TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:
THERAPIST: Hi.
CLIENT: Good morning. I woke up 10 minutes before my alarm went off this morning which I always sort of like but sort of hate because I'd like to sleep that extra 10 minutes. James's not doing so well. I don't really know what it is. He like went out for a walk late night late and got back later and I said is there anything I can do and he said, probably not and then that was that. There's isn't anything I can do.
(PAUSE): [00:01:32 00:01:51]
CLIENT: I don't know where to start.
(PAUSE): [00:01:51 00:02:40]
CLIENT: I don't know whether like I don't know whether at any given moment I don't know if what I'm doing is the right thing or the wrong thing. And whether I'm helping him or hurting him. It's like anything I do -
(PAUSE): [00:02:52 00:03:25]
CLIENT: I feel like we just don't trust each other right now.
(PAUSE): [00:03:25 00:03:38]
CLIENT: We were watching "Louis" we watch it like Tuesdays (unclear) less than a week. It's only 20 minute episodes. There was an episode last night of a guy who is a very old friend of Louis comes into town and basically takes Louis out and then tells him he's going to kill himself and so like we saw it was about suicide like on the blurb and James was like, 'er,' and so we didn't watch it one night and then the next night it was like, 'do you want to skip it?' and he was like, 'what about you I'm fine.' And I was like, 'fine, let's watch it.' It wasn't very, it just wasn't great. I don't know, it just didn't go anywhere and it didn't feel inauthentic to me, I just felt like the show's writers didn't know what they were trying to say. I don't know. I mean it's like I don't really know because I can't talk to him about it. I feel like James is just afraid that he's going to come back one day and I will have killed myself, which you know, I can see why one would not trust me given that and I can't promise him that I won't. I'm trying but I -
(PAUSE): [00:05:46 00:06:17]
CLIENT: I went out for a drink after church I guess two weeks ago now, or a week and a half with the regulars from church and at the very end of the evening everyone was like, like an hour (laughs) at the very end of the conversation one of them was like, a psychologist I think he's ordained in the Church, also? But I'm considering him a psychologist, somehow by calling like getting calls from like emergency calls from his patients came up and like what he said was like, 'well, if they're calling me, they don't want to die but they're still suicidal.' And everyone was like, 'huh?' Yeah, but I didn't want to say anything. I'm not quite sure why I thought of that. This was the same evening where another of the people I was hanging out with worked at [Frederick] (ph). So it was kind of a weird evening in that I don't know. Fortunately, nobody was that interested in listening to me. Like I was part of the conversation but nobody was relying on me to lead it. It was easier than it might have been. I didn't have to take a stand or anything.
(PAUSE): [00:08:14 00:08:22]
CLIENT: Yeah, it could have been much more uncomfortable than it was.
(PAUSE): [00:08:22 00:08:55]
CLIENT: And I think I'm doing better but it doesn't seem fair to you to make promises like that.
(PAUSE): [00:09:02 00:09:41]
THERAPIST: I'm wondering if one reason it's difficult to talk about it is because it feels like something that I get maybe a little more or am easier to talk to about it than James and that is not comfortable.
(PAUSE): [00:10:12 00:10:33]
CLIENT: I can't I don't like remember not being able to talk to James about something that was important in my life before. I just never -
(PAUSE): [00:10:46 00:11:07]
CLIENT: Even like falling in love with another man was something I could talk to James about. (Laughs)
(PAUSE): [00:11:14 00:12:30]
CLIENT: It's like I'm really used to thinking that most things are my fault. So it's like I don't even notice it anymore. It's just like a baseline assumption. And so like I start thinking that things would just be better if I weren't part of the equation. But that's exactly the problem right now. Like the fact that I think that is what is problematic. I don't know if that makes sense.
(PAUSE): [00:13:00 00:13:41]
CLIENT: So driving to one of the events I think it was like the brunch on Sunday because it was the one that got heated, I remember just like sitting there very clearly and thinking this is because of something I did. This is my fault. And like I think I remember that most because it was so clear that it was really not my fault at all like it was not anything I did or anything I could have done to prevent it -
(PAUSE): [00:14:13 00:14:33]
CLIENT: So yeah, fairly self-centered.
(PAUSE): [00:14:33 00:14:58]
CLIENT: I feel like James is having a rough time and maybe it's because of me and maybe it's not. But I feel that it must be because of me and it is incumbent on me to fix it. And like I know those things aren't true but I just can't handle it.
(PAUSE): [00:15:31 00:17:01]
THERAPIST: I can think that it's embarrassing to ask what I think because it's hard to imagine that I'm not thinking critically of you for maybe you're not being in more control or not being more rational or for even being involved (inaudible).
(PAUSE): [00:17:27 00:17:38]
CLIENT: Yeah, I guess I'm in sort of a double bind where I worry that if I talk about constantly thinking that everything is my fault you will think that it's very selfish and irrational of her and if I don't talk about it you will say don't you realize that everything is your fault? (Laughs). So I'm sort of fucked.
(PAUSE): [00:18:29 00:18:43]
CLIENT: I think about this with regard to my depression and how do you categorize depression and mental illness and like implicate (unclear) and people keep telling me it's not my fault but they also keep telling me that it's my responsibility to change it. So I don't really know I don't know how those two are in conflict with each other. (Crying) James keeps telling me that it's not my fault but he's really pissed at me for it all the same and so I don't -
(PAUSE): [00:19:22 00:19:27]
CLIENT: I don't know.
(PAUSE): [00:19:27 00:19:42]
CLIENT: I don't really remember this but I wrote about it at the time. There was a point in the hospital where the doctor who had been there basically a long time and on my third, or fourth or fifth visit and basically he was like, 'you need to work harder. You just need to work harder to feel better.' It was like, 'I don't know what to do.' (Crying)
(PAUSE): [00:20:07 00:20:26]
CLIENT: I can't exactly say they were wrong. If it pissed me off enough that they well, what I decided to do at the time was like, 'well fuck it, I'll just get better enough to go home and then next time I'll just kill myself. That's what I'll do.' But then I got better enough to go home and I didn't kill myself, so that was good. But I don't when people start saying that to me how do I I just think that, well that's what they've been thinking all this time.
THERAPIST: I see.
CLIENT: And I don't know.
(PAUSE): [00:21:09 00:21:54]
CLIENT: I don't really have a clear handle on what I'm talking about here even.
(PAUSE): [00:22:01 00:22:10]
CLIENT: So I'm trying not to forget that.
(PAUSE): [00:22:10 00:22:17]
THERAPIST: Well I think you're really anxious because you're describing I think how other people play an important part in putting you in a double bind. But I think kind of offloading blame or mentioning how that pisses you off is pretty terrifying at the moment, I suspect, because I'm going to retaliate in some way, maybe and even a little concern that's saying what it feels like I'm doing.
CLIENT: I don't know if that last (unclear) is true. (inaudible).
(PAUSE): [00:23:36 00:23:53]
CLIENT: I feel like it happens often enough that I will say I am angry at this other person and you're going to say, 'well, maybe you're also angry at me.' And I say, 'I don't know.' And then like right now I'm sort of angry with mental health care and I don't know how to day that and not have you interpret that as I'm really angry at you.
(PAUSE): [00:24:23 00:25:22]
THERAPIST: Yeah, I guess I was thinking more like it might feel like I was retaliating by pointing out that you were laying blame on other people and that that would make you feel anxious and guilty and as though I was kind of throwing it back at you in some fashion. If it doesn't feel that way to you, that's great, but I sort of -
CLIENT: (Laughs)
THERAPIST: Understand -
CLIENT: I don't mean to -
THERAPIST: (inaudible).
(PAUSE): [00:26:16 00:26:27]
CLIENT: I guess I should try harder like that.
(PAUSE): [00:26:27 00:27:36]
THERAPIST: I had the impression it had something to do with my saying that's not how it feels (unclear).
CLIENT: No, I think I was (Pause) telling you that I didn't know how to say that as angry as somebody with (unclear).
THERAPIST: I see.
CLIENT: I was immediately after saying that is when I started to panic.
THERAPIST: I see. No, that sounds (inaudible).
CLIENT: (Laughs)
THERAPIST: Un huh.
(PAUSE): [00:28:28 00:28:35]
THERAPIST: I felt like you were being like I was going to hear that as your being critical of me -
CLIENT: I don't know.
THERAPIST: Something.
CLIENT: Yeah.
(PAUSE): [00:28:38 00:29:03]
THERAPIST: I wonder if somewhere it felt like telling me how I was self-centered which it seems to me your feeling is one of the worst things in the whole world in a way that's sort of a third rail for you when you feel like you're being that way.
CLIENT: Yeah, it does feel like one of the worst things in the world. I didn't now think that I felt like that.
(PAUSE): [00:29:41 00:29:50]
CLIENT: I have a hard time telling you that I think you're wrong, increasingly like that. Well, because I think it's like, you know the longer we work together the more you end up being right. (Laughs) I don't know. I don't like not relying on my own judgment. I feel really uncomfortable with that. Like saying like I don't see how this is right but from experience I should probably sit with it for a while and see.
THERAPIST: I see.
CLIENT: It's actually very scary to talk to you about this.
(PAUSE): [00:30:48 00:31:43]
CLIENT: I feel like historically when I've trusted other people's judgment over my own it's ended badly for me.
(PAUSE): [00:31:51 00:32:13]
CLIENT: And I don't I really don't think that that is what you're asking me to do to be clear: I really don't think that. I -
(PAUSE): [00:32:24 00:32:37]
CLIENT: But there's always somebody asking me to do that.
(PAUSE): [00:32:38 00:32:54]
THERAPIST: There's no (unclear) if it's worse if you're actually making the decision of whether to do that and how, as opposed to my asking you to do that.
CLIENT: Yeah, a little bit, because then if it ends badly for me it's like I'm (unclear).
(PAUSE): [00:33:10 00:33:33]
CLIENT: It is very scary for me to let me know that I trust you that much because clearly you're (unclear) with me, like that's just going to happen. (Laughs) And so there you have it.
(PAUSE): [00:33:57 00:35:58]
THERAPIST: Is it sort of related to say that the more you let yourself think that this is about you and what's going on with you, the more likely that you'll be disappointed that it actually becomes about me and what I need?
CLIENT: I don't understand.
THERAPIST: In some way that I'm going to disavow like -
(PAUSE): [00:36:30 00:36:42]
THERAPIST: That in some way like our relationship is going to emerge as being like my needs in ways that I'm going to disavow.
(PAUSE): [00:36:46 00:37:03]
CLIENT: I don't know.
(PAUSE): [00:37:03 00:37:17]
CLIENT: I mean I certainly feel like it's not like it's eventually not going to be okay for it to be about what I need. But I don't know if that's the same thing as what you're saying.
THERAPIST: It does seem yeah, pretty close to what I was saying.
(PAUSE): [00:37:56 00:38:07]
THERAPIST: Although I guess when you describe me fucking with me that makes it sound more deliberate really.
CLIENT: Yeah.
(PAUSE): [00:38:17 00:40:05]
CLIENT: Yeah, I just thought, 'this is not going to end well.' (Laughs)
(PAUSE): [00:40:08 00:44:10]
CLIENT: I guess also the way that our conversations go and we talk for a long time and (unclear) this is going on and I sort of say, 'well that makes sense,' or like, 'no, that doesn't feel right.' But like, I don't know, I worry about I just worry about being wrong.
(PAUSE): [00:44:44 00:44:58]
CLIENT: And I know that I probably don't need to but I do.
(PAUSE): [00:44:59 00:45:06]
CLIENT: And (unclear) even like derail us or something.
THERAPIST: I think we should finish for today.
CLIENT: Okay.
END TRANSCRIPT
