TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

THERAPIST: (inaudible response)

CLIENT: Thanks for not having (inaudible) (heavy sigh) Oh, man, dude. I don't let me give you an example of what's been going on. Like I'm starting to get scared I have like Alzheimer's or something. I got up today and like, all right awesome, 12:50, whatever, plenty of time, whatever. I shower, whatever. Then it's around 12. I don't know why I suddenly am in a panic because I think the appointment is at 12:30. Like that's the kind of shit that's happening more and more lately. So I'm rushing. I rush to Dunkin, I run to my friend who, like I can't just, I gotta at least chat with him briefly, so like, fuck, fuck, fuck. So I get here at 12:33, I finally find parking, I sprint all the way here. The minute I get in here and see your door is closed what the fuck am I doing? 12:50. [00:00:04]

THERAPIST: (Chuckles)

CLIENT: I don't know. There's been a lot of stuff like that happens a lot lately. It's kinda like freaking me out. I'll like get ready, I'll put like a banana and a water to take with me when I leave the house. I'll forget it.

THERAPIST: Although today it maybe makes some sense that you were really, really worried about not being on time (cross talk) (inaudible) [00:01:18]

CLIENT: Yesterday was such a sh not a shitty, well, I don't want to say shitty it was a weird day. Yeah, but I don't know. I feel like my mind is on such overload that like sometimes I'll be having the like it happens here. I come here and I don't remember what we talked about, the time before. I'll be with someone at a bar and I'll sud like ‘did I just ask them this questions?' like 15 minutes ago? I don't know, it's kind of like freaking me out. But, that's a normal thing, right/ When you're ...

THERAPIST: When there's a lot on your mind, sure.

CLIENT: I don't know. It's just freaking me out. I don't it's strange. It's as if I've begun not paying as much attention as I think I am, or, do you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Um hmm.

CLIENT: So, in the conver I think I'm listening but then I'm only half listening? So I'm not really getting,

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I'm not remembering really the information, kind of. I don't know.

THERAPIST: Yeah, I mean you ask if it's a normal thing. I think it's so hard to tell exactly what it is yet, to know what's going on. It could be a lot of things. You, I mean you were, you mentioned in your message it's got to mean something I guess, not, not ...

CLIENT: Well, just because I mean fucking one o'clock, I mean come on there's no, you know. Yeah, I was up super, super late the night before. It was a weird whatever, but, really? Come on. So, I don't know. Maybe there's just something going on where it's just, especially lately, like I said, I just feel my mind's just really working overtime lately.

THERAPIST: You also said that maybe you know when there are things you are thinking about or feeling that are, you don't want to think more about or (cross talk)

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah ... (cross talk)

THERAPIST: (inaudible) [00:03:04]

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. Like maybe that's part of psychoanalysis or whatever, but, maybe I'm at that part where I'm like it's not causing me more anxiety in a way? But it is causing me more, like I don't know what I'm supposed to talk about, or I feel like, oh, there's deep things I'm not getting at, or I don't know. I don't know what it is. Or I'm just worried. Or I don't know what might come up so that scares me or something, I don't know. But.

(Pause): [00:03:41 00:03:46]

THERAPIST: Were you aware of the feeling that yesterday thinking about (inaudible) is like you were awake and then you'd go back to sleep. [00:03:49]

CLIENT: I wasn't awake.

THERAPIST: Oh, you weren't?

CLIENT: Oh, yeah, I was awake. I woke up a couple of times but I was so groggy and so (cross talk)

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: Like (inaudible).

THERAPIST: It's not like you (inaudible cross talk)

CLIENT: And I did set my alarm. I think that was kind of technically, like today, usually I have like three alarms that, you know. So, because there was really no alarm, I just, once I get into that deep sleep it was just, I woke up right at like one. Although I did wake up with a start. I mean I suddenly remembered and then I woke up all panicky and I was like, fuck me.

THERAPIST: But you also didn't set your alarm which is important, so even the night before (cross talk) (inaudible) [00:04:33]

CLIENT: Yeah, well the night before was kind of a weird, it was an unusual night. I don't think it was I really think I just forgot, like I had a little too much to drink. I mean I was fine, but I was, for a Monday night I don't do that very often. I was a little buzzed. This chick tried to kiss me twice and that threw me off a little bit. I resisted. That was never happened in my life I mean unless they're disgusting and I'm not attracted, but an attractive girl, like I fended her off. It was pretty awesome, I thought. But, and then I went to see Dave. I didn't drink at Dave's, but we had like a long talk. We hung out. It was nice but didn't get home til like 4:30.

THERAPIST: This was Tuesday night.

CLIENT: I'm sorry, Tuesday night See? I'm all like, God, I hate that. Tuesday night. So in all of that craziness I didn't have a moment to like, ‘oh, yeah, tomorrow, yeah.' It was on my mind but then it just (flit).

THERAPIST: So, now you think you just forgot.

CLIENT: I think it's a, understand, I think it's a combination, it was a weird night the night before where I was kind of not in my normal routine at all and some unusual stuff happened so I just...but yeah, it could be that that was an excuse to (cross talk)

THERAPIST: You wouldn't have been going out that late and you needed ... (cross talk)

CLIENT: I think it was a build up to an excuse, yeah.

THERAPIST: Um hmm. The mind is tricky.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. I've been getting more headaches lately, too. I used to get chronic headaches, really bad ones back in, between ‘99 and 2001. You know, one of those cluster kind of ones that are right here. And that's been happening not every day, not so bad but, yeah.

THERAPIST: Like migraines.

CLIENT: I don't quite think they're, I mean I don't throw up, or I don't, but yeah they're on that, yeah, they're similar. I mean my eyes get a little sensitive to light. I just feel kind of wacky and stuff. And again, I think it's just because there's so much, I don't know. And a lot of it's good, that's the thing, but it's just a lot, you know.

(Pause): [00:06:45 00:06:51]

CLIENT: I was thinking yesterday when I was thinking about it, it was like, god, maybe I'm not even prepared, or maybe I need to work on being okay. I mean that sounds simplistic, but even like physically, like do you know what I mean, if you don't know what it's like to be like, ‘oh, wow, I guess things are pretty good,' but I don't know if they're good today I guess they were good yesterday. Like there's a pattern of maybe I'm just, maybe that's making my mind not now it's on overload of goodness, or like projects and you know what I mean? Like, I don't know. Who knows what's going on.

THERAPIST: It could be that you're also saying in your association even on the phone was maybe there, maybe if there's anxiety or feelings about ‘what next' in here...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: If there isn't the same old usual things to talk about...

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: ...then, either will there be nothing and will it be uncomfortable, or will there be something that you don't know is coming...

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: ...somehow...

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: ...that also could feel really, really anxiety provoking?

CLIENT: Right, right. I've been seeing a lot more weird, kind of semi nightmarish dreams. Almost every morning I wake up a little sweaty. Which is weird because I turn the heat way down when I sleep but I had these really weird, vivid dreams.

(Pause): [00:08:17 00:08:24]

THERAPIST: Any you remember?

CLIENT: I did. I was so out of it I did, this time I didn't write a lot of it down. But, no. It'll come back to me. Some of them will come back. Nothing that was really so scary so much as just disconcerting and very vivid and just weird. And one thing I was thinking is maybe it's just, maybe I'm literally like see, even now I'm starting to get a little bit of a headache, yeah, right here, tightness. So, there's something going and my mind is just like (buzzing noises) you know, but it's just like, but in a different way than it used to, you know what I mean? Maybe I'm like freaking out because my record's going to come out and things with Kelly are like real and serious and you know, maybe (clears throat) I don't know, just a lot of stuff.

(Pause): [00:09:33 00:09:38]

THERAPIST: Do you remember saying last week on Friday that maybe you'd try the couch this week?

CLIENT: Yeah. I do remember that.

THERAPIST: Because that could be part of it, this time around.

CLIENT: Oh,, that, that because I said that now I feel oh,maybe. I didn't think about that.

THERAPIST: And it could feel scary or weird or...

CLIENT: Because I do remember saying it, but I do think that it might trigger. Yeah.

THERAPIST: You said it in a kind of, ‘sure, I'll try that,' kind of like, as though it was going to happen rather than talking about it first.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: So, I could imagine that.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Some (inaudible) of resistance. [00:10:19]

CLIENT: Yeah, I didn't even think about that. Yeah, that's true.

THERAPIST: Have you thought about that since at all?

CLIENT: No.

THERAPIST: Did it cross your mind?

CLIENT: I mean I remember talking about it, but not since then. But maybe it did but I don't remember, you know what I mean, maybe like pass -

THERAPIST: A passing thought.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's all I mean. Was there a passing thought that had content to it, or?

CLIENT: No, I think I definitely, it probably was like, ‘oh, yeah, you know, Wednesday. Not like Wednesday I gotta be on the couch, but I think there was something like, ‘like what's going on with yeah, that. Going to see Tricia and then there's the couch.' I don't know some kind of passing thought.

THERAPIST: That could be a reason not to be here on Wednesday.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Slip over Wednesday and get to Thursday. (Laughs)

(Pause): [00:11:09 00:11:17]

THERAPIST: Does that feel scary?

CLIENT: The couch?

THERAPIST: Yeah, yeah.

CLIENT: Yeah. Definitely. I mean, I don't know. Yeah, I think I definitely feel anxious and nervous.

THERAPIST: Do you know about what you think of...

CLIENT: Well, unfortunately, I think sometimes like it's, sometimes it's getting to feel like because now there's so much on my mind, this is almost starting to feel like one of those things. I mean it's hard to explain. Like I want to be here, but then it's something like, ‘wow, it's another thing I've got to do' and like it's psychoanalysis so I can't and there's nothing I really can complain about per se. it's not like before where it's like, ‘oh, today this happened.' You know what I mean? So, maybe it's just, yeah.

THERAPIST: Where it feels a little bit more like it's like a drag, or is it something you have to check off the list kind of in your day? As opposed to ...

CLIENT: Well no, not that bad. Not that bad. But it's like other things on my mind. It's more kind of anxiety producing.

THERAPIST: Um hmm. Instead of the place where it used to just be, ‘okay, I'll go there and I'll feel better.'

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense.

(Pause): [00:12:35 00:12:40]

THERAPIST: What if this place creates anxiety?

CLIENT: Yeah. Or, it's scary like, or what if like, ‘man, if I don't feel better here, like, it's like I'm fucked.' Like, no wonder my head starts hurting. Then you feel like, ‘Jesus, this used to be the place I come to and then I leave and I feel better.' But, lately I just feel like I'm so on edge, mentally on edge that it's just hard, you know. (Pause) (Deep breath) (Clears throat) (Sniff) [00:13:09 00:13:20]

CLIENT: The one thing I was, because like this is one thing maybe we both, might be one of the deep things which we've talked about before but maybe it's much more deeper and more profound than maybe I'd think about, but like I, I am a little worried that like with Kelly. I'm worried because I'm still, like I feel like I'm doing all the things, and I'm feeling the way I wish I would have felt when I was 30 or 25, you know? So, I'm a little worried that like that part of me isn't going to want to settle. Do you know what I mean? Even in a (inaudible). You're in like the prime. Chicks are into you. You're doing shit. Things are happening. Like you're really living now. So, why are you settling for do you know what I mean? There's like a voice like that, or that's just scared that, ‘yeah, I do really, really care about this person, but that I'm weak because of this deep feeling that, that some amazing girl, if some other amazing girl came my way it would be hard for me to resist. I don't know. Like, do you know what I mean? [00:14:00]

THERAPIST: I do. And it, there's some, the feeling that if only, god, if you'd felt this way about yourself when you 20 ...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: ...what then, what would be the possibilities then.

CLIENT: Yeah. By now I probably would have like had kids, you know. Because I would have been able to, I would have felt more okay about committing long term because, you know. But, yeah, I just worry that like it's like, I mean. That girl, my friend who tried to kiss me, like it wasn't completely her fault. I mean, I'm a flirt, man. You know like I wasn't going to do anything, but that started it, like man I just can't help it. I cannot help it. You know? I just love that feeling of knowing that, you know, I could have this person, you know. Because I'm trying to make up for years of feeling like a fucking loser and hating myself and, you know, just. I don't know, it just worries me.

THERAPIST: Also to the degree that the feeling that you still have to prove it...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: ...there means there's still some (cross talk) (inaudible) [00:15:52]

CLIENT: That still there is a kernel of it, yeah.

THERAPIST: ...there's still work to be done and to understand...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Because, in other words, there must still be some feeling which, of course, how could there not be, in a way when we're just scratching the surface...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: ...that you're not quite sure: are you or are you not worth this person somehow.

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah. But then I think, but some of it could also be, well, you know, I mean...(Pause): [00:16:21 00:16:24]

CLIENT: I only see Kelly once a week, you know, and maybe our bond isn't more together. It's awesome, but really other than that it's texting, you know? So, maybe there's a part that it feels like, ‘well,' I mean ...

(Pause): [00:16:24 00:16:50]

CLIENT: Or it is that there's a part of me that's like, ‘ay, you know.'

(Pause): [00:16:51 00:16:58]

CLIENT: Like (Pause) Yeah, it's serious but, you know, would it be a big deal if I saw somebody else like I mean, if you see someone once a week and you're just ti I don't know, like my mind is playing tricks on me like with that stuff, ya know?

THERAPIST: You know I wonder, Brian (sp?) about whether there's something, there's something that seems like is happening here and also happening with Kelly. The way you're talking about her and I was just thinking about how you were just talking about this place, like ‘ay, you know,' like it's becoming, rather than being really important, that something's happening where I almost get the feeling that it's just one of those things or what's the big deal if I did something else? What's the big deal if I slept in. You know? That with her there is also, there is some pulling back going on inside you and is not totally clear why, but there may be something about, like if the next step was being more intimate and more vulnerable here or there in different ways...

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's scary. It makes me anxious.

THERAPIST: Terrifying.

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah, that's probably exactly what it is.

(Pause): [00:18:20 00:18:26]

THERAPIST: Flirting with a girl in a bar who then tried to kiss you like that. You know, that's so open and safe and comfortable. Lying on a couch is not and taking the relationship you have with Kelly to it's going really well and to have it continue being well and deepened is really new.

CLIENT: Um hmm. (Clears throat).

(Pause): [00:18:47 00:19:25]

THERAPIST: I also (inaudible) as you were speaking Friday here about, and today some too, although it shifted over the weekend, the degree to which your anxiety starts to get focused here and so you can live your life out there, it's going along fine and it's starting to feel like it's here, it's oddly, I know that seems strange, but that's a good thing happening. It means that the essence of what's going on inside starts to get brought here more and more and more. Your functioning is going a lot better. But like everything's foreign, I mean outside, and now you actually then begin the get steps of what happens when you're still in yourself. What comes up and that's what would come up here. It doesn't really happen that much out there and it's good that it's here. That's exactly what we're here to get to know.

CLIENT: It's a good thing.

(Pause): [00:20:22 00:20:37]

CLIENT: Yeah. (Clears throat) Yeah, because it's kind of crazy like how ...

(Pause): [00:20:46 00:20:59]

CLIENT: ...yeah, I think it's just kind of like there's so much foreign to me, this stuff that's happening out there. It's like a weird thing. Like, in a way this should it's, I don't know it's a whole lot of things are like topsy turvy.

(Pause): [00:21:10 00:21:18]

THERAPIST: Say more. You mean because it feels so different out there?

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. My CDs done. It's actually coming out. It's at the manufacturer as we speak. I did that event. It went super well. Even little things like I got the DVD and I couldn't figure out how to just save it as a file on my laptop so I could send it to my you know it like took two fuck I just couldn't figure out, for some reason on Google, it wasn't super clear, whatever sites I found. So even that, like it was like I didn't give up. Like for two or three days I kept trying, I kept trying and I figured it out, you know. And, not only that I like edited it, so I made an edit for my publisher that's just me reading so it's not the whole hour and a half of chitchat, you know. That's like a little thing, but it's not. Yeah, that's huge. Or like I got my thing from the loan, like you know in 15 days they're going to consolidate all the loans and even now, I have to call them because the monthly payment is ridiculous. I don't know what's going on there. The whole point was that, whatever, I think that can be totally sorted out, but like all that stuff, you know what I mean. The record release, show, I'm starting two businesses.

THERAPIST: You are?

CLIENT: I'm starting two fucking businesses, yeah. One of them with my friend from the magazine. So, yeah, she's always had this idea to do a tee shirt business where it's you know that artist, Jenny Holzer, you know, just those sayings? We're going to come up with things like that. We'll just have really cool, nice cotton, form fitted, stylish tee shirts maybe with a very simple, some kind of thing and sell them. Have like a nice online source for that. But my other big thing is I'm always talking about clothing, right? So, I'm starting an online high end boutique for ties.

THERAPIST: Humph! Wow.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: I've never heard of one before.

CLIENT: Really?

THERAPIST: (Chuckles) I thought you were going to say, "root beer."

CLIENT: No, root beer we looked into it. The root beer is like too much grunt work. I mean you need places to store the stuff. It's kind of heavy duty work.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: And I couldn't find anything online that's like what I'm thinking, oddly enough. Like there are like big places like ‘shit load of ties,' or whatever, but like really a cool, like high end web site like I'm into fashion, whatever. So, like, the thing about that is that in the past I might have thought about that, but now like I have a whole file of wholesalers and I already looked up prices and that in of itself makes me anxious. Do you know what I mean? The fact that I'm doing these things is like unnerving me, like it's making me feel weird.

THERAPIST: That's almost not you.

CLIENT: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: Or it was you when you were 17.

CLIENT: Yeah. Right, right, exactly.

(Pause): [00:24:22 00:24:30]

THERAPIST: I think you're being born again.

CLIENT: Yeah. It's like, I mean, it's weird. That's why like, when I think see, it's like now or when I'm not here then my mind's really going like this. It's like inevitable now, I get like the headache and I feel wacky.

(Pause): [00:24:49 00:24:55]

CLIENT: It's probably the best time to start doing yoga. Probably. Seriously.

(Pause): [00:24:59 00:25:07]

CLIENT: But you know, but it's just a lot. You know, it's a lot of fucking stuff I'm trying to do.

THERAPIST: There's a lot of change.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: I mean maybe one of the things you're saying to me is that maybe it's not the time for the couch. Maybe it feels like there is already so much happening, to imagine something else that would, who knows how that would shift things, in what way, and you're already feeling flooded. I don't know.

CLIENT: Yeah, because I think I have a fantasy that if I lay down suddenly it's going to be something awesome, you know, but it's not like that.

THERAPIST: Some awesome what?

CLIENT: It's that some awesome things are going to get speeded up and it's going to be, like I'll feel a lot better and less anxious or whatever.

THERAPIST: If that's the only fantasy you'd have of it, I don't know that you would not do it.

CLIENT: Well, well, yeah, plus, yeah, yeah, yeah, there's the other stuff, too, but I don't know what I'm saying.

THERAPIST: Oh, but maybe even that, you're saying even if you did speed up and it got better and better and better, that's very disconcerting already. (Chuckle)

CLIENT: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I feel like I'm on a roller coaster already.

THERAPIST: Yeah, yeah. Like maybe it's time to keep just taking a deep breath and integrating all of this.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: Rather than turning up the dial.

CLIENT: Right.

(Pause): [00:26:27 00:26:33]

CLIENT: Yeah, ‘cause it's almost like I feel like I can't even handle things getting any better than this, you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: (Laughs) Yeah, I do.

CLIENT: Like, I look, and it's like, ‘what the fuck, I'm looking up wholesalers and shit...

THERAPIST: (Chuckles)

CLIENT: ...I mean it's like this could work. And I found a wholesaler where I could buy ties for three bucks. Why wouldn't I do that business? Do you know what I mean? Are you kidding me? Like, the mark up is so amazing. So, but that's like, ‘what the fuck? I'm going to do this, I'm going to have a tie shop on line? Like, I'm actually going to make some more money, or you know what I mean? Or even the tee shirts, that's even easier. I just fucking looked it up. There's a million places where you can just (Laughs) you know. Tee shirts. Nice tee shirts. Whatever. Different kinds of tee shirts. Just fucking buy a few hundred and you're off to the races. Whatever.

(Pause): [00:27:28 00:27:47]

THERAPIST: So much of this part of you kind of froze when your dad died. I mean you've been articulating so much more than I ever knew recently about how productive you felt you were up until that, even though there may be all this other stuff that's happened too, but that your capacity to work wasn't inhibited when you were in your teenage years up to his death.

CLIENT: Yeah, I mean I had jobs. I had, you know.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I had,, yeah.

THERAPIST: I just wonder if there is, you know, there's a layer of what's being disconcerted about this, is your being unfrozen from back when you were 20. You know it's like and also where does mourning him go in the thick of it?

CLIENT: I was just going to say I think maybe a lot of this too is like letting go of him.

THERAPIST: Yes.

CLIENT: Like, now he'd really dead. You know what I mean. Whereas before he was constantly ...

THERAPIST: Yes.

CLIENT: ...you know.

(Pause): [00:28:54 00:29:00]

CLIENT: I mean, I've also kind of been thinking more about like my aunt. I don't know. Yeah, like I'd been thinking more, not the one who was in the hospital, the one who died. So, maybe it's like these ghosts, or these, you know, it's like now I just, yeah.

(Pause): [00:29:14 00:29:28]

THERAPIST: Yeah, in this darkness, in the depression, in the days and the trauma you, there's a level of staying with the person who's died and not letting you go.

CLIENT: That's why the more I thought about PTSD, was like, yeah, that is not what it is. Like, you're still in the war. Even though you're still in the trenches, you're still a prisoner somewhere or some shit.

THERAPIST: Exactly.

CLIENT: So, you know. If you can't drive by a cemetery because you think of death or illness or something or you can't see an article about heart disease or something because you immediately, you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yes.

CLIENT: That's some fucked up shit. Yeah, that's not some little OCD or some whatever, that's some serious stuff. So, that's why I think that even though I hate labels, that's the one label, I just find that comforting. At least it's like, all right, at least I understand something about what the fuck's going on here. Because you can't one minute be a kid, a kid who's like, ‘oh, yeah, The New Yorker, I mean I could clearly send these poems to The New Yorker.' Back then, stuffing envelopes, fucking eight, nine, ten different places. You know, what the fu going to college a year early. Things were yeah, I did go to university and then I came back, but so what. That wasn't that big a I mean that's stuff I could have worked through. Of being a little big shy or a little bit in a bubble or people, there are a lot of people like that, you know. But, just, I think when things were going to start changing or get to more adult, you know, coming out, blossoming a little bit more, you know that's the problem. I had lots of friends, I had, you know, but. And I didn't suffer in silence. Sometimes rebellious. I was, you know what I mean, like so...

(Pause): [00:31:30 00:31:57]

THERAPIST: It was enough of a trauma for you that it did not integrate inside and remains a mask to symptoms you are describing of PTSD, are the symptoms, what I am reminded of, it's still happening right now instead of something that already happened. It is over.

CLIENT: Right, right.

(Pause): [00:32:16 00:32:23]

THERAPIST: I mean even in your kind of somatic preoccupations there can be an element of, as though, like almost like a paranoid fantasy that something's happening right now.

CLIENT: That's what I'm saying.

THERAPIST: Actually already happened.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying. I mean, that started a month right after, a month, out of the blue. Where it was like, suddenly I was him.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Instead of feeling like that's a separate person who it's really sad and devastating to lose, but I suddenly thought, I'm going to go exactly the same way. It's just a matter of time. And to be like that for almost 20 years, that's some fucked up shit.

THERAPIST: And rather than only being a fear that you've developed, it is, what we're talking about, a way of keeping him alive still.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. Right.

(Pause): [00:33:13 00:33:28]

CLIENT: That's good, I feel a little better.

THERAPIST: You should have come yesterday.

CLIENT: Aw, aw, that hurts. Wow! Tricia, with the zinger. Damn.

(Pause): [00:33:39 00:33:59]

THERAPIST: Actually you were telling me that you shouldn't be pushed on the couch. Maybe it's...

CLIENT: Yeah. That could be. Yeah.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Yeah, I mean really like one thing I do know about myself is I'm pretty good at suddenly making a leap, like pushing myself to, so probably when the time comes I'll just do it.

THERAPIST: Yeah. Yourself. And it may not ever feel like the thing that works for you either so that,

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: But I hear you saying there's so much happening already.

CLIENT: Yeah.

(Pause): [00:34:37 00:35:02]

CLIENT: And you know it's interesting, too, because like I've never seen myself give a reading let alone like a whole event about me and my thoughts on poetry. That's been really interesting. I was like, ‘holy shit, this guy rocks.'

THERAPIST: (Laughs)

CLIENT: I mean, I'm so ...

THERAPIST: You mean like watching the video?

CLIENT: Yeah. I was like so comfortable. And my reading, that was the best reading I've ever given. And I think it's probably because of this, because more and more, those poems are just out there. I'm not trying to work through anything. They're just works of art. So, that my reading of them I noticed just very, a lot of confidence, like the diction, the way I was like just calm, like it was just perfect. It wasn't over, you know some poets are too singsongy when they're reciting, that stupid poetry. I wasn't doing hardly any of that, like a very controlled, good breaths, like all my comments were like just very comfortable and confident and you know and I was like, ‘what the fuck?'

(Pause): [00:36:07 00:36:13]

THERAPIST: So really how it sounded even from your first replaying after it happened you felt so comfortable in your own skin. You've got to save those to see another layer.

CLIENT: Yeah, it's crazy.

THERAPIST: Like, ‘who is that person?' (Laughs)

CLIENT: And to see it and to not, you know, it's like an hour and a half or something or 20 minutes and I was like, ‘oh, god, blah' and I sounded like, ‘yeah, good, yeah,' whatever, it's not, that didn't really, do you know what I mean? That's huge for that long to watch myself?

(Pause): [00:36:49 00:37:22]

THERAPIST: It's almost like you're getting to know a new identity.

CLIENT: That's exactly what it feels like. Although, that, but also you're right. I've thought about this. It really does feel like pre 19 year's old. That's crazy. It's really kind of crazy to be honest, because that is what, I mean I'm writing a shit load of songs, I love the songs I'm writing. I'm writing again. Oh, that was the other thing. When I'd listen to the new poems at the end of what I read from the new stuff it was like, ‘wow, man,' this is being written by someone at a different place now that even that book, like it just...

THERAPIST: Um hmm.

(Pause): [00:38:06 00:38:13]

CLIENT: And especially one poem where it's playful, it's back to that, not caring really like it just sounds like, you know what I mean it sounds like someone really working at something and just really enjoying it.

(Pause): [00:38:29 00:38:37]

CLIENT: The difference now is back then I didn't think about it. Now, maybe I don't think about it as I'm doing it but then I have these moments when I'm like, ‘whoa,' like, ‘did that just happen?' or did that, just because it's, yeah, it does seem like waking up from a dream or like it's some kind of weird.

(Pause): [00:38:57 00:39:10]

THERAPIST: It sounds like you've been living drugged out on a sedative or something for 20 years.

CLIENT: That's exactly what it feels like.

THERAPIST: Now all of a sudden you're not on it anymore.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Just getting your bearings about who are you alive again.

CLIENT: Yeah. Which it kind of is like. I mean that is a drug. Right? Whatever that shit is. Cortisol, or whatever happens you're super anxious.

THERAPIST: Absolutely.

(Pause): [00:39:33 00:39:38]

THERAPIST: Or when you're dissociated a lot of the time.

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: I mean that's often what it sounds like you've described, like Oregon.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just zonked out. Completely zonked out. Yeah.

(Pause) [00:39:46 00:39:54]

THERAPIST: Yeah, actually that's exactly what it is. Now I'm so not that that it's, I mean I feel like I can feel everything tingling or something, you know what I mean? Like it's just like ...

(Pause): [00:40:04 00:40:12]

CLIENT: I don't know.

THERAPIST: It's like when your hands get numb from being really cold and then they start (cross talk)

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: The blood starts to come back ...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: ...and it hurts.

CLIENT: Right.

THERAPIST: It's good, but it can be a little bit much.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Coming alive.

CLIENT: Right.

(Pause): [00:40:25 00:42:04]

THERAPIST: So tomorrow at 3:10.

CLIENT: Awesome. Tricia, you got the thing I left, right? The envelope I left last week, or Monday?

THERAPIST: Yeah. I was actually going to ask you about that. You left something Monday?

CLIENT: Didn't I?

THERAPIST: (Laughs)

CLIENT: See, this is what I'm talking about. Fuck me. I'm sorry. I guess it's in my bag. All right. I'll ...

THERAPIST: Unless someone took it.

CLIENT: No, no, no, no, no. I probably completely forgot. I'll come by...

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: I'll just bring it with me tomorrow.

THERAPIST: Okay. Thanks Either one's fine. It's last week and then...

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah. Thanks, Tricia.

THERAPIST: You're welcome.

END TRANSCRIPT