I honestly love you

Who’s seen Stutz on Netflix? I need you to see it, and talk about it with me. I do not know what to think. I have many questions. Like: Are other people telling their therapists that they love them? Are we doing this now? Who decided it was okay? And: Can you really get your therapist’s life story from them? I thought they kept that to themselves? Am I being a jerk by not asking my therapist more about his life? I know this that the Stutz/Jonah Hill relationship is an unusual one, and Stutz (I’ve already forgotten his first name) isn’t a typical therapist (what therapist agrees to let his patient make a movie about him?). But boy, do Jonah Hill and his therapist tell each other they love each other a lot. It made me wonder if I’m doing therapy right. It’s impossible to know! When I ask my therapist he just says things like, “Hmm, I wonder why you feel you need to do therapy ‘right’.” Infuriating.

I had a therapist a while back who was also seeing a friend of mine, and this friend LOVED the therapist and talked all the time about how much they laughed together, how she was like her BEST FRIEND. And this very same therapist seemed to … dislike me? As if that’s possible? I’m charming. But I would try to joke with her and she would sort of wince, and comment on how I was avoiding the topic with humor. I couldn’t even get a chuckle out of her.

Anyway my current therapist laughs at my jokes. (Take that, old therapist.) But I don’t see us exchanging “I love you”s any time soon. I would, however, like him to make drawings for me on index cards. (That’s a Stutz thing. You need to see Stutz! It’s actually a sweet movie, if I think a little bananas. See it and talk about it with me.)

SPEAKING OF MY EMOTIONAL STATE

So this is interesting, at least to me, and I’m the one writing this: In the past, whenever life got tough it used to affect my sleep, such that I did not do it. Sleep, that is. But now my body has flipped the script and when I get emotionally overwhelmed, I cannot stay awake. I am not complaining, mind you; this is hugely preferable to sleepless nights and going insaner by the day. It can feel a little rude to other people, however. The other night we were having an intense family discussion and I could feel myself going beddy-bye even as feelings were being shared and things were, as they say, getting real. I was like, I can still feel these feelings in a lying down position, right? I can still listen with my eyes closed? Maybe if I shuffle into the next room and shuffle back out here with my jammy jams on, no one will mind? And what’s become of my stocking cap?

^^ me, having an emotional crisis

My psychiatrist recommended I pull out the ol’ SAD lamp and, you know, actually use it, since I told him that I want to sleep all the time (maybe I’m sleeping now?), but I have to admit, I’m loath to give up this constant need for a snoozle. It helps that I don’t have a “real” “job” and I can make my own hours, i.e. I can schedule in nap time(s) when life is too much. Now I’m definitely bragging. I’m sorry.

AND FINALLY

Working with clients, I can see that everyone has the same problem: No one believes in their work. Oh, except for me: I believe in their work. So much. I try to reassure them that their feelings are totally normal, but I can tell they’re not buying it. “Except in my case it’s true,” they’re thinking. “I really do suck. She’s just too nice to tell me the truth.” They fail to realize that I’m not that nice! I’ve done too good a job of fooling them!

This is all to say, if you have an idea, even a spark of something you’re noodling on, I feel even more strongly than before that you’d be foolish to dismiss it. I think there’s a reason that idea found you, and it’s already infuriating me that you’re ignoring it. Sorry, but also how dare you. Honestly, I would have thought I’d go the other way — that the more I worked with people, the more I’d see that certain ideas were non-starters, that maybe not everyone has something. But nope. So far, at least, every goddamn person who comes to me with their project, I think, “YES, that has to get out into the world, and this is the person to do it.” Every little bit of work they hand in, I cheer. Every time. And it kills me to see how much people torment themselves with thinking they’re not good enough. So cut it out! Thank you.