TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:
CLIENT: I got talking to a friend until like 4:22. So...
THERAPIST: It's okay.
CLIENT: That's why I was booking it over here. (PAUSE)
THERAPIST: Oh. Alright. I was on... (inaudible at 00:00:25) Speaking of Skype, I have not yet had a chance to check on other states.
CLIENT: And I (inaudible at 00:00:35)
THERAPIST: Okay.
(PAUSE)
CLIENT: So for scheduling...
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: ...I think I'm going to need to go into work on Monday.
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:00:43)
CLIENT: Yeah. So I don't think I'll be able to make it on Monday.
THERAPIST: Okay.
CLIENT: But it should be the last time that happens...
THERAPIST: Okay.
CLIENT: ...for a while, at least because the son is going to school in June and they're trying to (inaudible at 00:00:57) basically. [00:10:03]
THERAPIST: Oh, okay. Alright. So I was just thinking... So then we're meeting on Tuesday.
CLIENT: But she said that for me to come in on Wednesdays in July would probably work.
THERAPIST: Oh, okay.
CLIENT: Yeah.
THERAPIST: That's good.
CLIENT: Yeah. So it should get me here (inaudible at 00:01:31)
THERAPIST: So we start that on like the 10th, I guess.
CLIENT: Okay.
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:01:39) next week.
CLIENT: Okay. If something opens up, I can... So basically, I'm going to come in on Monday and then it's up to me whether I want to work four days next week or (inaudible at 00:01:57) So if something happens, I wouldn't be on Wednesday or Thursday. I can come in for that. [00:02:05]
THERAPIST: Okay. On Wednesday, I know I've got something in the morning. I think I've got 9:15.
CLIENT: Okay. Would that be okay?
THERAPIST: Yeah. It's fine. I'm just trying to... I need to verify it. But I'm like pretty sure I've got that.
CLIENT: Okay. Cool. Thank you. (PAUSE) Oh yeah, because you're not in next Friday.
THERAPIST: Yeah. Thursday or Friday.
CLIENT: Thursday or Friday?
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: Well, yeah. They're together anyway.
THERAPIST: Okay.
CLIENT: I'm just reminding myself. (LAUGHTER)
THERAPIST: Even I (inaudible at 00:02:55)
CLIENT: Oh yeah, it's July Fourth. Look at that. (LAUGHTER) Yeah. [00:02:59]
THERAPIST: Oh wait. No, I do not have a 9:15. Sorry.
CLIENT: Okay.
THERAPIST: I've got... (PAUSE) Alright. Let me look around and see what I can do.
CLIENT: Okay. And if nothing opens up, it's okay. (inaudible)
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:03:37)
CLIENT: Sorry. I feel like I've got a lot of loose appointments and reschedulings.
THERAPIST: Yeah. I should make a note of that.
CLIENT: It's okay. (LAUGHTER)
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: Okay. [00:04:03]
CLIENT: Okay. (PAUSE) An acquaintance from William & Mary... Kirsten and a whole bunch of other theologians (ph) at William & Mary have a blog, not Candace though because they didn't ask her to be part of it because she wasn't pursuing a PhD active enough. I disagree. So... We don't really like them but I read them anyway. Yeah, it was short sided. Just because Candace's a better thinker than any of them. Like obviously, she's my best friend of all of them but also she's a better thinker. [00:05:01]
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: So anyway, a post on do we as (inaudible at 00:05:19) care about mental illness? Not, surprisingly, I had some thoughts about... (LAUGHTER) So like I've been writing about that and kind of thinking about it and... (SIGH) I feel like I'm sort of at this stage of having a lot of things to say but none of them being very clear. Like I know the woman who wrote this post and like I like her and I know that it's an issue that's very important to her. But I didn't like the post very much. [00:05:59]
Like she said some things that were very good but also... (PAUSE) I'm like, "Maybe they needed to be said to that audience. But to me it's obvious." Like, "Hey, every time we talk about depression, we talk about it... Every time we talk about the treatment of mental illness, we talk about it as a sign of like lacks morality and consumer culture of America and that's not doing people who have real problems any good." It's like, "Yes. That is true. Good for you." She kind of said... She thought that academy should take a look at social and structural aspects of mental illness. I started a reply. I said, "Yes. Let's look at tenure review. Like, let's look at the social and structural elements of mental illness in the academy. Like how is the..." [00:07:05]
You know, basically she was trying to claim a critical distance that she was at the same time saying that she didn't have but she was saying people... I'm not making any sense, am I? (SIGH) Anyway, the upshot is I'm having this sort of involved and protracted discussion.
THERAPIST: Do you want to try me again on that other part?
CLIENT: (LAUGHTER) Okay. (SIGH) (PAUSE) So like one of the main things that she was saying is that she feels like when people talk about, when people within the academy talk about mental illness, it's like, "What can we do to help them?" [00:07:57]
She's like, "That's not a very good distinction to make because it's not actually them. Like it's us." (PAUSE) To which I say, "Yes. Yes, absolutely." But then she sort of goes on to say, "So, that means that we in the academy should be able to... We should look critically at mental illness in America and look at the social and structural aspects of it." And my thought is sort of like... (SIGH) Which I think it's much more of... I feel like my anger is getting in the way of my ability to think here. But I can't tell whether it's getting in the way of my ability to think of if it's actually helping me think better. My thought is, "Well, but..." (SIGH) (PAUSE) I feel that the academy is too busy fostering and exploiting mental illness to be able to think very critically about it. (LAUGHTER) [00:09:01]
THERAPIST: (LAUGHTER)
CLIENT: But... (PAUSE) I guess I'm thinking about... Like I'm trying to think about the depression and like the last six months or two years or lifetime. I'm trying to think about it and I can't well I'm being like too personal or not personal enough. And I'm trying to talk about it with people and I feel like... Like I worry that I am saying, "Well, I know about this and you clearly don't," or like, "This is what happened to me and you should feel sorry for me," which is really not what I'm saying at all but I feel like that's maybe what people are hearing. [00:10:17]
But I can't tell whether that's actually what people are hearing or just what I'm afraid that they'll hear. (PAUSE) (LAUGHTER) So I got like two Facebook messages in quick succession from a friend from William & Mary, the first one saying, "Tanya (ph), thank you so much for this comment that you posted on the post. It was really interesting and I'm going to think about it really hard as I try to look at this theologically." [00:11:03]
And the second comment was, "Whoa, I just read your blog post about the ECT (ph) and I'm so sorry that I used your intense pain as a stimulus for mental engagement." And I wrote back, "No, that was the point." (LAUGHTER) Like I want that. That's why I'm writing about it. I want it to mean something other than horrible things happened to me. (PAUSE) But I worry that the way I'm framing it means that I'm the only person who gets to talk. I'm just so... (SIGH) (PAUSE) Because it sort of feels like when I talk about these things with people that are my friends, they sort of tiptoe around me. And I can't tell whether that's coming from them or coming from me. [00:12:15]
(PAUSE)
CLIENT: I don't want people to feel sorry for me. I really don't want people to feel sorry for me. I think more I don't want people to feel sorry for me... (SIGH)
(PAUSE) [00:13:00]
CLIENT: Also, I feel like maybe in ten years, I'll regret posting such personal things on the Internet. But, oh well, it's what I'm doing now. So... (PAUSE) I have to take care of myself now. I can't take care of future Tanya. I don't know what she's going to need. (PAUSE) I also got sort of pissed off at this blog post because it's just like so jargon heavy. It's like the second... She like dropped a Latin phrase in the second sentence and then went on to translate it. Like, "No, if you're going to quote Latin, translating it doesn't... It just defeats the purpose."
THERAPIST: Right. [00:13:59]
CLIENT: First of all, you shouldn't...
THERAPIST: It's like using a big word in English and then saying what it means. Either you use the word and people are going to understand or you use a different word. But if you use the word and then explain it, you're being like, having a pretentious...
CLIENT: Yes. Exactly, exactly. Candace always gets pissed off when people use a Latin phrase that is pretty easy to just use the English equivalent to. It was like "locus theologicus (ph)," which is like... I mean, you can just say "a site for theological discussion."
THERAPIST: Oh okay.
CLIENT: Like people will know what that is. (LAUGHTER) It's not much longer.
THERAPIST: Right. (PAUSE) But the tagline that Candace and I have on our blog is "Friends don't let friends use academic jargon." I just don't know. [00:15:01]
So I started crying before I could get up this morning. So there's that too. I think I just need to stop sleeping in because I think I'm going to... Like I like getting sleep but then it just makes it worse to get up. It's just really hard. (PAUSE) I feel like... In some way, I, you know, I want to be talking about the depression and the hospitalization and the ECT and all this shit. I want to be talking to people. I want to say, "This is what happened to me and this is what I've been going through." [00:16:03]
But I feel like I can't talk about that and not be over it. Like, I feel like if I'm going to talk about it, that means there's that much more pressure on me to be okay. (PAUSE) So maybe that's my feeling that I need to have some clinical distance. (PAUSE) It's like things are fine and things are fine and then I just have thirty seconds of like, "Oh, I can't do this. I can't handle this." And then things go back to being fine. (CRYING)
(PAUSE) [00:17:00]
CLIENT: Can I ask you to turn the temperature down a little bit?
THERAPIST: Yeah, sure.
CLIENT: It's getting hot. I'm hot.
THERAPIST: Yeah, sure.
CLIENT: Thank you.
THERAPIST: Does it feel a bit muggy too or is it just me?
CLIENT: Yeah.
THERAPIST: Okay.
CLIENT: I think that's just the day though.
THERAPIST: Yeah.
CLIENT: (inaudible at 00:17:47) We don't have AC. So I can't tell anymore.
(PAUSE) [00:18:00]
CLIENT: I feel like that part of the reason I just jump on conversations like this is that I'm just starved for intellectual conversations like this. Like, I need to be thinking about something more than I am. (LAUGHTER)
THERAPIST: Yeah. It kind of sounds like you are resentful of feeling like, in a way, they are speaking for you.
(PAUSE) [00:19:00]
CLIENT: Yeah.
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: And that I think you feel, at least sort of, at one level, they should shut the hell up. I mean, at another level, I don't think you feel that. They have a right to say, you know... But there's a part of you that feels like they're speaking for you. I guess I get the impression part of your thought is that they should shut up. And I'm not sure quite how it fits but it does seem like you're having some trouble talking about this, like, to me. [00:20:01]
I mean, it's clear that you've written a fair amount about this on your own blog and I guess on comments about what they wrote and have strong feelings about it. But it sort of felt to me like you sort of petered out in describing it to me. I don't know. Maybe you didn't. Maybe I'm just...
CLIENT: No. I...
THERAPIST: ...misunderstanding or misreading.
CLIENT: I feel like I sort of started talking about it and was like, "I don't know if..." I don't know if this is what I want to talk about today and I don't know if I have enough of a handle on it to actually talk about it, like if I... [00:21:07]
You know, because I obviously can't... Oh, I didn't actually mean that. I wanted to say something else. Like I can't revise clearly. (LAUGHTER)
THERAPIST: And you also ought to know in advance.
CLIENT: Yeah.
THERAPIST: I guess I was sort of wondering about some kind of parallel where you feel like there's some reason that you shouldn't be speaking about it in the same way, kind of like they shouldn't be or like... (PAUSE) I don't know.
CLIENT: Yeah. I wonder about that.
(PAUSE) [00:22:00]
CLIENT: I wonder if... (PAUSE) You know, I write in my personal journal what is valuable to me right then. I try to post to the Internet what I feel is valuable to someone else. I wonder if I'm actually able to do that.
THERAPIST: The second one?
CLIENT: Yeah.
(PAUSE) [00:23:00]
CLIENT: I guess the phrase that keeps coming into my mind is, "Maybe I'm just crazy." (LAUGHTER)
(PAUSE) [00:24:00]
CLIENT: I'm not sure if (inaudible at 00:24:11) should just shut up. If it does (inaudible) (PAUSE) I guess I'm... I am reluctant to talk to you about my writing and thinking or my writing and more abstract thinking about this stuff because I am afraid that your internal response will be, "Oh, isn't that sweet," or something of that, along those lines. [00:25:15]
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: Like in what sense? I mean, it sounds patronizing. I sort of get that. But...
CLIENT: Yeah. That's... (SIGH) (PAUSE) Or that you will say, you know, anything in the spectrum of like, "Well, writing is a useful therapeutic tool," which is true. It is true. [00:26:03]
That is one of the things that, you know... That is one of the reasons I started writing. But like...
THERAPIST: Like I hear "exercise and mindfulness."
CLIENT: (LAUGHTER)
THERAPIST: Like that?
CLIENT: No. Like that you will take it seriously as something that could be good. (PAUSE) You know, that it will be valuable only insofar as it is about me and is valuable to me.
THERAPIST: I see.
(PAUSE) [00:27:00]
CLIENT: Yeah.
(PAUSE) [00:28:00]
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:28:15)
CLIENT: What's that?
THERAPIST: (inaudible)
CLIENT: Yeah. I guess so.
(PAUSE) [00:29:00]
CLIENT: I don't want to... (PAUSE) Like I don't want the best efforts of my mind to be sort of in the same class as the arts and crafts thing that you make in occupational therapy.
(PAUSE) [00:30:00]
CLIENT: Maybe it's that with the, you know, with the leaving grad school and spending so much time in the hospital or just as a patient... Shoot. I had an important second part to that sentence and now it's gone. (LAUGHTER)
(PAUSE) [00:31:00]
CLIENT: I feel like I'm tired of being pitied.
(PAUSE) [00:32:00]
CLIENT: But I feel like... But at the time I feel like I can't... I feel like no one will... It feels to me like no one will hear me unless they are, have no impulse to pity me or like there's nothing pitiable about me. If feels like no one will be able to listen to me without feeling sorry for me which sort of makes it problematic that most of the things I've been thinking about and wanting to talk about are related to things that people really should feel sorry for me about (LAUGHTER) or like things that are really hard, things that I feel sorry for myself about. So... [00:33:11]
I mostly don't feel like you feel sorry for me which I really appreciate.
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: Well, I imagine there are also times where... (PAUSE) I guess I'm wondering at times whether I sort of confirm or doubt or interpret things you said, maybe not so much as pity, but like not necessarily taking seriously what you say in the sense of not taking it at face value in a positive sense. [00:34:21]
CLIENT: Do you have an example?
THERAPIST: Well, like...
CLIENT: (inaudible at 00:34:31) (LAUGHTER) I can never think of examples.
THERAPIST: I can't think of a specific one. But I think I can explain myself a little more clearly. (inaudible at 00:34:41) is this," or... I mean, (inaudible) or, you know (inaudible) what you had been talking about a minute ago. Or, you know, what I'm hearing and you're saying is this thing over here which you thought you were talking about.
CLIENT: Yeah. Okay. I know what you're talking about. (LAUGHTER)
THERAPIST: I don't really imagine those things feel like I'm pitying you but I could imagine those thing feeling like I'm not taking at face value what you're saying in the way you would like it to be and in a way that feels like it, I guess... I don't know.
CLIENT: Undercuts what I'm saying?
THERAPIST: Yeah or like presumes that I'm up here and you're down there.
(PAUSE) [00:36:00]
CLIENT: Hmm... (PAUSE) Yeah, so sometimes when you, you kind of like shift the conversation like that, it's like... Sometimes it is very illuminating and sometimes it's a relief and sometimes it's frustrating because I actually just wanted to be talking about the thing that we're talking about. (inaudible at 00:37:05) (LAUGHTER)
THERAPIST: Yeah. [00:37:07]
CLIENT: It gets frustrating. (PAUSE) I don't know why it feels like the sort of... Like, I don't know if I... I don't know if that's a parallel. Like I think... I don't know whether I am afraid that you will pity me in one context because I feel like you are pitying me or approaching that in another context. That doesn't...
THERAPIST: I see. You're feeling is that I might pity you in that first context because anybody might and people have. [00:38:03]
CLIENT: Yeah. (PAUSE) Well, I think something to do with your role as therapist and treatment (ph) and like...
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:38:41) in the way that doesn't (inaudible) context in which it was written, in the purpose for which it was written. [00:39:01]
CLIENT: Yeah. (PAUSE) Yeah. (PAUSE) I think it's also having recently spent so much time in inpatient treatment where... And also like programs and all these places, it is... I don't know what I'm trying to say.
(PAUSE) [00:40:00]
CLIENT: Sort of like an attitude of, "Let's get you well and then we'll listen to what you have to say." But I don't know if that's quite it either. (SIGH) I don't know.
(PAUSE) [00:41:00]
CLIENT: Another part of the problem is as I think about it, I get fatigued and nothing is becoming clear and that's very frustrating for me. (inaudible at 00:41:39)
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: What pops into your head?
CLIENT: Hmm?
THERAPIST: What pops into your head?
CLIENT: It is imperative (inaudible) [0042:07]
In those exact words. (LAUGHTER) (inaudible at 00:42:35) I feel like I'm holding on very tightly to something but I'm not sure what. I'm not exactly sure what I should be holding onto. [00:43:01]
It feels exhausting.
(PAUSE)
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:43:35)
CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah. But... It's probably (inaudible)
(PAUSE) [00:44:00]
CLIENT: Maybe it's silly to take a blog so seriously. (PAUSE) Yeah. (inaudible at 00:44:29) (PAUSE) It's just hard. It's just hard not to be that person. [00:45:09]
THERAPIST: (inaudible at 00:45:15)
CLIENT: What? Being that person? Yeah.
THERAPIST: Well, we should go.
CLIENT: Okay.
THERAPIST: (inaudible)
END TRANSCRIPT
