TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:
THERAPIST: Hey.
CLIENT: Thursday (ph) did end up being fine. I did go and get tea for a couple of hours (inaudible at 0:00:20) very good (inaudible at 0:00:27). Yeah, I think most of it... I think most of my feeling, like, other people won't be okay with that comes from me rather than other people. I think most of the other people that I know, if they don't themselves feel a need to hide from people after a couple of days, they definitely understand that I do (laughing).
THERAPIST: (Chuckling)
CLIENT: So... [0:00:56] (Pause) Yeah. I'm still not exactly sure how work's going to go today. But...
THERAPIST: How work's going to go today?
CLIENT: Yeah. (Pause)
THERAPIST: Yeah. (Pause)
CLIENT: In some regards, James's parents and my family are really similar, as in, we spent at least an hour yesterday trying to decide where to go to dinner. [0:02:06] And it was hard because it's Monday, and places are closed on Monday. But, this is Andover, they have lots of restaurants! (Chuckling) Not all of them are closed.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: And there was just... I don't know, [they were just wanting to] (ph)... they spent a lot of time on (inaudible at 0:2:31) and online, trying to find good places. And we sort of listed all the places that we've been to, and, since nobody else was expressing an opinion, I said, you know what? I like the Ethiopian place. Let's try that. But my in-laws are not Ethiopian food people, in some ways? It was a novel... it was new for them to be like, let's eat food with your hands.
THERAPIST: Yeah. Right. [0:03:03]
CLIENT: And I think they liked it okay, but they wouldn't have gone on their own. And... (Pause) Yeah, so even after I made the suggestion, they go, yeah, okay, that would be nice, and then continued to look for other options, which is fine. But after that I was just like, well, I'm going to go do something else until you figure it out (chuckling).
THERAPIST: (Chuckling) (Pause)
CLIENT: I feel like I had more to say about what we were talking about yesterday, but I can't remember what that is now. [0:03:59] (Pause) But of course, as soon as it became clear that we were going to eat at the place I had suggested, I started to panic and feel guilty about that. [0:05:02] But I don't think I inflicted that on anybody else much, (inaudible at 0:5:12). (Pause) [0:05:59] I'm not... (Pause) So on the one hand I feel like I've had... there's been so much for pressure for me to... or from myself for me to have this job work and have moving to meeting with you three times a week work and to be okay in the fact of that. And I feel like the ways that I've tried to keep everything okay, I'm not sure that they're that helpful? But I don't know what else to do. And in some ways I feel like, maybe it's not that they're not helpful. Maybe it's just there's not anything that's going to be that helpful in making changes.
THERAPIST: Yes, uh-huh. [0:07:00] (Pause)
CLIENT: Yeah, I don't know.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause)
CLIENT: I ran into... (chuckling) this weekend I ran into two people I knew, just walking down the street, which is two more than happens almost ever. I just never see people I know.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: But... so both times I was out with James and his parents. Yesterday I ran into a guy from church, who serves as a Eucharistic minister with me. [0:08:00] And when we were at... we went to the museum, and when we were there I ran into Marla Jones, who was a woman who was at Williamd & Mary with me and is now...
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: A former roommate's roommate, Kirsten's (sp?) roommate...
THERAPIST: Right.
CLIENT: Both of which are just weird, Marla possibly more so. (Pause) Sort of throws me. I don't like it (laughing).
THERAPIST: Uh-huh. (Pause) [0:09:00]
CLIENT: Yeah. (Pause) I'm sort of having a hard time talking today.
THERAPIST: Hmm. Mm-hmm. (Pause)
CLIENT: I'm anxious about going to work. (Pause) [0:10:00]
THERAPIST: And you might have (inaudible at 0:10:25). Clearly an example with deciding where to go to dinner, I had an impression that you were worried you were going to spend the whole hour here trying to figure out what to talk about...
CLIENT: (Laughing)
THERAPIST: (Chuckling) And then in the same way you impose what you wanted on them. You were going to... you were worried about what you were going to impose on me when you picked something to talk about. And then [what you felt] (ph) you didn't do then, you worried about... you were going to feel guilty about imposing that? [0:11:01]
CLIENT: Hmm.
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 0:11:06). (Pause)
CLIENT: Yeah, I feel like a lot of days I sort of talk around things for a while. But... I don't know how not to. (Pause) [0:12:00] It's like I... (Pause) It's like I sort of talk and talk and talk, trying to avoid distressing things, until not feeling... feeling I don't know what to talk about becomes distressing enough. I'm like, wow, I'm already there, so (laughing)...
THERAPIST: (Chuckling) Right. Again, kind of like you said a few minutes ago about being determined to make [me and] (ph) your schedule work, sort of trying to do all these things...
CLIENT: Yeah.
THERAPIST: [Which in the end] (ph) make you much less distressed, I guess?
CLIENT: Yeah. And I can't know... (Pause) [0:13:01] I don't know what it would be like if I didn't try to manage everything, in a way.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause) [0:14:00]
CLIENT: And I guess it comes back again to, in a sort of smaller way, feeling like I won't be able to recover myself. [I don't know] (ph), I'm just very much thinking, well, after this I have to walk to my car and drive to work and then take care of kids all day and (pause), despite all evidence to the contrary-or a fair amount of evidence to the contrary-feeling like I won't be able to do that if I talk about things that matter here.
THERAPIST: I see. Uh-huh. [0:14:59] (Pause)
CLIENT: [Feeling like I have to] (ph) keep all the things that are distressing to me split off and out of sight, because there's no possible way I could function if they were not.
THERAPIST: Uh-huh. (Pause) [0:16:00] And I think it's a lot because of... that you're afraid [what it] (ph) will most immediately do to someone else, like me, and then sort of, as kind of an immediate consequence, to you for feeling like you've done that...
CLIENT: Hmm. (Pause)
THERAPIST: That you will impose or you will have done something that makes me kind of push back or not hear it or misunderstand it. [0:16:57]
CLIENT: Hmm. (Pause) That wasn't what I was thinking of?
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: But I don't really know how much I... (Pause) [0:18:00] I think I'm more worried right now that I'll disappoint you in some way.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: Not a big worry, but...
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: In terms of things I worry about with you, that's kind of at the top.
THERAPIST: I see. (Pause) [0:19:00]
CLIENT: Yeah, it feels like the things I need to do and be in here in order not to disappoint you and the things I need to do and be at work in order not to disappoint there are contradictory.
THERAPIST: I see. (Pause) [0:20:00] Which I guess includes the idea that I think you really ought to talk about (inaudible at 0:20:31) kinds of things.
CLIENT: Yeah. (Pause) I keep [weighing them out] (ph), which is, I recognize, not the same thing as thinking I need to talk about what I should talk about. [0:20:56]
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: But I... (Pause) But I think also there's a lot of... (Pause) It's hard for me to talk about these things. It's hard for me to admit that I want to talk about these things. So here you are conveniently suggesting that (chuckling).
THERAPIST: (Chuckling) Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I guess it seems to me that, at least now, you're kind of hearing what I said yesterday about some of the things that you were afraid of not seeming to line up with how things had gone in the past...
CLIENT: Mm-hmm.
THERAPIST: As part of an argument then that you will be okay talking about these things. Or there's a kind of implication that you should. [0:21:57] I guess in a way there was an argument that it seems plausible that you will be more okay than you think talking about difficult things. But it also... I have the impression that it felt like there was some pressure there from the in-laws. So you should.
CLIENT: [It must be okay] (ph) (chuckling).
THERAPIST: Uh-huh. It's not going to be as bad as you think, so...
CLIENT: (Laughing) I don't know.
THERAPIST: Uh-huh. (Pause) [0:23:00]
CLIENT: I can't figure out how to say it. But (pause) there are three halves of thoughts in there, but they don't actually add up to anything that I can say.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause) [0:24:00]
CLIENT: Yeah, I keep kind of thinking one thing and then immediately saying, no, that's not exactly right. So I don't think I was framing it really as an argument yesterday. Well, maybe it sort of was (chuckling). I don't know. (Pause) [0:25:00] Yeah, I have this sort of overwhelming feeling of, I can't do this well enough for you.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: But I'm not really sure what this is. I don't... if I try to say, well, what do I think Josh expects of me, I can't actually formulate that very well. So (pause) I don't know.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause) [0:26:00]
CLIENT: But I (ph) definitely (chuckling) have that overwhelming feeling of, I can't do this well enough...
THERAPIST: Uh-huh. Whatever it is (chuckling).
CLIENT: Whatever it is (chuckling).
THERAPIST: Uh-huh. (Pause)
CLIENT: Just like, what would it mean to take care of kids well enough? It's not... what would that even mean, I mean, in the sense that they're alive at the end of the day (laughing).
THERAPIST: (Laughing)
CLIENT: That's one bar. But... (Pause) [0:27:00] [0:28:01] [0:28:57] Yeah, so I feel like somewhere there must be a very clear picture of what it means to do well in therapy. But I don't know who has that picture or where it is.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause)
CLIENT: There's got to be an objective standard (chuckling).
THERAPIST: (Chuckling) Uh-huh. (Pause) [0:30:00]
CLIENT: Well, you know this, but I just wanted to say anyway...
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: Just because I was arguing with you yesterday doesn't mean I wasn't listening to what you said. It doesn't mean that didn't help. It's just... (Pause) Yeah, I guess... (Pause) Yeah. (Pause) [0:31:00] One of the women that I prayed with at church this week...
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: Asked me to pray with her for relief from fear, that she [had a lot of fear] (ph). (Pause) [0:32:00] So it's sort of... well, I'm not sure if this is actually like this, but this is the next thing my mind goes to. So we're walking with my in-laws, and we see Smart Cars kind of parked out and around. And they think they're absolutely ridiculous and say, they're like clown cars. And yes, they are like clown cars. But the main point... the main thing they'd say, being like, you should never take those on the highway. Oh no. They're just too dangerous for the highway. [0:33:00] And so I kind of keep my mouth shut. And then last night they both kind of pushed me and said, you'd take them on the highway? I don't know. I think, if a tractor-trailer hits you, you will be just as dead in a regular-size car as in one of those cars.
THERAPIST: Right.
CLIENT: I don't think... I don't buy the bigger is safer thing.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause)
CLIENT: So maybe I guess... (Pause) Maybe one way of sort of thinking about what we were talking about yesterday is to... I don't feel like you were saying... (Pause) [0:34:06] You... I feel like you were saying that, maybe... telling me that the times I've been in the hospital comes from some place, comes from a specific trigger and... or it has in the past, and sort of saying, you can still be safe. You will be more safe than you think you are to talk about these things.
THERAPIST: I see.
CLIENT: When I feel like, for me, the kind of... the challenge is not figuring out how to be safer or recognizing that I will be safer, but recognizing that I won't ever actually be safe and being okay with that. [0:35:11]
THERAPIST: I see.
CLIENT: Something like that.
THERAPIST: So, with the cars, the issue is to be okay with riding in a deathtrap no matter what you're behind the wheel of...
CLIENT: Yeah.
THERAPIST: Rather than to try to avoid Smart Cars because those are dangerous on the highway.
CLIENT: (Chuckling) Yeah, I think so.
THERAPIST: [I like that] (ph), yeah. (Pause) [0:36:00]
CLIENT: So (pause) it is (pause) helpful for me to remember that... I've always [felt like] (ph) my moods don't come out of nowhere and just go into nowhere. [0:37:03] They're not inexplicable. And that helps, but in some sense it's not... yeah, it doesn't quite address what I'm, I think, worrying about most, which is, they're there. And I can't... (Pause) That in some sense figuring out how to protect myself has to start with me knowing that I'm not ever going to be able to protect myself enough. [0:37:59]
THERAPIST: Hmm. (Pause)
CLIENT: (Teary) And I don't know how to do that. (Pause) [0:39:00] I'm not sure that's where I started out, thinking about this. (Pause) [0:40:00] [0:41:02]
THERAPIST: I see, so in a way the issue is (pause) kind of being cognizant of how you yourself or other people sort of try to talk you out of the way that you're scared all the time and feel very much in danger all the time. (Pause)
CLIENT: Yeah, I guess. I try to talk myself out of it, too, because I want to be talked out of it. [0:42:00] (Pause)
THERAPIST: Except that in your case it's kind of avoiding what it's actually like. Is that what you mean?
CLIENT: I think so.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm. (Pause) And I think the way that it being... there's something kind of impossible here, isn't there?
CLIENT: Yeah. (Pause) Yeah.
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 0:42:51) and somehow you have to be okay with that.
CLIENT: Yeah. [0:42:57] But it's like, I know it's not impossible, because other people live with it and because I do drive on the highways.
THERAPIST: Mm-hmm.
CLIENT: And that's not... yeah, I don't feel like I live with that fear or that uncertainty in other ways. I just don't know how to get [there here] (ph).
THERAPIST: We should stop.
CLIENT: Mm-hmm.
THERAPIST: See you at 7:30 tomorrow morning.
CLIENT: Okay.
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