Revolving Mirrors: Anger. Men. & Sex.

Chapter One: Old Therapist New Issue

"Good Morning Ms. Blackwood."

"Please, call me by my first name."

"My apologies. Good Morning, Tatum. How are you doing today? What brings you in this morning? When I saw your name on the schedule, I said to myself it has been such a long time since you've been in the office. Come on in and have a seat. Everything must be going quite well for you?"

"Yes."

That's fantastic! I'm so happy to hear that!"

"And no."

"That's typical for most people. Some good aspects and some challenging aspects."

"That's one way of looking at it, but I wouldn't exactly call them challenges."

"What would you prefer to call them?"

"Can I speak candidly?"

"Sure, that's what therapy is all about; speaking openly and candidly about your feelings. I know it's been a long time since we've spoken."

"Yes. It's been 12 years to be exact."

"Has it been 12 years already?  Let me think, yes, it has been 12 years since your mother passed. That was the last time we had a session. I think we ended our talks 10 or so months after her passing away. You were very candid in those conversations. Especially about your deep inner feelings of not wanting to..umhm...

"It's okay to say it."

"....live. I didn't want to bring up a sore subject before you were ready to talk about it, but if you are ready, let's dive right in and please be as candid as you would like."

"I'm okay with the whole being alive thing, for the moment. I'm more so in a tough place with what you called challenges."

"You don't have to refer to them as challenges. Call them whatever you want."

"In that case, I would like to call the "challenges" I've experienced a load of shit."

"Ok, we can definitely refer to the challenges as a load of shit, if that helps. I see nothing wrong with that. Do you have a particular person, time, or event you would like to start with?"

"Yeah. I do. Then again, maybe-- I don't. It's years' worth of stuff I need to express. It's hard to pinpoint exactly where I want to begin. There have been several events that have brought me here, to your office. It's a lot that has gotten me to this place, in my life. It's a lot going on in my head."

"Let's take a moment so you can think and process. Then we can begin with either the yes or the no? Or, we start with you telling me what prompted you to call."

"I guess, if I had to jump right in, I'm having an extremely difficult time in my life. EVERYTHING seems to be off."

"Tell me what you mean by off."

"It's just everything seems to be spiraling completely out of control. Love, money, spirituality, men, my career, EV-E-RY-THING. I've been annoyingly indecisive at home and work. I'm afraid I'm at a point of total shut down physically, emotionally, and mentally. The mental has become my biggest obstacle."

"Umhm. I see. That does sound like everything. Can we make it a bit more focused? Let's begin by picking three topics. Perhaps you may want to start where we left off years ago. I remember the last time you came we really only dealt with the grief you were experiencing from your mother passing away. Do you want to begin there?"

"No. I've made peace with my mother's death... I think. Sometimes I still feel a bit of uneasiness when I have old memories come up. However, she isn't what I want the focus of our session to be. I would like to talk about all this chaos I got going on inside of me."