Author Archives: jwlef1

Rocks and Doves

Posted on January 14, 2015 | Leave a comment

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I remember the summer before I started Graduate School was fairly intense. We were married about one year and money was very tight. I had been teaching in a Catholic high school for three years and this was not going to be a long term career choice. I think I finished there making about $6500.00 per year. My wife was making between 8-10,000.00 and having a family was really not going to be possible with our limited resources.We both agreed graduate school would open more doors. I was accepted into George Williams School of Social Work and would start in the fall. After my high school class finished I was able to get a summer job as a security guard thru one of our friends. I was probably the worst possible choice for this. This was during my post hippie peace and love days. One of the jobs required us to wear a gun. On our rounds. I would carefully remove all the bullets before my round. Thankfully I never had any problems. The one good thing about the job (besides the pay) was it gave me time to read. George Williams had recommended a number of books to read before starting class. I just remember Freud’s Interpretation of Dreams and General-Introduction to Psychoanalysis. I would read and study these books and pictured myself in the analyst mode.

The first week of school I was given a field placement at Hines VA Alcoholism Treatment Center. At that time the VA was vast—almost a totally separate city. I found out that there were people who literally would go from VA facility to VA facility depending on the season. They would have a summer VA and a winter VA. This was happening right after the Viet Nam war ended. Vets from that and from WW2 and Korea were the patients.

So I started in all my new found Freudian grandeur. My first patient was an African American guy in his forties. He had been thru a number of programs without any real success- by our standards. By his he had found a way to survive. Our first few meetings consisted of me sitting in an old desk chair and asking him questions. I would sit in this chair and ask a question and rock back in the chair while I waited for him to answer. The chair was quite old and the floor it was on was old linoleum tile. One day I rocked back, the chair slipped and I ended up flat on the floor with the wind knocked out of me. My “patient” was standing over me inquiring about my welfare. I don’t remember much else about him or the course of his treatment. What I do remember is that it was the start for me of not taking myself too seriously

I think it is important to have a theoretical framework, but that framework should never come between meeting a person where they really are. In the beginning we all think we have to have theories and techniques. In the end we realize that the most important therapeutic instrument we have is ourselves.

There is an old story about Picasso walking along the beach with a reporter. The reporter asks him where he gets the ideas for his creations. Picasso picks up a rock and asks the reporter what he sees. The reporter says “A rock” . Picasso says “I see a dove” . The reporter is confused and asks where is the dove. Picasso says “I just take this rock and carve away everything until the dove appears”.

I am still chipping away at my rock. Sometimes the dove is very clear and sometimes not so much—I just have to keep chipping.

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Posted in Family Story, Uncategorized

Long Time Between

Posted on January 12, 2015 | Leave a comment

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So I haven’t written for a while .—at least since April of 2013. Now I feel the need to start again. I have been retired for almost two years. We’ve traveled to Ireland, Scotland, Great Britain and Wales. We recently came back from a month in France and it was all great.

However I need more structure and perhaps this will help. I have often had the fantasy of being able to write. I know the only way to become a good writer is to write regularly. So maybe I can push myself. We’ll see

This retirement thing is still strange. I really don’t want to work again. That time is done. I don’t think I could see 35-40 patients a week. The farther I am from it, the more I see how I literally was swallowed up. I went back to visit two or three times. People said it seemed like I had been gone longer than 2 years. When I questioned them they were surprised at how long they had been working at the clinic .

I think the routine of seeing large numbers of patients for therapy begins to distort time. You do pay a price in your personal life. Thankfully I have been able to reconnect. I really thank my wife for that.

One of my friends and his wife had a long relationship with a therapist. After she retired they continued the relationship as ‘friends’. This lasted until one time they disagreed with some of her “advice’. She then insulted them and basically discounted all the work they had done. I told him there are a lot of messed up therapists. A lot of time we go into the field to help work on our own issues. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. Too often we can get the impression that we are “always right” about other peoples lives—that, in fact, our advice is infallible. I think it comes from seeing too many people who don’t confront us about what we say and do.

I remember coming home one day when I was in graduate school. I think I was in counseling 101 or some other starter class. My wife had had a bad day at work and I tried to use some Rogerian techniques on her. She told me quite clearly to “leave that shit at work—I am not a patient, I’m your wife!!” I have never forgotten that. It s important to have people in your life that keep you grounded and I am grateful to those that were there for me

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Posted in Meandering

RETIRE???

Posted on May 7, 2013 | Leave a comment

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So here I am in week five . First off it was William Buckley that had the quote I am living by and not old Harry Stack. I still believe “Industry is the Enemy of Melancholy”. I just have to not get too crazy about it. Our breakfast club is still meeting weekly. It’s nice just to kick back and talk. My wife is still working and around 1 or 2 in the afternoon I run out of things to do. When she’s home she will always think of something – and sometimes that’s great and sometimes it isn’t. I cant wait until she  is around more tho.

Our trip to the British Isles and the “Auld Sod” is rapidly approaching and I am looking forward to that. I’ve been to Canada twice and Mexico once so this should be an adventure. We are renting a car for part of this and that is daunting but doable .

I am getting over the therapist part. I don’t think of patients much any more (except one). I wish I could help her but if I make any contact I think it will just make it worse by not letting her establish with her new counselor.

I remember one of the staff at the family institute saying that we are great at connecting and helping, but the good bye part is still a really difficult thing to do. He said then that he was not sure he had ever heard of anyone doing it well. He would tell a story about his children at a birthday party. They would always cry when it was time to leave. He tried to change that , instead of the kids saying good bye, they would all wave “Hello” while waking backwards . I don’t think it would have been possible for me. I would have been followed.

Maybe the ‘amputation’ is still the best way . It still bothers me tho

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Posted in Meandering, Uncategorized

First

Posted on April 26, 2013 | Leave a comment

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So this is retirement.  I’m all of three weeks into it.. I wake up each day thinking I have to do something and then realize I really dont. I keep hearing the words I would tell my patients. Harry Stack Sullivan’s quote “Industry is the Enemy of Melancholy” keeps flashing thru my mind. I do try and stay busy. I have been exercising and that does help and does give me some structure. I don’t want to get like some of the guys I saw who told me there is no difference between Monday and Thursday. There is. Not everyday is the same

I keep questioning myself and wonder if I should have stayed longer. I feel guilty about some patients who think I abandoned them. I really tried not to, but after I left I couldn’t keep in contact. I have no clinic to back me up and at this time I don’t want to do private practice. I need to step back from therapy.  Then I tell myself that I deserve to do more than just see 11 or 12 patients a day and listen to their stories. What about my story?  I am still thinking about it. What should I do?? Buy a motorcycle and go touring? I always dreamed of that, but I suffer from a lifelong lack of coordination and tendency to daydream—so motorcycles are really not a good idea.

What about professional wrestling? I could wear a mask and get a trick name. “El Thumpo”? Nah, probably ‘el jerko”.

My wife and kids are kind of worried about me. They keep asking how I am and what I am doing. My one son wants me to take some cooking classes. I do like to cook and BBQ. Maybe.  My other son thinks I should take up golf. I just cant get into it. I keep picturing the old guys that would play golf when I was in HS and worked at a course. Maybe occasionally would be OK , but not all the time. Golf can swallow you.

My wife and I are going to do some traveling and maybe that will help. Maybe I will get over my fear of flying or maybe I will develop my own new course of therapy for anxiety.

I keep remembering the one guy I saw years ago who told me you don’t retire from something, you retire to something. That is probably true , but I still think I needed to step back.

The thing about being a therapist is that you have to care. No matter how much experience you have, or how good you are at setting boundaries, you still have to care. I heard Salvador Minuchin say at a conference one time  “If you are not dependent, get out of the field!”.  Sometimes the problem with caring is you get swallowed up into other people’s lives. So at this time I am going to keep trying to write my own new story or maybe just keep trying to develop one I put on hold. We’ll see– and maybe I will occasionally write something about how it’s going

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Posted in Uncategorized