WEBVTT - #35 Rachel and Jon 0:00:15.210 --> 0:00:28.290 Pushkin. Hi, John, I am robot Goldstein. I will be 0:00:28.330 --> 0:00:33.729 your robot medical assistant. Pass me the scalpel to chat. 0:00:34.250 --> 0:00:37.530 Would you would you really? Would you love to continue 0:00:37.530 --> 0:00:38.129 to chat with me? 0:00:39.690 --> 0:00:39.849 No? 0:00:41.409 --> 0:00:43.530 How many people are you able to be that honest with. 0:00:44.970 --> 0:00:45.210 Just you? 0:00:46.930 --> 0:00:46.970 So? 0:00:47.050 --> 0:00:51.849 Well, that's that's kind of special, right, I know that 0:00:52.090 --> 0:00:54.130 is a good point. Do you see it's a very 0:00:54.170 --> 0:01:06.650 special bond? Yea from Gimblet Media. I'm Jonathan Goldstein and 0:01:06.730 --> 0:01:19.930 this is Heavyweight Today episode Rachel and John. Right after 0:01:19.970 --> 0:01:20.369 the break. 0:01:25.650 --> 0:01:28.050 You ready to start? I'm ready to start. 0:01:28.130 --> 0:01:28.850 You're sitting down? 0:01:29.170 --> 0:01:33.450 Yeah, okay, your eyes closed. Anything you see where there's 0:01:33.490 --> 0:01:35.410 some feelings, that's what we're looking for. 0:01:35.730 --> 0:01:36.170 Okay. 0:01:36.650 --> 0:01:39.570 This is a therapist named Alvin in session with a 0:01:39.610 --> 0:01:41.890 patient named Ted. What are you feeling? 0:01:42.090 --> 0:01:45.729 Can you describe it? Like it's happening right now, right now. 0:01:46.090 --> 0:01:48.770 The session was recorded as a part of an educational 0:01:48.810 --> 0:01:53.050 psychotherapy video series. In the session, Alvin is helping Ted 0:01:53.170 --> 0:01:56.210 relive a memory. The time is domineering father in law 0:01:56.450 --> 0:01:57.690 was rude to his wife. 0:01:58.090 --> 0:01:59.770 Yeah, and he's all dressed up. 0:01:59.690 --> 0:02:02.450 Hi, Jenny, Yeah, oh there is and. 0:02:02.490 --> 0:02:03.730 He's Yeah, there's a formal thing. 0:02:03.770 --> 0:02:05.450 It's like, you know, good to see we have to 0:02:05.530 --> 0:02:06.970 It's like the meanute. We talk to each other, our 0:02:07.010 --> 0:02:10.730 voices drop, yeah, hi, how are you? Alvin's eyes are 0:02:10.770 --> 0:02:14.250 shut tight. His method is to try to will himself 0:02:14.290 --> 0:02:17.810 into the patient's skin to feel what the patient is feeling. 0:02:18.410 --> 0:02:19.610 I can do this better than you. 0:02:19.650 --> 0:02:21.570 Watch me. Okay, okay, okay. 0:02:21.650 --> 0:02:23.250 I'm gonna put my arms around you. 0:02:23.330 --> 0:02:25.210 I'm gonna bring you kind of clothes. 0:02:25.370 --> 0:02:27.530 I'm doing better than you. Huh yeah good. 0:02:27.690 --> 0:02:30.970 Alvin does voices and role plays, and at times the 0:02:31.010 --> 0:02:35.210 session feels like avant garde improv It's playful and honestly 0:02:35.290 --> 0:02:38.050 kind of bizarre. But the point of it all is 0:02:38.090 --> 0:02:41.090 to help the patient rehearse behavior in the office that 0:02:41.130 --> 0:02:46.730 he can then apply in real life. Toucher toucher, Oh yeah, Holder. 0:02:46.970 --> 0:02:48.810 And Jenny like so much. 0:02:49.050 --> 0:02:51.330 By the end of the session, Alvin has turned ted 0:02:51.730 --> 0:02:55.730 a meek, buttoned up patient into someone capable of expressing 0:02:55.770 --> 0:02:59.370 himself emotionally. Gonna be this way with Jenny because you 0:02:59.490 --> 0:03:00.450 rehearsed it, got it. 0:03:00.890 --> 0:03:05.450 I'm ready. 0:03:09.570 --> 0:03:14.170 We had this ability within us to become a whole 0:03:14.210 --> 0:03:14.770 new person. 0:03:15.730 --> 0:03:19.130 Alvin died in twenty fourteen, but this is Howard, a 0:03:19.170 --> 0:03:23.850 psychotherapist and one of Alvin's disciples. Howard runs Alvin's website 0:03:23.890 --> 0:03:27.530 and publishes his books. Are you talking a little hyperbolically 0:03:27.530 --> 0:03:28.770 when you say a whole new person? 0:03:28.890 --> 0:03:31.970 No, it is that radical topathon. It's to become a 0:03:32.010 --> 0:03:35.730 whole new person the term you use as an optimal person, 0:03:36.450 --> 0:03:38.370 and to discover that within yourself. 0:03:39.610 --> 0:03:43.410 According to Alvin, once you've discovered this optimal personhood, you 0:03:43.450 --> 0:03:45.890 can shake off what others want and live on your 0:03:45.890 --> 0:03:46.530 own terms. 0:03:46.930 --> 0:03:48.890 It changed my life direction. 0:03:49.290 --> 0:03:52.170 And for these kinds of radical results, Alvin was given 0:03:52.170 --> 0:03:56.690 a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Psychological Association. One 0:03:56.730 --> 0:04:00.570 psychology textbook even goes so far as to describe Alvin 0:04:00.690 --> 0:04:14.170 as being quote as important as Freud. But this isn't 0:04:14.170 --> 0:04:17.529 a story about Alvin's professional life, his life inside the office. 0:04:18.529 --> 0:04:21.690 This is a story about Alvin's real life. 0:04:21.770 --> 0:04:23.129 He insisted, I run away. 0:04:24.130 --> 0:04:27.529 This is Rachel, Alvin's daughter, and I. 0:04:27.529 --> 0:04:32.570 Did, How old were you? I was in grade five? 0:04:34.130 --> 0:04:38.010 The year was nineteen seventy. Alvin and Rachel's mom had 0:04:38.049 --> 0:04:41.210 been locked in an ugly custody battle for eight years. 0:04:41.690 --> 0:04:45.609 Rachel's mom was poor and struggled with depression. Rachel really 0:04:45.650 --> 0:04:49.010 wanted to live with her dad, so when Alvin suggested 0:04:49.089 --> 0:04:51.689 she run away from Judy in Denver to his house 0:04:51.729 --> 0:04:54.969 in Ohio, Rachel didn't pack a bag, She didn't say 0:04:55.010 --> 0:04:57.849 goodbye to anyone. She just left. 0:04:58.130 --> 0:05:01.089 Like he set up this whole thing with his lawyer, 0:05:01.330 --> 0:05:04.089 and I just felt like I needed to do with 0:05:04.130 --> 0:05:06.089 my dad. And the lawyer told me and this was 0:05:06.130 --> 0:05:08.409 the right thing. I think, I said, I was going 0:05:08.450 --> 0:05:12.529 to the lie and somehow, I don't remember how I 0:05:12.570 --> 0:05:15.529 got to the lawyer's office, and then they took me 0:05:15.609 --> 0:05:18.289 to the airport and put me on the plane and 0:05:18.330 --> 0:05:19.330 I left. 0:05:24.409 --> 0:05:27.130 Alvin had gotten remarried to a woman with two kids, 0:05:27.409 --> 0:05:29.409 and Rachel loved feeling like she was a part of 0:05:29.450 --> 0:05:32.529 this happy family. There were dogs to play with and 0:05:32.609 --> 0:05:36.249 bikes to ride, and yet this other feeling would often 0:05:36.289 --> 0:05:36.770 creep in. 0:05:37.330 --> 0:05:40.249 I miss my mom, I miss my friends, I miss 0:05:40.330 --> 0:05:44.689 my cat. But I could never ever ever say that 0:05:44.929 --> 0:05:46.650 out loud to anybody. 0:05:47.890 --> 0:05:50.729 And there was someone else Rachel missed, missed most of all. 0:05:54.609 --> 0:05:58.889 She told us she was going to the library, and 0:06:00.089 --> 0:06:02.289 then she never came back. 0:06:03.330 --> 0:06:06.249 This is Rachel's brother John. He's two and a half 0:06:06.330 --> 0:06:09.369 years younger than Rachel and only has flashes of early 0:06:09.450 --> 0:06:13.570 childhood memory About Alvin. He recalls doing father's son things 0:06:13.609 --> 0:06:16.650 that it'd make perfect sense if the son was an adult, 0:06:17.250 --> 0:06:20.010 things like lifting weights together and smoking. 0:06:20.729 --> 0:06:23.770 He was a pipe smoker. He bought me my own 0:06:24.169 --> 0:06:27.770 little cherrywood pipe, and you know, as a four year old, 0:06:27.810 --> 0:06:30.890 he actually had me smoking, you know, tobacco in the 0:06:30.929 --> 0:06:32.049 pipe with him. 0:06:32.409 --> 0:06:35.849 It was as though Alvin couldn't distinguish between adults and children, 0:06:36.409 --> 0:06:39.049 which was why he saw John's closeness with his mom 0:06:39.450 --> 0:06:43.010 not as a child's natural maternal attachment, but rather as 0:06:43.049 --> 0:06:46.489 a personal slight and so Alvin ever asked John to 0:06:46.529 --> 0:06:50.289 run away. John was left behind in Denver with Judy. 0:06:50.929 --> 0:06:53.330 I think in his mind, I just, you know, was 0:06:53.450 --> 0:06:57.489 more a mama's boy and a chip off Judy's block, 0:06:57.609 --> 0:07:00.849 and I think he sort of gave up on me, 0:07:02.010 --> 0:07:04.409 and he was really focused on Rachel. 0:07:05.369 --> 0:07:08.529 And as the final custody hearing approached, Alvin's focus on 0:07:08.650 --> 0:07:11.929 Rachel and intensified. He wanted to prove to the court 0:07:12.010 --> 0:07:14.770 that Rachel was better off with him, So he had 0:07:14.770 --> 0:07:18.690 about a half dozen social workers and psychologists offtfare assessments, 0:07:19.250 --> 0:07:23.210 Rachel was interviewed, and Alvin's new family observed. None of 0:07:23.210 --> 0:07:27.129 the experts spoke to Judy, and the plan worked. In 0:07:27.170 --> 0:07:30.130 the autumn of nineteen seventy, a judge ruled that Rachel 0:07:30.130 --> 0:07:32.809 would be allowed to stay in Ohio with al for good, 0:07:33.450 --> 0:07:35.890 but John would remain in Denver with Judy. 0:07:36.730 --> 0:07:38.489 And we never lived together again. 0:07:46.369 --> 0:07:50.130 When you have a sibling who is just a critical 0:07:50.450 --> 0:07:53.649 part of your family and then you're separated from them, 0:07:54.090 --> 0:07:54.810 it's a wound. 0:07:55.570 --> 0:07:58.850 How uncommon was an arrangement like that? 0:07:59.690 --> 0:08:03.810 Extreme? Yeah, very very uncommon. Kids are not split up. 0:08:04.929 --> 0:08:09.170 We each grew up alone. I missed her through my 0:08:09.170 --> 0:08:13.410 my whole childhood. I missed her a lot. I mean, 0:08:13.489 --> 0:08:17.970 we were so close when we were young, and you know, 0:08:18.770 --> 0:08:21.810 she was the big sister who through all of that 0:08:21.970 --> 0:08:29.530 was looking out for me growing up from then on, 0:08:29.890 --> 0:08:33.370 just me and my mom. Grew up as an only child, 0:08:33.970 --> 0:08:39.450 and my mom just always being in pain, and she 0:08:39.570 --> 0:08:41.929 never was able to enjoy whatever it is we were 0:08:41.970 --> 0:08:44.290 doing at the moment. It was always, Oh, if only 0:08:44.690 --> 0:08:46.650 Rachel were here, we could all be together, and I'd 0:08:46.650 --> 0:08:49.130 be saying, but we're here now. 0:08:50.450 --> 0:08:53.730 When he turned thirteen, John invited Rachel to his bar Mitzvah, 0:08:54.290 --> 0:08:57.930 but Alvin wouldn't let her go. Rachel sent a poem instead. 0:08:58.650 --> 0:09:01.850 It had to do with a rubber band stretching across 0:09:01.890 --> 0:09:09.490 the distance and connecting us. 0:09:10.610 --> 0:09:13.210 For John, not only did he lose his big sister, 0:09:13.570 --> 0:09:17.050 he also lost his dad. Year after year, John tried 0:09:17.090 --> 0:09:20.130 to re enter Alvin's life, but each time he reached out, 0:09:20.370 --> 0:09:24.570 Alvin rebuked him. One time, as an adolescent, John tried 0:09:24.570 --> 0:09:25.450 scheduling a visit. 0:09:26.170 --> 0:09:30.650 Then he said, well, as long as you guys you 0:09:30.690 --> 0:09:34.610 know me and my mom required any money, any child support, 0:09:34.770 --> 0:09:38.050 there be no visit. And I said, well, it sounds 0:09:38.130 --> 0:09:40.770 like you care more about money than about me, And 0:09:41.650 --> 0:09:43.250 he said, well, I don't want it to just sound 0:09:43.330 --> 0:09:44.810 like that. That's how it is. 0:09:51.530 --> 0:09:55.210 Nevertheless, a few years later, John asked once again if 0:09:55.210 --> 0:09:58.890 he could come visit. By this point, Rachel was eighteen 0:09:59.090 --> 0:10:02.170 and no longer living with Alvin, So when Alvin refused 0:10:02.250 --> 0:10:05.250 John yet again, Rachel told her brother to come visit 0:10:05.290 --> 0:10:09.250 her instead. They hadn't seen each other in eight years. 0:10:10.090 --> 0:10:11.970 Was she the same sister that you remembered? 0:10:14.130 --> 0:10:16.610 No? I mean I knew her as a you know, 0:10:18.770 --> 0:10:21.930 six seven, eight, nine ten year old. Next time I 0:10:21.970 --> 0:10:24.570 saw her, she was an adult. 0:10:25.290 --> 0:10:27.850 In the years since that visit, Rachel and John have 0:10:27.890 --> 0:10:30.530 made a point of staying in each other's lives. They 0:10:30.570 --> 0:10:33.610 talk on the phone, celebrate holidays together, and once a 0:10:33.690 --> 0:10:36.770 year their families all take a trip. But their childhood 0:10:36.850 --> 0:10:38.570 together that's been lost. 0:10:39.290 --> 0:10:42.930 I mean, my daughter certainly watches us and thinks that 0:10:42.970 --> 0:10:48.650 we're more like cousins. She can see the disconnect because 0:10:48.690 --> 0:10:49.970 we did not grow up together. 0:10:50.930 --> 0:10:54.330 John and Rachel still have questions about their childhood, but 0:10:54.370 --> 0:10:56.610 now that their parents are both dead, they have no 0:10:56.650 --> 0:10:59.810 one to ask, so they pass through their separate memories, 0:10:59.970 --> 0:11:03.250 trying to construct a timeline, comparing moments of overlap and 0:11:03.250 --> 0:11:06.850 filling in the blanks to this end. One night, while 0:11:06.890 --> 0:11:10.170 John was visiting Rachel for Thanksgiving, he asked if they 0:11:10.170 --> 0:11:15.170 could go through Alvin's files. Alvin was an obsessive record keeper, 0:11:15.410 --> 0:11:19.130 and after he died, Rachel inherited his papers. She'd never 0:11:19.170 --> 0:11:21.530 really gone through them, keeping them stored away in a 0:11:21.570 --> 0:11:25.210 filing cabinet, but that night she pulled him out, and 0:11:25.250 --> 0:11:29.130 together John and Rachel made a series of disturbing discoveries, 0:11:29.970 --> 0:11:32.449 the first of which was the script. 0:11:34.850 --> 0:11:37.930 The script for me was like, oh my God. 0:11:38.930 --> 0:11:41.850 The script was a lengthy diatribe written by Alvin from 0:11:41.850 --> 0:11:44.730 the point of view of a child, Rachel's point of view. 0:11:45.410 --> 0:11:49.690 In it, Alvin refers to himself as Daddy, Judy, as mother, 0:11:50.010 --> 0:11:53.930 or Judy or simply she. I later asked Rachel to 0:11:53.970 --> 0:11:58.010 read some over the phone, two and. 0:11:58.010 --> 0:12:02.170 Half pages long and small psychologists, writing, Okay, so here 0:12:02.210 --> 0:12:06.810 I go. It's in my good, happy dreams. Custody is changed, 0:12:06.930 --> 0:12:11.050 and I live with Daddy. If I am forced to 0:12:11.290 --> 0:12:14.010 go back and live with mother, it will only be 0:12:14.130 --> 0:12:17.410 till the day I'm fourteen, which apparently was when you 0:12:17.450 --> 0:12:21.690 could de side. When I'm with her, I feel scared 0:12:21.730 --> 0:12:25.050 that I might get tight and angry and cold like Judy. 0:12:26.050 --> 0:12:28.770 She's not a mother, she is a keeper. She makes 0:12:28.810 --> 0:12:32.050 me feel like I'm in a prison. I can't let 0:12:32.090 --> 0:12:32.890 her touch me. 0:12:33.610 --> 0:12:36.810 It was like finding your childhood internal monologue committed to 0:12:36.850 --> 0:12:40.730 paper and written in your father's handwriting. Rachel didn't remember 0:12:40.810 --> 0:12:43.490 seeing the script as a kid, but you remembered saying 0:12:43.570 --> 0:12:47.330 those things, and she remembered thinking them. In one of 0:12:47.370 --> 0:12:51.930 Alvin's many books, a volume entitled The Manual of Optimal Behavior, 0:12:52.330 --> 0:12:55.410 He writes that behavior can be rehearsed and modified quote 0:12:55.770 --> 0:12:58.330 until you are ready and eager to go ahead and 0:12:58.410 --> 0:13:02.650 do what you have rehearsed and modified. Unbeknownst to her, 0:13:03.130 --> 0:13:05.930 Alvin was having Rachel rehearse and modify. 0:13:06.970 --> 0:13:12.650 It was so explicit. There was nothing subtle about it. 0:13:12.730 --> 0:13:14.090 You know, the whole thing was sick. 0:13:15.530 --> 0:13:18.130 The second thing discovered among the files was a letter 0:13:18.130 --> 0:13:21.530 from Rachel to her mom. In it, she begs Judy 0:13:21.610 --> 0:13:24.890 to let her live with Alvin, but there were two copies, 0:13:25.530 --> 0:13:28.930 one written in Rachel's hand and one written in Alvin's. 0:13:38.490 --> 0:13:41.930 Going through the papers, Rachel remembered, other things, how Alvin 0:13:42.010 --> 0:13:44.330 encouraged her not to smile when she was with her mom, 0:13:44.650 --> 0:13:47.410 saying if someone photographed her happy, it could be used 0:13:47.410 --> 0:13:50.850 as evidence against him in court. In every photo from 0:13:50.850 --> 0:13:53.690 that period with her mother, Rachel is wearing a frown. 0:13:54.410 --> 0:13:58.450 That's when I started questioning and started to realize that 0:13:58.570 --> 0:14:01.530 I was coached or brainwashed. 0:14:04.730 --> 0:14:08.250 It made sense. For most of her adult life, Rachel 0:14:08.290 --> 0:14:11.330 had had no memory of loving her mom. It was 0:14:11.370 --> 0:14:14.130 only after her mother's death when she found mother's day 0:14:14.170 --> 0:14:16.330 and birthday card she'd written to Judy when she was 0:14:16.450 --> 0:14:20.810 very small that Rachel realized she had I love you, mommy. 0:14:20.890 --> 0:14:24.410 She'd written I love you so much, but with Al's 0:14:24.450 --> 0:14:34.570 constant coaching, it had all been stamped out. The final 0:14:34.610 --> 0:14:37.570 thing John and Rachel found that night were those psychological 0:14:37.610 --> 0:14:40.690 reports Alvin at Rachel submit to just before the final 0:14:40.690 --> 0:14:44.810 custody hearing. In them, you see Alvin's scripting bear out. 0:14:45.450 --> 0:14:48.770 One report notes that Rachel kept repeating, quote, I want 0:14:48.810 --> 0:14:51.730 to live with my father. He loves me. My mother 0:14:51.850 --> 0:14:55.170 doesn't love me. The report notes that she said this 0:14:55.370 --> 0:15:00.850 with quote grim determination. They also uncovered one particular report 0:15:00.890 --> 0:15:03.290 that night that was longer than any of the others. 0:15:03.930 --> 0:15:06.530 It was the only one that evaluated both John and Rachel, 0:15:06.930 --> 0:15:10.410 and in this it carried the most weight and what 0:15:10.530 --> 0:15:13.530 shocked John and Rachel most of all, my dad. 0:15:13.410 --> 0:15:14.050 Clearly ed. 0:15:15.570 --> 0:15:18.770 Edited it and then she rewrote it with the edits 0:15:19.130 --> 0:15:22.450 and submitted that rewrite. 0:15:22.690 --> 0:15:24.370 Is that ethical as a social work? 0:15:24.450 --> 0:15:26.530 No no, no, no, no, no no no no it's 0:15:26.570 --> 0:15:31.650 not no oh no no no. No one should ever 0:15:31.770 --> 0:15:36.570 let anybody else, especially their client, edit their reports. No, 0:15:36.650 --> 0:15:38.170 it's it's really bad. 0:15:39.490 --> 0:15:42.730 The report was written by a social worker named Joyce. 0:15:49.410 --> 0:15:52.890 Alvin's edits to Joyce's report made the language more emphatic. 0:15:53.530 --> 0:15:56.730 For example, where Joyce had written that Rachel was hesitant 0:15:56.770 --> 0:15:59.530 when it came to judy, Alvin changed it to say 0:15:59.650 --> 0:16:03.490 she was fearful. In another spot, he added that Rachel 0:16:03.570 --> 0:16:06.450 wanted to blot out any memory of ever having been 0:16:06.450 --> 0:16:07.730 away from him. 0:16:08.490 --> 0:16:12.810 Honestly, I mean it was horrifying, you know, just to 0:16:12.850 --> 0:16:18.610 see the detailed notes, to see the edited drafts, the 0:16:18.650 --> 0:16:22.610 crossouts and his handwriting, and then the final version that 0:16:22.690 --> 0:16:26.050 was submitted to the courts with his edits in there, 0:16:27.410 --> 0:16:29.330 like there's no question in what happened. 0:16:30.810 --> 0:16:34.290 The report concludes with a recommendation, the strongest one of 0:16:34.330 --> 0:16:37.330 any report and the only recommendation of its kind. 0:16:37.890 --> 0:16:41.050 She recommended that I live with him, and that my 0:16:41.090 --> 0:16:42.970 brother lived with my mom. 0:16:44.210 --> 0:16:47.610 John and Rachel's separation came down to a decision dictated 0:16:47.690 --> 0:16:55.330 by Alvin and signed off on by Joyce. How was 0:16:55.370 --> 0:16:57.770 Alvin able to exert this kind of power over a 0:16:57.770 --> 0:17:01.170 social worker, someone who was supposed to be an impartial outsider. 0:17:02.090 --> 0:17:05.410 John and Rachel couldn't understand it. But that night, when 0:17:05.490 --> 0:17:08.889 Rachel googled Joyce, she was shocked to realize that Joyce 0:17:08.889 --> 0:17:13.409 had been an impartial outsider at all. Joyce was a 0:17:13.409 --> 0:17:18.169 family friend. Rachel recognized Joyce as the kind, dark haired 0:17:18.209 --> 0:17:21.530 woman whose house she visited as a child. Rachel would 0:17:21.530 --> 0:17:23.649 bring her cello over to play music with Joyce in 0:17:23.689 --> 0:17:27.129 her family, which means that, on top of everything else 0:17:27.169 --> 0:17:29.810 wrong with the report, Joyce should never have been the 0:17:29.810 --> 0:17:31.649 person to write it in the first place. 0:17:32.530 --> 0:17:35.650 She was like the one person in my life as 0:17:35.689 --> 0:17:40.090 a kid who could have said, Hey, I think you're 0:17:40.090 --> 0:17:43.929 coaching her and this isn't right. Why are we going 0:17:44.010 --> 0:17:47.330 to try and split these kids up? She was the 0:17:47.369 --> 0:17:50.170 one who could have said something. 0:17:51.169 --> 0:17:56.769 In nineteen seventy Joyce recommended that my sister go with 0:17:56.810 --> 0:17:58.970 my father and that I go with my mother. And 0:17:59.010 --> 0:18:05.249 that's what happened, and that dictated the course of my life. 0:18:05.490 --> 0:18:07.169 What happened? 0:18:08.290 --> 0:18:10.369 This is the question that's been nagging at John and 0:18:10.449 --> 0:18:13.850 Rachel since they found the report. How could this have happened? 0:18:14.689 --> 0:18:17.729 And so John and Rachel want to find Joyce and 0:18:17.850 --> 0:18:21.249 ask her. What I don't fully understand, though, is what 0:18:21.330 --> 0:18:24.609 I have to offer. Rachel and John are both practicing 0:18:24.649 --> 0:18:28.929 therapists themselves. They're more than capable of posing difficult questions 0:18:29.449 --> 0:18:32.449 and Although I play a mental health semi professional, semi 0:18:32.490 --> 0:18:35.770 convincingly on a podcast, I'm not actually one at all. 0:18:36.609 --> 0:18:39.170 What can I do well? 0:18:40.770 --> 0:18:40.850 So? 0:18:41.129 --> 0:18:45.209 I have had to advocate for myself my entire life 0:18:45.369 --> 0:18:49.249 from a very young age, and nobody advocated for me 0:18:49.369 --> 0:18:53.850 or my brother, and so if you could help me 0:18:53.970 --> 0:18:57.929 with this, it would be a healing piece for me 0:18:58.090 --> 0:19:00.489 that somebody else advocated for me. 0:19:06.609 --> 0:19:28.969 After the break in search of Joyce, I find Joyce 0:19:29.010 --> 0:19:32.649 the social workers facebook and email address right away, and 0:19:32.689 --> 0:19:34.969 I message to ask if she'd be willing to speak 0:19:34.970 --> 0:19:38.569 with John and Rachel about their parents' custody battle. I 0:19:38.570 --> 0:19:41.570 don't hear back for several weeks, and during this time, 0:19:41.850 --> 0:19:44.330 my thoughts keep returning to Alvin and the video of 0:19:44.369 --> 0:19:47.689 his session with Ted, the meek, buttoned up patient. 0:19:47.810 --> 0:19:49.529 Toucher toucher oh Jack. 0:19:49.929 --> 0:19:53.490 Throughout, Alvin tries to help Ted release his bottled up feelings. 0:19:53.649 --> 0:19:54.850 I can do this better than you. 0:19:54.889 --> 0:19:55.249 Watch me. 0:19:55.409 --> 0:19:57.410 Okay, right, okay, okay. 0:19:57.169 --> 0:19:58.729 What's happening inside me? 0:19:59.409 --> 0:20:00.650 Right now? 0:20:01.290 --> 0:20:02.169 Over my chest? 0:20:02.250 --> 0:20:04.090 I'm having a who It felt like a brand of 0:20:04.129 --> 0:20:07.530 extreme empathy in the first viewing, now feels like something else. 0:20:07.570 --> 0:20:09.210 I'm gonna put my arms around you. 0:20:09.369 --> 0:20:11.290 I'm doing better than you. Huh yeah. 0:20:11.730 --> 0:20:14.210 Now it feels as though Alvin is scripting the outcome. 0:20:14.490 --> 0:20:16.330 If you want to cry, go ahead, good, it's okay, 0:20:16.490 --> 0:20:16.729 go on. 0:20:17.129 --> 0:20:19.369 At one point, Alvin tells Ted to cry. 0:20:19.689 --> 0:20:22.090 Ted, it's okay, go ahead, cry, go it's all right. 0:20:22.169 --> 0:20:24.169 Ted is not anywhere close to crying. 0:20:24.330 --> 0:20:25.250 Ted, you're starting to cry. 0:20:25.250 --> 0:20:27.609 Go ahead, let yourself, let yourself go on. It's all right, 0:20:27.649 --> 0:20:30.369 go on, do it. Ted is not starting to cry, 0:20:30.970 --> 0:20:33.850 but Alvin insists, Ted, you're on the verge of crying. 0:20:34.369 --> 0:20:34.649 Do it. 0:20:34.730 --> 0:20:35.770 No, cry, go. 0:20:35.649 --> 0:20:38.929 Ahead, And then a tear appears in the corner of 0:20:38.970 --> 0:20:42.770 Ted's eye. It rolls down his cheek. It's as though 0:20:42.810 --> 0:20:46.249 Alvin has conjured it into being through sheer force of 0:20:46.250 --> 0:20:46.929 his own will. 0:20:47.250 --> 0:20:50.210 Good for you, Good for you, great, great, okay now. 0:20:53.850 --> 0:20:56.290 The video is a part of a series produced by 0:20:56.290 --> 0:21:01.769 the American Psychological Association intended to showcase prestigious psychologists in session. 0:21:02.570 --> 0:21:05.609 The way the series works is that, for privacy reasons, 0:21:05.770 --> 0:21:09.049 the patients are portrayed by actors. As the credits were, 0:21:09.449 --> 0:21:12.850 I learned that while Alvin the therapist is Alvin the therapist, 0:21:13.330 --> 0:21:16.649 Ted the patient is actually Bob the actor. 0:21:17.209 --> 0:21:19.850 It was a quick shoot. There wasn't a rehearsal per se. 0:21:19.889 --> 0:21:21.930 We just kind of went in and improvised. 0:21:22.649 --> 0:21:26.250 This is Bob, and performance wise, Bob is done at all. 0:21:26.609 --> 0:21:30.609 Chuggled swords, cracked whips, eaten fire. I've done for ten years. 0:21:30.649 --> 0:21:32.169 I did a stage hypnosis show. 0:21:32.810 --> 0:21:36.330 Bob is a regular renaissance man in that he also 0:21:36.369 --> 0:21:39.449 worked at a renaissance fair. When Bob showed up to 0:21:39.490 --> 0:21:42.210 film that day, he was asked to improvise some sort 0:21:42.250 --> 0:21:45.330 of marital problem that Alvin could help solve by bringing 0:21:45.369 --> 0:21:48.409 his method to bear. I asked Bob if he found 0:21:48.409 --> 0:21:53.169 Alvin's behavior domineering, but Bob doesn't recall much. There is 0:21:53.209 --> 0:21:56.529 one thing, though, that Bob does still recall, even thirteen 0:21:56.609 --> 0:22:00.890 years later. It seems Bob wasn't Alvin's first choice of patient. 0:22:01.490 --> 0:22:03.369 He had had someone else do it before. I think 0:22:03.369 --> 0:22:06.249 it was an African American lady and it didn't go 0:22:06.409 --> 0:22:07.609 the way it needed to do. 0:22:07.649 --> 0:22:08.210 You know what I mean? 0:22:09.689 --> 0:22:10.450 Can you elaborate? 0:22:10.770 --> 0:22:13.129 He showed it to me briefly. 0:22:13.449 --> 0:22:16.290 Bob describes the video Alvin showed him before they started 0:22:16.290 --> 0:22:19.330 filming that day. In it, the setup was the same 0:22:19.369 --> 0:22:22.409 as it was for Bob shoot. Alvin was in an armchair, 0:22:22.649 --> 0:22:25.969 his legs up on an ottoman, except this time in 0:22:26.010 --> 0:22:30.090 the armchair beside him was the actress. Like Bob, the 0:22:30.129 --> 0:22:32.090 actress in the video had been asked to come up 0:22:32.129 --> 0:22:35.609 with a marriage problem, but in doing so, the actress 0:22:35.649 --> 0:22:38.810 went to a darker place than Alvin anticipated, describing a 0:22:38.889 --> 0:22:43.369 husband who was vicious and cruel. Nonetheless, Alvin tried to 0:22:43.409 --> 0:22:44.090 offer counsel. 0:22:44.770 --> 0:22:47.530 He was saying things like when he behaves in this way, 0:22:47.609 --> 0:22:50.170 can you be playful about it? And the actress said 0:22:50.209 --> 0:22:54.050 things like when he calls me names, suggesting that he 0:22:54.169 --> 0:22:55.889 might be in some ways borderline, at the very least 0:22:56.449 --> 0:22:57.369 verbally abusive. 0:22:58.330 --> 0:23:00.369 It seemed there was the way the actress was given 0:23:00.409 --> 0:23:03.530 to talking about an abusive relationship, and then there was 0:23:03.570 --> 0:23:05.689 the way that Alvin preferred her to talk about one. 0:23:06.409 --> 0:23:09.529 And so the actress was replaced and Bob shown her 0:23:09.609 --> 0:23:12.850 video to illustrate what Alvin did not want. 0:23:12.929 --> 0:23:24.889 It's you know. I got the message, I guess. 0:23:26.330 --> 0:23:29.449 Still, not having received a response from Joyce, I decide 0:23:29.490 --> 0:23:32.050 to mail a letter, and just a few days later 0:23:32.449 --> 0:23:36.090 I find an email in my inbox. In it, Joyce 0:23:36.129 --> 0:23:38.330 tells me She's not sure how much help she can be. 0:23:38.970 --> 0:23:42.249 She reminds me that it has been fifty years, but 0:23:42.409 --> 0:23:46.490 she says she's willing to try. She concludes the email 0:23:46.530 --> 0:24:05.370 by saying, please feel free to contact me if you wish. Joyce, Hello, Hello, 0:24:05.929 --> 0:24:07.290 I think your sister's here too. 0:24:08.129 --> 0:24:09.770 Here we are well. 0:24:11.609 --> 0:24:14.530 The last time John and Rachel saw Joyce they were children. 0:24:15.010 --> 0:24:18.489 They're now in their fifties and sixties. Because of the pandemic, 0:24:18.649 --> 0:24:21.249 the meeting between Rachel, John, and Joyce will have to 0:24:21.250 --> 0:24:24.450 take place over Zoom. John and Rachel joined first from 0:24:24.490 --> 0:24:28.090 their respective homes. So how are you guys feeling today? 0:24:29.530 --> 0:24:30.450 Uh? 0:24:30.929 --> 0:24:34.689 Quite anxious? Actually, what about your brother John? 0:24:35.609 --> 0:24:37.769