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Finding Ms. Analyst was not a terrifically tough process. Finding out who she really is - that's been another matter.
I first made my decision to go into psychotherapy almost three years ago exactly. There were a few things I wanted to manage a little better - OK, a LOT better - so I could wind up a more productive husband, Daddy and provider. Mix in two research psychologists for grandparents, plus my uncle Jim standing as a successful forensic psychiatrist, and therapy seemed like a natural move for getting things right. As opposed to a court-ordered last resort.
My next-door neighbor LCSW has a healthy practice, so I asked her to make a recommendation. To prevent any crosstalk, she suggested a colleague of a colleague - someone once removed who I wouldn't bump into at a birthday party.
Three referrals came up, and eventually Ms. Analyst emerged as the winner. She took my insurance. Her office location was relatively convenient. She had a time that fit for me. After our first session, I thought I could work with her. Approximately 279 sessions later, I still think we're a well-matched analytic dyad.
A couple of months into our work, however, a nagging issue arose that has yet to be resolved: Ms. Analyst was learning everything about me, but what did I know about her?
This started to nag at me. Who was this skilled person who knew the traumas and triumphs of my past? My deepest doubts? My fears and fantasies? The more she understood me, the more this imbalance became an issue. Her discipline when it came to self-disclosure - and strict lack of same -- only made things more disorienting for me.
As interested as she always was in the psychological source of my wondering, Ms. Analyst was equally elusive about answering my questions regarding what made her tick. Queries that usually get answered inside of five minutes at a cocktail party simmered in her zone of optimal frustration for weeks...months...years on end.
Sometimes the mystery was a big issue for me, sometimes not. The intensity of my curiosity never took me to private investigator-land. Nothing like that.
But I would let the Internet take me as far as it could go.
Early on, my Google searches bore simple but incredibly rich fruit. I learned from Ms. Analyst's Web page that she was not only into classic Freud, but also the orientation known as self psychology - an academic niche I had never heard of. From there I learned about how cool Heinz Kohut was, and this humanistic approach to psychology that I'm now happy to study for life. I checked out the curriculum of the graduate school where she got her MSW, gleaning 1,001 ideas for articles to read, books to buy, concepts to explore. I cultivated a common language for us along the way, and I often revel in the shortcuts that have resulted.
But the relative dearth of info on Ms. Analyst has also served as a non-stop source of aggravation for me. On off-days when I long for the empathic environment, the same six Google entries stare back at me: static, unchanging, tauntingly distant.
The new finds, when they do arise now, usually don't seem to help. In fact, they can hurt even more. They typically signify her progress on an academic paper she's authored that I can't find, a professional panel that's closed to the outside world, a workshop I could technically drop in on -- but we eventually conclude may be chancy for me to attend.
Even if it's at an event that's open to the public, I grudgingly agree that an encounter outside our secure psychoanalytic pod would be fraught with unpredictability. I might get the additional information I crave on this powerful figure in my life, but it could come unaccompanied by sufficient context.
My mind could get blown out there. And not in a good way.
In our delicately balanced world Ms. Analyst and I delve for cosmic truths, but we've also seen how a new doorknob has the power to throw things askew in the room. "Even if you ‘survive' my workshop," Ms Analyst pointed out during the latest controversy, when I debated attending her next class at her institute, "you yourself have said the experience has potential to endanger our work. It may not be worth the risk."
While we have an often fierce disconnect over my quest to understand her, and what that means about my life, I had to agree with her once again. Ultimately, I'd rather learn about myself inside our safe and sound boundary lines, no matter how frustrating that gets sometime. Our finely-tuned dyad is worth it. I'm worth it.
How much do you know about your therapist? How much do you need to know? And how much do you need to know about that? True understanding is a two-way street, but in analysis, it can be tough to read the road map. - Mr. Analysand
