All Therapists are the Grinch (or at least, I am)

Tags: Therapy, Loss, Meaninglessness, Identity, Vulnerability, Loneliness, Doubt, Mental Health

Christmas Eve is here, and it’s that time of the year that sets off all kinds of contemplation that we are adept at otherwise avoiding.

I’ve become rather good at ignoring arbitrary markers of time as goal posts, but somehow, after holding it all together all year round, I too seem to be unraveling right now. 

What feels rather ironic is the cause for the spiral. That would be Secret Santa. You know, that fun, happy event where you get gifts from a secret someone leading all the way up to Christmas. Most people I know have been unwrapping presents received from Secret Santas. The only difference between the Grinch and I is that I’m living vicariously, while overcome by a wave of emotion that I’ve been hiding from all year. 

As a private practitioner, you’re working with clients in therapy by holding space for them to hold, nurture and express their emotions, their fears, their hopes and worries, the moments of joy and comfort that they create and hoard. You’re with them through this, and that’s where this role ends. Each session, I cherish and return the experiences that they’ve chosen to share with me and root for them. The most meaningful conversations that I’ve been a part of this year may have personal significance for those I’ve had them with, but I have no claim over those. And this time of the year, seeing people celebrate their shared connections, is making me resentful for having nothing to claim from all that meaning. Along with that is that tidal wave of loneliness. 

The loneliness in therapy is the fact that it is work. When clients say: ‘I don’t think anybody likes their job, except maybe you’, I feel, yes, I do like my job, because it’s meaningful. Is it enjoyable? I don’t know. Does it have personal meaning to me, or is that also borrowed? These aren’t questions I’d necessarily seen as separate from each other. When someone I’d been working with for a while said that they were worried they’d have to switch therapists, I felt blindsided, because I was hit with a sense of loss, which reminded me that I’m also human, and need to speak to my own therapist. It also brought to mind the imagery of being a stepping stone: that somehow, that might be all my role is.

Right about now, I feel like screaming into the void, and protectively cling on to all the meaningful conversations that added meaning to my life. Conversations that started because people were brave enough to express their doubt and were willing to sit with uncertainty. Now, there are more people willing to open up and have conversations, more support spaces to access, and yet, it might always be transactional. The only difference is, they can carry their meaning, and feel seen and heard, while I’ll hand it over to them, and pat myself on the back for having been a good therapist. The problem here is that being a therapist means working with emotions – the client’s and my own, and there are times when I’m questioning my competence as a therapist as well as my worth as a person, because all the work involves a significant aspect of my personhood too! 

I recently felt seen in a session, and I panicked. It’s bizarre how exposed I felt, and was overwhelmed by the urge to retreat and hold space for them, not me. To bypass any conversation that might feature me and say: ‘How does that make YOU feel?’ After all, I’m supposed to do the validating, right? How can that possibly accommodate me? Each time the urge to cite ethics or guidelines pops up, I’m becoming aware that I’m rejecting some part of human connection in me or the other person, because it’s shifting back to an impersonal hierarchical dynamic that was made by old, white men a few decades ago. 

So, there won’t be Secret Santas. There won’t be presents to guess the sender of, not naturally built into the system of work. To do that, I’ll have to put in the tiniest bit of extra effort, and right now, I don’t have it in me to do that. Because adults suck at making friends and opening up, except when they’ve been holding it all together all the time and finally let go. There is no more hiding from this loneliness, or the void. Because work is meaningful, but borrowed, and life isn’t work. And somehow, in urging people to question their wellbeing aside from work, I seem to have sidestepped the same for myself. 

Putting this out there feels like I’m a skinned grape, with the essence threatening to explode any second. Without realising, this year was all about exploration, and trying to make private practice work. Surprise, it did! I absolutely love what I do, and would not rather do anything else, but this is the closest I’ve come to walking away from it – the feeling that there’s no ownership over this, which leads to: What is mine, then? In all that doing, where was the time to just be? And now, that I’m just being, what’s here with me? And how do I make this stop? 

*Deep breaths* 

Alright. Time to stop. Hi there, loneliness. I’m done running now.