THERAPIST: Do you [inaudible]

CLIENT: Yeah.

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