Speaker 1: Hey, fellow travelers. I'm Lari Gottlieb. I'm the author of
Speaker 1: Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, and I write the
Speaker 1: Dear Therapist's Advice column for The Atlantic.
Speaker 2: And I'm Guy Wench. I'm the author of Emotional First Aid,
Speaker 2: and I write the Dear Guy Advice column for TED.
Speaker 2: And this is Dear Therapists.
Speaker 1: Each week we invite you into a session so you
Speaker 1: can learn more about yourself by hearing how we help
Speaker 1: other people come to understand themselves better and make changes
Speaker 1: in their lives.
Speaker 2: So sit back and welcome to today's session.
Speaker 1: First, a quick note, Dear Therapist is for informational purposes only.
Speaker 1: It does not constitute medical or psychological advice and is
Speaker 1: not a substitute for professional healthcare advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Speaker 1: Always seek the advice of your physician, mental health professional,
Speaker 1: or other qualified health provider with any questions you may
Speaker 1: have regarding a medical or psychological condition. By submitting a letter,
Speaker 1: you are agreeing to let iHeartMedia use it in part
Speaker 1: or in full, and we may edit it for length
Speaker 1: and clarity. In the sessions you'll hear. All names have
Speaker 1: been changed for the privacy of our fellow travelers.
Speaker 2: Hey Guy, Hey Laurie. So today we're going to do
Speaker 2: something a little bit different.
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 1: Recently we did a live event where we got to
Speaker 1: share how we do these your therapist sessions every week
Speaker 1: and what we're really thinking when we're trying to help
Speaker 1: all of you through the issues that you bring us.
Speaker 2: We also dipped into our mailbox and gave advice to
Speaker 2: some letters you sent us. So this week here's a
Speaker 2: treat Deotherapists Live. You're listening to Deotherapists from iHeartRadio. We'll
Speaker 2: be back after a quick break.
Speaker 3: I'm Lori Gottlieb and I'm.
Speaker 2: Guy Wench, and this is Deotherapists.
Speaker 4: My name is Janet Gattis. I am the owner and
Speaker 4: founder of Avid Bookshop here in Athens, Georgia. Welcome, good evening,
Speaker 4: and welcome to our very special event with Guy Wench
Speaker 4: and Laurie Gottlieb from the podcast Dear Therapists. Both of
Speaker 4: these people are stellar therapists, hosts of their own podcast,
Speaker 4: and have written multiple books.
Speaker 3: First off, I.
Speaker 4: Am so excited that the new season of Dear Therapists
Speaker 4: just launched. As of yesterday, already heard the episode twice
Speaker 4: and as with every other episode of the show that
Speaker 4: I've heard. I'm really curious to know sort of the
Speaker 4: background of how you to process the number of letters
Speaker 4: you get, how many letters you get, and how you
Speaker 4: choose ultimately what gets on the show. Would you guys
Speaker 4: answer that for us?
Speaker 1: Well, first of all, just thank you for doing this
Speaker 1: and having us. We were so excited to have this conversation,
Speaker 1: especially launch week. We get so many letters, and going
Speaker 1: into season two, one of the things we've always said
Speaker 1: is what made season one so great, or the quality
Speaker 1: of the letters that we got from people all over
Speaker 1: the world. We wish we could do all of them.
Speaker 1: It would be great. We would just have a million episodes,
Speaker 1: But we really pick letters that we feel have some
Speaker 1: universal quality to them. So while each letter is very
Speaker 1: specific to a situation, like in the first episode it
Speaker 1: was about Instagram cheating, it really was about so many
Speaker 1: other things and I think you'll find that in every
Speaker 1: single episode. The one thing that's interesting about it is
Speaker 1: that we don't actually discuss the letters. So even though
Speaker 1: we will choose letters, we don't actually know before we
Speaker 1: start talking on that episode what we're going to be
Speaker 1: talking about. We don't say we think this might happen
Speaker 1: in this episode, or let's discuss how we think about
Speaker 1: this letter.
Speaker 3: We don't do any of that.
Speaker 1: We act like someone has just walked into our therapy
Speaker 1: room and we're hearing this for the very first time.
Speaker 1: And I think that's what makes the show so dynamic
Speaker 1: is that it's not scripted. There's no agenda that we
Speaker 1: have in mind beforehand. We're just like, here's the letter.
Speaker 1: We have no idea what's going to happen. The audience
Speaker 1: has no idea what's going to happen, and here we go.
Speaker 2: And by the way, that's what makes it scary also
Speaker 2: for us, you know, a therapist, because we're there, we
Speaker 2: really don't know what the other person is thinking. We
Speaker 2: don't know where it's going to go. The actual session
Speaker 2: might go in a very different direction.
Speaker 4: Oh my gosh, that's exciting. Had either of you done
Speaker 4: sort of therapy with a therapeutic partner before, Like, how
Speaker 4: did you go about knowing who's going to speak when
Speaker 4: and what kind of feedback you would give in tandem?
Speaker 2: We don't. That's what's.
Speaker 3: We don't at all.
Speaker 1: I mean, but I think that that's what's so great
Speaker 1: is that when so what a lot of people might
Speaker 1: not know is that when therapists train, often you get
Speaker 1: feedback in a certain way on your session, So some
Speaker 1: people might be behind a one way mirror, or you
Speaker 1: tape your sessions and record them and you bring them
Speaker 1: to your supervisor. All of this, of course with the
Speaker 1: consent of the client, but once you're in private practice,
Speaker 1: you don't get that anyway. Really, And one of the
Speaker 1: things that's so interesting about working with Guy is to
Speaker 1: see how he works. He makes me a better therapist.
Speaker 1: I think watching a direction he goes, or where I
Speaker 1: might get stuck somewhere, He'll jump in, and vice versa.
Speaker 1: I think if he is sort of going somewhere and
Speaker 1: the person is stuck there, I'll jump in. And so
Speaker 1: we really tag team really well. Even though we can't
Speaker 1: read each other's minds. Even if sometimes I think where
Speaker 1: is he going with this, I'm confident that wherever he's
Speaker 1: going is too an important place.
Speaker 2: And I can say that I've many times over this
Speaker 2: past you know, a year and a half since we
Speaker 2: started working together, in my own sessions that I do
Speaker 2: in my own private practice, I'll get to a moment
Speaker 2: where I literally say to myself in my head, I'm
Speaker 2: going to do a lor here, and then I do
Speaker 2: a thing that I think Lauri would do because I
Speaker 2: was I think that's a good place, and she does
Speaker 2: that thing. Well, I'm going to do Lauri here, and
Speaker 2: I have that in my head. Many times I'm like, yep,
Speaker 2: thank for a LORI right there. That's great.
Speaker 4: One thing that I find really out about it is
Speaker 4: that I was just texting a friend about this last night,
Speaker 4: about recommending episodes of season one for her, and one
Speaker 4: of the things I pointed out was that even if
Speaker 4: the name of the episode and the description sound like
Speaker 4: this person, I don't have any strange daughter, I don't
Speaker 4: have any kids at all, I'm not going to get
Speaker 4: a lot out of this episode. Every single episode there
Speaker 4: are these gems and takeaways that are impacting me, a single,
Speaker 4: forty one year old woman who doesn't have any kids.
Speaker 4: So it's just really interesting to me how you can
Speaker 4: tell very much that you too are hyper focused on
Speaker 4: the client in the virtual room, yet so many of
Speaker 4: the things that you share are really applicable to so
Speaker 4: many of us. And that brings me to a question
Speaker 4: about sort of how the pandemic has affected the sorts
Speaker 4: of therapy you do in dear therapists or in your
Speaker 4: private practices. I know that the show launched sort of
Speaker 4: as COVID was a thing in the world, but how
Speaker 4: have you noticed the nature of people's concerns or worries
Speaker 4: letters shift over the last year or so.
Speaker 1: Well, I just want to say before we talk about
Speaker 1: COVID that what you were saying earlier about how applicable
Speaker 1: each episode is to everyone, because relationships are relationships in
Speaker 1: the world. Whether it's relationship to self, relationship to friends,
Speaker 1: to family, to siblings, to romantic partners, to bosses to coworkers,
Speaker 1: they're all relationships. And so I remember in season one,
Speaker 1: early on, we had a couple on and this was
Speaker 1: a married couple, they had kids, they'd been married for
Speaker 1: a while, and this young woman in her early twenties
Speaker 1: wrote in and she said, I'm not married yet, I
Speaker 1: don't have kids yet, but I use the advice with
Speaker 1: my boss at work and it was amazing. And so
Speaker 1: I think that that's the kind of response that we've
Speaker 1: been getting all through season one and we hope to
Speaker 1: continue through season two. Is that even if you look
Speaker 1: at the title of the episode and you say, well,
Speaker 1: that's not my situation, I would really encourage people to
Speaker 1: listen to the episodes because our goal in putting them
Speaker 1: out there is to make these sessions accessible to everyone.
Speaker 1: Not everybody can or wants to go to a therapist,
Speaker 1: but you can get so much out of one conversation
Speaker 1: if you see yourself in some element of the struggle,
Speaker 1: and a lot of it is the things that you
Speaker 1: can use in your daily life, no matter who you are,
Speaker 1: how old you are, what your situation is, and that's
Speaker 1: what we love about the show.
Speaker 2: And as therapists, we're trained to ask questions such as, so,
Speaker 2: why are you doing the thing that you're doing, or
Speaker 2: what are you hoping to achieve? Or how did that
Speaker 2: get set up for you in your earlier relationships or
Speaker 2: in your childhood, And then that is crafted around a
Speaker 2: specific issue perhaps, but the question is relevant in a
Speaker 2: much more general way, and people hear that and they're
Speaker 2: asking ourselves that question in the context of their own lives.
Speaker 2: And that's why you can learn a lot from it,
Speaker 2: because it's really about how to think about yourself, how
Speaker 2: to think about your situation, how to think about your patterns,
Speaker 2: how to think about the impact of earlier experiences, And
Speaker 2: that's generalized as to everyone.
Speaker 4: Truly, So thinking keeping all that in mind, does that
Speaker 4: mean that maybe COVID era letters maybe weren't all that
Speaker 4: different at heart from what you had been getting previously.
Speaker 1: I think they weren't that different. I mean many of
Speaker 1: them touched on how COVID was impacting these people, whether
Speaker 1: it was in a marriage, or we had a teacher
Speaker 1: who couldn't be with her students and how that was
Speaker 1: impacting her. Whatever people were going through before the pandemic
Speaker 1: was amplified. So if they were, if a relationship was
Speaker 1: very strong, it got stronger. If a relationship was struggling,
Speaker 1: or things were not discussed. This really came to light
Speaker 1: during COVID. Really, what we're dealing with is just the
Speaker 1: human condition. And yes, there are going to be big
Speaker 1: events like COVID or you know, other things that happened,
Speaker 1: But really what we're dealing with is how do we
Speaker 1: deal with the daily stuff of life.
Speaker 4: And speaking of people's personal stories, both of you in
Speaker 4: your talks and your books and occasionally in interviews I've
Speaker 4: I heard you'll reveal personal things about your own lives.
Speaker 4: How do you decide what you want to reveal to
Speaker 4: an audience where you don't know who's there, and how
Speaker 4: do you sort of ride the line of being someone
Speaker 4: like I'd never met you until today, but I trust
Speaker 4: you both very much. But until you saw my face,
Speaker 4: you would never have known who I was passing you
Speaker 4: on the street. How do you balance that role of
Speaker 4: where people feel like they know you, but you really
Speaker 4: are still just a therapist to them, Like, how does
Speaker 4: that play out in your careers in different aspects.
Speaker 1: It's funny because in Maybe You Should talk to Someone.
Speaker 1: In my most recent book, I follow the lives of
Speaker 1: four very different patients, and then there's a fifth patient
Speaker 1: in the book who is me as I go through
Speaker 1: my own therapy with my therapist, and I say at
Speaker 1: the beginning of the book that my greatest credential is
Speaker 1: that I am a card caring member of the human race.
Speaker 1: That I know what it's like to be a person
Speaker 1: in the world, and I didn't want to present myself
Speaker 1: as sort of the expert up on high. And I
Speaker 1: feel like that translates over into the podcast, because you know,
Speaker 1: we're sitting here talking about our personal lives in the podcast,
Speaker 1: but we use our personal experience to connect with people
Speaker 1: on a very human level. We obviously are using our
Speaker 1: training and our expertise and everything that we have learned
Speaker 1: as therapists, but we're also relating to people just human
Speaker 1: to human, and I think that's what makes the episode
Speaker 1: so compelling, and I think that's what makes therapy so compelling.
Speaker 2: It's an interesting thing. People will come up to me
Speaker 2: sometimes will recognize me from either Ted Talks or the
Speaker 2: podcast or writing or different things, and they will come
Speaker 2: up to me as if, as you said, is if
Speaker 2: they know me when I don't know them, and this
Speaker 2: in essence, they don't really know me. But it's there's
Speaker 2: something that I So far in my experience, people have
Speaker 2: been very respectful. They feel a certain affinity, a certain
Speaker 2: fondness because if they heard something it might have touched
Speaker 2: them or it might have resonated with them. We've been
Speaker 2: very fortunate in that way. At the second speak to
Speaker 2: my experience that when that does happen, when I do
Speaker 2: pass people in the street and they stop me, or
Speaker 2: in a restaurant, an airport, once in the gym in
Speaker 2: the shadow but that's a different one, and.
Speaker 1: In the broad department of a department store just like why.
Speaker 2: But thankfully it's been friendly and so those are okay,
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, it's funny.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and maybe you should talk to someone.
Speaker 1: I say that therapists are like Dalist celebrities, you know,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like the only people to whom they are, they're.
Speaker 3: Like, oh my gosh, you know who that is? Who
Speaker 3: I just saw in the restaurant.
Speaker 1: Is the people who have come to see us, right,
Speaker 1: or the people who maybe read our books or listen
Speaker 1: to podcast.
Speaker 3: I don't you know.
Speaker 1: Obviously from the podcast you don't see us, so you
Speaker 1: only hear our voices. But I've actually had people recognize
Speaker 1: my voice from across a restaurant.
Speaker 3: Maybe I'm just a loud talker. I don't know.
Speaker 1: But like guys said, I think people, I think they
Speaker 1: feel a connection because they've been moved very personally in
Speaker 1: these very intimate conversations by something that we've put out there.
Speaker 3: And so that's I think incredibly meaningful to us.
Speaker 1: We appreciate the fact that we have touched somebody's life
Speaker 1: in that way.
Speaker 3: That's beautiful.
Speaker 4: And speaking of that again, writing the line between really
Speaker 4: knowing someone versus only interacting with them. On this one episode,
Speaker 4: I've been really curious about the letter writers who end
Speaker 4: up being featured on the show. What is that the
Speaker 4: vetting process like in order to figure out if yes,
Speaker 4: this is the letter writer we want, and then what
Speaker 4: kind of conversations and things do they need to keep
Speaker 4: in mind when they are putting their voices out there,
Speaker 4: even if they are kind of masking identifying details.
Speaker 2: What people need to know, especially people who are writing
Speaker 2: in is that, as in a therapy session, you can
Speaker 2: come with issue A, but everything has to be on
Speaker 2: the table because if we think issue A is related
Speaker 2: to other things, we want to be able to explore
Speaker 2: those things and we want to be able to ask
Speaker 2: questions about those things. And therapy is a very non
Speaker 2: linear process. Its zigzags all over the place because connections
Speaker 2: are made in patents identified by doing that, and that's
Speaker 2: kind of what we do within the podcast, And so
Speaker 2: we edit out any identifying information, So people use pseudonyms
Speaker 2: in that way. I think people can remain anonymous, but
Speaker 2: they have to be able to truly open their hearts
Speaker 2: as you do when you go to therapy.
Speaker 4: I really appreciate how in the shows we can't see
Speaker 4: you two or the person you're speaking with, but you
Speaker 4: both do a really good job of saying like, I
Speaker 4: see your eyes are filling with tears, or you looked
Speaker 4: away from us just then. But yeah, I just really
Speaker 4: love those moments where you kind of let us have
Speaker 4: a peek into what's going on for that client.
Speaker 1: We say that as much for the audience as we
Speaker 1: do for the person that we're talking to. So sometimes
Speaker 1: people don't even realize that they're tearing up, so we
Speaker 1: want to have them slow down in that moment. Say
Speaker 1: I notice that you're tearing up. What are you feeling
Speaker 1: right now? What just came up for you? Because people
Speaker 1: will just go right over that because they don't want
Speaker 1: they don't want to notice that, and we want to
Speaker 1: slow them down so that they do notice it. So
Speaker 1: because something important just happened there. If they smile, sometimes
Speaker 1: people don't even notice that they experienced joy or that something,
Speaker 1: you know, something really resonated with them. So say, I
Speaker 1: noticed you smiling there, so I think that that resonated
Speaker 1: with you. So it's for both. It's actually what we
Speaker 1: would do in a regular therapy session too.
Speaker 3: I like that a lot.
Speaker 4: I know, even in I won't spoil it for anyone
Speaker 4: who's not already heard the first episode of season two
Speaker 4: there's a moment there where I was surprised by what
Speaker 4: you observed in the letter writer, and I hadn't expected
Speaker 4: you to say you saw on her face what you saw,
Speaker 4: And that was kind of a fascinating moment to hear
Speaker 4: her saying, kind of reflect on what you're bringing up.
Speaker 3: I really appreciated that.
Speaker 4: My mom is here at this event too, and she
Speaker 4: and I listened to on season one, Jeff's critical parents
Speaker 4: on the way back from a road trip, and I
Speaker 4: very am, very thankful I have great parents who are
Speaker 4: not critical of me and are positive. But it was
Speaker 4: fascinating to listen into that with her. And then afterward
Speaker 4: I realized that that storyline echoed in several loved ones
Speaker 4: in my life, so I was able to send that
Speaker 4: episode to them. But I think that one in particular,
Speaker 4: I remember hearing the moments where you're pointing out how
Speaker 4: he's reacting in the moment. I think you also do
Speaker 4: such a great job for the audience. I know it's
Speaker 4: for the client, but it helps us a lot when
Speaker 4: you kind of catch like the tone someone's using with himself,
Speaker 4: or the way that he's speaking about a certain scenario,
Speaker 4: and how the roles are changing. I just find it
Speaker 4: so fascinating. So a lot of all of us are
Speaker 4: made up of stories. And Guy and I were talking
Speaker 4: a little bit before we started recording about how he
Speaker 4: worked as a bookseller. I think as an adolescent. Laurie
Speaker 4: has done a thing that we linked to on our
Speaker 4: Instagram a couple weeks ago written an article on bibliotherapy,
Speaker 4: which is the process of using books and the written
Speaker 4: word to help people get better in touch with themselves
Speaker 4: and their emotions. Can you talk a little bit about
Speaker 4: some books that you have recommended for particular clients and
Speaker 4: why it's.
Speaker 2: Really wonderful When you have a book in mind that
Speaker 2: you think would be really useful for a specific person,
Speaker 2: it always feels like, oh, I have the perfect thing
Speaker 2: for you. One book that I recommend a lot to
Speaker 2: expecting parents who are expecting for the first time is
Speaker 2: a book called Welcome to the Club one hundred Parenting
Speaker 2: Milestones You Never saw coming. It's by a comic called
Speaker 2: Rakeldia Piece. She's actually an Emmy Award winning writer. But
Speaker 2: it's a wonderful book because it's hilarious, but it's about
Speaker 2: everything that goes wrong, and the idea there is that
Speaker 2: parents are so terrified to bring home this baby for
Speaker 2: the first time, and they think that anytime they do
Speaker 2: something wrong, it's terrible, and they don't realize that everyone
Speaker 2: goes through it, and all parents make all these mistakes,
Speaker 2: and in the humor it normalizes, it humanizes, and I
Speaker 2: find that people when they read that, it just lows
Speaker 2: their anxiety tremendously by the humor of it. So that's
Speaker 2: one book I love recommending.
Speaker 1: I actually never thought I would become a therapist growing up,
Speaker 1: but I was an avid reader. And how this relates
Speaker 1: to your question is that I always found that novels
Speaker 1: were the really good ones, the ones that I would
Speaker 1: think about, the ones I would reread at different stages
Speaker 1: of my life, really had these deep psychological truths embedded
Speaker 1: in them. And that's what made for the kinds of
Speaker 1: characters that really lived inside of you. And I think
Speaker 1: when you're reading a novel and you have those moments
Speaker 1: of that's me, I see myself. I'm not alone, and
Speaker 1: you think you were the only person who felt that,
Speaker 1: did that, thought that, and this character does things, says
Speaker 1: the same things.
Speaker 3: It's such an amazing moment of connection.
Speaker 1: And that's what books have always been for me, and
Speaker 1: so later when I became a therapist, I was always
Speaker 1: recommending books. Even in my training when they said, oh,
Speaker 1: don't recommend books. You can't do that because you're supposed
Speaker 1: to be very neutral, and I was always like, are
Speaker 1: you crazy, Like you know, books are therapy, and that's
Speaker 1: why I wrote that New York Times piece about bibliotherapy.
Speaker 1: So I really tailor my book suggestions to the particular person.
Speaker 3: It's something that comes up in the moment where.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm like an encyclopedia with books, and so
Speaker 1: someone says the thing, I'm like, wait a minute, stop,
Speaker 1: if there's this book you have to read. So for me,
Speaker 1: it's less nonfiction than it is great novels. But I
Speaker 1: will recommend nonfiction if there's something particular, like someone's struggling with,
Speaker 1: you know, some of the themes even that we see
Speaker 1: on the podcast, but also in the therapy room, estrangement
Speaker 1: partners who maybe have some characteristics of personality disorders, or
Speaker 1: family members who do books about In fact, guy just
Speaker 1: recommended a great book on We just taped an episode
Speaker 1: for season two where he recommended a book on anxiety
Speaker 1: to the person and she found it so useful even
Speaker 1: just starting the book that first week. So books can
Speaker 1: be incredibly healing and informative at the same time.
Speaker 2: By the way, the book the Loid just Reference is
Speaker 2: called The Anxiety Toolkit by Alice Boyce. I also get
Speaker 2: a lot of recommendations from my patients because they will
Speaker 2: come in and they're like, oh my god, I read
Speaker 2: something and it was so helpful, and I'm like, tell
Speaker 2: me what it is, and I'll write it down and
Speaker 2: I'll check it out, and it's very useful in general.
Speaker 1: I had that experience with maybe you should talk to someone,
Speaker 1: where interestingly, a lot of therapists did not know about
Speaker 1: it at the beginning. It was general public kind of book,
Speaker 1: and so many therapists said, I heard about your book
Speaker 1: because a client brought it in and they were talking
Speaker 1: about it, and I had to read it because they
Speaker 1: kept talking about it every week, and so it didn't
Speaker 1: go from therapist to client. It went from client to therapist.
Speaker 1: So guys write books do go in the opposite direction.
Speaker 4: That's funny. Yeah, I'm a huge fiction reader, and I
Speaker 4: remember for a while in my mid twenties when I
Speaker 4: wasn't sure what my career was going to be. I
Speaker 4: was like am I do. I want to be a
Speaker 4: therapist because that's what I love the most about reading novels.
Speaker 4: I do not hold the degrees that you have or
Speaker 4: the experience, but there is such an element to working
Speaker 4: in an independent bookstore where we get to know our
Speaker 4: community members, and I and my staff are really good
Speaker 4: at reading the emotions on someone's face and kind of
Speaker 4: helping them figure out what the next book is it's
Speaker 4: going to kind of help them move forward.
Speaker 1: That's one of the things I love about independent booksellers
Speaker 1: is that you walk in and they know you, and
Speaker 1: if they don't already know you, they will talk to
Speaker 1: you until they do know you. Every book that I
Speaker 1: have gotten as a recommendation from an independent bookstore has
Speaker 1: always been one of the books that stays on my
Speaker 1: bookshelf forever because I think there's that personal element. Just
Speaker 1: like therapists can very personally suggest something, so can independent booksellers.
Speaker 2: You're listening to Deotherapists from iHeartRadio. We'll be back after
Speaker 2: a quick break.
Speaker 4: A lot of the time I've heard you recommend to
Speaker 4: people that they write a letter or do some sort
Speaker 4: of introspective work that requires them to do a letter
Speaker 4: to themselves a journal entry, rewriting their own biography. How
Speaker 4: does writing help your clients in you and how do
Speaker 4: you use that as a tool in your therapy.
Speaker 2: The people who come on our show, they're not our
Speaker 2: clients by definition, their guests on the show. Writing is
Speaker 2: a very very powerful tool because it uses all kinds
Speaker 2: of parts of the brain. It's not just the idea
Speaker 2: that you have that has to be translated then into
Speaker 2: various specific words that have to follow grammatical rules. You
Speaker 2: need to find motor skills to type it or write it.
Speaker 2: And when you're trying to get someone to think differently
Speaker 2: about a task or to discover something about themselves, giving
Speaker 2: them a writing task affords them a certain level of
Speaker 2: emotional and psychological distance because by the time it gets
Speaker 2: translated into the written word, they are experiencing what the
Speaker 2: thought might have been very emotional and difficult. By the
Speaker 2: time they write it, they have a layer of distance
Speaker 2: from it, which gives them that little measure of objectivity,
Speaker 2: that little different kind of perspective that will allow them
Speaker 2: to potentially see this in a new way. So it's
Speaker 2: a tool that therapists use literally all the time. Then
Speaker 2: we use it in very different ways for different people
Speaker 2: in different situations. We use it in the show, of course,
Speaker 2: all the time, because it's very very useful and impactful
Speaker 2: to really see something in a different way than you
Speaker 2: might if you were just thinking about it.
Speaker 1: I think what happens is people come on the show
Speaker 1: and they'll often say, I've been dealing with this problem
Speaker 1: for years, and they're stuck and they don't know how
Speaker 1: to get unstuck, and you need to get them out
Speaker 1: of whatever they're doing which hasn't been working. I think
Speaker 1: that most people truly know what they need to do.
Speaker 1: They just don't know what's getting in the way of
Speaker 1: doing the thing that they need to do. And what
Speaker 1: we do is we help them to do that through
Speaker 1: these various exercises. And just because it's a writing assignment
Speaker 1: doesn't mean it's the same. No two writing assignments are
Speaker 1: the same, and we don't suggest a writing assignment on
Speaker 1: every podcast, obviously, but when we do, it's very unique
Speaker 1: to that person and their situation. There are no two
Speaker 1: episodes where they have exactly the same homework assignment. I
Speaker 1: was a competitive chess player growing up, and one of
Speaker 1: the things that was really important was how do you
Speaker 1: get in there, which if I make this move, they're
Speaker 1: going to make this move, and then uh oh, I
Speaker 1: better adjust my plan and make this move. Guy and
Speaker 1: I are constantly thinking it's very strategic when we're doing this.
Speaker 1: How do we get this person to the place that
Speaker 1: they need to go in order to have things change
Speaker 1: for them? Because really the show is about change and
Speaker 1: growth and healing and transformation, and we only have one
Speaker 1: session to do that. We want to get as far
Speaker 1: as we can. And what we've been so surprised by
Speaker 1: is that even with that one session, people are able
Speaker 1: to make significant shifts in their lives. And in season
Speaker 1: two we have where are They Now? Episodes where we
Speaker 1: take the season one guest so we don't just get
Speaker 1: the week update, but we get a year long update
Speaker 1: and we find out where are they a year later?
Speaker 3: And it's been so gratifying. I don't want to spoil it.
Speaker 1: Guys looking at me giving me the look like, don't
Speaker 1: say it, because we have heard them now we know
Speaker 1: where everybody is. But we are just blown away by it,
Speaker 1: and we think people are going to be so moved
Speaker 1: when they hear you know where people are a year
Speaker 1: later after having just one conversation not because we're so great,
Speaker 1: but because.
Speaker 3: We move them to a new place and then they
Speaker 3: took it from there.
Speaker 4: That's beautiful. There's one episode in season one where you
Speaker 4: have a letter writer explore a situation in his life
Speaker 4: from his ex spouse's point of view, and I was
Speaker 4: wondering if you could talk a little bit about, because
Speaker 4: we have a lot of readers in the audience right now,
Speaker 4: just that change of point of view and how that
Speaker 4: type of exercise in particular can help shift someone's perspective.
Speaker 2: That was an exercise in perspective taking. That was a
Speaker 2: person who had cheated on his wife and then left
Speaker 2: her for that person, think a month after the birth
Speaker 2: of their second child. And this person was actually a
Speaker 2: good person, but they really had trouble connecting to the
Speaker 2: ex wife's perspective of how their actions must have felt
Speaker 2: to her. And when we asked about it, you could
Speaker 2: see that there was a wish to connect, but he
Speaker 2: couldn't articulate or see it from her perspective, and so
Speaker 2: we literally took him through an exercise that some of
Speaker 2: the feedback that we've gotten was, Wow, that sounded so difficult.
Speaker 2: It was emotionally very challenging. Because he ritually had to
Speaker 2: put himself in her shoes and look and see the
Speaker 2: impact of his actions on her and tell story. The
Speaker 2: exercise was from her point of view, from the beginning
Speaker 2: of meeting him, through the marriage, and through the cheatings.
Speaker 2: So it was a very difficult exercise, but he was
Speaker 2: really gained to do it, and he was brave to
Speaker 2: do it, and it was painful for him, but he
Speaker 2: eventually got there and was able to connect with her
Speaker 2: perspective in a way he really hadn't been able to
Speaker 2: despite thinking about this for a very, very long time.
Speaker 1: This was the episode called Mike's Messy Affair, and we
Speaker 1: really wanted to go with that letter because I think
Speaker 1: so many people make assumptions right away. He was basically
Speaker 1: asking what the cultural assumption was in his letter, which was,
Speaker 1: you know, as Guy says in the episode, so this
Speaker 1: is a tell me I'm not a scumbag letter because
Speaker 1: he wants to know everyone thinks I'm a terrible person
Speaker 1: for doing what I did, and you know, my friends
Speaker 1: won't talk to me. Nobody will talk to me all
Speaker 1: of this, and you know, he wanted you know, he
Speaker 1: really was concerned about his children.
Speaker 3: Because he didn't want to lose custody of his.
Speaker 1: Children and all of those things. I think that when
Speaker 1: you see the humanity in him, and when you see
Speaker 1: him really be able to say, Okay, the reason that
Speaker 1: I can't acknowledge how much pain I've caused is because
Speaker 1: of how much shame I feel around having done what
Speaker 1: I did. I wish that I had handled it differently.
Speaker 1: I think ending the marriage was a good thing, but
Speaker 1: this is, you know, his perspective. I think ending the
Speaker 1: marriage was a good thing, but the way I did
Speaker 1: it was a terrible thing. And for him to go
Speaker 1: through that, and you can see, you know how much
Speaker 1: he's struggling with it. But I also hope that people
Speaker 1: have so much compassion for him and feel, you know,
Speaker 1: just how human he is, and get past the what
Speaker 1: he did and more into the where is he now
Speaker 1: and what is he trying to do now?
Speaker 3: With all of this.
Speaker 4: I remember that one in particular, making note of my
Speaker 4: own reaction to his tone, particularly at the beginning of
Speaker 4: the episode, and I thought like, oh, Janet, you don't
Speaker 4: have a right to judge him. But I also was like, oh,
Speaker 4: this guy, wonder what's going to happen, and just hearing
Speaker 4: just how his tone shifted and just the journey he
Speaker 4: went on was fascinating to me.
Speaker 1: I think with Mike in the episode, he had his
Speaker 1: own struggles too. He was so lonely in that marriage.
Speaker 1: He did not know how to talk to his wife.
Speaker 1: His wife didn't know how to talk with him. They
Speaker 1: both did not know how to communicate. And that's the
Speaker 1: part that's very relatable, is what do you do when
Speaker 1: you've never had that model for you, You don't know
Speaker 1: how to say how.
Speaker 3: Just desperately lonely? You are desperately alone? You feel you know,
Speaker 3: do you cheat?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: That's a choice, right, But he did, and now he
Speaker 1: knows to do something different. Now he's just learning, well,
Speaker 1: how do I communicate? What would that look like?
Speaker 2: I do want to add when we discussed whether we
Speaker 2: should use that mesa for the show, one of the
Speaker 2: things we thought about, naturally is that, yes, it sounds
Speaker 2: terrible what he did, but he is writing to us.
Speaker 2: He's actually asking for help in resolving that very issue
Speaker 2: of like what is this about me? And how do
Speaker 2: I think about this? And that's a big step forward
Speaker 2: in terms of like, Okay, there's something to work with them,
Speaker 2: because he's actually curious and he actually wants to think
Speaker 2: about these things. So that was what allowed us to
Speaker 2: say yes, and let's work with him.
Speaker 1: You can't help people who aren't curious about themselves. So
Speaker 1: often people will come into therapy and they're very curious
Speaker 1: about other people, like, you know, why does my husband
Speaker 1: do this or you know all these other why does
Speaker 1: my mother do this? As opposed to why do I
Speaker 1: react the way they do? Or what am I doing
Speaker 1: to contribute to the situation, or why am I in
Speaker 1: this relationship in the first place. So when people come
Speaker 1: on the show, we don't know them yet. We hope,
Speaker 1: we cross our fingers that they're going to be very
Speaker 1: curious that they know what the show is, because it's
Speaker 1: a show where if you aren't curious, you're you're going
Speaker 1: to find yourself really struggling when you get in a
Speaker 1: room with guy and with me.
Speaker 4: I'm now going to pivot to something you both offered
Speaker 4: to do, which is dive into your letter bag a
Speaker 4: little bit and tell us about a few rights who
Speaker 4: maybe weren't featured on the show, but you still want
Speaker 4: to address their letters in this format. So take it away.
Speaker 2: I will begin and I'm gonna as we do in
Speaker 2: the show. I'll read this one to Laurie. She will
Speaker 2: be the next one to me. But this is a
Speaker 2: question you get asked a lot, and I think it'd
Speaker 2: be good to just clarify it. Dea LORII and Guy
Speaker 2: I love the podcast and the Atlantic column. What does
Speaker 2: fellow travelers refer to people traveling through life? I feel
Speaker 2: like I missed the reference explanation somewhere because we always
Speaker 2: welcome our listeners to as fellow travelers and our guests
Speaker 2: as fellow travelers. So where is that from?
Speaker 1: So we introduced that in the trailer for season one
Speaker 1: when we started, and we were struggling with what do
Speaker 1: we call the people who come on the show because
Speaker 1: they aren't our actual therapy clients and they aren't really guests,
Speaker 1: because we feel like we get very deeply attached to
Speaker 1: these people in the course of our session with them.
Speaker 1: And I I just spontaneously said to Guy, you know
Speaker 1: irv Yallam, the eminent psychiatrist who's really revolutionized the field
Speaker 1: of psychiatry and therapy by being so human and so
Speaker 1: real with people. You know, he broke down that wall
Speaker 1: and he would call people fellow travelers. He said We're
Speaker 1: all fellow travelers on this journey, you know, therapists and
Speaker 1: patient together. We're fellow travelers trying to figure this out.
Speaker 1: And I just love that. And so we really thought
Speaker 1: that that maybe was the best way to refer to
Speaker 1: the people who come on and share their lives with us.
Speaker 2: All right, let's go to another letter, Lorie.
Speaker 3: This is a letter that came into our box.
Speaker 1: It goes like this, Dear therapists, I could really use
Speaker 1: some help navigating my new relationship with my soon to
Speaker 1: be stepdaughter's biomm I've been a mom of my own
Speaker 1: two kids for twelve years and have learned a lot.
Speaker 1: I'm feeling very confident as a mom. My fiance and
Speaker 1: his ex have been parents for three years. I am
Speaker 1: running into a situation where I feel like the biomm
Speaker 1: is overreaching. It's interesting by the way that she calls
Speaker 1: her the biomom as opposed to just their mom. She
Speaker 1: wants to know how our marriage house will be set up,
Speaker 1: what kind of bed their daughter will have, and things
Speaker 1: like whether we have dead bolts on the exterior doors.
Speaker 1: I feel a huge invasion by these requests. Interacting with
Speaker 1: biomom has felt like I'm being interviewed to be a
Speaker 1: babysitter and getting inspected for my safety protocols. I've tried
Speaker 1: to assuage her fears while also establishing some healthy boundaries
Speaker 1: of my house, my rules. But I'm wondering if you
Speaker 1: have any advice for how to navigate conversations with biomm
Speaker 1: that help her unclench her fists of control. Do we
Speaker 1: try to be more open right now to establish trust, or,
Speaker 1: like my instincts suggests, would that just be a precedent
Speaker 1: of biomom having a level of control over our space,
Speaker 1: something I was already very worried about because of the
Speaker 1: way she talks to my fiance. He is a wonderful
Speaker 1: father and very doting. I just wish his ex would
Speaker 1: see that and trust him. I'm just going to start
Speaker 1: here because I'm having a lot of counter time transference
Speaker 1: with this letter. And by the way, that's a very
Speaker 1: real thing, you know, for people who don't know. Counter
Speaker 1: transference is the is the therapist's reaction to what the
Speaker 1: person presents to them. And what this person is missing
Speaker 1: is that she is not the mother of these children.
Speaker 1: She's the mother to her own children, but she is
Speaker 1: not the mother of her fiancee's children, and she's referring
Speaker 1: to these kids' mother as the biomm not even the
Speaker 1: sometimes she's biomm which is kind of like she wants
Speaker 1: her out of the picture. It feels like, and my house,
Speaker 1: my rules. No, these are not your kids. So of
Speaker 1: course the mom wants to know are there dead bolts
Speaker 1: on the doors? And where are they going to be sleeping?
Speaker 1: And what's going to be happening with my children.
Speaker 3: The way she's.
Speaker 1: Going about that is she's making a lot of assumptions
Speaker 1: about her role in this blended family.
Speaker 2: And I will add to that again, we're not talking
Speaker 2: to this person unpacking anything with them. But to me,
Speaker 2: what stands out is that why is she the one
Speaker 2: negotia with bio mom. Why isn't the father of the
Speaker 2: children dealing with his ex wife and coming to know
Speaker 2: agreements with his ex wife about like here's how I
Speaker 2: want to do things, you know. So either he's not
Speaker 2: stepping up the fiance or she's overstepping it's one or
Speaker 2: the other. But the solution to it is let him
Speaker 2: deal with BioMA.
Speaker 1: Well, also, I don't know the bio Mom's a problem,
Speaker 1: and I don't know what the fiance wants so nowhere
Speaker 1: in here was my fiance also feels this is a problem.
Speaker 1: So I have a feeling that she feels it's a problem,
Speaker 1: but I don't have any information about does the fiance
Speaker 1: feel it's a problem or is the fiance caught in
Speaker 1: this untenable position of this person that I'm going to
Speaker 1: Mary wants this, my ex wife wants this, and I'm
Speaker 1: conflict avoidant, so I don't want to deal with any
Speaker 1: of it.
Speaker 2: Definitely the conflict avoidant, I would guess.
Speaker 1: But yes, yeah, But I would just say this about
Speaker 1: blended families and gentlemen. We've had some full episodes about
Speaker 1: blended families. We had one in season one, and we
Speaker 1: do have another one in season two, different issues. But
Speaker 1: I think that people have to remember that there are
Speaker 1: many parents here. It's not that certain parents get kicked out.
Speaker 1: That everybody is co parenting in a certain way. And
Speaker 1: when people can get along and not try to control
Speaker 1: other people and be really compassionate and emotionally generous with
Speaker 1: one another, it's better for the kids, and it's also
Speaker 1: better for the adults. And this whole like my house,
Speaker 1: my Rules thing screams of just lots of issues around
Speaker 1: control and lack of openness to what the mother of
Speaker 1: these children might be experiencing and might want for her
Speaker 1: own kids.
Speaker 2: And I just want to maybe generalize what I said
Speaker 2: earlier just because I think it's applicable to many situations.
Speaker 2: For example, you know, I hear we get a lot
Speaker 2: of issues in the therapy, learn about this person having
Speaker 2: a lot of trouble with their in laws when they're
Speaker 2: talking about things with their in laws that they shouldn't
Speaker 2: be talking about with their in laws. The spouse should
Speaker 2: be talking with their parents about them. And when the
Speaker 2: other person is stepping into do that communication and negotiation
Speaker 2: when it's not their place to do it, things often
Speaker 2: go awry. And it's often the issue of the person
Speaker 2: who needs to be doing it is not stepping up
Speaker 2: or doesn't think they should, or the other persons are
Speaker 2: a stepping And that generalizes to all kinds of situations
Speaker 2: where there's a third party and someone gets stuck in
Speaker 2: the middle. It's a person who's stuck in the middle
Speaker 2: who needs to be speaking up more, usually one way
Speaker 2: or the other. Okay, next one, uh, Dear therapists, I'm
Speaker 2: forty six years old and I'm about to move from
Speaker 2: where I've lived for all my life and where my
Speaker 2: kids and family are. I'm moving to Nevada because my
Speaker 2: boyfriend of one and a half years got a job
Speaker 2: down there and it seemed like he was the one.
Speaker 2: So I found a job and started preparing to move
Speaker 2: with my boyfriend. On the morning we were set to
Speaker 2: fly to find a home, he told me he didn't
Speaker 2: want to live with me anymore and he isn't in
Speaker 2: love with me. I had already quit my job and
Speaker 2: had accepted a job in Reno. I was devastated, but
Speaker 2: not surprised. He had been dropping hints for weeks, and
Speaker 2: I chose to ignore them, blaming them and anxiety and
Speaker 2: the stress of preparing to move. The twist in the
Speaker 2: story is that my ex boyfriend had learned I was
Speaker 2: moving to Reno with someone new, and instead of giving up,
Speaker 2: he aggressively tried to get me back. Two hours after
Speaker 2: my breakup with my current boyfriend, I had a marriage
Speaker 2: proposal and an invitation to visit him in New York,
Speaker 2: where he now lives. I went to New York, but
Speaker 2: I'm feeling completely numb. The irony is I always complained
Speaker 2: that he was emotionally unavailable but now it's me who
Speaker 2: has become emotionally unavailable. My decision as of right now
Speaker 2: is to move to Reno on my own. I'm excited
Speaker 2: about the job down there, and I have been desperately
Speaker 2: wanting to leave Montana since my marriage ended. My question is,
Speaker 2: how did that become so emotionally unavailable? My ex boyfriend
Speaker 2: is offering everything I wanted him to when we were together,
Speaker 2: plus a very nice life in New York. My question
Speaker 2: is am I going through a midlife crisis? I feel
Speaker 2: like Reno offers me a fresh start and maybe a
Speaker 2: way to get back in touch with myself.
Speaker 1: Well, this is interesting because we see this a lot,
Speaker 1: where somebody is unavailable and then the other person becomes
Speaker 1: unavailable and suddenly they're very available.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 1: So here the person who wrote the letter that boyfriend
Speaker 1: had been unavailable to her and then when he found
Speaker 1: out that she was moving in with someone else, suddenly
Speaker 1: he wants her back, and the two hours after the breakup,
Speaker 1: there's a marriage proposal.
Speaker 3: All of a sudden. Move to Reno.
Speaker 1: Explore the relationship from afar, Take lots of time she
Speaker 1: just got out of this other relationship. Take lots of
Speaker 1: time to see what happened with the other boyfriend, why
Speaker 1: he's suddenly emotionally available seemingly, So would she get to
Speaker 1: New York and find that he's not emotionally available again.
Speaker 1: So I really feel like she has to do what
Speaker 1: she needs to do and explore this very slowly.
Speaker 2: From afar, I would bet that had she decided to
Speaker 2: go to New York and try it with this marriage proposal,
Speaker 2: she would find that he very soon would start to
Speaker 2: become emotionally unavailable again because there was a reason it
Speaker 2: didn't work out the first time. I'm not hearing anything
Speaker 2: from him about, oh, here's what would be different for
Speaker 2: me this time. It's just wait, But I don't want
Speaker 2: to lose you, so maybe we'll do this. And I
Speaker 2: agree the advice should be go to Reno as you're
Speaker 2: planning to do. If he's that intent, if he's that serious,
Speaker 2: if he's that emotionally available right now, he will tolerate
Speaker 2: the distance and welcome the relationship with enough time to
Speaker 2: give you a sense that actually it's solid and he
Speaker 2: means it. But in my experience, in my practice, when
Speaker 2: I hear these stories all the time, it often not
Speaker 2: always often swings right back the minute, the person says okay,
Speaker 2: so now I'm here, and then the person goes like,
Speaker 2: oh wait, commitment issues again, and then it.
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 1: We have an episode in season two somebody's asking if
Speaker 1: he should get back with his ex partner. One of
Speaker 1: the things that's really important that we ask people to
Speaker 1: do is to say, have they articulated what would be
Speaker 1: different this time? Have they articulated what didn't work, what
Speaker 1: they've learned about themselves, why they behave the way they behaved,
Speaker 1: whether it was being emotionally distant, being emotionally clingy, being
Speaker 1: emotionally abusive, not having boundaries, whatever the issues were, What is.
Speaker 3: Going to be different this time?
Speaker 1: And if nobody can articulate that on both sides, what
Speaker 1: would be different? What have you each learned about yourselves?
Speaker 1: And would what is the goal of getting back together?
Speaker 1: Not just I miss you. I think that that's really important.
Speaker 1: And here we have you know again, we don't know
Speaker 1: any other information than what's in this letter, so on
Speaker 1: the podcast we would really dig into this. But the
Speaker 1: marriage proposal two hours after she had broken up with
Speaker 1: the other guy is in my mind, something to be
Speaker 1: wary of.
Speaker 4: Thanks. That was so much fun to get a glimpse
Speaker 4: into some of those letters. Thank you for sharing. I
Speaker 4: really am so thankful that you two joined us in
Speaker 4: supported Avid Bookshop and all of us who are here.
Speaker 4: This has been a great honor for me and for
Speaker 4: the attendees, and I know for the people who will
Speaker 4: listen to this podcast. So thank you so much, so
Speaker 4: thank you guys, thank you Laurie.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having us well, thank you so so
Speaker 1: much for having us.
Speaker 2: Next week. A woman's resentment of her financially successful brother
Speaker 2: threatens to tear apart their relationship.
Speaker 5: They have a lot of freedom, they have a lot
Speaker 5: of time to spend, they have a lot of money.
Speaker 5: They just they have all these things and we don't
Speaker 5: have those things. Yeah, I wish I had those things too.
Speaker 5: I don't necessarily begrudge these people for having the thing.
Speaker 5: What I don't like is the way that they're treating me.
Speaker 1: Hey, fellow travelers, if you're enjoying our podcast each week,
Speaker 1: don't forget to subscribe for free so that you don't
Speaker 1: miss any episodes, and please help support Dear Therapists by
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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 3: Your reviews really help people to find the show.
Speaker 2: If you have a dilemma you'd like to discuss with us,
Speaker 2: Big Go Smooth, email Us at LORII and Guy at
Speaker 2: iHeartMedia dot com.
Speaker 3: Our executive producer is Noel Brown.
Speaker 1: We're produced and edited by Mike Johns, Josh Fisher and
Speaker 1: Chris Childs. Our interns are Dorit Corwin and Silver Lifton.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Alison Wright and to our podcast fairy
Speaker 1: Godmother Katie Couric.
Speaker 2: We can't wait to see you at next week's session.
Speaker 1: Dear Therapist is a production of iHeartRadio