I am a long time lurker on Daily Kos, while passionate for politics, I had no personal story to tell that merited a diary, until recently.
Feeling down about various aspects of my personal life and my general perspective on things, several months ago, a friend, who had an amazing experience, inspired me to start seeing a therapist. Unfortunately, a different (read: crappier) health insurance, location, hours of availability, and self-imposed restrictions (such as age and distance I would be willing to travel) eliminated his psychiatrist as well as many others available to me.
I ended up seeing a Social Worker located not far from my home, who was a few years older than I am (for right or wrong, I know I would feel uncomfortable discussing problems with a therapist significantly younger than I am – mid forties , as I feel that empathy may only go so far in understanding someone else’s problems when you have no frame of reference in your own life from which to draw upon.) and had late evening hours that would allow me to see her after I got home from work and had some time to spend with my children before they had to go to bed. (One of my reasons for seeking therapy in the first place was to be more attentive, positive and alive as an example for them, and leaving for work before they awake was a necessity, but being home before they were sent to bed was a MUST.)
Our first sessions were fine, feeling each other out, getting ourselves comfortable with one another, learning what boundaries would be in place, etc. I let her know that I am prone to swearing like a longshoreman with Tourette syndrome, especially when speaking without thinking (which was another issue to cover in our sessions.) She told me that she works part time in a doctor’s office counselling patients in various stages of the bariatric surgery process, and that her private practice often treats those with addition issues. She gave off a no- nonsense vibe I had not really gotten with a lot of other people that I felt I might have needed if I was to take this therapy seriously, which I desperately wanted to do. Needed to do.
Somewhere in our third or fourth meeting, things started to bother me. I am a contrary person by nature, which I was trying to suppress, as I it seemed akin to asking for advice on a subject, with the intention of ignoring it before you ask. But, mini-diagnoses started popping up. Very ‘buzz word’ psychology diagnoses. AD-HD. (which I do not mean to put down as an insignificant stumbling block, but is unlikely to be a root issue for me) Bipolar disorder (same) Abandonment issues (possible, but I hate blaming things on parents, so I mulled over my initial rejection of it, and again, while I can see why one could arrive at this conclusion, I don’t feel it is an accurate diagnosis here.) All of these were not given with the caveat of “I’m not a psychologist, but….” Or just not definitively: “Something we may want to examine is…..” I am surprised that I was not told that schizophrenia or psychopathy were never mentioned as it seemed that every other mental disorder mentioned during prime time television made its way into our conversations.
I came to dread each session more than the last, but I kept going under the belief that just because I didn’t like something didn’t make it untrue, and my promise to myself was that I would go into this with an open mind. If I quit now, could I say I did my best in this? The next session started with her opening the door and saying “So, you gave up on the diet?” (While I am still struggling with my weight, I had at that point lost about 45 pounds from my biggest) This was when I thought about giving up the therapy entirely, promise or no. The rest of the session was focused on her pitching to me the merits of lap band surgery, something to which I am vehemently opposed. I told her so, and that I was far more interested in working the weight off the same way I put it on, slowly and naturally over time. Her response could be roughly paraphrased as a sarcasm dipped: ‘And how’s that working out for you?’
She wanted me to meet with a support group of people who were considering bariatric surgery and when I told her that I was completely uninterested in such a thing and that meeting with other people in need of such a thing would not change my mind her exact words repeated over and over: “Well then, Prove me wrong.” It’s a good thing she didn’t double-dog dare me, huh?
I felt as if there was never going to be any progress in this venue, but once again, I apparently had not hit my limit, because I told her I would be back the next week and I would give her suggestion some thought.
The next week our session was scheduled for the day before Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy. It was all over the news. And I came out of our meeting with an interesting thought: If you are going to hit bottom, there is some comfort in it being rock bottom. Knowing that the wall you hit, is in fact a brick wall, immovable, and permanent and real; seeing the x-ray of the camels back and knowing that it is in fact broken and not just a herniated disk: there is a comfort in that surety. And I was sure that I was done.
In the midst of our session, somehow, while trying to get off of the surgery subject ( I did not change my opinion, and I really did not want to discuss it further) our conversation, slipped into Hillary’s announcement, and into politics in general. She seemed to have a world view that was neither conservative nor liberal, independent or libertarian. She disliked all of them, convinced of all political beings complete aversion to honesty. I bantered, as I usually do with people whose political beliefs are different from my own, as I find that it usually yields one of a few interesting outcomes. (Either I can persuade them to see my point of view and perhaps bring them to my causes, or trip them up in their own logic so badly, that they at least walk away questioning things and perhaps engage in a little more critical thinking., which again, more often than not, brings them to my side.) In the past I have enjoyed this as I have been very fortunate to have surrounded myself with people who, if not always grounded in reality, can at least see it from where they are.
But I overestimated my (anti) social worker. When the words “I feel certain that Obama is a terrorist” came out of her mouth, my vision got fuzzy and my ears started to ring. The gurgling in my stomach that usually followed a night of heavy drinking and a large Taco Bell meal accompanied by an urge to get to a toilet that knows me started in me.
(As a matter of disclosure- I feel that it is pertinent that I should color in a bit of my political leanings. I have always been a liberal. My votes are almost always democratic, even when it is a vote that I have to hold my nose while making. I was fortunate enough to see Bill Clinton speak in California in 1992, and then Senator Barack Obama at a rally for soon to be Senator Sheldon Whitehouse in 2006. However, President Obama was not my first choice for the Democratic nomination in 2008, and I was attacked on many an occasion, by people who felt his nomination was mandatory for anyone who described himself as liberal, on many internet discussion groups whenever I even suggested that yes we can left out the important details of “how?” I would vote for a Republican if I believed him the best candidate for what I want to see happen in this country. I am just very well aware that my political worldview is always going to be best met by those representing the Democratic Party. My point being, I am by no means a cult of personality sycophant for Obama, or Clinton for that matter. But what she said?........)
I actually questioned whether I had heard her correctly. She confirmed it. I tried to walk her back from the extremist ledge she was jumping up and down on. I said things that would give her the opportunity to spin the ludicrous nature of her statement into something that would still me mistaken, but now absurd. Like “you mean you don’t like the way that he has tried to get his way by going around the congress like a bully?” But she wouldn’t budge. In fact, she doubled down. “I mean I think that he is intent on the total destruction of America in the same way that Osama Bin Laden was.
"Holy Shit! Are you Serious?? I thought I thought.
“You bet I am” she said. Ooops
She went on to tell me all of her reasons for her dislike of the President, most of which I have heard before on Fox, but she took them to such extremes that I think even Bill O’Reilly would have asked her to tone it down a notch and Glenn Beck would have asked her to up the dosage of whatever anti-psychotics she was supposed to be taking.
Here are some of her greatest hits….
· The president committed treason when negotiating with Terrorists for Bowe Bergdahl and giving away so many high ranking al queda leaders, (she couldn’t name one or specify how many were in the negotiated trade)
· ObamaCare is unconstitutional. (She could not tell me which portion of the constitution it violated, but ranted at me that the congress wouldn’t have passed it if he had sent it to them. I advised her that the congress did pass it in both chambers by Christmas Eve, 2009 to which she said that it was only because the lawmakers didn’t know what was in it. I sighed and said that it was introduced anywhere from two to three months earlier and that if they didn’t read it, why did they vote for it?) She just knows that it is now more expensive for her insurance and she “liked it better before”
· Benghazi!!!!! (I almost laughed at the way she said it.) Terrorists were going to hit that embassy and he knew it! So he deliberately left them defenseless! She couldn’t tell me where Benghazi was (she said Syria and I didn’t bother to correct her. Sometimes its better to leave them with a limp so others can recognize them easier.) but she was certain of her knowledge that the President knew every aspect of the happening.
I left after that as our time was up. In more ways than one. I drove home in a daze that stayed with me for the majority of the night. I finally understood how well I had insulated myself. I had seen the ‘Moran’ signs and the nimrods taking submachine guns to political rallies, and thought, well, that’s somewhere else, not near me. I have friends with leanings (both political and religious) different from my own, who are truly ‘conservative’ without being extremist and can understand that shouting at the rain only makes you wet, but this… this scared me. This is someone I had sought out for advice on the best ways to improve myself. How could I ever take counselling from someone who so clearly had her head up her ass and was so far detached from reality that the light from our world won’t hit hers for at least a thousand years? This woman was dangerous.
The next morning at breakfast, was when I finally shook out of funk. My son reminded me of what I used to tell him when he was first going to pre-school and someone would say something unpleasantly hurtful. "Remember, dad? I should just shrug my shoulders casually say 'You obviously dont know what you're talking about' and walk away shaking my head. It was cute when he was 4 doing this. I doubted it would be quite so charming from me in my mid 40s. But his smile and the fact that he remembered that lesson I taught him so long ago, pleased me. And made me feel better.
I am sorry for such a long diary on such a mundane subject, but I feel better having gotten it out.
And for those of you who are less fortunate than I and deal with people so obviously deluded on a much more frequent basis, I wish you nothing but strength.