TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

CLIENT: I gave my notice today.

THERAPIST: You did? Holy cow.

CLIENT: Yeah. Phil either took the job today or will accept it tomorrow.

THERAPIST: Where?

CLIENT: IndStevea.

THERAPIST: Holy cow. Wow.

CLIENT: I feel like a million bucks. I was ready to go buy three $20 scratch tickets.

THERAPIST: How about that?

CLIENT: My boss turned purple. (laughs)

THERAPIST: How so?

CLIENT: I said, "So Phil got a job in IndStevea and he's due to start mid-March." She was like, "No, no, no," because so many other people are leaving. [00:01:11]

THERAPIST: Right. Wow. Congratulations.

CLIENT: (laughing) Thank you.

THERAPIST: I can see you're happy.

CLIENT: I am happy. I'm sad to leave the kids, but I'm not really that sad to leave the job.

THERAPIST: You feel like a million bucks.

CLIENT: Yeah. I also told her that I needed the last week of February off and she told me that usually once you give notice you're not supposed to take any time off. I said, "Well, the other option is me leaving on the 22nd of February," and so I have that whole week off except for Monday because Tracy is already out and she can't have that many people out. We'll probably try and find a flight that afternoon because now I'll take Tracy's hours, which are 7:30 3:30. That week we'll go to IndStevea and look for places and come back by way of Virginia for the engagement party. Then we'll come back up here and I'll work my last week of work and I'll be packing all of my stuff up. I'll have my bachelorette party on the 9th and then we'll move that week. [00:02:44]

THERAPIST: Wow, wow. All of a sudden. Game change. So he found out when?

CLIENT: I guess they offered it to him Thursday night or maybe Friday. Thursday, I guess. She won't like this my boss. (chuckles)

THERAPIST: Yeah. What are you...?

CLIENT: At least I'm I think she'd be really mad if I was leaving for a different job in the city, but it feels good.

THERAPIST: I would imagine it felt good to go in there and give notice.

CLIENT: Yep. (pause) [00:04:03]

THERAPIST: Sounds like you can't contain the smile. (both laugh)

CLIENT: I'm really happy, but I'm going to miss some of the parents and some of the families. But it will be okay. I don't know if I told you this last week, but Phil's brother isn't coming to the wedding. I guess Gina is just too worried about being alone because her labor and delivery was really, really hard last time.

THERAPIST: She's due right around...

CLIENT: She's due right before the wedding. I get it, but Dave wasn't able to tell that to Phil. Phil had to hear that from his parents not about not coming, but about the reasons behind it. Gina has no support right now. She's not getting any emotional support from her mother. She's not talking to her sister. Blah, blah, blah. [00:05:09]

THERAPIST: I don't understand why she doesn't just make the trip down.

CLIENT: Because she doesn't want to go into delivery in the middle of my wedding, which I get. Pregnant women aren't supposed to fly so far into their third trimester.

THERAPIST: Her due date is when?

CLIENT: It's like June 2nd. It's ridiculously close to my wedding. The thing is, she's not going to be the only ridiculously-pregnant person there. My very good friend, Paige, is pregnant and due that same week. My not real brother but practically my brother his wife is due the first week of May, so she'll have a teeny baby there if she comes at all. It's not like she's going to be the only person there. [00:06:08]

THERAPIST: Why? Do you think that's some of it for her?

CLIENT: Maybe. I think some of it is going anywhere when she's that pregnant, which I get. But I just wish Phil's brother could have communicated all of the reasons why instead of just "Gina doesn't want me to go. She doesn't want to be alone." All the reasons behind it like a really tough labor and delivery, getting no emotional support from her mom, arguments with her sister. (sighs) I get it and I don't want to be a bridezilla, but you need to get over yourself and buy yourself an anytime ticket. You know the one that you can fly stand-by and be put on the top of the list so, if the flight is full...

THERAPIST: You mean if you have to rush home or something? [00:07:10]

CLIENT: Right. Phil's friend, Steve, is going to do it instead. Steve totally understands the situation and said, "Listen, if all of a sudden your brother can come, I'll step back gracefully. It's totally okay," so that's really great. I'm just glad he has somebody there to support him because, if I'm a mess, I don't want him to see me a mess or for me to be there for him. You want him to have his own support?

CLIENT: My parents are coming to town this weekend (chuckles) because my mom does that thing with the independent schools the hiring conference thing, that [...] (inaudible at 00:07:57) thing, so it's just going to be bang, bang, bang, bang until we move. (pause) That's about it. [00:08:26]

THERAPIST: That's about it?

CLIENT: (laughs) I know. We're already 20 minutes into our session.

THERAPIST: Tell me, what are you...?

CLIENT: I just hope I don't drop all the balls at once. So far, I know have to get through work, I have to do all of these wedding things, and I have to move.

THERAPIST: There's a lot in front of you.

CLIENT: It's a lot in front of me, but by June it will all be over.

THERAPIST: Well, gosh. There's so much there. What does it mean for him to get the job? What does it mean for you to leave work? To leave here? To leave this? Any number of things. [00:09:24]

CLIENT: To leave town is kind of sad. I've grown to like it here. I know people complain about the transportation, but I find it very efficient. I got from there to here in like 20 minutes. I couldn't even do that driving, especially not in this weather. I'll be sad to leave. I won't be sad to leave the hoity-toity, closed-off, I'm-better-than-you and I-have-the-latest-iPhone attitude. (pause) Kind of sad to leave. I like living in a big city, but it will also be nice to have something a little slower and a little quieter. I live next to a small farm, apparently, so all night I hear "crunch, crunch, beep, beep, beep, beep, pkew" like that. (giggles) [00:11:13] I guess to leave work I like having something to do, so I'm a little bit worried about having nothing to do when I'm down there. But I will have plenty to do because I'll have to be planning the wedding and unpacking and everything. And then we will I don't know. My head is everywhere right now. Leaving therapy, I think it will be okay. I've been thinking about going off my meds, but I'm not planning on doing that until after the wedding. [00:12:08]

THERAPIST: I thought you had.

CLIENT: No. I tried to do it in November, 2008, and it totally didn't work out for me. I actually remember being really depressed and like writing an e-mail to the doctor like "This is not going to work." I thought about doing it again this past November, but I didn't want to do it in the wintertime because the winter is so depressing for me anyway. I'm going to do it after the wedding. It's kind of weird because I've been on it for so long. I've been on it for ten years. This July will be ten years. I'm not really convinced that I need it and I'm also not really convinced that it's doing a lot. [00:13:12]

THERAPIST: What are you taking?

CLIENT: I take Effexor. I take the generic one.

THERAPIST: What was the med that you came off of that you started to feel there was some med you were taking and you went off it in the spring and you started to feel somewhat better?

CLIENT: I went off birth control like last winter. I stopped taking the pill and in the summer I stopped the IUD.

THERAPIST: Okay. Maybe that's what it was and I'm confused about that. Birth control/antidepressants same difference, right? [00:13:59]

CLIENT: Yeah. I want to call my friend. Today is her birthday, but I left my cell phone at work. I'll have to try to use Phil's phone. (pause) I don't know. I still think it's kind of ridiculous that Phil's own brother isn't coming to the wedding, but happy wife, happy life right? They're going to take us out for a nice dinner before we leave to like smooth everything over. Or, as I call it, throw money at the problem. Is that too mean? I know they want to be celebratory and wish us congratulations, but they want to take us to the Omni and I'm like that's great that he wants to do something nice for his brother and smooth everything over so that we're not leaving on a bad note. But I just feel like it could be Applebee's. (laughs) Why Omni?

THERAPIST: Throw money at the problem.

CLIENT: Throw money at the problem, or replace feelings with money. [00:15:51]

THERAPIST: Yeah, yeah. The whole thing around him not talking to you about what was really going on, what was really happening with Gina...

CLIENT: Whatever.

THERAPIST: How much does it mean to Phil to have his brother at the wedding? That's a pretty significant thing.

CLIENT: Phil never asked his brother, "Will you be my best man?" because it wasn't really about that in Quaker weddings. Maybe I should have pushed it. When Phil was asked to be Dave's best man and I was looking at the wedding stuff. We found this little book that's like this big and it's like How to be a Best Man or How to be a Groomsman or something like that. And we took it seriously, like asking for favors from the groom is not best man behavior. You have to really be his support, xyz, so we were moving and we didn't ask him for help. I said, "That's not best-man behavior to ask him for help right before his wedding." We were moving three weeks before his wedding. When Gina found out we moved she was like, "How did Dave get out of not helping?" I was like, "It's not best-man behavior to ask your groom for help before the wedding." If they asked me to help them before my wedding or if they will I'll probably say "yes" if I weren't busy, but, still, you don't ask major favors from somebody like that. So I just feel like you can't return the favor by showing up. [00:17:52] And I found out that, apparently, somebody is supposed to sit on the facing bench with us. The facing bench is like if this were a Quaker meeting house, the facing bench would be here and would have tiers. There would be square rows and most people would face the facing bench. If I had known that I would have pushed it more with him asking Dave to be his best man. Really? This baby was clearly a surprise, but I just feel like this is going to be really crass but Dave just needed to get his dick wet at the wrong time. He was just horny at the wrong time and that's how this baby is being born right before the wedding. [00:18:56] I know it's not me. I have to always remind myself that it's not me.

THERAPIST: What is the...?

CLIENT: Because Gina is really cold towards me. She doesn't hug me; she hardly talks to me; I'm not allowed to hold the baby. If I do hold the baby, it's for like three minutes. She was looking at the pickle on my plate and I was like, "Do you want some pickle?" like I'm going to feed your baby a pickle. Gina was like, "She doesn't eat pickles yet." I'm like I'm going to feed your baby a pickle? You might let her taste the pickle juice (chuckles), but come on, woman. I'm not an idiot. I did tell the baby, though she was trying to get my baby carrot. I was like, "Give us a big carrot and let him suck on it." (chuckles) Like her dad I don't know if her mom heard it, but why not? She's trying to teethe on something. If you're supervising it, what's the problem? But she does have those front teeth to bite it, so it could be a problem. I don't know. Maybe I'm just way too chill with the babies and parents are really worried that she's going to choke, she's going to fall, whatever, whatever. I don't know. I actually don't believe in helicopter parents and helicopter parenting. [00:20:41]

THERAPIST: She can be overly protective and a bit intrusive?

CLIENT: Yeah. She's a helicopter parent. She's (whoosh, whoosh, whoosh).

THERAPIST: But what you were saying that you will go there in your mind that...

CLIENT: That they were like, "Oh, they're getting married in nine months. Let's have a baby so I don't have to go."

THERAPIST: So I don't have to go I get it. Yeah. This kind of coldness would go that far with her.

CLIENT: It just feels that way.

THERAPIST: Yeah, there is something that...

CLIENT: Super convenient.

THERAPIST: I guess what I was thinking of was the whole approach about the wedding, too, and it being off the table considering going down. [00:21:39]

CLIENT: Oh, yeah. It was on the table as soon as the found the due date.

THERAPIST: I think, with the kind of freezing behavior, you don't sense that there's a lot... I mean, you wonder what kind of feelings are there, you know? As you've been saying, you don't get much of Well, does this wedding mean much to them? Do they want to be part of it? Would they want to be part of it? How do they feel about you being part of the family? How do they feel about the marriage?

CLIENT: I really felt Gina was really comfortable with me before she had the baby. We would go out, the four of us. We would go over, you know. But I don't know if it's a left-over feeling from when the baby was really young and I was really eager to help them, or if she's just completely closed off for other reasons. But, no, it doesn't feel like this wedding is important to them at all. I don't think she's ever heard me say it, but I've said it to other people, her wedding was the most abysmal wedding I've ever been to. [00:23:01]

THERAPIST: Why? What was it like?

CLIENT: Because she's Catholic and baptized and Dave is not Catholic. I don't know if he's baptized or not.

THERAPIST: Did they get married in a Catholic church?

CLIENT: Yeah. They got married, but the priest was like, "Dave, we look forward to seeing more of you." They said something about being together in heaven. Basically, I got the message like "I hope you become Catholic so you can be together in heaven."

THERAPIST: He ain't on the train.

CLIENT: Right. I'm sure I'm making more of it than it was at the time, but it was... (pause) And there was hardly anybody there and it was this enormous cathedral. If you're going to have a wedding where only 80 people come, you need to have it in a teeny-tiny, little church instead of Holy Name. So the church felt empty, but whatever. [00:24:57] There's nothing I can do about it. You can't make her un-pregnant. I can't break up Dave and Gina so Dave will come or, at least, I'm not going to. I could say nasty things to them, but that's not going to help our relationship in the long run. And I don't say nasty things to people. It's just not my style. So what am I going to do? Tell Dave he's being a pussy? Tell Gina that she needs to ask her mom for support? We're not close, so we don't have that relationship. I could tell that to my friends, but Gina has built so many walls that nobody is going to be frank with her about anything, you know? [00:26:04]

THERAPIST: Yeah. It's interesting because I guess the freeze that they've put on you makes you kind of feel frozen to them. It's kind of like it goes into a cold war.

CLIENT: Yeah. (pause) They could have had a perfectly warm relationship with me over the past year, but they shut me out and they told me that I needed to back off; and I did. I, apparently, went to Siberia.

THERAPIST: I think, too, the issue here is a deep one for you. You've talked with me a lot about this feeling of a certain amount of rejection you've felt over the years, and it's a pretty big message for them to not really work out this issue around your wedding, not talk to you about it, not give you any kind of clarity about where they stand and, I think it must in a lot of ways, evoke a lot of feelings of them freezing you out. Not just to freeze you out, but all of those feelings of being a little bit rejected by them. It's your wedding. [00:27:46] (pause)

CLIENT: I don't know what's going through their heads about it. I know they say they wish they could come, but didn't really if you really wish you could come, you'd make an effort. You'd say, "We'll see how it goes. I'll see if maybe I've had the baby. I'll see if maybe I'm not going to have the baby for another couple of weeks" Because her first baby was two weeks late and I know that, in her pregnancy now, she has an anterior placenta the placenta is up here instead of back there. So I don't know if that's a risk. I don't know. They've shut us out and they've shut us out and they've shut us out; and now we're moving and now they have to take us to the Omni to make it all better. Sorry. I'm going to have an appetizer, lobster, and a $14 martini and it's still not going to be better. (laughs) [00:29:03]

THERAPIST: They're just getting started. You'll show them how you feel. If they want to speak through money, you'll speak through money.

CLIENT: (laughs) Exactly. I can eat. Take me to Louis Vuitton afterwards.

THERAPIST: Let's talk through the language of money. Well I'm happy for you guys.

CLIENT: When are you getting married? I'm serious. I have to tell you something and this is really embarrassing, but the first day I came to your office I was giggling. You were like, "What is going through your head right now?" I was like, "Nothing. If my psychiatrist had told me he was so cute, I would have come a long time ago." (laughs) So I think you should get married or, at least, fall in love. [00:30:03]

THERAPIST: Oh, yeah?

CLIENT: Yeah. It's pretty good. (both laugh)

THERAPIST: Well, you seem happy and you want that for me, huh?

CLIENT: Yeah. I do.

THERAPIST: That's sweet to say. Well, thank you.

CLIENT: You're welcome. So stop going to all your therapy club meetings and go out for drinks (both laugh) or whatever you do that makes your appointments on Wednesday at 6:15.

THERAPIST: Yeah, what about me not being married, not having kids?

CLIENT: I don't know. I just don't see why you're not married or have kids unless you don't want marriage or children. [00:31:01]

THERAPIST: I guess, in a way, you're getting this thing with Phil and the move is kind of exciting and this thing is good. I should have it, too. That kind of thing? That's it, huh? What do you mean?

CLIENT: That's it. That's the secret I've been keeping. I think you're really cute, okay? You look like a tall version of Phil, and so that's why I kept coming I mean, in the beginning. I feel really embarrassed. I'm not supposed to tell my therapist these feelings.

THERAPIST: Why not?

CLIENT: Because it's weird.

THERAPIST: What was it like in the beginning?

CLIENT: It was fine, but I think it's better now that we're talking about real things instead of how to clean my desk. (pause) [00:32:35]

THERAPIST: I guess one thing is that and I guess I've been thinking about it is how much is important that was going on in the sexual realm of your relationship with Phil, knowing that that was a hard thing for you to talk about. I was just thinking that, yeah, those feelings in that realm for you, when you would talk about it, it took a lot of guts because of what it kind of evoked in the moment with me. Like in some ways it's just exposing and all of that stuff, but I thought it was incredibly important just like being able to talk about how you feel and think about me; how you see me. As we started to get into some stuff around sexuality, there were a lot of important associations you were making to your past, to the neighbor we had discussions about the neighbor. It was a neighbor, right? Yeah, that was pretty... [00:33:54]

CLIENT: Not just a neighbor, my parents' tenant.

THERAPIST: Your parents' tenant? That was deep stuff.

CLIENT: I've forgiven him. I don't want to have to explain to people at my wedding why he's not there, so I just invited him. At first I didn't want to invite him.

THERAPIST: I know. I was wondering where you are with that.

CLIENT: (sighs) He's with a girl who's my age or younger.

THERAPIST: And he's how old?

CLIENT: Older than you. 50-something. Ugh, whatever.

THERAPIST: Yeah, yeah. And he is going to attend?

CLIENT: Yep.

THERAPIST: Have you sent out invitations yet?

CLIENT: I haven't sent out invitations. The designer and I are working on them.

THERAPIST: But your parents have indicated is that how you know that he's planning on going?

CLIENT: Well, he's invited, I don't know if he's going to go. [00:34:58]

THERAPIST: But he probably is close enough? Yeah. (pause) Just to say that there is a lot there and (chuckles) I guess, per our conversation last week, I was noticing again that, yeah, it's been a certain kind of level. I think there's a lot underneath, too.

CLIENT: Every time my co-worker she's a friend of mine she catches me looking in the mirror and she says, "You're so vain." I'm like, "Vain?" because I hate myself. I hate the way I look. I hate being fat. I hate having weird spots all over me. And then I can't get up early enough to put make-up on or care. I don't care. I hate myself, but I don't care. [00:36:04]

THERAPIST: Yeah, yeah. And maybe that's why it's been so off the radar, because not-caring is a kind of maneuver to keep that stuff at bay.

CLIENT: There were people in college who, clearly, have low self-esteem; but they got up early and did their hair and did their make-up and got their nails done. I'm just like, "What's the point?" because, for me, make-up was always an indication of low self-esteem. All the girls in middle school because in middle school I had really good self-esteem or, at least, I thought I did. The mean girls wore makeup, the girls who had boyfriends in like seventh grade wore makeup, so it wasn't my thing. I have tons of make-up. I always buy make-up, but I never use it and I've never learned to use it particularly well. [00:37:22] I want to learn because I don't know if maybe wearing make-up would make me feel better about myself, but what I really want is that new miracle drug that they found out that makes you lose weight no matter what diet they're on. I don't know if you read about that earlier this week, but it's the cold-sore drug that they've given the mice to ingest, but the mice gained all the weight back when they stopped giving the drug. It would be really convenient, though. I could become really thin for the wedding and then get real fat again if I'm really depressed. [00:38:06]

THERAPIST: That whole issue around how you see yourself and how you feel in your body is deep and there is a lot there. Talking about even the question of make-up. I think, in a way, to start whether or not you actually use make-up is another matter entirely but just the fact that you're thinking about it seems to me to be an indication of your wanting to take some care or think about your body. And yet, right away you go into this idea of "Well, would I know how to do it?" It's filled with a lot of uncertainty and question. [00:39:02]

CLIENT: Right. And then, I know I should be exercising, but I hate exerting myself. One of the reasons I hate it is because I sweat. I turn the color of those red books over there, and so I hate doing those group zoomba classes because all the girls are like this big and they're in their little Lulu-lemon shorts and their cute little Adidas tops and dancing around. And I'm in my penguin's t-shirt and some umbro shorts. It's just like ohhh. [00:39:42]

THERAPIST: Yeah, you don't feel good in your own body.

CLIENT: No. And that's another reason why I'll be happy to get out of here because of all of the young, affluent, physically-fit, beautiful people. Somebody who hasn't lived here in a while, "So, how's the city?" I said, "It is the same. Even the ugly people are beautiful." I feel like everybody has it all together because it is like the most physically fit city in America and the most educated city in America and the most traveled city in America. Whatever. We're breeding perfect specimens or something and I don't feel like a perfect specimen. [00:40:50]

THERAPIST: Right. And when you're in contact more with your body, you feel at odds with that vision of the place, of the perfect Lulu-lemon workout girl.

CLIENT: Yeah. You know exactly what I'm talking about, too. She's on the treadmill next to a gym place that I...

THERAPIST: Oh, sure. I think it must make you not want to be very much in contact with your own body.

CLIENT: I don't know if this is part of it because I never really showered or bathed a lot, even as a young kid; but I take a shower two or three times a week. I definitely don't take a shower every day.

THERAPIST: I think that is part of it. What were you thinking? I think that is part of it. What were you thinking? [00:41:42]

CLIENT: I was going to say I don't care. I just never have. That definitely didn't start happening after what happened with the neighbor. It's always been that way. My parents used to be like, "You have to take a shower once a month whether you need it or not."

THERAPIST: I don't mean to make it seem like that was the genesis of everything. It's just in the soup, I guess.

CLIENT: I don't usually take showers in the morning, but when I do my hair always feels so nice and soft. So I took a shower this morning so I would feel nice and pretty for going in to talk to Stephanie. So, I don't know, maybe I should make an effort and it would help me. I like the feel of my hair when it air dries and when I don't sleep on it. It's not that it feels different, it just feels I don't know. You don't get to touch it when it's like that.

THERAPIST: Well, we should stop.

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