To Be Righteous and Selfish

To Be Righteous and Selfish

Earlier today I was talking to my roommate, and he seemed like he was in a rough spot.  His cat was missing, his job was up in the air, and, most present, he was desperate for sleep.  I told him to get some rest, take care of himself; we’d talk later.  It was a funny sort of thing to say, considering the morning I’d had.  I was just coming home from seeing my own therapist, to whom I’d whined gloriously and had my expectations for what reality owed me properly reset.  My advice to my roommate, as is so often the case with advice, was the sort of thing that I needed to say to myself instead.  But it begs the question: how does a person take care of themself?

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What it Means to be Free

What it Means to be Free

When I was 13, I requested that my parents sign me up with a therapist.  Being 13, I probably actually said psychiatrist on account of not knowing any better, but my folks made a wise choice and found me someone who was more interested in talking than prescribing.  That being said, now that I work with that age group, I can see that this is not as rare a request for a teen to make as I had always assumed.  A lot of my clients are brought to me by baffled parents who don’t know quite why their kids want to talk to a professional.  And when I meet with those teens who ask for a therapist, the reason is often the same: angst...

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The Walking Cure

The Walking Cure

I remember taking a walk with a fairly new teenage client this winter, trudging aimlessly through the snow.  The walk had been his idea, and I’d had to convince him to wear shoes for it.  Once we got moving, conversation flowed in fits and spurts.  We would talk while we walked, then quiet down to take in some natural splendor, then listen to the crunch of the snow under our boots as we made our little track across the snowy field.  Properly bundled for the cold, it proved to be exceedingly pleasant to stretch our legs while we meandered through a conversation about fantasy novels, school bullies, and the thousand adult decisions required in the proper navigation of middle school life...

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How To Break Out of Jail

How To Break Out of Jail

As I sit here on president’s day, wondering what to do with myself now that my routine has been all disrupted, I can’t help but think of a previous client of mine.  This was when I was working with inmates, and this client, we’ll call him Jon, was very very much in jail.  He was locked up on extremely serious charges, most of which ended up being dropped, and had spent about a year in jail by the time we met each other.  We went on to work together for just over a year, and towards the end of our time together he was able to negotiate a deal that got him back into the community on probation with no felonies - this is the kind of plea-bargain windfall so rare it starts snitch rumors.  Yet, he chose to serve his probation time in jail...

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The Myth of Therapy

The Myth of Therapy

In honor of a dear old friend who visited me over the weekend, I’m choosing to write about something a little more esoteric than usual this week.  His visit reminded me of why and how I got on track to become a psychotherapist in the first place; he called to memory the philosophical grounds of the work I try to do in every session with my clients...

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