A succesful case, a fresh wound and too much bla, bla, bla.
Wednesday, 10/07/09 - 9:41 pm.

I closed a case yesterday. She's the second succesful case. It was very rewarding hearing her speak about the process and about the results. It was a struggle to me, too. This is the patient that came to me a week after Joseph broke up with me.

I broke up with my boyfriend of four years, he was my first love and I thought we'd be together forever. I can't get over him. He has somebody else now, although he insists on keeping in touch with me, even after he kicked me out of his house. His new partner has a baby on the way and quite often I find myself fighting with him in my mind, and yet I dream of one day getting back together. I'm scared of running into him and everything reminds me of him. I called his mother to wish her a Happy Mother's Day, but in the end that proved to be a horrible mistake. I feel guilty, it's my fault that we broke up. I should have done many things differently.

So is it her or is it me talking? We went through the same thing. I kept it professional, and to be honest, it wasn't THAT hard. Not as hard as one might think, anyway. I was dealing with my own pain my way. All in all, I had better resources to deal with it: my personal background, my personality, my frame of mind, I didn't have dad issues, hers was ultimately an abusive, violent relationship...But still, I learned so much with her. Professionally and personally. Thanks to her, I found other ways to cope. As I was teaching her (because part of my approach is about educating or reeducating the patient), I was learning.

I got better before she did, for the reasons stated above and others. But just tonight it ocurred to me that Joseph is still a fresh wound. Seriously. He comes to my mind from time to time, and it always feels fresh. I'm pretty much over him (not 100%, never 100%) and I've come to terms with losing him and the circumstances around the loss. But still hurts. I still step on that zone and I start to sink. I look at myself and feel proud for getting over him...but then I say, then imagine how over you he is; given he's busy raising a family, on top of falling out of love with me. And so my heart cracks. Again.

Anyway. I wish my patient a happy life. She now knows how to build one.

Last night I went out with CR. On monday HE called me to invite me to some place. It felt nice, just the day before I'd been complaining that nobody ever calls me. So we met and he invited another guy: an accomplished musician, a doctor, not yet in his 30s. He seemed a little nerdy, and dressed like one. But I suspect, and CR told me so, that he's a genius.

I feel sorry, though, because CR and I engaged in a discussion. It started with me talking about the psychoanalysis/psychodynamic approach and its story, from Freud to the mothers of the dissapeared in Argentina. CR is a good guy, but as highly as he thinks of his own opinions, he's just traditionally close-minded, and on top of that, his speech tends to be so confusing and all over the place that you miss the point quickly. And he goes on and on and on and on. He reminds me of another patient, actually, the one that sucks me in in his internal dialogue. They're not doing it to spite you, they just can't get their thoughts together.

CR says quite some things that...I don't know. Like, remembering martyrs from the war is necrophilia? You mean, people that follow the tradition of visiting the graves of the murdered do so because they are sexually attracted to their corpses? I put my arguments over the table -just now I'm thinking of new ones- and I think I got my point across, slightly, having to restrain myself at times when he said something absurd. I don't hold the Universal Truth either, but frankly, I'm more informed on these topics than he is.

So I'm afraid we got this guy bored for a while, although I'd also like to think that he was interested. I don't think the guy disliked me, I'm just sorry we didn't stick to lighter subjects, if anything, to be polite. I thought about changing subject, but CR and I were very deep in his shit. Anyway, after saying goodbye, he asked "this is your car?". He'd parked next to me but I didn't get what was up. I noticed he was looking at the skeleton hanging from my rear-view mirror and I looked at his own rear-view mirror. He had the exact same skeleton. It was funny.

I'm looking forward to friday. I'll ask for half the day off at work, I'll attend the Psychology Festival at my university, maybe I'll go see Mr PhD about a teaching position (I'll call tomorrow to make an appointment), and afterwards I'll attend Joe's jazz concert.

The end. I need to sleep.

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