Mal de tête

Yesterday, I wrote someone a thank-you note for listening to me ramble and stutter and verbally fumble through a painfully stilted, forced conversation.

Oh, fine: it wasn't really a thank-you note. Rather, it was a check. For one hundred and fifty dollars. Which is, apparently, the going rate for two sessions of therapy.

Therapy. I confess that I cringe and squirm, just saying the word. At the risk of sounding judgmental, I admit that I feel ridiculous, weak and self-absorbed, submitting to therapy.

I thought it would be liberating. I hoped it would be helpful. I felt that my ability to cope, which had never been especially impressive to begin with, had completely imploded over the past few months, and that perhaps a professional could help me sort through the rubble and begin to rebuild, newer and stronger than before.

Is that a realistic goal? I don't know. From the innumerable psychotherapists in a fifteen-mile radius, have I made a wise choice with this one? I don't know. Does therapy actually help anyone, or is it simply a placebo, a sugar pill, a lollipop? I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.

I'm sure that time will answer these questions and more. But time: well, I'm never very confident that it's on my side.

"I sense that you're feeling a real sense of urgency," she said. YES, I wanted to shout. Yes! Please, just cut to the chase and tell me what to do. Can't we just skip past these little getting-to-know-you exercises, and get to the good stuff already?

Patience: clearly, a challenge for me.

And so, instead of dissecting the events of this past week, which featured a highly unusual 24-hour visit with my father, and then another one with my sister (ahem: my two most dysfunctional relationships), we primarily discussed my mother, and the things she did and said thirty years ago, most of which I only vaguely recall. Agony.

Three sessions, I've promised myself. I'll attend three sessions before I throw up my hands and call this a big fat failed exercise in futility. Two down; one to go.