TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

THERAPIST: Actually I, when I heard about it I had just got into work and (inaudible) from Ohio told me, texted me "Are you okay?" How about you?

CLIENT: (inaudible) I was at home with Laney, far away and we got from Laney's sister.

THERAPIST: Is that right?

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah we went online and looked and were like "Holy shit!" We were in our own little world.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: That's good that no one you know was hurt.

THERAPIST: You know I had some friends that were maybe two blocks away.

CLIENT: Oh wow.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: They must have heard it.

THERAPIST: Yeah they heard it. They heard it and were quite shaken but they also had a...my friend her cousin was running it and finished, just crossed the finish line when it happened.

CLIENT: Holy smokes...

THERAPIST: Maybe two minutes before it happened and so she had a lot of family there and her family was in between the two explosions.

CLIENT: Oh right on the street, yeah. [00:01:24]

THERAPIST: But they were fine. I'm just going to make sure this things rolling. Yeah it was good. Did you know...?

CLIENT: No, I didn't know anybody, nothing like that. I don't want to talk about that, it's all everyone's been talking about for the last couple of days. Last Thursday when we last met I was trying to recall when I was sitting out there what we were talking about and again I remember how our conversation ended. We were talking about something then it just turned into, then it started to focus a lot on like recalling the way that the conversation with my parents went when I kind of set the (inaudible) with them. When they had told me about...when I came in I think the appointment before last I was left kind of with that question about like what does it mean to feel sad in front of someone about that topic and I kind of reflected on the fact that despite what people would ask me or how Eric's experience with therapy went, where he kind of had one of those like crying breakdowns after a couple of meetings, it kind of occurred to me that I never really came anywhere near that here. I just thought it was kind of interesting, I hadn't really thought about it. [00:03:26] And then we were kind of talking about that experience with my parents and then talking about like my dad crying when he had that conversation with me and the fact that I never really see my dad...let alone often he'd get like vulnerable, you know, but certainly never where he was crying like that. (pause) What I remember leaving with was this weird, this kind of like funny insight. We were talking about like, we had referenced that e-mail that Marcus had sent me, my sisters fiancé, where he explicitly painted some images of my sister being really sad and crying and stuff. You put in some words like "She had found a place where she felt like that was something she could do." Leaving I sort of remember thinking to myself that he had mentioned it...it's just funny because my dad found a place like that. I really thought about that actually. [00:05:01] It seemed really disarming when it kind of struck me.

THERAPIST: That your dad had found a space?

CLIENT: Yeah! Yeah, the fact that he...I've never cried about it, you know, if we just use that as a grow monitor for housing experiences. My sister obviously experiences it very differently than me, she cries, she sees a different...she seems different to me when I have an image in my head of her crying about it. It just is not sort of able to fit with like my experience with the whole thing. I figure with my dad and it's just interesting that my dad would have at any point in his life cried about it. (pause) [00:06:07] Its just weird, it's not the way I would typically think about it. Particularly because I feel like the way I talk about it a lot is that my dad is sort of...he lives as if, not to say he is but as if he's almost just ignorant to the reality of that whole experience. Maybe what his actions are just maybe what that experience did, you know, like the rippling effect, the consequences of it, that it would still be something that might really either be unresolved or that it was really serious. I feel like the way that he lives now doesn't really seem to suggest that kind of an awareness, you know what I mean? I guess the way that I talk about it a lot is that like I'm more aware of it than he is or something. [00:07:12] Like he's ignorant. I just read something that sort of observed the word ignorant as like ignore. That he's never really thought about it or something and that I'm kind of more attuned to it or something. It's just funny when I think about it from the perspective that my dad actually cried about it at some point and I've never really done that. Its (pause) yeah I don't know it's just a different way to think about it. A different way for me to think about him. Do you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yeah, go ahead...

CLIENT: I don't know, I don't know. (pause) [00:08:26] It just strikes me as odd that the same person who at point in life would be that immersed in it, in that overwhelming, taken over by, assumes a sadness about it and then can be like he is now, so...I don't know, not (inaudible) to it or so seemingly unconcerned or...

THERAPIST: Ignore?

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: Ignore that emotion that he showed, that he acknowledged that day.

CLIENT: Yeah I was just thinking about it from when me and my mom (inaudible) because I see her not very much in a more similar standing in the sense that I feel like my mom is still her. I feel like it still has kind of found a way to determine everything about her life. You look at my dad like now you just think that the guy has just never...might have lived by himself forever. My mom is very much a divorced woman. [00:09:51] My dad's sort of just someone who seems to have like stepped into the marriage or jumped out or something. I guess I see like, I know my mom was that upset when she was sitting next to my dad crying. I know I was that upset but it seems like (pause) like I said it seems like you can't get out of that or something. I don't know how you do that. I don't know how it didn't like ruin his life like I feel like it ruined mom's. (pause) Do you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yeah. (pause)

CLIENT: I don't know it just seems easier for me to like to make sense of the way I see him now to just like interpret it through the frame of he just has no idea or something, it's just sad, blissfully unaware. Maybe all these people are stuck out, the things just so normal, (inaudible).

THERAPIST: Everything's all cool and this isn't really something that has ripple effects or implications or psychological, emotional ramifications.

CLIENT: Yeah but it's not consistent like with me taking into consideration the fact that at some point he was aware enough of it to cry about it, maybe even more in touch with it than I had been or something for him to assume that that's what it takes to cry about it or something. [00:12:09] (pause) Its weird because it makes me wonder like...just thinking about now I've never thought about it like this but I didn't like seeing my dad. I remember that was the thing that I really remember about what I said last time I was here. My dad cried, he was vulnerable, in a way he was sort of doing everything that I'm (inaudible) now for not doing. He was aware of it, he was letting it take him over the way that I feel like it takes me over. He was not ignoring it, he was vulnerable but I don't want him...I didn't like him like that. I didn't want to look at him and I certainly not as anything like that I'm angry at my dad about, now it would be made better if he was like that or something like that would make me just as upset in a different way. [00:13:26] It struck me as interesting when I realized that because in a way sometimes I think I not really thinking it through almost want him to be like as sad, as if that would make something better. Do you know what I mean? Like not be so happy, not be so low, whatever.

THERAPIST: Yes, yes. I think it's not a contradiction, it's not as if...I mean I was thinking that you don't want him not to acknowledge it and you also don't want him to...it's also another thing to see him acknowledge it.

CLIENT: What just sort of popped into my head a minute ago was like when I see him like that it makes me upset, right, but I certainly wouldn't want him to not...it wouldn't fix whatever's making me mad if he just wasn't like that. It makes me wonder maybe it pisses me off because it is very different from what my mom does, maybe not because he's doing it, maybe because I'm mad that my mom's not doing that? That's what the discrepancy is, that's what's significant about it is its far away from how my mother...I mean he runs three miles a day and mom can't walk up the stairs because of her...

THERAPIST: Yes!

CLIENT: Do you know what I mean? [00:15:10] They're just so...

THERAPIST: He's walked away unscathed in some way? Emotionally, physically...is that what you?

CLIENT: Yeah and I guess in some ways I guess because I was just thinking a few minutes ago I could say that that's evidence of his ignorance, its evidence of his insensitivity, his lack of caring or something. I don't know...can that be equated with like being held? So he would if he was unhealthy, if he was miserable like my mom and sick then would he be...?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Almost as if that's just...that's not the case. I'd be more upset if my dad was...

THERAPIST: Its got its own implications.

CLIENT: But it makes me wonder if what's really upsetting me is the fact even if I'm not really thinking about the time when I see my dad like that, I'm angry when I see it because it just...even when I'm seeing him all I see is what my mom's not doing and that's what I'm angry about. That's the affect, that's the issue. In a way if my mom was like that I wouldn't care if my dad was like that almost.

THERAPIST: If your mom wasn't wrecked?

CLIENT: Yeah!

THERAPIST: I think that's (inaudible).

CLIENT: If they were both wrecked it'd be even worse.

THERAPIST: Yes. [00:16:55] Yeah, I think there's that side to it too. You bring up a very important point. I think that it sounds like its occurring to you around your mom not recovering and your dad dating, your dad having other women in his life, your mom not.

CLIENT: My mom got rheumatoid arthritis, makes her (inaudible) swell up. (pause) I see the like packed in the same category or something almost as if in a way I guess you could draw things you could actually thrive from it. The fact that she's alone is I guess perhaps, at least its half right, my dad's not alone. (pause) [00:18:12] That's something that I'm think I'm taking away from that moment when I realized I actually wouldn't want my dad to be measurable, maybe I just don't want my mom to be. Maybe it pisses me off that he is able to or something, I don't know, maybe I'm just projecting that on to my dad. I don't know.

THERAPIST: I think there's some element here of your...maybe it's not the only element of what you feel about your father, the way your father has lived his life, one element is that it's a complete contrast to your mother's way of living post-divorce or post-breakup and then it shines kind of a light on some feelings you have about your mom living that way.

CLIENT: Yeah, I mean...(pause) [0019:33] That's...I've always on some level been aware that that's what's been like hard for me. That my mom had such a hard time. That was like...I think I even phrased it one time that I feel like my experience of the divorce was witnessing my mom's experience, that's what's hard for me.

THERAPIST: That's right.

CLIENT: And in that sense she's still experiencing it or at least in the way that I sometimes think about it.

THERAPIST: She's still experiencing it?

CLIENT: I feel like she is, I feel like she's always going to be.

THERAPIST: She's still experiencing it? And always...

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Tell me about that, what's your...conception of what she is living out now?

CLIENT: Like when my mom, when my parents got divorced I feel like my dad (pause) he did other things. Something went out of his life and he supplemented it with different things, different people, different women. [00:20:56] I feel like my mom, I even kind of had this idea in my head before I ever came here, like I feel like the way that she, I feel like she had this thing in her mind that she did something to me, that it put into question her...the quality of mother that she had been to me or something. That she was wrong by giving her son a divorced family or something. I feel like in response to it she just, I feel like her reaction to it was then to just try to overload on maternal, motherly type shit. Like whatever void was there she filled it up just trying to be more motherly, more helpful, more...I don't know. More loving, focusing more on me which I never liked because even as a young kid it was just suffocating in a way that would be anytime there's a parent doing that, even if they're not divorced. [00:22:25] But at times I think I thought to myself like I would love it if my mom was more...my friend Eric, his mom, she got divorced and not too far apart from my mom and they're very close the two of them and leading up to the divorce she kind of mirrored a lot of things my mom did. She was very unhappy, she was depressed, she gained tons and tons of weight but when she got divorced she like revolutionized, she got healthy, she exercised like crazy, lost a ton of weight, became active doing stuff. I don't know she was being happy. I don't know, in a lot of ways she did a lot of stuff like what my dad did. I can remember like literally seeing that like next to my mom. They used to hang out a lot, as much as moms did but they even kind of stopped hanging out a little bit because she started doing different things, active things more going out at night to bars or something, I guess people do, I don't know where but...(pause) [00:24:05} My mom never did that. She never really (pause)...if my dad kind of went into that, during that conversation when my parents wanted to split up, my dad went into that really sad, crying mode and then hopped right back out of it, I feel like my mom just kind of stayed in. (pause)

THERAPIST: It seems to me like its related to her feelings about what it was doing to you?

CLIENT: Mm hm. I almost feel like my awareness that that was consuming her so much was like the most bothersome thing. I didn't want her to do that because then she was still just focusing on this divorce, still focusing on this bad thing. I think it aroused feelings of guilt and shame in her, you know?

THERAPIST: Yeah. [00:25:40} Yeah and I wonder if it almost meant that...I was just thinking that it meant that if you were to...it one gave you a reason not to show any feeling but I also think then it didn't give yourself potential to do it because what's it going to lead to? If you don't have a space for it, the space or place we've been talking about, if you take that what's it going to...? It meant that you couldn't have a place for it.

CLIENT: Mm hm.

THERAPIST: Surely you wouldn't want to take it? Make your mom more miserable...

CLIENT: No of course, absolutely. Yeah, that definitely, I think on some level it definitely led me to like consciously not to reveal certain things and on some level it probably pushed me to almost literally convincing myself that there were things that...almost like as if my mom thought I was upset but almost as if I was upset, you know? I think it definitely had the effect of making it clear to me that only bad things would come from sort of being expressive about any of that stuff, being upset about it. Just thinking about it, it sounds almost as if like what (pause). [00:27:33] Like if I would've been very skeptical of the idea that the fact that my parents split up was like a traumatic thing. I don't think it has to be. I don't think it should be. I don't think if I just said my parents were together and then they weren't together has to be like a dramatic type thing anymore than the fact that I stopped being with some people in the past that I've been with. That there's something else going on there that is the source of that, you know? But it makes me wonder like, at least if I think about it now, it's like hypothetically if my mom did what my dad did, I don't know that I would be so upset about it.

THERAPIST: Huh.

CLIENT: If she did the same thing like...when I imagine that I just imagine, I don't know, just like a release of like a lot of (pause)...I just...this? I don't know, everything. I don't know. [00:28:53} (pause) I don't know, it's just making me wonder like about the way that I know that I sort of narrate this experience and the two people that my mom and my dad are, it's like my mom is the sacrificial lamb and my father as like Judas. That it's my dad's fault, my mom didn't do anything wrong, that this surely is a result of my dad's like badness or something and I know that I have that frame. I'm skeptical of it because it just seems to simple. Do you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Mm.

CLIENT: I've thought of that, I always think about that. [00:30:09] I don't know, when I put it into terms I just put it here, like it makes me angry at my mom. It makes me mad at her, that she didn't do...I don't know. Do you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yeah I do.

CLIENT: That's just a very different way for me to think about it.

THERAPIST: I think there's that side of it.

CLIENT: I don't know if I should be angry at my dad for the way that he (pause), I don't know, I guess I'm just wondering if I should be angry at him for doing some of those things. (pause) [00:31:24] I don't know if I should be, if I could say that I would want that for my...that I really wish that she did that. How could I be angry at him when...do you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Say that again, if...(pause)

CLIENT: How can I be angry at my dad for just being able to fall asleep at night if I want that for my mom.

THERAPIST: Oh I got it. (pause)

CLIENT: I don't know.

THERAPIST: You don't know what?

CLIENT: (pause) [00:32:40] I don't know, I...(pause) I just don't know what to feel about it. I think that's what I'm trying to do right now, I feel like I'm trying to figure out what is like cool for me to feel, you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I feel like in a way this is what I do in a million different ways, I think some things for some reason, even though I'm aware that their not (pause), maybe that they're kind of Mickey-Moused together, I find the ways in my head at least that I'm able to feel angry at my dad, to feel something. I don't know. It's not something I'm really that confident in, you know, it's not...I just don't know what to feel about it.

THERAPIST: The confident part, you're not sure your confident in...

CLIENT: I don't know if its justified, I don't know if it makes sense and when I try to go towards it, when I try to take away there's something I feel like I'm...I feel silly. [00:34:04] I don't know.

THERAPIST: Silly, yeah. Do you notice anything in maintenance? Anything about how long were you acting? (pause) (inaudible) like telling me that's...

CLIENT: I feel like if I say it to you, when I imagine myself saying it to my parents or something I just imagine and feel stupid. I feel as if there's something I overlooked or I didn't consider this or (pause) say.

THERAPIST: Okay, okay.

CLIENT: You know what I mean? (pause) I don't feel confident in even like feeling sad about it, you know? I don't know, yeah, its very (over talking), it's very (inaudible), very anxious, I feel I'm (inaudible).

THERAPIST: You do, yeah?

CLIENT: Yeah. I imagine myself saying something as if like my parents were here, if I was saying it to them, I would end up saying something wrong. [00:35:46] Does this make sense? I imagine one of them getting very upset, not mad, but me saying the wrong thing and then you can't take it back and they're sad and I hurt them or something as if like I said this and then my parents (inaudible). And if I said my dad is an asshole, I'm angry at my dad for what he did to my mom as if that was just totally wrong or something and then (inaudible) and how it played out or something...and people are really sad.

THERAPIST: It's not who when you say how it played out?

CLIENT: Yeah I don't know, that's not right or something I don't know.

THERAPIST: It's not right, yeah. Not justified, not true that...

CLIENT: It happened. It's not...it's okay to think and feel, you know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yes.

CLIENT: I try to make and I try to get it and I try to (pause), just I imagine I guess me hurting, me doing something. [00:37:18]

THERAPIST: It sounds like the impact you're going to have on the other person and also that somehow you're not certain of your feelings or its not justified or not...its almost like a kind of an automatic, unconscious sort of reflexive, second guessing of your feelings in a way that almost makes it even hard for feeling the (inaudible) or something.

CLIENT: Yeah, yeah it doesn't...its restrictive of where I feel like I can even let my thoughts run. Absolutely its...(pause). Yeah I don't know. It just makes it tough to...sometimes I feel like I don't have...if I'm going to be sad what am I going to be sad about? Like what happened? Sad that my mom is by herself and single? What does it mean to be sad about that? What does that mean if I'm sad about it and my dad's not? What does that mean to him? What does that mean to my mom? What if I'm angry at my dad? What does that mean?

THERAPIST: It's almost like explaining yourself.

CLIENT: What implications does it have? What fault? Now what?

THERAPIST: So now what? There's almost like before you can even think about having a feeling you have thoughts about...it's almost like "Come on tough guy, what are you going to...?" (laughs) It's kind of like what do you mean you feel this way? [00:39:44] I don't know if that...

CLIENT: Very much the same way like if I say something to my parents, that I couldn't take back, like if I said...if I thought of saying some of this stuff to my parents, the fact that I know I couldn't take it back, maybe it would right or something, whatever that is, you know, like toothpaste out of the bottle or something. Like if I ever regret it I wouldn't be able to pretend like it didn't happen because it's out. I almost feel like I'd be (inaudible) something similar even if I didn't get sad about it. Even just with myself, it doesn't even...even though I know that it wouldn't necessarily bring anything different to the table with my parents or something. I feel like a similar preparedness or something.[00:40:47]

THERAPIST: Yes! By yourself or who your with...here.

CLIENT: Yeah I just feel like if I say like I get sad I'm going to cry about it right now. Like what do I do when I talk to my dad on the phone? I have to do that tonight. Maybe it won't change anything, I don't know if it will. You know?

THERAPIST: Yeah, now what? Now what that the toothpaste is out of the tube?

CLIENT: Because I don't even know what it means like (pause) I don't know how I would deal with the other side of that. You know what I mean?

THERAPIST: Yep.

CLIENT: Just in the same way I don't know what my relationship with my dad would be on the other side of me telling him that maybe I'm angry about it.

THERAPIST: Is it then kind of like D, heading it off at the pass? Heading the feelings off? Almost like the way you talk about it is almost like there's a...the way your describing it is that before you go looking for any feelings you head it off at the pass in terms of "Well if I was to feel x, y or z," you don't know what's going to happen so let's...until you got that settled, don't go down that road?

CLIENT: Yeah. [00:42:32] Very much like what I'm saying.

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: I want to know what I'm getting myself into.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Because there are particular things that I'd be willing to get into and there's feelings that I wouldn't I suppose.

THERAPIST: Yes.

CLIENT: I don't say...that just seems to be like its safe doing that or something.

THERAPIST: Going into a space that you don't know much about and you don't know what will happen, that space is not safe.

CLIENT: My mom offered just the other day to help me take out less money in loans for law school by getting a non-interest loan from some of the money she's going to use for retirement. She'd give me some money every single month and when I get out of school I could pay her back with no interest and that would save money because I wouldn't be collecting the interest. (pause) I don't know what...I imagine stuff like that. What might happen then? Like if that's something I'm committed to for some time now what happens then? If I get angry someone or sad about something, I don't know, those are the things that come to mind. [00:44:06]

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I work for my dad, you know?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I got to go to abroad in August.

THERAPIST: Yes.

CLIENT: Yeah, I don't know.

THERAPIST: Yeah and so it's kind of a risky area, it's a gray area for you and kind of akin to the...a really kind of critical story that's so important, almost like a fable, no dinner at night. No dinner tonight for saying that.

CLIENT: Maybe. If I had known prior to that I would have thought to myself "Do I have to eat dinner tonight?"

THERAPIST: Yeah, you can't take back what you said. Toothpaste is out of the tube and...

CLIENT: Mm hm. (pause)

THERAPIST: It's something though with your mom too that you're getting that, it's not just your dad, it's your mom.

CLIENT: Yeah. [00:45:23] I just remembered that interesting little slip I had a weekend or a week or two ago, saying something about I want to say "Dad's gone, it's all her fault," or something. I don't know.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I'm already skeptical you know. (over talking) I'm skeptical of this good and evil story. Seems to be the one place I'm able to, at least in my mind put things to rest at times. (pause)

THERAPIST: It's the storm that keeps things at rest, is that what you said?

CLIENT: Yeah I mean you can...I don't know. (pause) [00:46:57]

THERAPIST: Dan, what do you think?

CLIENT: I don't know I just never really thought of it in those terms like that this things like not safe, just being sad about it. That I never really (pause) I never really thought about it most times I guess. I never even really got close to like feeling really that sad about it to actually feel some push back a little bit, you know? I feel like a couple (inaudible) ago I did. (pause) I feel like (inaudible) time, I'm hesitant to want...

THERAPIST: When did you have the thought?

CLIENT: No my mind is not really letting me run too much. Just for disclosure sake I feel like I can't keep going with things once its 6:05.

THERAPIST: Yeah. I realize we started a little bit late.

CLIENT: Oh okay. [00:48:17]

THERAPIST: Yeah. Give me (inaudible) that. I'm just thinking about the dilemma it's been for you to have a space for sadness or anger or your feelings. What a complex kind of (pause) complex thing to sort out, to have.

CLIENT: Yeah, it's like sometimes when I'm walking around or something, like when I walk by a stove and I feel like I turned it on even though I know I didn't hit it or something or if I'm like walking down the street and I think that I knocked someone over even though there's no one in the street, I look back to make sure. It's almost like a feeling like that, like what domino effect is going to get set into motion here that I'm not going to be able to reel back in?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: You know?

THERAPIST: Yes!

CLIENT: What might I be doing here that I'm not taking into account?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: It seems like a lot of potential for that unknown or whatever as its approached. It almost feels kind of similar to that like "What have I done?"

THERAPIST: Burning down the house?

CLIENT: Yeah. [00:50:05] The ultimate, final conclusion of that fantasy is precisely the same thing, like people really...making something worse. That was always it, having that on top of everything.

THERAPIST: Yeah. Walking somewhere on the street, is that what you said?

CLIENT: Yeah sometimes I go walking down the street and think I've knocked someone over and I have to look behind me.

THERAPIST: Uh huh. What are the consequences of doing something, having something out there, what happens next? Who falls?

CLIENT: I always want to kind of keep my hands in my pockets.

THERAPIST: Yeah. Cut off any possibility at the pass, cut it off at the pass.

CLIENT: Mm hm. That's what it kind of feels like. (pause) Monday?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: Thanks for the few extra minutes. [00:51:11]

THERAPIST: Yeah. (inaudible) See you.

CLIENT: Thank you.

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