“They're being stuck up about it.”
thirteen-year-old Linda said in the beginning of her first
group-therapy session.
The five people around her sighed, the
therapist included. Her, the therapist's eyebrows wrinkled a little
and then she said: “It's not wise to always be accusing them. Even
so I can understand that they sort of were stuck up with you all, or
at least most of, the time.”
One of the two boys who were in the
group looked at Linda and asked: “Why try to be different from
everybody else? You know we all had that kind of abuse against us.
And we've all been manipulated into finding ourselves comfortable
with pretending to be something we aren't.”
“I don't,” the other boy said,
“find it to be that what I did was to find myself very comfortable
with that!”
One of the girls broke in: “I don't
like that you're saying they didn't find it in you to seem to be part
of their club for socializing the way they have it young boys should,
because you told me you had to fancy yourself as a man already, and
thereby pretend to be as tough as they!”
“Exactly!” the other boy said. “I
also know that you pretended to be satisfied with it! Besides, it
seems you didn't pretend to be blackmailed into seeming to be!
Thereby think it's impossible
for them tho have you pretend that well without making you feel
comfortable with it!”
“But,”
the boy defended himself, “I couldn't escape that they would be
bullying me! I mean, although there wasn't quite any blackmail about
it!”
“That's
right,” the therapist broke in. “I recommend that it's not to be
seen as if we were an group only for those who pretended to be happy
in a way that actually fooled them into faking their happiness to be
real, or so.”
The
boy who had spoken first cleared his throat. “But I am a guy who
never found myself to be happy without pretending to be happy in the
first place!”
“I
can't find it in you to be happy on the surface right now, though.
... So what do you actually mean by you insinuation that I aught to
treat them as if they were in a group for pretend happy people?!”
“I
can't help being facially happy when you tell me I'm not happy!
Because I am facially happy right now, in the sense that I'm not even
remotely as happy as I seem to be right now!”
She
sighed. “I can't pretend that you aught to be pretending in my
group, that you're actually fairly happy about the situation even if
there are feelings in you of complete unhappiness! Thereby I
recommend you to tell me about those unhappy feelings you say you
have!”
“I
feel unhappy that she isn't coming here to find our group to be for
real about the problems of manipulation! I also feel disappointed at
that Eric pretended to be someone who didn't have to be into faking
himself into comfort as if happy about unhappiness!”
Linda
looked at him, and then at her therapist. She felt as if she (the
therapist) didn't realize that the boy she spoke to was just being
obnoxious. In a sense she felt the therapist had no point in actually
being the one to say there was any half a point even in letting that
boy speak out for himself. She thereby seemed unhappy to the people
around her, and the therapist looked at her and asked:
“Why
do you keep on writhing as if we were trying to manipulate you right
now? You know we're a group for trying not to be manipulative!”
“I
find it in me not to pretend that I am not trying to be happy, only
I'm not trying to be happy in the way that actually makes me
comfortable!”
“What
do you mean by that?” The therapist looked a bit interested in
Linda's mimicry about her situation.
“What
are you staring at?!” Linda burst our.
“Oh,
I was just looking at the way your facial expressions changed during
our conversation! It's just an interest I have in feeling comfortable
about each other here in this precarious locality for having therapy
against your notions of not being for real!”
The
girl who hadn't yet spoken before broke in: “Why do you feel that
it's therapy to say that they are for real, those people we can't
trust, when we feel ourselves that those people try to facilitate our
interpretations of them as so real that they aren't ever to be
handled as if questionable?!”
Linda
said silently to herself that she too felt that way about it, but
that she hadn't dared to speak that way about those people in charge
here. So instead she looked at the therapist now and added: “How
come we never get to view ourselves as the kinds of persons who don't
very easily find ourselves not to be a nuisance?! I mean I don't have
an argument in my mother for actually trusting her! That is she is
always the bitch about it! She always pretends I'm the imbecile in
her company, and then when I'm being that she scorns me into feeling
inferior so that I become even worse an imbecile for her and
everybody else!”
“I
can't see you as the kind of girl who doesn't fit in with having me
in therapy. I can't see in any of you not to feel inferior because of
those who insinuated about you that you are imbecile or something
seemingly the same as that. Because I can't see it in you to be
imbecile enough to actually pretend that you are secure with those
acquaintances - including family - that you present for me as
though you didn't care for actually being their friends or family,
nor even acquaintances.
“What,
then,” the boy who spoke first asked, “do you mean by pretending
we're all family with each other around here!? I mean we're no family
with each other! On the contrary she and I are very unalike!” He
indicated Linda when saying the last sentence.
“Oh,
Golly!” the girl who spoke first broke out. “Why do they feel
that they are so stuck up, those parents!? I mean I have in my own
two parents not to ever fake that they're unhappy about me and my
so-called imbecile attitudes! Instead it's they - and they're
virtually the only ones for that - who cared indiscriminately to
say to me that I was an okay person and an okay soul to for that
matter! So why do you complain about your parents!? I feel my parents
are really good enough and they should be into pretending as if
something about their own, so that they could be good enough as
well!”
The
second boy looked grimly at her. “We all have our own parents to
talk about! They're not a bit like your own!”
“Then
how come,” the girl asked, “do you never comment me about them
when I tell you how nice it is that they still keep on caring?!”
“It's
because,” the boy answered, “we have nothing to say about those
parents who are just completely different! We have nothing to say
about you, because you don't seem to be the same as the rest of us!
Our problems are with parents; yours are that you're a stuck up
little rascal who has parents that tell her she's an alright kid,
although she isn't!”
Linda
looked at the two of them. Now she found in herself to fit in,
although she felt awkward about being fitting in just for being
miserable enough for it. Then he looked at the therapist, who looked
a bit troubled.
“How
come,” the therapist asked, “do you feel that it's so important
that she is different?”
“It's
because,” he answered, “we don't have anything to say to each
other! I mean how come she's here after just being that stuck up
person whom nobody likes - except for her own folks!?”
“I
suppose there isn't any need for therapy for her according to you,
then? But I, I feel she needs therapy, just like you! And thereby she
needs also to be treated with respect just like the rest of you all!”
The
second girl said: “I guess we should all go home then and talk to
our freaking parents about this session, which wasn't at all very
rewarding, but which after all taught us to reward our parents for
not being as stuck up as they, those who pester us for all they're
worth, as it seems!”
The
therapist looked at her watch and stated: “Yes, I believe there's
need for doing something of that kind for perhaps all of you. But
before you rush into anything, let me just tell you that it's not
demanded from me that you tell your parents about anything. But
neither do I recommend that you don't. Because I feel that if you do
- to the extent you do it - you will very likely be able to find
out from them, at least something about who might have to be seen as
stuck up according to them. Thereby I recommend for you all to try to
be into thinking about them as something of wiser than you are, and
thereby, perhaps, you can get yourselves to talk to them, and thereby
get to know yourselves from them. But, as I said, you should not feel
that you really should have to do that. What I mean is that if you
can, you really aught to try that!”
Upon
that she ended the session by rising from her seat and going to the
door, standing at which she said: “I fully understand that some of
you feel uncomfortable in this group as well as with for example your
parents. If so - or something similar to it - then you should try
to feel comfortable with at least relating your problems with
someone, perhaps not me, who thereby can be your parent about it! If
not, then I am ready to be your parent, and then perhaps you can feel
as well that I am the one to find it in to take interest in your
problems.
“As
for you, Linda, your problem with your grandma and mother both being
stuck up, please turn to anyone else about it! I don't feel that you,
yet, aught to speak to either of those two directly about it! And for
you others, all of whom are already in therapy since at least six
months, you should be speaking to either your parents,or to me, or to
anyone. But don't speak to your parents if they don't agree with that
you should consider them haughty - or stuck up, that is. Just speak
to them to the extent they actually feel bad about themselves for
being stuck up, or, as with Lisa, that they are not even part of that
problem for you!
“Even
if there perhaps are tendencies of facial happiness seeming to be
everything there is of trust from your friends or so, even if so, you
should try to speak to me, your parents - or at least someone!”
Not
until now did she open the door. Linda stood and waited until all
others - but the therapist - had left. Then she walked slowly
towards the door, and whispered said to the therapist: “I don't
have anyone to talk to! But I feel not even that I want to talk to
you about my problems! So how can I abide by the assignment without
you - or all others I might talk to - feeling that I am not to be
seen as anyone but an idiot who doesn't seem to fit in with anyone
but those who despise me?”
“I
feel you are not to be despised! Now how come you are so scared of me
or anyone else relating to your side of the story you have to tell?
To tell me is, I can assure you, not a very dangerous thing! To tell
your parents, or your grandmother or so, can be that, but for me it's
not very interesting to have them know what we say to each other. So
why don't you tell me, and then I'll drive you home, but not until
you've told me all will I have to take you to those parents you are
so afraid of!”
With
that they talked for about half an hour. But Linda didn't really say
much about how to relate to her mother (or the father whom she hardly
knew). Instead she fussed about her mother not trying even to feel
empathetic, which the therapist tried to sympathise with. But in the
end she just felt confident that she had in Linda a patient who would
never be well and whom she thereby didn't have to care about.
She
drove her home and followed her up to her mother apartment. When
saying hello to the mother of Linda, she felt that she could not
believe Linda to be an imbecile. But even so she felt tempted to
actually scold her as such. But for the better of things, she
thought, the mother seemed to be into saying to herself that she
didn't have to be into finding this therapist to be very bad even if
the therapy failed.
