Jul 22

 Therapy day yesterday.

I have wandered off on so many tangents this post, I've decided to mark the waffle. So it's skippable. 

When I had met up with Hazel some days prior, and gone over some of the Not Great things the shrink had got up to, I got the entirely predictable Hazel response. Anger. If there's going to be a response you can set your watch to with Hazel, it's going to be be protective anger. Regardless of appropriateness. She laid into the shrink and listed the many ways that Wasn't What A Shrink Should Do. They Are Shit. etc. 

[SKIPPABLE TANGENT] 

Like the echo of the challenges she faces however, she always lays in 150%. Stretches the thing to some untenable level, with also some collateral damage - you also end up getting winged in the crossfire. I had been having problems with the shrink all the time. None of it was working out. Shrink is a hot mess. etc. This is patently untrue. I ended up having to defend the shrink. Some of what Hazel says is justified. Some of it absolutely isn't and is stretched to make a point, and produce more ammo. The under the surface rage wants more.

This is exactly what you get with Hazel. I am well used to it. And well used to navigating around any tipping points that would blow up and out of control. It's definitely a pattern of behaviour for her. This is, I think, the day to day, less dramatic reality of dealing with someone with borderline. When it's largely "behaving itself", but still manifests in a predictable angry, not entirely on the leash kind of way. She does it with many different interactions in her life, and has been doing it since I've ever known her. It has caused a good deal of consternation in those around her over the years I've been witness to it. One tiny snippet sticks in my head many years after.

After storming out of a flat literally looking for trouble - to put some minor transgressor in their place verbally - leaving two of us at a dining room table, her boyfriend of the time coming in from the kitchen on realising Hazel had left, door open, sighed and said out loud "oh God, what is she doing now". It was said in mild anxiety with a little sprinkling of frustration. He followed it up with "she's going to end up getting stabbed". But this is Hazel. It also explains how she has been in proper stand up fights with many neighbours, loiterers and even just some confused people in the past. I have gently and slightly tongue in cheek suggested that if she ever did move to the US, she stood a reasonable chance of getting shot.

Eventually, you imagine, she's going to run into the wrong person. So far - and sometimes by a whisker - this hasn't happened yet. It's also somewhat of a reflection of her guaranteed behaviour to always escalate, and never de-escalate. At a maintaining bridges scale, she has little in common with a diplomat, and a lot in common with a raiding viking. Both in consequence and temperament.

Anyway. Tangent. Just to explain that Hazel is always going to give you a militant answer. Half the time it's a protective one - protective of people she cares about. But there's also a little zing for everyone in there, including the people she is protective of.

A strength of this, is that if you need someone to fight your corner. You can reasonably rely on Hazel. So long as you take a bit of padding for yourself. 

She is far from the only fire cracker I know in my life. I either like fire crackers, or I have a necessary patience with them. Little of column A, a little of column B I suspect. Acutally. My mom was exactly the same. Even down to you taking collateral damage in the protective crossfire. I had to more than once gently nudge my mom to stop beating me up because she was angry about how someone was treating me. Beating me up doesn't help. It just adds insult to injury. My mom did always get the point. And take it back a step. But the behaviour would inevitably repeat. 

I find this behaviour not entirely uncommon in people. The more fiery ones. ( self selecting going on there perhaps ). But. Watch for it. How quickly protective of someone becomes misdirected anger at that someone. I think it is one of those, Not Helpful common by default behaviours in the human condition. 

See also my dad kicking my mom on the floor because she was so ill she couldn't get up. Protection turned to fear turned to anger turned to violence. Stop dude !

Anyway.

[/SKIPPABLE TANGENT] 

With Hazels scorching words in my ears - don't have another session with the shrink, get rid of them. You're just going to pay them money to be miserable. They're a professional they don't need closure ( one of my answers to why I would do). Just do it and get rid of them. 

[SKIPPABLE TANGENT] 

( the conversation eventually turned into a not entirely unfamiliar place of a "debate" that I am too nice, too patient, too forgiving, and I need to tell people to fuck off a lot more, versus my, I understand what you are saying, I don't even really disagree, but, it's a conscious choice to be nice despite possibly getting hurt or taken advantage of because given that the world at large is full to the brim of people who will tell you how wrong you are, shit you are, and life itself will devour you at the first chance it gets, if I am erring on the side of kindness I am not sure that's the greatest sin there could be in such a generally shitty world. It is. A tiny bit of counterbalance. And in any case. I don't sit and choose to be kind most of the time. It's just who I am by default. Or rather, at this point of my life, who I've worked on becoming and also been trained to do ( placating volatile people ) ).

I don't really ever, ever bring up the irony here of the consequences that that proposed more militant strategy in the face of someone with a borderline diagnosis who can be extremely challenging and needs a lot of patience and understanding would end up having. By her own measure, she should be thrown under the bus. In fact. If you're keeping score. And I don't really. But. Some of this is very hard to forget. I should have by rights ditched her so many times by now for some very serious abusive transgressions, that our relationship would have been over many years ago ( and in doing so, followed almost all the other relationships in her life, from friends, to neighbours, to work colleagues, to family, to boyfriends - the nature of the borderline beast ). If you push the point a bit too far perhaps ( but maybe not ), at a very deep level, her advice to be less kind might be Hazel telling me not to allow her to hurt me. A tiny sub conscious voice telling me to run not endure. Again. This would not be the first woman in my life that I got that advice from. In a bit of very clear headed revelation from someone who I suspect is some level of sociopath I was directly told to not allow myself to be hurt by them. Because. They would. Hurt me.

For the record they ended up hurting me. A lot.

Sometimes I reflect on this, that this was the sociopath giving me fair warning. Run dude. No ? Ok. I Warned you...

But if we know anything about me, it's that I don't run. I hold my ground. And take the hit. Not to be a martyr. But to be there. For someone.

I am not a victim in this. It's a conscious - and very open eyed - choice I make. There is a big difference there. And in the most extreme cases - I will protect myself ( gasp, a boundary ! ). But I wont run. Or burn bridges.

[/SKIPPABLE TANGENT] 

I went into the session zen with it. I am calm. I am clear. But also with steel in my spine. This was the reality. I would not be putting up with any shit. I am not angry. I am not frustrated. I am not looking for a fight. Or an argument. Or even dischord or a debate. I am very zen. I don't need anything from this. But also. This is how it is. 

[SKIPPABLE TANGENT]

I think. This is probably the worst kind of formidable you can face. One with no heat. No venom. No emotion. But very clear on just where your weaknesses are. There is as they say - and I think this is absolutely true - nothing worse than to be treated with indifference. Hate is one thing. Love another. The worst bite is indifference. Truly. And it's related sibling. A calm but open eyed and maybe disappointed mindset. Consider how often someone being calm absolutely can enrage someone else. I think it's something about a mismatch of emotion. A coding problem if you like ( as in code switching, not matching someones body language, intensity etc, a screechingly awkward social cues dissonance ). But it also has to be said, the criticism that clearly doesn't come from a place of hate, or love, or anything but just the thing itself, is extremely hard to find some chink in the armour to be able to rationalise it away. Oh you're just upset. It makes it a lot harder for the person to wriggle out of.

There are some tangential lessons there in the dark arts. Which after writing about it twice. I have snipped. Because. No one needs to be getting directions on that. If you haven't figured that shit out, good. Albeit it does leave you open to it. Is it better to communicate to everyone How To Build Yourself Something Terrible To Inflict Damage To All in order to educate people what to look for, or better to censor it, so people don't learn How To Build Yourself Something Terrible To Inflict Damage To All. There is some social / legal precedence to this. The answer being ( right or wrong ) it's better to bury that information. No AI for instance, is going to tell you how to do heinous act X. Pandora's box. Do you take knowledge, and all its horrible consequences, or innocence/ignorance. Highly debatable. No good answer. I suspect however the lean towards innocence is generally a better call however. But. Yeah. Highly debatable. Context sensitive. Nuanced. IE. Tricky.

For the record, I do not engage in the dark arts. I am aware of them. And what you could do. And how you could do that. But I don't. Because that shit is no bueno. You have to be something of a monster to happily engage in them in my emphatic opinion.

[/SKIPPABLE TANGENT]

My expectation of the session was, this was the last one. I would talk openly about what I thought was useful and what wasn't useful. I wouldn't even necessarily get into last weeks debacle. Leave it there. Give the shrink closure ( I didn't need it, already there ! ). And be done with it. Nice. Neat. Exit. Excellent.

But at the same time I didn't go into it with my mind already firmly made up. I am open minded.

One of my decision tipping points was whether the shrink would apologise for what went on last week. But not from a, you owe me an apology point of view. But rather very importantly, are you self aware enough to know you fucked up. If you aren't. Yikes. Physician heal thyself. If you are. Ok. Cool. 

I am very forgiving of personal fuckups. Somewhat forgiving of professional fuckups on a contextual basis. And not forgiving at all of deceitful or pompous professional fuckups.

People do fuck up.

It's the nature of being people.

We are all wonderfully prone to fucking up. In fact. If you've gone through your life without fucking up, I can say you're either a) a liar or b) delusional.

It's part of the deal of getting to be people. Have some kindness. Some meanness. A desire for cake. And a guarantee that somewhere along the way, probably multiple times, you're going to fuck it all up. Welcome to the human club. Name badges on the right. Snacks on the left. 

I started concisely. Without any preamble.

I think this, I said, is to be our last session. Let's talk about progress.

I set out what I thought the various avenues of progress could be.

The first, and typically biggest in therapy was the notion of people learning about themselves with the help of a shrink. Finding out why they got so angry. Or upset. Or revealing unconsidered emotions. Cognitive dissonance in their thinking. Lives. All of it. This is. By my estimation. The usual. The typical. The main reason therapy exists.

It is also something that by my reckoning that you cannot do with me. Because. I already have most - or all - my ducks in a row. I know who I am. I know how shit works. I am clear eyed about everything, from the electrons pinging around my nerves, to the meta level emotions, intellect, my place in the world and yada. If anything I am too clear eyed about it. I have no sense of magic or awe. Just the awful weight of revelation and that yes, there is no wizard of oz, it's just a dude playing with smoke and mirrors.

The shrink agreed with that assessment. Both of the process and largely agreed with the assessment of myself. They did query my shorthand summation of - you're not going to tell me something about me I don't already know. Never ? They said. I don't think so I said. Very probable. I could be wrong. Pretty sure I'm not. But who knows I said. Perhaps you or someone will tell me that the secret all the time was that I needed to drink more green tea.

The shrink laughed and said that was doubtful there was a solution like that although green tea was very good. 

In any case they agreed I had a very good awareness of all that "shit". And that no. The typical therapy path for me wasn't a thing.

Next.

IF you want to just be emotional I said. And gave a pointed look at them and raised my eyebrows ( because they can bang on a bit about how I am less emotional and more analytical, oh man, I wish that was true, life would be so much less.... painful... ) . Then being "seen" and having someone acknowledge hey that sounds really shit. I'm sorry you've experienced that. I understand the difficulties you have etc. Has value. It's a bit of a salve for my soul. Hey. Someone sees me. And gives a shit. Well. Ok. I said I don't get an awful lot of that ( particularly family wise who have all been raised to soldier on and shut up ). I think people also fall into that trap of seeing me as very calpable, so, what help or kindness does he need, and also default into the soldier on soldier. The very thing my mom lamented about when people used to tell her, oh you're so strong, you're such a fighter, etc etc, when all she really wanted was emotional comfort. Even though, ironically, my mom was not a hugger, and had been taught to avoid that as being false, what she really wanted was not to be told she was strong, but actually wanted a hug. Even though she never realised it. Wanting something she never realised. How very human. Not knowing what it is you need or want. Anyway. Jesus. Tangent.

Next I said. I found the validation I got from them, confirming yes, what I see in person X is very likely to be what I think it is. And that my approach with person Y is very grounded and sensible and understanding. Is useful to me. It gives me some reassurance I am not a lunatic, off with the fairies in my own delusion about what I think I see in the world, or rather, what I see in people and what I do about it to support them. I said to the shrink it was a bit like getting my homework marked.

Finally I said. There is value in just talking. In somewhat of a safer space. Where I don't have to always second guess my approach. I don't have to enact special care with what I say, when I say it. I don't have to worry about people trying to compete with me. Or being intimidated. Or anything like that. And. A shorter version is. I don't have to worry so much about everyone else in the room , it can instead focus on me. 

So. That sounds like more positives than negatives the shrink said.

Kinda I said. I think you can argue about how useful the touchy feely stuff is. Is it that important. That big of a deal. Possibly not. However I said I am not sure I could measure it. Even if I had a perfect measuring device, I'm still not sure I would be able to measure it. I suspect and then added feel ( again as a bit of an amused swipe at the shrink )  that it has a bigger impact on me than I think. I'm just not great at being able to measure that stuff. I know I'm not. Effects of stress and otherwise are not trivial for me to pick up in myself. Sometimes I have to listen hard. And sometimes I am not sure. Until much later. I have over the latter years done a lot of work on myself to learn to listen to myself. And I am way way better than I was. In somethings I am now very good at listening to myself - particularly health wise. But some others are a bit sketchy. It takes time for them to resolve. Which I also suspect is just how the process works. It's not available instantly.

This is also something I have learned wisdom wise. Give things time. Sleep on a decision. Be patient. Mull things over. Let it percolate in the background. Sink in. Give yourself time to process. You are not an instant decision making machine.

I believe this to be very good wisdom. Take a breath. Give yourself a break. And consider at a slower pace and more angles.

The shrink picked up on my use of the word touchy feely.

They again banged on about how that implied it wasn't accurate enough. Unreliable. IE. Duh. My emotions or instincts et al are unreliable. Untrustworthy. Etc.

Uh huh. Ok. No.

I am aware how important that all is. There is no derision in touchy feely. But. And I am not defending then some analytical dominance. But. There are places in life where it's important to understand that a touchy feely measurement of say a bridge needs to be acknowledged. There are some places where accuracy IS important. And some places where it is irrelevant. You want accuracy in your surgeons and bridge builders. And is irrelevant to poetry. It's important to know the difference. Not that one is more important than the other. Context. No one wants an aircraft pilot to run on vibes, thoughts and prayers. They want them to run on training. Equally. No one gives a shit if your poet can break a sonnet down into its mathematical origins. 

I think this is a bit of a cul-de-sac the shrink often travels down. I think it's a manifestation of the "I'm not sure I Can keep up with you" malarkey. I say a thing. They take a simplistic, trope interpretation of that. And I have to finesse them back from the ledge of labelling every thing they see and explain the nuance and context.

You mention tin of beans ! My training indicates tins of beans means you eat nothing but beans !

Sigh. I understand what you are saying. And why your training says that. And once again we are roaming around with a hammer in hand looking for the proverbial nails.

So. Let me explain why I like more things than beans. And that you've jumped to the wrong conclusion. With your hammer.

We get that pattern.

Repeatedly.

And then they get frustrated at me being analytical and going on tangents.

That's because I'm trying to explain something to you that you made a mistake with goddamit. How should I approach it ? Interpretive dance ? No. I'm going to break it down methodically and teach you something.

Perhaps. At a very high meta level. Their frustration at analytical tangents might not be actually with that, but more frustration at having to be continually corrected. Frustration at continually falling into ignorance potholes that I then pull them out of. For a knowledge worker used to that being the other way around, I can guess that's frustrating for them. But. Very high level meta. Possibly in the atmosphere of make believe it's so high up. But. Also very possibly the root of it all. 

So far, so good.

Then we got to the bad.

Last week, one of the many tussles was about my approximate statement of, you can either know, or you can be happy. But not both.

This week. Poetic. Because I can wax poetic.

I paused. Maintained contact. And sighed.

Do you want to know or do you want be happy I asked them.

They opted for know. Always know. At least within the context of a shrinks office. That is what this process is about right they said ? I agree. But that doesn't mean it happens. Or people do that. There's always a choice.

They braced themselves. I could see the flicker.  

I decided to go somewhere else first.

I said. There is almost a personality switch with me. Between personal and professional. In a personal context I try hard to to be patient, understanding, caring, very accepting of human frailties, keenly aware how hard it is to get from day 1 to day 2. And yet. Profesionally. You do your job. You do what's expected. Otherwise I am going to have your ass.

I said to her that I keep my inner critic on a leash. Only able to hurt me, not others. But. Profesionally. I am not mean. Or a bully. But. That inner critic leash is let slip a little. The inner critic comes out to be just the critic, and show you how you fucked up in excruciating detail. I used the word ferocious. I can use that ferocious analytical intellectual side to pick apart exactly why it went wrong, and how you got it wrong, and just how shit you are. I said. I was aware the professionally speaking I could be intimidating. 

The shrink noted there was no wiggle room there for frailties. Exacting. No forgiveness.

I defined it. I am not unfair. I do accept people don't know everything. Have to learn. Have good days bad days. I accept all of that.

I gave the example of support at work to those who have Very Bad Days. Who burn out. Mentally struggle. Whatever it is. I have a lot of time and patience for that. I have a lot of patience for people getting it wrong but having tried honestly.

The shrink noted it seemed to be about authenticity.

Yes. People can tell me they are having an off day. Can't be bothered. That's ok. Off you go. I get it.

However if someone does one thing and pretends to be another. No way. No quarter. Fuck you.

I said it comes down to honesty. I need to know I can trust you in a professional sense. To get it done. If you cause me to doubt that, by being dishonest at least once. Then that throws that trust relationship into doubt. Everything is then a doubt. Can I trust the fireman to put out the fire. Can I trust the bridge builder to build a good bridge. If I cannot. I can't have them fighting fires or building bridges. They need to be removed. Even if it means there are no firefighters or bridge builders. At least everyone is then aware, oh, hey, we have no bridge building capacity. Because then they are aware they need to do something about that, rather than complacently relying on a bridge builder who never turns up for work.

I said I had a high art adult expectation of people, that if they felt they couldn't do a job at any given point, to say so, and if necessary excuse themselves. Which is OK. I understand. That's being human. But. You must have that mature sense of responsibility. Faking it. Lying about. No way.

The shrink said they could see I was very firm about this. Very sure. Very clear boundaries. They said it was like the surgeon. Who can't tolerate people who are not up to the job, because the stakes are high, and you need to excuse yourself if you can't.

Exactly.

There is no fucking around when your knuckle deep in someones chest cavity. Not "feeling it", or being hungover, or cant be bothered is unacceptable.

The shrink understood. Referring to the intimidating thing they asked if I would like me as a boss.

Yeah I think so I said. Because so long as you're honest. It's good. I am understanding of human frailties. Ups and downs. But I also value excellence. And also am critical of fuckups. You know where you stand. And you know I wont tolerate bullshit.

As Hazel later pointed out, this was the difference between me and Andy, where Andy would tolerate shit he really shouldn't - at the very detrimental impact to employees losing respect and faith in Andy to hold any kind of excellence level - and I didn't tolerate that. Of anyone. Including Andy. As Andy had pointed out many years ago, I held him to a higher account of himself than his wife did.

So all of that being said.

I then said.

Some of what I get in here is a professional level of critique. I have an expectation of you. As a professional. ( and the implication that was unstated was - And when you fuck up. . . and are dishonest about it. . . . )

So I asked about. Do you want to know, or be happy. Because. I said. Whilst the truth is always the truth. The truth isn't always helpful. The truth will flense the flesh from bones I said. ( Hazel asked if I had used those words. Yes I said. Exactly. Oh my she said. She will have noted down that you're a possible serial killer ). The shrink pondered that the truth was always the thing. But I quickly cut that bullshit down to size. Absolutely not. Which on reflection is an odd thing for a shrink to think. Surely they understand the power and necessity of the kind untruth. Truth can be cruel sometimes. And the lie can be kind. It's not always important to be objectively true if it has fuck all impact on an outcome. KNOW. OR BE HAPPY. I said that if an asteroid were going to hit the Earth tomorrow and wipe everyone out, I'd argue people would be better off not knowing, than spending their last 24 hours in some form of hyper fear ( not withstanding all the bullshit about people making the most of their last 24 and all that nonsense ). The upshot is. Sometimes it's better not knowing. We're back to the wizard of oz. Again. One of the touchy feely tricky context sensitive navigation problems with life, is knowing when it's better to be kind and when it's better to be truthful and the consequences of those decisions. This can quickly get into Most Complex Things You're Going To Have To Deal With life situations as well as no win and lesser evil scenarios.

The shrink affirmed they wanted to know.

Still I doubted. I gave up. You're an adult I said. I have given you the choice. I should respect you've made a decision. OK. Mostly because I doubted how helpful the truth would be. Particularly if this is the last session. What's the point in dropping a truth bomb if there are no useful consequences from it ?

So I said last week was terrible. Really bad.

Why.

A number of things. But probably the most egregious was the

Defensive. Evasive. Wrong. Acceptance they were Wrong. Followed by polite flipping of table about whether the process was making any progress at all.

They were open minded about it. Accepting of it in fact. Albeit there was some defensive ass covering. A little.

So I got into it. And broke it down. Painful accurate fact by fact. This is what happened. This is how you reacted. You were wrong. It wasn't very shrink like. It was like a normal non shrink relationship.

It did not meet my expectation of professionalism in a shrink.

I was not angry. Or heated.

Just matter of fact.

The shrink took it with very good grace. No shirking. No defensive squirming.

Very good.

The shrink said they had "thought a lot about last week".

So clearly. It had rattled them a lot. As, in my humble opinion, it should have done.

They explained what they were thinking and why they said what they said.

It was beat for beat what I knew them to be thinking.

This is the thing.

I can see what you're thinking. Even though that's impossible. There is no way I can know what you're thinking. And yet here we are. You tell me what you're thinking. It matches exactly what I knew you to be thinking.

It's not that it isn't possible. It's just highly improbable. And yet.

Improbable is not something we do well with understanding. Our very existence on this planet, as a human, bumbling around and deciding what to have for lunch is so cosmically improbable that it defies all logic and rationality. From a rational point of view, it's ludicrous.

And yet.

There you are. Deciding to have soup for lunch.

The point is. Our brains cannot handle large scale stuff. Patterns that are part of enormous chaotic systems. Things that defy a relatively simple step by step abstract process. There are things we can't wrap our heads around. And yet happen anyway.

I once worked with ( a verifiable asshole ) a guy who was militantly adamant that there was no way an eye could evolve, and that it was absolute proof that god existed and designed us. He absolutely could not grasp that that is very possible in a simple evolutionary setup combined with an unimaginable number of inputs and recursions over a stupid amount of time. Those numbers too big. Therefore. God.

That dude had all sorts of problems with that. Anything outside of his context of understanding was stupid, ridiculous, impossible. Including technical solutions he couldn't come up with therefore had to be impossible.

The dude was also a violent bully. One of the few legitimately awful asshole people I have met. I spent some afternoons with his ex girlfriend as she related to me the ways he had abused her in their relationship. Wonderful guy. Anyway. 

So the shrink related their thinking. 

Yes I said. I know what you were thinking and why you said what you said. I filled it out a bit more, the bits they had left out, I filled in.

I do indeed "get it".

But none of that excuses the defensiveness, evasion and so on. I wasn't confused about why you did what you did. I can write down the why in detail. Each step. Each thought you had. I am dismayed about the choices you made.

The shrink made a small focus on the positive.

I did accept I was wrong.

Yes. You did.

So I can acknowledge when I am wrong and adjust.

Yes.

( quick test. name which of us is the therapist and which the client at this point ) 

But I said. You did - profesionally and politely - flip the table at that point. A sulky response.

Again.

This is brutal truth.

This is not normally what I would do with a person.

That level of truth is usually very destructive. It's not wrong. But boy. Does it challenge someones comfort zone, who they think they are, and the narrative of being the hero in their own story. In many ways it's cruel. See the comment about the truth not always being helpful. ( and most definitely not kind , the truth if anything is typically unkind . Huh. Which is an interesting point. The truth is "not nice". Something to ponder about objectivity vs kindness , and perhaps thats why objectivity does not mean happy, Because it can be unkind ? And unkind is not a happy state, unless you're some kind of sadistic asshole ) 

The shrink pivoted a little and said that all relationships were subject to <some technical shrink word I cant recall but I think was disruption>. Basically a fancy way of saying, all relationships hit issues. Even shrink and client ones. And that we had run headlong into a disruption. Which can end things.

The shrink said they would like to - if I was willing - work through it. Deal with it. Process it. Very adult. Very mature. Some high level adult stuff. In fact. That's as high level mature as I've ever experienced. Which. Would track with my expectation of a shrink.

Sure I said.

Sure the shrink repeated, the implication being I wasn't enthused.

I corrected myself. Bad habit I said. What I should have said was, yes, I am open to working through it and would like to do that.

At some point during that I shared another truth bomb.

The one about if they had not been self aware enough to realise they had fucked up, we would have been done. I made the shrink very aware that was a line of expectation. A test.

Again. Brutal.

You are on notice. There are boundaries. You are being measured.

But.

They wanted to know.

They wanted the truth.

I also went through the impossible situation they put me in. When they said they wanted to see what I saw. And know it all. And even when I was hesistant and questioned the wisdom of that. They said yes. And I Shared what I saw. And predictably they didn't react well to it. I said. You precipitated that.

I also noted that this had then made me question with a friend, whether I should actively protect the shrink from somethings, not always be entirely open, but I already knew the answer. And my friend confirmed that you can't be anything but truthful, otherwise, why bother with the shrink in the first place.

The shrink agreed.

But again.

Brutal truth.

Expectations. Failures.

Eh well.

In the end, all being said. It was a useful session.

I did query without expecting an answer, whether they had had a bad day, a bad week last week, or what, exactly was going on. But uh huh.

So. We left it there. 

I am going back next week.

I am content that the shrink took everything on the chin. Was honest about it. Accepting of mistake - albeit it was very quiet and couched in a lot of psych relationship smoke - and also seemed genuinely interested in continuing on with me.

I think the shrink understand how much authenticity means to me. It's not a straight up duh always be honest with me thing. Because. I absolutely accept people lie to my face all the time. The usual social handshaking. Lying about not wanting to do something. Lying about feeling sad. Or whatever. People mask all the time. But there is something in there of trying to refute something that's already out. Or doing it with malice. I think malicious inauthenticity is one of my biggest lines. You're going to get a real bad time from me with that, thin patience. Plus. If you decide to stick a professional label on your head, note that I am going to have very distinct expectations of you in having that label. If you say you're a rocket scientist. I am going to expect you to show me that. And I will not be understanding when you tell me, oh well, I was just trying it on.

I suspect my critical professional viewpoint has arisen from having my time endlessly wasted as an expert level professional dealing with other professionals. Repeated wasted time. Frustration. Accreted into impatience with dickheads. 

 

 Later in the afternoon I met up with Hazel and we pootled about. On the drive out to a lovely riverside pub just across the water from where I live, I reflected to Hazel about the thing with the shrink thinking I was analytical, and less emotional, to which Hazel said one thing doesn't mean you're not the other thing - yes exactly, and I said that if anything I was controlled by emotions to a debilitating degree. And that really. All I wanted to know. Was how to make it stop hurting. And that if I was just analytical and not so emotional, how much easier that would be. Because. I hurt. A lot. And I don't like it. And want it to go away. And will someone please tell me how to stop hurting. But. I suspected. There wasn't an answer in how to make it stop hurting.

No Hazel said. I don't think there is. It just hurts.

I sighed.

Yeah. I Said. I think it just hurts. And you have to put up with it.

My emotions bumped. A quick punch in the stomach. And I was very sad.

And I hurt.

Well done. I had just woken the sad monster. Poked it with a stick. Are you still there ? Still sad ? Does it hurt. Are we doooooomed ?

Yes.

Jolly good.

Situation normal.

Stupidy shitty painful sad life.

Onwards to a nice pub by the river.

Perhaps the pretty water with sunny glints can put the sad monster back to sleep.

Coping mechanisms.

All that life is

Coping mechanism on top of coping mechanism on top of coping mechanism.

Coping mechanisms all the way down. 

 

Other shrink things. To be fair this week the shrink did, perhaps more gently this week, note a few things. I wasn't just analytical. I am emotional. Ok. Thanks. Cool. Nice. Why does that feel like I had to wrestle with you with that. That also I wasn't a monster. Nor intimidating. Nor cruel. They saw "no malice or want for harm when being truthful with me". I was "careful". I did apologise to them. For being so truthful. They said I had nothing to apologise for.

Still.

Truth can be unkind.

I don't like being unkind.