TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

THERAPIST: Um, before I forget, we need to...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Uh, it would be a help to me if you could pay me, like as much as you can, around the end of the first week of April or so?

CLIENT: Okay.

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Is it all on there?

CLIENT: Yeah. I’ll talk to James.

THERAPIST: Okay. (pause) I know it’s a pain, especially with the insurance company and all.

CLIENT: No, but I also know, you know... you do actually need to get paid, so... (chuckles) (pause) Um, yeah. I (inaudible) the insurance company.

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: The woman promised me she would call me back, but I’ve heard that before, so... {00:01:05}

THERAPIST: (chuckles)

CLIENT: I’ll probably call them and harass them in a couple of days.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: But, yeah.

THERAPIST: If I had a nickel for every time the insurance company had not followed through, then I would not need to get paid.

CLIENT: (chuckles) Yeah. Um... yeah. I don’t know what I’m going to do when it comes time to renew my insurance. I don’t really want them to be my insurer anymore.

THERAPIST: Right, yeah.

CLIENT: But on the other hand, I don’t think anywhere else is going to be any better.

THERAPIST: Yeah, I don’t know that anywhere else is better, I’m not sure.

CLIENT: So...

THERAPIST: I wish I hadn’t complained, but...

CLIENT: That’s okay. I’ll see. Yeah. (pause)

Well, James and I finally talked about why he’s been sort of blowing up at me all the time recently. [00:02:04]

THERAPIST: Oh.

CLIENT: It was a good talk, actually.

THERAPIST: Good.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) He said that (pause) you know, I think he’s still really angry with me. And feels like I abandoned him, and he’s having a really hard time trusting me. You know, I have a lot of “make it better.” This kind of thing can’t, just like, make it better. It’s just, you know, the time frame.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Which makes it -

THERAPIST: And this is from?

CLIENT: Me, wanting to kill myself. And having to be honest about a lot of stuff.

THERAPIST: Oh.

CLIENT: I think that’s the big part of it.

THERAPIST: I see. [00:03:05]

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah, I think he sort of feels like I left him. Which, you know, (chuckles) I understand pretty well.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: At the same time, I really do feel like everything I told him is sort of hard to remember, understand, or wrap my head around his, you know, feeling so abandoned and being so angry because I’m just really proud of myself that I’m still here. (chuckles)

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: And I sort of feel like I’ve been working as hard as I can, and doing everything I can not to leave him. (pause) [00:03:59]

So, yeah, you know. I told him that he could be angry with me for as long as he needed to, and I’ll stick around. (pause)

Um... so basically what’s been happening is, I will start talking about (pause) something that I’m angry about, or to James, something that I feel like I am a victim of. And James doesn’t deal very well with that. [00:04:55]


So, like, the other night, I was really discouraged about jobs and saying, I sort of feel like I’ve done everything right since I was fourteen, and sort of feel like (pause) certainly my parents, and I feel like most other people spent a whole lot of time telling me, you know, do what you love and follow your dreams and the money will work out. And well, the money’s not working out.

THERAPIST: Right.

CLIENT: You know? Humanities degrees are not good for much, as it turns out. [00:05:43]

THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.

CLIENT: (chuckles) (pause) You know, maybe I should have expected that, but I didn’t, and I don’t feel like... (pause) You know, and James just kind of blew up at me. (pause)

I’m in a spot where, like (pause) James doesn’t want me to feel like I have to censor what I have to say to him, or I have to, like, shut down. I would not like that, and I’m not very good at that. You know? I don’t have much of a filter with him. But at the same time, it doesn’t really get us anywhere. You know? [00:06:52]

THERAPIST: Go ahead.

CLIENT: It just really doesn’t help either of us for me to say, “I feel this way,” and him to say, “You shouldn’t feel this way.” We both get angry, we both feel bad. (pause) [00:07:59]

THERAPIST: Well, I’m a little confused. Because (pause) you’re saying that (pause) you didn’t think it was right but you both thought it was totally helpful for him to say, “Look, what I’m really angry about is, you know, that you would think about abandoning me like someone else did.”

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And that’s probably one of the reasons why when you were growing up you did that.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And you’re also saying that (pause), you know, when you say these particular things he gets mad, and I gather, goes like, “Well, you shouldn’t be upset about that, you know.” But you’re saying you’re upset about having done the right...? I mean, I get why you’d say that you’re upset about feeling like you’ve done the right thing since you were fourteen, and... you know. [00:09:00]

CLIENT: Yeah. And his response was, basically, “You knew, like... you knew this was going to happen. People did tell you to, like, take more math and science, or whatever.” And I was like, “Yeah, sort of.” I don’t know. It’s like... his answers aren’t wrong. It’s just, it is hurtful to me that it’s like he doesn’t hear the part where I am hurting. So... (pause) [00:09:57]

You know, and (pause) most of it is just, like, I’m just really angry, and don’t quite know how to handle that, don’t know what to be angry at. (pause) And I’m kind of trying not to just be angry at myself, because that’s not good for me either. (pause)

THERAPIST: So when he says, “Well, you know, actually, you have been kind of told that,” what is it that you want to say back? [00:11:08]

CLIENT: (pause) Hm.

THERAPIST: Are you thinking anything like... (pause) It’s not that I have no idea, but I’m curious how you see how he’s missing the point you’re making there. I understand that he’s not sort of sympathetic to your speaking in a way peacefully a part of you that’s hurt. I think I get that. But...

CLIENT: Um... (pause) Hm. The problem is, I don’t (pause) I don’t know what it, what I want him to say. [00:12:10]

THERAPIST: My hunch is there’s something in his response that shuts you down.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) [00:13:10]

I guess mostly I just want to know, why are you so angry at me about this? You know? (pause)

Why does it piss you off that I feel like my life isn’t fair? (pause) [00:14:14]

He keeps saying he doesn’t think it’s helpful for me to think about things these ways, or think about things. And he doesn’t think it will move me forward. Which is fine, but you know, I don’t think things because they’re helpful. I mean, I try to, but (chuckles) I don’t think it happens. [00:16:13]

THERAPIST: Um, I think I just about universally hate the position that you (pause) always think things partly because they’re helpful.

CLIENT: What do you mean by that, or do you have an example? (chuckles)

THERAPIST: Sure. Yeah. Um... (pause)

CLIENT: I think I know what you mean. [00:17:09]

THERAPIST: I think you’re trying to reclaim something from being angry about this bit of your life, and what you don’t have. (pause) Um... (pause) I’m not exactly sure what it is. I don’t know if it’s being angry at the people who told you just to do what you love, and not think about the money, or if you’re angry at the world being the kind of place that doesn’t sort of make the kind of opportunities that you want and that it should? (pause) Or what exactly you’re angry about. But I’m pretty confident you have a point. It doesn’t mean necessarily that you’re, in some sense, right about everything, I don’t mean that. [00:18:33]

CLIENT: I’m pretty sure I’m not right about everything. Just to be clear. (chuckles)

THERAPIST: Well, I’ll leave that to you (chuckles) But it’s about something that matters.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause)

THERAPIST: I imagine you may also be sort of (pause) probably testing me a little bit to you know, sort of, worry that maybe, really, you don’t have a point being angry about that, and that I’m going to (pause) say that, “Ah, you really shouldn’t pay attention to that, you should try to focus on other things. It doesn’t really matter what you’re upset about,” or something like that. [00:19:38]

CLIENT: Hm. I know. (pause) [00:20:36]

I mean, yes in the sense that (pause) every conversation I have with you...(pause)

THERAPIST: Mm-hmm?

CLIENT: There’s always a question, is he going to drop me?

THERAPIST: I see. But it doesn’t feel like I kind of, in addition to that, think that’s important?

CLIENT: It doesn’t feel like it. [00:21:26]

THERAPIST: But it doesn’t feel like there’s something more particular? I guess what I’m trying to say is, it sounds like (pause) it’s feeling to you that you’re getting a similar response to being angry as you, I guess, had gotten from your dad.

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah.

THERAPIST: I’m not trying to say James is coming from the same place as your dad, or sort of generally reacts to you being angry or upset that way, but in this case I imagine it feels like that to you.

CLIENT: Yeah. I mean, you know, it feels like their reasons and their personalities are widely different, but the result is kind of the same.

THERAPIST: Yeah. (pause) I thought I would sort of put into words as, there’s really no youthful point, or no point at all, to feeling that way.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) [00:22:36]

I mean, I also think of it as, it makes me uncomfortable for you to be this way. So, I certainly don’t want to hear it.

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: That’s more Papa than James.

THERAPIST: I see. (pause)

CLIENT: You know, I just (pause) I can’t tell whether that’s the thing it’s most like from here. [00:23:55]

THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.

CLIENT: I just can’t tell.

THERAPIST: Yeah. (pause)

CLIENT: I mean, the good thing that came out of this conversation -

THERAPIST: Mm-hmm?

CLIENT: is that, you know, I know that (pause) James’ not angry with me for (pause) the person I am right now all the time.

THERAPIST: Right.

CLIENT: Like, oh well, you know, he’s angry with me for this thing that had happened and -

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: that I couldn’t really help. (chuckles) Somehow that makes me feel better? (chuckles)

THERAPIST: Yeah, of course. Sure. (pause)

CLIENT: He was so afraid to just have the conversation. [00:26:02]

THERAPIST: Mm.

CLIENT: His point was, he doesn’t know when he’s going to say something that’s going to upset me and set me off. And (pause) I don’t really have any reassurance to give him. (pause)

THERAPIST: You’re pretty much worried about falling apart at any time. [00:27:18]

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And for any ordinary discernible reason.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause)

Yeah, based on my own experience and people I know, like, this is going to come back. In some ways, it’s not really gone. I’ve had a good two weeks, so... And, yeah. I don’t, don’t know what to do about it. Don’t feel like there’s that much that I can do about it. [00:28:40]

But at the same time, I ought to be able to do something about it. (chuckles) It’s crazy.

THERAPIST: It’s here again. (pause)

CLIENT: In some ways, it’s not fair to us to trust it. (pause) [00:30:36]

THERAPIST: Well, (pause) it seems to me you’re going a little global. [00:31:20]

CLIENT: (chuckles) Fine.

THERAPIST: There are particular types of things that set you off, and it’s not always easy to predict which things that happen of those types will. But (pause) a lot of things don’t.

CLIENT: Yeah.

A lot of things do, though. That’s the thing too. (pause) Yeah. (pause)

THERAPIST: Like, of the two things you mentioned, his saying he was angry at you and explaining why, it didn’t shut you down. Actually, you responded pretty assertively to it, as I understand. You didn’t need to say you overrode what he was saying, but you sort of both told him something along the lines of you feel that way, and you’ll feel that way all you want as far as you’re concerned. You’re not going anywhere. But at the same time (pause) you could have told me... your other side of it. Which is like, “Yeah, but I didn’t do that.” You feel pretty strongly about it, and it’s a pretty different point of view from his. [00:34:11]

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah

THERAPIST: Whereas in the other conversation, when he (pause) told you something along the lines of, “There’s no point in being upset like that, that’s not going to help you,” or, no, he said a little more curtly, he said, “I have told you, you should take other stuff, math and science.” There, it seemed to me, you kind of lost your point very quickly.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And when you got in here, you’re trying to recover, your thought was like, “Why are you getting so mad at me for being upset about this,” or something like that. Which is a good question and an important thing, but was not actually the point you started with. I’m not saying it’s that, I’m just saying -

CLIENT: No, I see.

THERAPIST: I think it’s you like, under a kind of onslaught from him that way, quickly abandon what you were feeling angry about.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: You know, I mean, I’m just making shit up now that you could have said. Like, “Yes, clearly the only people who have jobs out there have studied math and science.” Or, you know, “That’s why Harvard only has graduate programs in math and science.” Or you know, what you would have said that would have been, I mean, those other things aren’t quite right, but could’ve you worked feeling something and in another context, are usually at a loss for words or argument. [00:35:48]

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: But this is a (pause) so charged, I think, when you’re angry and somebody kind of strikes you down like that.

CLIENT: Yeah, and so I guess (pause) So part of what I think I’m saying is that it’s not clear to me (pause) why I (pause) get so shut down sometimes and don’t other times. (pause) You know? Sometimes James snaps at me, and it’s like, “Well, that’s ridiculous,” and then I continue on with my day. Sometimes James snaps at me, and it shuts down the entire day.

THERAPIST: Uh-huh. [00:36:47]

CLIENT: And (pause) you know, on a larger scale, the kind of normal talk thing that people deal with, sometimes I deal with him and (pause) then I continue on with my day, and sometimes I just can’t. And it sends me spiraling down, and (crying) it’s scary for me not to know how I’m going to react, and not to feel like I’m in control of that in any way. (pause) [00:37:47]

THERAPIST: Well, (pause) I mean, let’s look at those two situations. In those you did react pretty differently. (pause) I mean, do you have thoughts? I have some, but I... (pause)

I guess one of the things that’s coming to me, he was sort of jumping on you for how you were feeling bad. Like more frustrated than angry. And he kind of jumped on that. Which seems to me, kind of sides with the part of you that always feels like, you shouldn’t be upset, you should just have done better, and stuff like that. [00:39:12]

CLIENT: Mm-hmm. (pause)

THERAPIST: The other one is just different?

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) I mean it is, I just -

THERAPIST: You don’t worry about abandoning him.

CLIENT: I’m sorry?

THERAPIST: You don’t worry about abandoning him any more than they abandoned him. I heard that, at least you said it to me very strongly, that he’s the reason you’re still alive.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And like sort of feeling that he’s not... he’s awesome, but that’s not why you’re still alive. It’s because you don’t want to do that to him.

CLIENT: Mm-hmm. Yeah. [00:40:29]

So it’s like, he’s angry at me for something I’m not already angry at myself about.

THERAPIST: Yeah, I guess that you feel kind of, “Fuck you.” You feel quite confident about it.

CLIENT: Yeah. Okay. I can see that.

THERAPIST: Yeah, maybe your reasons are different but...

CLIENT: Hm. (pause)

THERAPIST: Maybe another example like that would be when, didn’t he say, was it last week where he said, “Oh, well, we should have a conversation about money.” And that (pause) as I recall was devastating.

CLIENT: Yeah, that didn’t feel right. I mean, we did talk about money, it went pretty well.

THERAPIST: Right. Maybe if you had been more conspicuous in a way, like, because like, what he originally said was, “Oh, we should have a conversation about money.” Which is something, I think, you’re terribly upset with yourself about.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: And he wasn’t mad, so what seemed more conspicuous was, he wasn’t mad, he wasn’t, as I heard it, accusatory or mean. He was more like, “Oh, we need to figure this out.”

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah. (pause) [00:42:21]

I’m tired. I’m not thinking very well.

THERAPIST: Oh. What’s going on? Do you feel sort of, can’t get it out, or...

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. It’s like, everything you’re saying makes sense but I’m still upset about this? And so...

THERAPIST: That’s very important. (chuckles)

CLIENT: Um...

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: But I don’t quite know how or why or, like, even how to say, like, how I’m upset, I just feel upset.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: So just... (pause) Yeah, I feel like usually I’m a little better at at least saying what it looks like. But... (pause) [00:43:42]

THERAPIST: Oh.

CLIENT: And I’m just, I’m scared. And (pause) I feel like I don’t know what’s going to happen, and I don’t know... It’s one thing to be able to say, “Okay, well, I reacted well to this because of this, but I didn’t react well to this because of this.” And... but that doesn’t (pause) help me predict what’s going to happen next necessarily.

THERAPIST: Right. (pause) [00:44:37]

CLIENT: Yeah. James has a hard time trusting me because he doesn’t know when I will go back to wanting to kill myself fully. I’m the one who wants to kill myself. (chuckles) You know, like, I can’t trust anything. (chuckles)

THERAPIST: I see. Like, in other words, if he can’t trust you, like to like do everything, you can’t trust you either.

CLIENT: Yeah. (chuckles)

THERAPIST: And that’s with you all the time.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause)

THERAPIST: We should stop.

CLIENT: Yeah. Thanks.

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