Speaker 1: I'm Laurie Gottlieb. I'm the author of Maybe You Should
Speaker 1: Talk to Someone, and I write the Dear Therapist advice
Speaker 1: 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 real session where
Speaker 1: we help people confront their biggest problems and then give
Speaker 1: them actionable advice and hear about the changes they've made
Speaker 1: in their lives.
Speaker 2: So sit back and welcome to today's session.
Speaker 1: This week, a woman who has elaborate revenge fantasies about
Speaker 1: the people in her life wants to understand why she
Speaker 1: does this and how she can stop.
Speaker 3: I have no training and how to have a positive conversation.
Speaker 3: I think it feel a shameful as a grown woman
Speaker 3: that I can't defend myself, and so I take all
Speaker 3: about hurt and I channel it towards these letters.
Speaker 2: First, a quick note deo Therapists is for informational purposes only,
Speaker 2: does not constantitute medical or psychological advice, and is not
Speaker 2: a substitute for professional health care advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Speaker 2: Always seek the advice of your physician, mental health professional,
Speaker 2: or other qualified health provider with any questions you may
Speaker 2: have regarding a medical or psychological condition. By submitting a letter,
Speaker 2: you are agreeing to let iHeart Media use it in
Speaker 2: part or in full, and we may edit it for
Speaker 2: length and clarity. In the sessions you'll hear. All names
Speaker 2: have been changed for the privacy of our guests.
Speaker 1: So Hey Guy, Hi Laurie, what do we have going
Speaker 1: on in our mailbox this week?
Speaker 2: Today we have a rather interesting letter which I will
Speaker 2: just read and you will see why. Deotherapists, I have
Speaker 2: an issue in which I feel a great compulsion to
Speaker 2: write letters to people that are filled with scathing criticisms
Speaker 2: or that bring up long buried events. I am embarrassed
Speaker 2: to admit that I write these mostly to good friends,
Speaker 2: and I even think about sending such letters to the
Speaker 2: spouses of good friends that contain in that would be
Speaker 2: highly damaging to the relationships at hand. I have never
Speaker 2: sent these letters because I know they could potentially cause
Speaker 2: great emotional and in some cases financial damage to my friends.
Speaker 2: But while I don't send these letters, I have to wonder,
Speaker 2: why do I want to hurt other people? Some of
Speaker 2: these people are friends of more than three decades? Am
Speaker 2: I jealous of them? Do I feel abandoned when they
Speaker 2: move and have their own families even though I am
Speaker 2: married and have my own family too. Why do I
Speaker 2: weaponize certain things that were told to me in confidence?
Speaker 2: It's upsetting to take delight in crafting these letters when
Speaker 2: most friends have shown genuine support and love for me.
Speaker 2: Thanks for any help, Catherine.
Speaker 1: You know, this is really interesting because so many times
Speaker 1: people come into our offices and they have these almost
Speaker 1: confessions of things that they're very ashamed of. They feel
Speaker 1: like they're very unique to them, and in this case
Speaker 1: it is. But I think that what we discover when
Speaker 1: we start exploring it with them is that whatever's going
Speaker 1: on underneath it is probably pretty universal, that's right.
Speaker 2: And in this case, what's going on underneath is a
Speaker 2: lot of emotion. Clearly, she feels a lot of these
Speaker 2: feelings and then writes letters to express these feelings in
Speaker 2: some way. What's certainly not clear to me yet is
Speaker 2: what are these feelings about? What's causing them to come up?
Speaker 2: And it sounds like she's not entirely sure why she
Speaker 2: does it either, and that's why she's writing.
Speaker 1: To us, and I think that as she starts to
Speaker 1: understand more about what this is, she will have more
Speaker 1: compassion for herself and then also be able to hopefully
Speaker 1: start to change the behavior. And so for anybody out
Speaker 1: there who thinks that they have some kind of behavior
Speaker 1: that they're embarrassed to share with anybody, this will probably
Speaker 1: be a very helpful episode.
Speaker 2: So let's go talk to her.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Dear Therapists for my Heart Radio. We'll
Speaker 1: be back after a short break.
Speaker 2: I'm Lori Gottlieb and I'm Guy Wench and this is Deatherapists.
Speaker 1: Hi, Catherine, Hello, thanks for coming on the show.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: It's our pleasure. We read your letter, and I'm curious
Speaker 2: to hear how this habit of writing these skating letters
Speaker 2: that you don't send, how that started, when it started?
Speaker 2: If you can give us a little context of how
Speaker 2: that got going and the development of it throughout the years.
Speaker 3: I think it started probably about ten years ago. The
Speaker 3: first time I began to compose these letters. In my mind,
Speaker 3: it was to one particular friend, and our relationship had
Speaker 3: started to go through some rockiness, largely in part because
Speaker 3: she has a spouse who was treating me quite poorly.
Speaker 3: The friendship sort of it lessened, but we've remained good friends,
Speaker 3: I would say, but it sort of started as a
Speaker 3: way of addressing wasn't said between us, and I would
Speaker 3: find myself waking up in the morning, and perhaps as
Speaker 3: I was unloading the dishwasher or taking a shower, I
Speaker 3: would begin to write these letters in my mind, either
Speaker 3: to this friend or to her spouse. I've known this
Speaker 3: friend for a long time, probably about thirty years now,
Speaker 3: and in the course of that relationship, she shared a
Speaker 3: lot of personal details about herself and her relationship with
Speaker 3: her spouse, and I would use that information to write
Speaker 3: fairly scathing letters in my mind. In my mind, I've
Speaker 3: never sent anything, and I do it to other people too.
Speaker 3: It would be a criticism of the way that they
Speaker 3: raised their children, the way that they spend money. It's
Speaker 3: just it's not healthy. I do it mainly for a
Speaker 3: couple friends, but also if there are people in town
Speaker 3: that I see that their children are treating other kids
Speaker 3: terribly on the playground, I'll think about writing letters to
Speaker 3: these people. It's almost become now something that's a part
Speaker 3: of my daily habit, and I want to understand why
Speaker 3: I'm doing this and what I can do to stop
Speaker 3: doing it, because I'm so aware of it not being productive.
Speaker 2: When you described the first incident, you were upset because
Speaker 2: the husband was treating you poorly, and it was one
Speaker 2: of the ways to kind of express your beef. But
Speaker 2: you're saying that now it can happen with people you
Speaker 2: don't know, people you just even see that you don't
Speaker 2: have any personal stake in it, but it can activate
Speaker 2: you sufficiently to want to do that. Are you aware
Speaker 2: in those moments of what you're feeling that's making you
Speaker 2: think of writing the letter.
Speaker 3: Yes, I'm aware of people who I believe are not
Speaker 3: taking responsibility for their actions or responsibility for how their
Speaker 3: children are acting towards others.
Speaker 2: What's the feeling that you have in those moments? You
Speaker 2: aware of what you're feeling in that moment.
Speaker 3: I think it's angry at feeling mistreated or disrespected and
Speaker 3: feeling like my friends are not sticking up for me
Speaker 3: and saying to their spouse, hey, that's not right to
Speaker 3: treat someone this way. I love this person and you're
Speaker 3: being awful to them.
Speaker 1: There seems to be a real thread of injustice throughout
Speaker 1: these even when you see the kids that you don't
Speaker 1: even know at the park who are being treated in
Speaker 1: a way that feels unfair.
Speaker 3: I do have a pretty strong sense of what is
Speaker 3: right and what is wrong, but I'm also keenly aware
Speaker 3: that not everyone has those same views. When I'm feeling
Speaker 3: angry and then I want to write these letters, it's
Speaker 3: a way of, I guess settling scores.
Speaker 1: This sense of feeling misunderstood or feeling like you or
Speaker 1: somebody else is being treated fairly. Was that something that
Speaker 1: you felt growing up? Does it feel familiar at all?
Speaker 3: It does. In my household, we really weren't allowed to
Speaker 3: express ourselves and what was decided upon by my parents,
Speaker 3: mostly my father. That was the rule, and there wasn't
Speaker 3: a lot of leeway to plead your case, to think differently,
Speaker 3: to express yourself differently. That just wasn't tolerated.
Speaker 1: Do you have siblings.
Speaker 3: I do. I have siblings, older and younger brother.
Speaker 1: How did they react to that environment?
Speaker 3: They took it as well. I mean, you know, to
Speaker 3: be essentially iced out was just a really unpleasant feeling.
Speaker 3: It could be a couple days of your parents not
Speaker 3: talking to you. It could be feeling like you were
Speaker 3: the odd man out in sort of an already not
Speaker 3: terribly a motive family. It was. It was not fun.
Speaker 2: That's what your parents would do. If they're upset with you,
Speaker 2: they would shun you, like ice you out.
Speaker 3: Yes, my father would not speak to us for several days,
Speaker 3: or my mother would write us letters and either leave
Speaker 3: them on our bed, or sometimes she would even mail
Speaker 3: them to us, just we were in the same house.
Speaker 3: She would mail them to us, and you know she
Speaker 3: would express her anger by writing these letters.
Speaker 1: So you have been the recipient of the letters that
Speaker 1: you compose in your mind, Yes, I have. What were
Speaker 1: the kinds of things that you would get iced out for.
Speaker 3: Not bringing home perfect grades?
Speaker 1: What would happen with the grades? Can you paint the
Speaker 1: picture of that?
Speaker 3: So if I did not bring home you know a's
Speaker 3: or as it was just there was hell to bay.
Speaker 3: This was in the eighties and the nineties, and you know,
Speaker 3: if we brought home a report card with anything less
Speaker 3: than a's, it was it was ranting and raving that
Speaker 3: America is going to be surpassed by this country. America
Speaker 3: is going to be surpassed by that country. And we're
Speaker 3: not trying hard enough ever, any question about well do
Speaker 3: you understand the material? Why are you getting b pluses
Speaker 3: as if there's anything wrong with that.
Speaker 1: So you talked about them sending you letters, but it
Speaker 1: sounds like they also directly expressed you their anger.
Speaker 3: Yes, my mother would send me the letters. My father
Speaker 3: would directly express the anger.
Speaker 1: I'm curious, then, what were the letters about that you
Speaker 1: received from your mother.
Speaker 3: I have one specific incidence where she gave me a
Speaker 3: jewelry box for Christmas, and I didn't particularly love the
Speaker 3: jewelry box and I put it underneath my dresser and
Speaker 3: it stayed there for a couple months, and she must
Speaker 3: have found it at some point and it was dusty.
Speaker 3: It wasn't broken, it wasn't used, it was just dusty.
Speaker 3: And so that afternoon I came home and there was
Speaker 3: a letter on my pillow just saying, you know, why
Speaker 3: did you treat it like this? This was a gift
Speaker 3: I gave to you, and I don't think it's acceptable
Speaker 3: that you would treat something like that.
Speaker 1: It sounds like she sent you a lot of letters
Speaker 1: over the course of your childhood. Did you ever respect
Speaker 1: to them? Or she would send you a letter and
Speaker 1: the two of you would never speak of it.
Speaker 3: It was more of the latter. I would never speak
Speaker 3: of it, partially because I felt cowed by it, because
Speaker 3: it wasn't her directly addressing me, and partly I thought
Speaker 3: it was just ridiculous.
Speaker 2: You know what's interesting to me in what your dad
Speaker 2: said is the disproportionality of you not getting an A
Speaker 2: and on your shoulders because of your lack of a
Speaker 2: is the entire future of the American country. It wasn't
Speaker 2: your future might be disappointing, it's about the whole country
Speaker 2: now is on your shoulders. In other words, it's such
Speaker 2: a disproportionate response that it really kind of set the
Speaker 2: stage for you that it's okay to respond to these
Speaker 2: kinds of things in a hugely disproportionate way, and in
Speaker 2: a way from your mum in which people can't answer.
Speaker 2: So between the two of them, they're really teaching you
Speaker 2: that when you feel slighted or upset or disappointed even
Speaker 2: with someone, you get to respond in ways that are
Speaker 2: not direct but very disproportionate, like burn the house down
Speaker 2: kind of thing. And that's what you're describing that you
Speaker 2: do in your letters.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I hadn't actually thought about that disproportional reaction,
Speaker 3: but it's right there, it's braided right in with the letters.
Speaker 1: Can you tell us what happened with your friend's husband
Speaker 1: that started you on this process of writing these letters
Speaker 1: that in your fantasy world you would send, but you don't.
Speaker 3: From the time I met her fiance soon to be husband,
Speaker 3: he was always very cold to me and very distant. He,
Speaker 3: I believe, felt threatened by our friendship. And at their wedding,
Speaker 3: they had some issues and they had a fight and
Speaker 3: it was very uncomfortable, and she had withdrawn to a
Speaker 3: room and she didn't want to be with him, and
Speaker 3: I tried to talk to him to go and see her.
Speaker 3: It was their wedding night. It was a beautiful wedding,
Speaker 3: And that was the most that I could do to
Speaker 3: help her was to just say to him, look, your
Speaker 3: wife is waiting to talk to you. She's upset. And
Speaker 3: all he would say to me was, oh, well, you're
Speaker 3: very proper. Isn't it always important to have good manners?
Speaker 3: And since I've at that point really seen him, it's
Speaker 3: either been he cuts me short or makes a comment,
Speaker 3: and I want to preserve the friendship with her, so
Speaker 3: I really don't react, she'll tell me some terrible behavior
Speaker 3: he's shown to her. I try not to react because
Speaker 3: I get the sense she just wants to talk about it,
Speaker 3: not necessarily get advice from me. So I can't point
Speaker 3: to you a specific run in that we had. I
Speaker 3: feel like from the beginning he just felt threatened by
Speaker 3: me and by our friendship.
Speaker 2: You're saying that he would just be cold and distant.
Speaker 2: You're also describing that your dad's way of dealing with
Speaker 2: conflict was to shun to not speak to you for
Speaker 2: several days. Now, that's extremely painful when you live with
Speaker 2: someone when they're icing you out, when they're shunning you,
Speaker 2: it's an extremely painful form of rejection. And you're describing
Speaker 2: here with this husband of the friend that he also
Speaker 2: was just a bit shunning and distant and cold. Because
Speaker 2: there's also something about your mum's letter writing that's so impersonal,
Speaker 2: and that she's not coming to talk to you. She's
Speaker 2: writing and even mailing a letter as if it's far away.
Speaker 2: There's something very distancing about that, and I'm wondering whether
Speaker 2: that's something that you're aware of that you have a
Speaker 2: specific history within reaction to it.
Speaker 3: Could be I immediately. I notice it if I think
Speaker 3: that someone isn't being polite to me, or if I
Speaker 3: think someone's being disrespectful, I pick up on that, and
Speaker 3: all of my senses in almost every other interaction following that,
Speaker 3: are alert to it.
Speaker 1: And your mother felt the same way. She was hyper
Speaker 1: aware of perceived disrespect. And I say perceived because of
Speaker 1: what you're describing, And so I wonder if it's hard
Speaker 1: for you to sometimes know whether this really is disrespectful
Speaker 1: or whether you feel like maybe I'm holding them to
Speaker 1: a standard that's a little bit stringent like your mother did.
Speaker 3: I think you're right that I think that there have
Speaker 3: been some clear cut instances of disrespect. But also perhaps
Speaker 3: I'm just I'm primed for it and I'm reading into
Speaker 3: something differently. I think after about ten years of, you know,
Speaker 3: sort of coolness on his part, I've got it pretty
Speaker 3: accurately sized up. But yeah, it could be that I'm
Speaker 3: just I'm looking for it, or I'm interpreting it in
Speaker 3: the wrong way.
Speaker 1: You said that you're married with a family. Does that
Speaker 1: mean that you also have children?
Speaker 3: Yes? I do.
Speaker 1: How old are your children?
Speaker 3: Twelve, ten, and seven.
Speaker 1: And you've been married for.
Speaker 3: About fifteen years now.
Speaker 1: Does this come up in your relationships with your husband
Speaker 1: or your children.
Speaker 3: Well, yes, in the sense of I do get upset
Speaker 3: when I have to ask my children to do something
Speaker 3: and I'm asking them five and six times I've said
Speaker 3: it to them before. I do not like feeling as
Speaker 3: if I'm being ignored.
Speaker 1: Because being ignored when you were growing up was extremely painful.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's kind of how I would characterize my whole childhood.
Speaker 3: My brothers included, is that it was we were just
Speaker 3: kind of bouncing around in a house and not really
Speaker 3: given the space to express ourselves.
Speaker 1: You're kind of smiling and laughing as you're saying this.
Speaker 1: Do you notice that?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I do, because I don't necessarily think it's funny.
Speaker 3: In fact, I don't think it's funny at all. But
Speaker 3: I feel like it's just so interesting to me how
Speaker 3: these patterns play out again and how certain things repeat themselves.
Speaker 3: I fervently hope that I'm giving my girls more space
Speaker 3: to express themselves and what I was given.
Speaker 1: So with your children, you've talked about having some of
Speaker 1: these times when you feel ignored by them, and how
Speaker 1: much that triggers you. What happens with your husband. Have
Speaker 1: you ever felt ignored by him or what happens when
Speaker 1: you feel disrespected or there's some kind of conflict between
Speaker 1: the two of you.
Speaker 3: No, my husband is incredibly open and a motive and
Speaker 3: does such a wonderful job of touching in with me.
Speaker 3: He's had a good deal of therapy and understands how
Speaker 3: to communicate. I am amazed at how he can talk
Speaker 3: so beautifully to our daughters. I wish I had that.
Speaker 3: I feel almost like, Oh, I let him do a
Speaker 3: lot of like the tough talk, I don't feel quite
Speaker 3: as well equipped to do it, and he is just
Speaker 3: he is a gem when it comes to conversations.
Speaker 1: Sometimes the letter in your head is a way to
Speaker 1: kind of process all of these feelings, and it feels
Speaker 1: very solitary because that's what you had to do growing up.
Speaker 1: You really didn't have people to process your feelings with.
Speaker 1: Even when your mom wrote those letters, you didn't go
Speaker 1: then and talk to her about it or say I
Speaker 1: feel differently.
Speaker 3: About this, yeah.
Speaker 1: And so now you have someone in your life that
Speaker 1: you can talk to that way. And I'm wondering when
Speaker 1: something comes up, an incident happens where you feel slighted
Speaker 1: by your friend's husband, or you see the kids being
Speaker 1: mistreated at the park. Do you ever feel like if
Speaker 1: I talk to my husband that that lessens the impulse
Speaker 1: to need to then go ahead and write the letter.
Speaker 3: Not really, And perhaps that's something I should do more of,
Speaker 3: to sort of speak to someone about it. I think
Speaker 3: something about me too, is that I really hold on
Speaker 3: to grudges. I really hold on to perceive slights. It's
Speaker 3: almost like it's a point of pride to keep going
Speaker 3: over these unpleasant interactions I had with people as a
Speaker 3: way of not I don't know, not forgetting as a
Speaker 3: way of saying, oh see they're really bad. They said
Speaker 3: this to me or they did this to me.
Speaker 2: The thing that strikes me about letter writing when we
Speaker 2: don't send the letters is that there's a certain powerlessness
Speaker 2: that comes with it because the powerlessness feeling is that
Speaker 2: I can't address it with the person directly. I can't
Speaker 2: actually get satisfaction. I can't tell them that I feel slighted.
Speaker 2: If that's the case, the best I can do is
Speaker 2: have a revenge fantasy in my head. But to me,
Speaker 2: that is associated with feeling unempowered to actually have an
Speaker 2: impact in the real world with a person themselves. Your
Speaker 2: mother did something similar because she wasn't looking for a conversation.
Speaker 2: She would have spoken to you if she was. She
Speaker 2: was looking to just throw it out there and then
Speaker 2: hope for the best. And I'm wondering about this aspect
Speaker 2: of the feeling unempowered to address some of these lights
Speaker 2: directly with the people who slighted you, and is that
Speaker 2: something that you tend to do at all, And how
Speaker 2: does that go when you try and actually have a conversation.
Speaker 3: It's very awkward for me, It's very difficult. I feel
Speaker 3: like when I have to have a difficult conversation with someone,
Speaker 3: it's almost as if like I'm blanking out and I
Speaker 3: have a hard time keeping track of the conversation or
Speaker 3: making coherent points. I would attribute that to my father's
Speaker 3: anger when we were growing up, and what a great volume.
Speaker 3: There was no room for a conversation. And I think
Speaker 3: a difficult conversation like that now really cows me.
Speaker 2: When you feel slighted or hurt or dismissed or ignored,
Speaker 2: do you also then feel frustration because of the powerlessness
Speaker 2: that you feel because you can't address it directly, so
Speaker 2: you won't be able to get satisfaction that way. Does
Speaker 2: that feeling stand out for you?
Speaker 3: Yes, it does, because I know that it just sort
Speaker 3: of goes on a hamster wheel of I feel affronted
Speaker 3: by something, I'll write a letter. There's a slight release,
Speaker 3: you know, the valve is twisted a little bit, and
Speaker 3: then I'll ruminate on it again. So I write the
Speaker 3: letter and it's a little bit more of vitriolic. It's
Speaker 3: a treadmill, and it's exhausting and it's shameful. It's really
Speaker 3: shameful that I do this to people that I love
Speaker 3: and that have shown a great generosity to me.
Speaker 2: Well, but you haven't done anything to them. From what
Speaker 2: they know. You actually really pleasant because you never bring
Speaker 2: up any issues, right.
Speaker 3: And maybe I'm mad at myself that I'm not bringing
Speaker 3: up these issues. That's probably a portion of it too.
Speaker 1: You mentioned resentment, and I'm thinking about what Guy was
Speaker 1: saying about how it really fuels more resentment. The way
Speaker 1: that you ruminate you think about it, it gets bigger,
Speaker 1: not smaller for you. And the more emotional real estate
Speaker 1: that you devote to this, the more land it takes
Speaker 1: up in your mind. Because it doesn't really feel satisfying.
Speaker 1: It doesn't really go.
Speaker 3: Anyyeah, right, it really doesn't.
Speaker 1: We think about resentment almost counterintuitively as related to grieving
Speaker 1: that sometimes when we carry around a lot of resentment
Speaker 1: towards someone, what we're really resisting is doing some grieving
Speaker 1: of maybe I'm going to have to let go of something,
Speaker 1: or maybe I'm going to lose this, maybe I can't
Speaker 1: have this kind of closeness in the way that I
Speaker 1: want to have it. So we hold the resentment thinking
Speaker 1: that it's empowering, but in fact it's disempowering. And I
Speaker 1: don't think that you see a third way, which is
Speaker 1: is there a way that I can get more acquainted
Speaker 1: with what I'm feeling, get more clarity on it, have
Speaker 1: some perspective on it, and then be able to pick
Speaker 1: and choose what I approach my friend about. Once I
Speaker 1: have more clarity about what is historical and what is current,
Speaker 1: what is something that's getting magnified because of my experience
Speaker 1: as a child, and what is something that is really
Speaker 1: very present right now. And those kinds of conversations could
Speaker 1: very well bring you more closeness and not have you
Speaker 1: feel the need to rehearse all of these scenarios in
Speaker 1: your head.
Speaker 3: To say that word rehearsal is just so spot on.
Speaker 3: I find myself having these conversations where I'm almost trying
Speaker 3: to prepare for almost comeback, and it's like, why are
Speaker 3: you rehearsing a conversation that hasn't taken place.
Speaker 1: It sounds like what you're doing is you're presenting a
Speaker 1: your case in court. Yeah, and there's a jury that's
Speaker 1: there in your head and you're trying to convince them.
Speaker 1: And the problem is that really the courtroom is empty.
Speaker 1: But we do that all the time. It's so common
Speaker 1: where something happens in our lives and we have all
Speaker 1: these fantasies about what we'd like to say and why
Speaker 1: the other person was wrong and why we deserve to
Speaker 1: be treated this way, and often we don't tell the
Speaker 1: other person, but we're trying to prove our case in
Speaker 1: our head, and that is not very satisfying.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think at the heart of the matter, what
Speaker 3: it is is what you said. It's that there's a
Speaker 3: closeness that I'm longing for that has disappeared since she
Speaker 3: married this person. And I know logically friendships they wax
Speaker 3: and they wane, but I really miss that friendship of
Speaker 3: how we used to be before this person showed up.
Speaker 3: And I know I can't ask her to throw away
Speaker 3: her husband. That's not reasonable.
Speaker 1: But there's a lot in between asking her to throw
Speaker 1: away her husband and not having closeness with her, right because.
Speaker 2: Right now you're the one that's creating the distance, because
Speaker 2: when you write these letters to her and to her husband,
Speaker 2: and as Lori said, when you take the case to court,
Speaker 2: to the empty court, because unfairness is what makes us
Speaker 2: do that. We want to get validation that things are unfair.
Speaker 2: So we prepare in our head the case that we
Speaker 2: will present the court in which will be ruled, and indeed,
Speaker 2: something unfair was done to us, and there's our validation
Speaker 2: because we're not getting it anywhere else. But when you
Speaker 2: do that, the anger and resentment towards the husband and
Speaker 2: towards her for having that husband does create a distance
Speaker 2: emotionally between you and her. But that's coming from you,
Speaker 2: which you then have to overcome that distance whenever you're
Speaker 2: together or talking with her to be able to reconnect,
Speaker 2: And so it makes the friendship less satisfying for you. Yeah,
Speaker 2: in other words, you're the one that actually pays the
Speaker 2: price rather than her.
Speaker 3: Or her husband, And that's that's exactly how I would
Speaker 3: characterize the friendship. You know, we see each other sporadically.
Speaker 3: It's by as high high kiss case, the quick lunch,
Speaker 3: and then it feels pretty empty. Again. It's not satisfying.
Speaker 2: Because it's hard to have connective tissue and conversation with
Speaker 2: someone toward him, you're holding so many grudges and resentments
Speaker 2: and history. It's hard to open up to feel vulnerable
Speaker 2: because there's so much stuff in the way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you said that you're very uncomfortable bringing up difficult
Speaker 1: topics with people. Can you do that with your husband?
Speaker 3: Yes? I can. I don't very often, but I know
Speaker 3: I can. I know he would make space for me.
Speaker 3: I know he would hear just about anything and really
Speaker 3: try to approach it with an open mind.
Speaker 1: You're saying that he would as if you imagine that
Speaker 1: like the letters that you write, you imagine a scenario.
Speaker 1: But I'd like to hear if you have had a
Speaker 1: difficult conversation with him that you brought up, and can
Speaker 1: you tell us about that.
Speaker 3: You know, we don't fight terribly often. If we have
Speaker 3: a tough topic to discuss, it's my husband who brings
Speaker 3: it up. He's really the one that sort of leads
Speaker 3: that conversation. I often feel so like my hands and
Speaker 3: arms are cut off when it's a difficult conversation. And
Speaker 3: he's helpful, never in a way that's like he's telling
Speaker 3: me what I think or what I feel. But I
Speaker 3: find him very helpful to help me articulate things. But
Speaker 3: to answer your question, Laurie, I can't say that I've
Speaker 3: ever brought up a difficult conversation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and even there with someone that you feel very,
Speaker 1: very safe with, it's hard for you to bring something up.
Speaker 1: In fifteen years, you have never brought up a difficult
Speaker 1: topic between you. It's always been him. Yeah, what's your
Speaker 1: fear with your husband? If you were to bring something up?
Speaker 3: I guess my fear, and I think this is a
Speaker 3: fear that applies to almost any difficult conversation with anybody,
Speaker 3: is that I won't be able to, I guess, stay
Speaker 3: on my ground or articulate my voice because you'll feel
Speaker 3: too flooded to do that, or because they won't listen.
Speaker 3: I think I'd feel too overwhelmed. I think i'd feel
Speaker 3: fearful that that the floodgates would open, and that a
Speaker 3: lot of hurt would come spilling out. And you know,
Speaker 3: as I said before, when I fight with people, I
Speaker 3: almost can't think. When I have a difficult conversation, I
Speaker 3: lose the thread a lot, and I lose my thoughts,
Speaker 3: so you dissociate. Yes, And I have no training in
Speaker 3: how to have a positive conversation. I have no experience,
Speaker 3: and I think it feels shameful as a grown woman
Speaker 3: that I can't defend myself. And so I take all
Speaker 3: of that hurt and I channel it towards these letters.
Speaker 3: And I'm sure that you know these letters are not
Speaker 3: just toward that one person, but it's towards all of
Speaker 3: the people that I feel angry about. It's just easier
Speaker 3: for me to sort of sift it down into one person.
Speaker 3: But yes, fighting is very, very scary for me.
Speaker 1: See, we weren't even talking about fighting. We were talking
Speaker 1: about a conversation. But for you, in your mind, there's
Speaker 1: no difference between bringing something up to help prepare something
Speaker 1: and fighting.
Speaker 3: That's right. I can't see them as being separate.
Speaker 1: And yet when your husband brings these things up to you,
Speaker 1: do you feel that that's fighting or do you feel
Speaker 1: like you're having a conversation.
Speaker 3: I feel like we're a conversation. I trust him, and
Speaker 3: I never feel like it's going to be combative. I
Speaker 3: know that I can always get to the words somehow,
Speaker 3: but with other people, I don't know why I sort
Speaker 3: of revert into this like I'm cowering in a corner.
Speaker 3: I know what I feel and I know what I think,
Speaker 3: but somehow to express that to people it's so tough
Speaker 3: for me.
Speaker 1: Can you give us an example of something that happened
Speaker 1: recently with anyone? Is that it's not just with this friend? Yeah,
Speaker 1: where you said you know exactly what you're feeling.
Speaker 3: Sure. I was talking to a fellow mom on the
Speaker 3: playground a few months ago, and she was ranting about
Speaker 3: someone that we know in common, and the person I
Speaker 3: was talking to she has a dusk job, and she
Speaker 3: was all of a sudden making snide comments about this
Speaker 3: third party not having a job. She was just a
Speaker 3: stay at home mother, and she was really denigrating and
Speaker 3: pitting sort of the work moms and the stay at
Speaker 3: home moms, pitting them against one another. And I said
Speaker 3: to her, well, you do realize that I must stay
Speaker 3: at home mom. And I can't remember exactly what she said,
Speaker 3: but she glossed over it, and she kept talking in
Speaker 3: a very condescending manner about this woman, implying that she
Speaker 3: does nothing. And I've stowed about it for days. I
Speaker 3: continue to doe about it because she knows full well
Speaker 3: that I'm a stay at home parent. And yet even
Speaker 3: as I told her to back off that I found
Speaker 3: this offensive, she kept going. And in the moment, for me,
Speaker 3: it was easier just to sort of walk away from
Speaker 3: this person rolling my eyes. But I still feel that
Speaker 3: smart and I've sort of spun that interaction into her
Speaker 3: being a horrible person, a neglectful mother, inconsiderate of other people,
Speaker 3: and it just has sort of become this hurricane.
Speaker 1: But I was asking what you felt, so I'm hearing
Speaker 1: a lot about what you thought. Yeah, tell me what
Speaker 1: the feeling was.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I felt disrespected and unheard, and those I think
Speaker 3: are my trigger points. I felt small.
Speaker 2: What do you wish you would have said to her
Speaker 2: in that moment?
Speaker 3: I wish I could have told her to I mean,
Speaker 3: buzz off. I mean, she probably shouldn't say this to me.
Speaker 2: What occurred to me also is that you can think
Speaker 2: about it in hindsight and you can articulate it very
Speaker 2: clearly in the moment, the anxiety you feel is so
Speaker 2: severe that you truly dissociate. And I'm just was wondering
Speaker 2: whether you had any knowledge about whether that's something that
Speaker 2: happened to your mom, And maybe that's why she would
Speaker 2: write letters, because she too might not have been able
Speaker 2: to handle a direct conversation.
Speaker 3: Yes, I believe so. She had a very hard, charging
Speaker 3: mother who would tell you exactly what she thought, tolerated
Speaker 3: no other opinions.
Speaker 1: So your grandmother would express herself in a very unthoughtful way, yeah,
Speaker 1: and then your mother would express herself also in a
Speaker 1: very rigid way and maybe unthoughtful, but never directly to later.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I've often thought about that.
Speaker 1: And when we talk about intergenerational trauma, this is a
Speaker 1: way of being that has been passed down through the generations,
Speaker 1: and it's always the person who comes and says, I'm
Speaker 1: having trouble with this. Who can put a stop to it,
Speaker 1: who can really end the cycle? And I think it's
Speaker 1: interesting that the word you used when you said this
Speaker 1: woman was talking to you and I said how did
Speaker 1: you feel? And you said I felt very small, because
Speaker 1: you probably did feel small, literally like you felt as
Speaker 1: a child.
Speaker 3: Yeah, totally, totally.
Speaker 2: Is this something you've ever spoken about with your siblings.
Speaker 2: Is it a conversation you've had about the style your
Speaker 2: parents had with the shunning and the letters, and the
Speaker 2: impact that had on you.
Speaker 3: It's interesting you say that because I recently saw both
Speaker 3: my brothers over the holidays. My father is in the
Speaker 3: middle of dementia and he really can't handle having grandchildren
Speaker 3: around him because he doesn't know who is who. He
Speaker 3: had an outburst yelled at some small grandchildren. But my
Speaker 3: oldest brother said to me, she just like being twelve again,
Speaker 3: And I kind of thought, like, oh, look at you.
Speaker 3: That's right. Like if anybody has been more forward in
Speaker 3: talking about our father and how sort of oppressive he was,
Speaker 3: it's me. I felt like a little glimmer of hope
Speaker 3: hearing my brother say that, an acknowledgment that, like his
Speaker 3: childhood had been kind of miserable too.
Speaker 1: Have you ever directly talked to your brothers about the
Speaker 1: experience of being children together and your father's outbursts and
Speaker 1: your mother's letters.
Speaker 3: No, we haven't. We've had some comments where I know
Speaker 3: that they felt similarly, but no, we've skated over it
Speaker 3: and made comments. I think because it was traumatic for us.
Speaker 3: All we try to put it behind us.
Speaker 1: That comment, though, about oh, which just like being twelve again,
Speaker 1: feels a little bit like an acknowledgment and opening.
Speaker 3: That's how I read it.
Speaker 1: Can you give us an example of the most recent
Speaker 1: letter that you've written in your head with this friend.
Speaker 3: Sure, I'll give you an example of a letter I
Speaker 3: would write to the spouse. I would probably say something
Speaker 3: about how my friend had an affair because she was
Speaker 3: so frustrated and bored by you, And I would probably
Speaker 3: end it by saying, that's how everyone finds you boring
Speaker 3: and frustrating. They're just written to eviscerate, and no, there's
Speaker 3: nothing really about them other than to hurt.
Speaker 2: But you don't convey your hurt. In other words, the
Speaker 2: letter isn't I'm very upset with you because you took
Speaker 2: my friend away from me, and you cost me this
Speaker 2: bond that was so special to me for so long,
Speaker 2: and you created such resentment in me that it's difficult
Speaker 2: for me now to really connect with her and to
Speaker 2: reach the depths of friendship that we used to have.
Speaker 2: That's not what the letter is. Have you ever written
Speaker 2: a letter like that that actually just speaks about how
Speaker 2: you feel. No, no, why not do you think?
Speaker 3: I think because it's harder for me to express myself.
Speaker 2: I think it's because it's more pained to do that,
Speaker 2: to confront yourself with how you're really feeling, with the
Speaker 2: loss that you really experience, with the sense of injustice
Speaker 2: that you have, with that sense of powerlessness and frustration.
Speaker 2: I think it taps into that. Yeah, and I think
Speaker 2: you're trying to stay away from that, even though you
Speaker 2: do have access to it, because when we speak about it,
Speaker 2: you get tearful. But the letters are not just the
Speaker 2: venting there to keep you away from the real painful
Speaker 2: stuff that's going on underneath.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I see that, and I agree with you.
Speaker 1: Are you wanting something to change with your friend or
Speaker 1: with her husband, because you were talking about a letter
Speaker 1: to her husband. What are the letters that you write
Speaker 1: to your friend?
Speaker 3: The most recent versions would have to do with how
Speaker 3: she's raising her children, or who are all lovely by
Speaker 3: the way, I would perhaps see the child and the
Speaker 3: child in completely the normal course of being an eight
Speaker 3: year old or a nine year old has a moment
Speaker 3: where they act out, so I would probably say something like, well,
Speaker 3: your child is disrespectful to you, and everyone thinks is
Speaker 3: a brat. Really, the crux of my letters are written
Speaker 3: to this husband, So you know the letters that I
Speaker 3: write to my friend, I would probably also point out
Speaker 3: how awful her husband is.
Speaker 1: It sounds like she shares her own difficulty with her
Speaker 1: husband with you, Yes, And I wonder what that's like,
Speaker 1: given your own feelings toward him. What role do you
Speaker 1: play in that when she brings up something difficult about
Speaker 1: her husband.
Speaker 3: Well after they were first married, there was a very
Speaker 3: rocky period immediately following their marriage, and it looked as
Speaker 3: if the marriage would be over very quickly. And I
Speaker 3: remember being out with her one night and she was
Speaker 3: telling me his terrible treatment of her, and I offered
Speaker 3: her a place to stay, and I said, you know,
Speaker 3: you can always stay with me for however long you need,
Speaker 3: but I don't believe that you deserve this treatment. Within
Speaker 3: a couple weeks, things were repaired, they were back together,
Speaker 3: and it was as if sort of an iceberg had
Speaker 3: come in between us. I think she was greatly offended
Speaker 3: by me saying, based upon what she told me, that
Speaker 3: if you want to leave him, I will help you.
Speaker 3: I think she wanted to vent and the fact that
Speaker 3: I gave her advice put a wedge in between us.
Speaker 1: But she still shares things that happen with her husband
Speaker 1: with you.
Speaker 3: Yes, And now what I say is I just say, do.
Speaker 2: You share any struggles with her? Since she's sharing such
Speaker 2: personal things, do you?
Speaker 3: She never asks, And when I try to bring something
Speaker 3: up that has happened to me, something about my family
Speaker 3: or my father, it almost always reverts back to her.
Speaker 3: And I'm certain that's feeling. Some of my anger in
Speaker 3: this situation is that I don't feel heard.
Speaker 1: It doesn't sound like there's a lot of reciprocity in
Speaker 1: the friendship.
Speaker 3: You're absolutely right. The way that the friendship is structured,
Speaker 3: there's very little reciprocity. I'm aware of the imbalance of it.
Speaker 3: And I have tried to talk about, you know, my children,
Speaker 3: not in a way that feels forceful, but just to
Speaker 3: sort of even things out, and it always seems to
Speaker 3: go back to her and her situation or her life
Speaker 3: whatever it is.
Speaker 1: You know, of all the letters that you write in
Speaker 1: your head, I haven't heard you write a letter in
Speaker 1: your head to your mother or your father. Yeah, when
Speaker 1: you were young, did you do that? Did you make
Speaker 1: your case. Did you have your courtroom in your head
Speaker 1: when you would feel misunderstood or mistreated.
Speaker 3: Yes, in my head, I would definitely write them letters.
Speaker 3: It was too scary, though, to think about having an
Speaker 3: actual face to face conversation with them. My father would
Speaker 3: just walk away. I'm almost positive of it.
Speaker 1: So you've been writing these letters, in fact, for a
Speaker 1: very very long time.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 1: Tell us a little bit about what your relationship with
Speaker 1: your mother is like now.
Speaker 3: I touch base with her usually every day, every other day.
Speaker 3: She is recovering from about of cancer. We talk, but
Speaker 3: we don't talk about anything that's you know, I had
Speaker 3: a fight, I'm feeling very closed in today, or something
Speaker 3: like that. We just would never talk about that. My
Speaker 3: mother is relentlessly positive, relentlessly positive, and you always look
Speaker 3: to the bright side. If someone offends you, you just
Speaker 3: shake your head and roll your eyes and move on,
Speaker 3: and you don't waste time on stuff like that.
Speaker 2: Well, you write them a letter, really, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3: She has her own ways of dealing with it. So
Speaker 3: I'm close with her, but I'm not emotionally close with her.
Speaker 3: I want her to be a part of my children's lives,
Speaker 3: and she's a wonderful grandmother cozy in a way that
Speaker 3: I didn't have the grandmother be cozy with me, And
Speaker 3: I'm really happy for that relationship. She loves those girls
Speaker 3: so much. But she just is not an emotional mother.
Speaker 3: She never has been an emotional mother that would give
Speaker 3: me advice or I don't feel like she or my
Speaker 3: father ever taught me how to navigate difficult conversations.
Speaker 1: I want you to notice that you said she's cozy
Speaker 1: with them in a way that I didn't have that
Speaker 1: with a grandmother. But you didn't say she's cozy in
Speaker 1: a way with them that I didn't have with my mother.
Speaker 3: True.
Speaker 1: Do you see how far away you stay from those
Speaker 1: painful feelings?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I have to tell you that there's been one
Speaker 3: time in my life that my mother called me sweetheart.
Speaker 3: She called me something other than Catherine. And when she
Speaker 3: called me sweetheart, I remember just freezing and just I
Speaker 3: couldn't believe that she used a term of endearment towards me.
Speaker 3: It was so strange. I still remember where I was
Speaker 3: and just kind of thinking, like, I can't believe she
Speaker 3: said something to me like that. It was almost like
Speaker 3: being slapped.
Speaker 1: You kind of dissociated too, you kind of froze.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Have you had a friendship that's been reciprocal and satisfying.
Speaker 3: Yes, Yes. It was somebody I met through work and
Speaker 3: it's been a friendship of about twenty years or so.
Speaker 3: This person has subsequently moved to another state and we
Speaker 3: don't talk very often, but it's an immediate and deep
Speaker 3: friendship when we do. I feel very comfortable with her,
Speaker 3: sort of like my husband. I feel like she has
Speaker 3: an emotional adroitness that I admire and one that I
Speaker 3: know won't be used against me.
Speaker 1: So you don't freeze with her. You're able to bring
Speaker 1: up things with her, although it sounds like probably not
Speaker 1: a lot comes up because you're not in the same location.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, I do feel comfortable having difficult conversations with her.
Speaker 1: Have you ever done that?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I think at one point it was probably in
Speaker 3: the lead up to her wedding. It was all we
Speaker 3: talked about, and I asked her for a little bit
Speaker 3: of space because I couldn't talk about this wedding anymore.
Speaker 3: I just needed a break, and she was very respectful
Speaker 3: of that.
Speaker 1: And it didn't make the friendship go away.
Speaker 3: No, it didn't make the friendship go away. I still
Speaker 3: count that as one of my most important friendships, and
Speaker 3: I'm very thankful for it.
Speaker 1: Does she know how much you appreciated that?
Speaker 3: I don't know. I should probably tell her about that.
Speaker 2: Does your husband know how much you appreciate him?
Speaker 3: I think he does. I think we have a good
Speaker 3: a good way of just sort of day in day out,
Speaker 3: you know, a touch on the shoulder. He is. I
Speaker 3: will say this very good about every day saying I
Speaker 3: appreciate you. I am less good. But I will tell
Speaker 3: you something. The big difference between my husband and I.
Speaker 3: My husband lost his father in a terrible boating accident,
Speaker 3: so he understands far better than I do about losing people.
Speaker 3: He has done a great deal of work emotionally processing
Speaker 3: that loss, and although I know it has been the
Speaker 3: defining moment in his life, it has brought him a
Speaker 3: real emotional clarity and a facility with saying I need help,
Speaker 3: who can help me? And and taking that help. And
Speaker 3: I have not had that experience of loss.
Speaker 1: I think you have had an experience of loss. It
Speaker 1: just looks different. You mentioned when your mother called you sweetheart,
Speaker 1: it you froze. Yeah, what do you do when your
Speaker 1: husband tells you I appreciate you.
Speaker 3: Well, he usually comes in for a kiss and it's
Speaker 3: very sweet, and I love that he does that.
Speaker 1: But what happens inside your body?
Speaker 4: Well, I think it's a little bit still of an
Speaker 4: unfamiliar feeling, but it's also quite sweet and welcome. Does
Speaker 4: your body freeze, well, a little bit, But you know
Speaker 4: I return his kiss or his hug.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but verbally you don't. Oh, yeah, very turn the sentiment.
Speaker 3: You know what I usually say. I usually say we
Speaker 3: have a wonderful life together, because we do do.
Speaker 5: And I really feel that I'm laughing because it's like
Speaker 5: if someone says I love you, and you say things
Speaker 5: are very nice, right, it's not personal, it's not intimate,
Speaker 5: it's not about you specifically. We have a nice life
Speaker 5: together is a very safe response.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I appreciate you too is a less safe response.
Speaker 3: Right. It's just it's wildly unfamiliar to me to be
Speaker 3: I guess more of vulnerable.
Speaker 2: Do you say I love you to him?
Speaker 3: Oh? Yes, yes, we say that quite often. I'm very
Speaker 3: comfortable saying that to him. I'm very comfortable saying it
Speaker 3: to my children. When my mother calls, she never says
Speaker 3: the word I, but she just says love you, you know,
Speaker 3: and I notice that, and I don't want my husband
Speaker 3: or my children to feel that because there's a lot
Speaker 3: of space missing from that word.
Speaker 1: There's a huge space left by the lack of the eye.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, Catherine, we have some advice for you. When
Speaker 2: here's the first part. We spoke about the fact that
Speaker 2: when there's something intense emotionally going on, you tend to dissociate.
Speaker 2: That's what keeps you, in part from being able to
Speaker 2: have confrontations or even difficult discussions with people. But it
Speaker 2: also happened when good things happen, when your mom calls
Speaker 2: your sweetheart, or when your husband says something very loving
Speaker 2: to you, then you also have a little bit of
Speaker 2: a freezon that moment because it's intense. So the first
Speaker 2: thing we'd like you to do is we'd like you
Speaker 2: to express to your husband. And we think the best
Speaker 2: way for you to do this would be to write
Speaker 2: it out, not as a letter, but just write it
Speaker 2: out and then read it to him. He says to
Speaker 2: you that he appreciates you all the time, you said,
Speaker 2: and your response, people areking the said is like, yes,
Speaker 2: we have a nice life together and we want you
Speaker 2: to make it more personal. We'd like you to express
Speaker 2: to him how much you appreciate him, and we'd like
Speaker 2: you to make it very personal about how he makes
Speaker 2: you feel, that you feel safe with him, whatever the
Speaker 2: things are that are specific that he does that is
Speaker 2: so emotionally expressive, that you admire how well he recovered
Speaker 2: from the loss of his dad and how much work
Speaker 2: he did in therapy and work on himself and be
Speaker 2: such a loving dad after that kind of loss. We'd
Speaker 2: like you to write it out, because we think that'll
Speaker 2: be easier if you wrote it out ahead of time,
Speaker 2: but then we'd like you to read it to him
Speaker 2: and see how you feel doing that. But we'd like
Speaker 2: you to not only do that, but then also be
Speaker 2: able to sit with his response and sit with how
Speaker 2: he's receiving it, and especially if it's meaningful to him,
Speaker 2: to be able to take that in as well, because
Speaker 2: that's connective tissue we think you can have even more
Speaker 2: of with him.
Speaker 3: I can do that.
Speaker 1: And as we're talking about having a more direct connection
Speaker 1: with your husband, we were thinking about your friend about
Speaker 1: how many of the letters that you write in your
Speaker 1: head around that friendship are actually directed toward her husband.
Speaker 1: We would like you to focus more on the relationship
Speaker 1: between you and your friend, regardless of what's going on
Speaker 1: in their marriage. And one of the things that was
Speaker 1: interesting was you talked about how close you are, but
Speaker 1: at the same time, there doesn't seem to be a
Speaker 1: lot of room for you to get support from her.
Speaker 1: The conversation kind of drifts back to whatever is going
Speaker 1: on with her.
Speaker 3: You have this.
Speaker 1: Idea that either you confront somebody and everything could blow up,
Speaker 1: which is why you don't confront people, or you write
Speaker 1: letters in your head and you plot revenge. And those
Speaker 1: are the two alternatives. We want to give you a
Speaker 1: third way. We would like you to call your friend
Speaker 1: and say, is there a time that we can talk,
Speaker 1: And we'd like you to talk about something going on
Speaker 1: in your own life, and maybe it's your father right
Speaker 1: now with dementia and some of the difficulty because your
Speaker 1: family doesn't really talk about things. And if she readirects
Speaker 1: and says, let me tell you about what's going on
Speaker 1: with my husband instead of just sitting there and then
Speaker 1: writing a revenge letter later in the moment, you can say,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm happy to talk about that later, but
Speaker 1: right now, I'm really struggling with this. Can we talk
Speaker 1: about this a little bit more and see how she responds. Now,
Speaker 1: she might not be able to do that with you,
Speaker 1: and that's good information, and the information is, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: she's not a person that really has the capacity for that,
Speaker 1: And that might motivate you to look at the other
Speaker 1: relationships in your life and other friendships so that you
Speaker 1: don't lose this friendship. But maybe it serves certain purposes
Speaker 1: for you but not others, so you're not simmering all
Speaker 1: the time with this feeling of being unacknowledged or unseen
Speaker 1: or unheard. The other possibility is that she might respond well,
Speaker 1: and she might really be there for you. And now
Speaker 1: what you're doing is you're changing that assumption you have
Speaker 1: that she just doesn't have an interest in you, and
Speaker 1: you're saying, oh, I haven't been stepping up. I haven't
Speaker 1: been sharing myself with her because I was afraid to.
Speaker 1: But when I do insert myself into the conversation and
Speaker 1: I tell her what I need, she's actually quite responsive.
Speaker 1: And this takes you away from the whole obsession around
Speaker 1: the husband and all the revenge fantasies around him, and
Speaker 1: it puts you right there in the friendship to see
Speaker 1: what this friendship can be.
Speaker 6: Yeah, because that's entirely what I want, so that you're
Speaker 6: not sitting there feeling helpless like you experienced growing up,
Speaker 6: and then you feel like you have no recourse other
Speaker 6: than to have these court cases go on in your mind.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And our hope is that once you establish more trust,
Speaker 1: that you can be in this friendship differently. Maybe you
Speaker 1: guys will start talking about the friendship itself at a
Speaker 1: certain point to be able to say to her, Hey,
Speaker 1: I miss you, can we get together, or even positive
Speaker 1: things like I've really enjoyed how we've been talking lately.
Speaker 1: It makes me feel really close with you. Little statements
Speaker 1: like that really can have an effect on the entire
Speaker 1: feeling of what the friendship is like.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, no, I like that.
Speaker 2: One more thing we have for you to do. We
Speaker 2: were thinking about your childhood and how unseen you felt,
Speaker 2: and how unable you will to speak up because your
Speaker 2: dad would just bark and your mom wouldn't communicate. You'd
Speaker 2: send a letter but not have the conversation. We'd like
Speaker 2: you to get in touch with how that felt to
Speaker 2: grow up in that house because your letters tend to
Speaker 2: be an attempt to, in fantasy hurt the other person,
Speaker 2: but you're writing them because you're not looking at your
Speaker 2: own hurt. And we'd like you to get in touch
Speaker 2: with some of that hurt from childhood. So we'd like
Speaker 2: you to actually write a real letter. Now it will
Speaker 2: be one you don't send, but we'd like you to
Speaker 2: write a letter to your mum in which you tell
Speaker 2: her and describe to her what it was like for
Speaker 2: you to grow up in the house, what it was
Speaker 2: like for you to receive that letter from her about
Speaker 2: the box that you didn't love and gather dust. We'd
Speaker 2: like you to tell her what it was like to
Speaker 2: not be able to speak up, what it was like
Speaker 2: to be told that the weight of the future of
Speaker 2: America is in your hands and that a minus is
Speaker 2: going to cost us Aul dearly. You know, we'd like
Speaker 2: you to be as honest and as open as you can,
Speaker 2: because you won't be sending the letter to her, what
Speaker 2: you will be doing with it after you're done. We
Speaker 2: want you to be seen, So we'd like you just
Speaker 2: to share it with your husband and say, this is
Speaker 2: a letter I'm not sending to my mom. Someone has
Speaker 2: to hear it and I'll appreciate so much of that
Speaker 2: with you and read it to him and be able
Speaker 2: to express it and be heard and be seen by someone.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's beautiful. I love that idea.
Speaker 1: And then we'd also like you to sit with what
Speaker 1: it feels like when he resis what is it like
Speaker 1: not only to be able to let your feelings be
Speaker 1: seen by yourself, which we think you don't do enough
Speaker 1: because you're so focused on the other people and the
Speaker 1: revenge fantasies, but what is it like to be seen
Speaker 1: by someone I'm close with? Yea, those are the three
Speaker 1: tasks for the week, okay, and we're really looking forward
Speaker 1: to hearing how those go for you.
Speaker 3: Oh, thank you. This has been something more than I
Speaker 3: could have imagined.
Speaker 2: I really feel for Catherine because growing up feeling so
Speaker 2: unseen and dealing with that silent treatment and the shunning,
Speaker 2: it's so painful, and then experiencing that in her adult
Speaker 2: life over and over again because she can't speak up
Speaker 2: and so she feels so unseen and then so powerless.
Speaker 2: It is just very difficult to deal with for so
Speaker 2: many decades.
Speaker 1: And what's interesting is that sometimes people don't realize that
Speaker 1: there's an intergenerational transmission. We saw that it might present differently,
Speaker 1: where her grandmother was very critical and outspoken, and then
Speaker 1: the mother was very critical writing letters, but we're not
Speaker 1: going to have a conversation about it. And then you
Speaker 1: come to Catherine and she's just dissociated, so you can
Speaker 1: see that she wants to stop it. I was very
Speaker 1: encouraged by how open she is to taking risks, even
Speaker 1: though it scares her. She's very interested in trying something new.
Speaker 1: She's gotten to the point where she said, this is
Speaker 1: very exhausting. I don't want to live this way. This
Speaker 1: is emotionally draining, and so I really hope that the
Speaker 1: assignment we gave her will help her not only to
Speaker 1: feel more seen and heard around her experiences, but also
Speaker 1: opens her up to the positive experiences. We always say
Speaker 1: that if you're going to mute the pain, you're going
Speaker 1: to mute the joy, and I think that's what's happened here.
Speaker 1: When her husband says I appreciate you, she says, well,
Speaker 1: we have a nice life together. So I think it'll
Speaker 1: be really interesting to see how these exercises go this
Speaker 1: week and what kind of shifts she can make from them.
Speaker 2: You're listening to dea therapists. We'll be back after a
Speaker 2: short break.
Speaker 3: So guy.
Speaker 1: We heard back from Catherine and let's hear how her
Speaker 1: week went.
Speaker 3: Hello, Assignment number one. My husband was very touched to
Speaker 3: hear my letter. He listened and cried at times. While
Speaker 3: he knows how hard it is for me to express
Speaker 3: my feelings, they really felt as if I saw him. Overall,
Speaker 3: he was very supportive and cited my kindness and the
Speaker 3: fact that I reached out to your program the signs
Speaker 3: that despite having had an unhappy childhood, I still want
Speaker 3: to treat others and myself well and want to find
Speaker 3: a deeper understanding about my childhood so I can have
Speaker 3: better relationships. We had a great conversation that lasted about
Speaker 3: an hour. I didn't blank out, but I do feel
Speaker 3: that because it was just a lot to process, I
Speaker 3: will remember more about it in the coming days. It
Speaker 3: was a very positive and loving experience, and my husband
Speaker 3: noted at the end that he doesn't doubt my love
Speaker 3: for him, but he would like it if I expressed
Speaker 3: that love more, which having heard that from him, I
Speaker 3: will do for me. The atmosphere was sort of charged
Speaker 3: in a very unfamiliar but I think positive way, and
Speaker 3: my body felt relaxed for assignment too. Speaking with my friend,
Speaker 3: it certainly felt unfamiliar to pick up the phone and
Speaker 3: call her. We chatted for a few minutes, and then
Speaker 3: I asked her if she had the experience of seeing
Speaker 3: her childhood in a way that significantly differed from her siblings.
Speaker 3: I could hear the surprise in her voice, maybe because
Speaker 3: we text far more often than speak on the phone,
Speaker 3: but she answered my question openly. We laughed at parts
Speaker 3: and we commiserated at others, and I felt a connection
Speaker 3: through that. I'll see her soon, and I'm going to
Speaker 3: tell her how much I enjoyed that conversation, and that
Speaker 3: I think about our friendship a lot. Assignment three. Writing
Speaker 3: the letter to my mom, but reading it to my husband,
Speaker 3: this letter came flowing out of me. I noted how
Speaker 3: she could see my father's ragey behavior dictating the atmosphere
Speaker 3: of almost everything in the house, and how that left
Speaker 3: very little room for anyone to safely express their feelings.
Speaker 3: I wish that she could have taken me aside, somewhere
Speaker 3: safe to have these conversations, if only to say, you
Speaker 3: may not feel comfortable speaking with your dad around, but
Speaker 3: we need to do it for your sake and your benefit.
Speaker 3: My mom has often said that she's so thankful that
Speaker 3: I've never had something terrible happen to me. But I
Speaker 3: wrote to her that although I look okay, they are
Speaker 3: hollow parts inside, and she had a role in that.
Speaker 3: My mom often spent time with her best friend, with
Speaker 3: whom she had a deep friendship. She got to escape
Speaker 3: my father, and she had a confidant to discuss his behavior.
Speaker 3: But I realized last week after our talk that she
Speaker 3: didn't provide that escape for me, and that's a real
Speaker 3: failure on her part. Reading this letter, I noted I
Speaker 3: kept crossing my arms. I felt flat while I was
Speaker 3: reading it, but less so when I discussed it with
Speaker 3: my husband. We agreed that if I sent this letter
Speaker 3: to my mom, she would never respond to it, so
Speaker 3: fixed is she on only seeing good things. I feel
Speaker 3: very thankful to have had these three experiences. At the
Speaker 3: end of the day, the thoughts were right there, and
Speaker 3: I really didn't have a tough time expressing them. Made
Speaker 3: a couple interesting connections in my mind since talking with
Speaker 3: you both. Most of all, I've taken from it that
Speaker 3: a conversation won't automatically scale up into a screaming match.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: So let's start with that conversation with her husband where
Speaker 2: she read to him how she felt about him. That
Speaker 2: sounded like such a powerful moment for the two of them,
Speaker 2: and as we suspected, he really needed to hear it,
Speaker 2: and then he even asked for more of it thereafter,
Speaker 2: and he was so moved by it, And to me,
Speaker 2: that just confirms what we suspected that although she has
Speaker 2: these internal emotional experiences, they don't get expressed outwardly enough
Speaker 2: the good or the bad, as we said, and here
Speaker 2: the good wasn't coming across as overtly as it might.
Speaker 2: So hopefully this opens an entire new way for her
Speaker 2: to communicate with her husband that will allow them much
Speaker 2: more closeness as a result.
Speaker 1: I like what you said about the good and the
Speaker 1: bad because I think sometimes when people are really afraid
Speaker 1: of sharing their feelings, they also aren't comfortable sharing the
Speaker 1: positive feelings, and that really keeps a distance in a
Speaker 1: relationship even when the positive feelings are there. And I
Speaker 1: was so moved when he was able to tell her,
Speaker 1: and it sounds like in a very gentle, loving way,
Speaker 1: I would like more of this, I think that will
Speaker 1: bring them so much closer, and I think she will
Speaker 1: get more as well from the reciprocity that's going to
Speaker 1: come from this.
Speaker 2: The second assignment that was a little confused, to be honest,
Speaker 2: what we asked her to do was share something about
Speaker 2: herself with her friend, whatever it is, and make sure
Speaker 2: that her friends can stay on her, rather than revert
Speaker 2: the conversation back to the friend's feelings or needs. So
Speaker 2: she said she brought up this question about whether she
Speaker 2: or siblings had different perceptions. If she then followed that
Speaker 2: question with because for me, and she spoke about herself
Speaker 2: and the friend listened, great, But if she just asked
Speaker 2: a friend to do that, then there was a miss
Speaker 2: in terms of the point of that assignment, and I'm
Speaker 2: just not sure which it is.
Speaker 1: There was something else that was interesting in her update,
Speaker 1: which was that her mom had this confidant that she
Speaker 1: would go to to complain about Catherine's dad too, And
Speaker 1: it sounds a little bit like a mirror of Catherine's
Speaker 1: friend coming to Catherine to complain about the friend's husband,
Speaker 1: And I think that some of the resentment might be
Speaker 1: wrapped up in that parallel dynamic. That's going on that
Speaker 1: we hadn't heard about during session, So it's just another
Speaker 1: thing for Catherine to think about as she thinks about
Speaker 1: what the source of her anger and resentment really are
Speaker 1: when it comes to this friend and her husband.
Speaker 2: Right her third assignment, writing the letter to her mother,
Speaker 2: I was glad to hear that she was commenting on
Speaker 2: how she feels hollow internally and that her mother has
Speaker 2: something directly to do with that, and wishing her mother
Speaker 2: had taken her aside and legitimized conversations and talking about
Speaker 2: feelings with her. I think those were very important things.
Speaker 1: And I think the important part of this too was
Speaker 1: being able to share it so it's not just something
Speaker 1: that she is holding inside, because I think that's where
Speaker 1: all of those letters were coming from. And we always
Speaker 1: say choose your audience well in terms of who you're
Speaker 1: going to share yourself with in a very vulnerable way,
Speaker 1: and her husband was it sounds like a great audience.
Speaker 1: I also think about that friend who lives in another
Speaker 1: city that she also feels very close to, and one
Speaker 1: of the things we also wanted her to do was
Speaker 1: to see about cultivating friendships that feel better to her,
Speaker 1: and I think that the exercises that we gave her
Speaker 1: our first step to cultivating all kinds of relationships, including
Speaker 1: a closer relationship with her husband, a better relationship with
Speaker 1: her friend, and maybe cultivating other friendships and mostly a
Speaker 1: better relationship with herself.
Speaker 2: I agree, and so I think that in the one week,
Speaker 2: she's taken quite a few steps and gone quite a journey.
Speaker 1: Yeah, as you said, it's an opening, and I think
Speaker 1: it's a fantastic place to start. Next week, a woman
Speaker 1: who loves her husband worries about his anger toward their
Speaker 1: young children and considers whether she should leave him to
Speaker 1: protect them.
Speaker 3: It's not healthy for our daughter. You need to get
Speaker 3: therapy or we're going to leave so that I can
Speaker 3: protect her.
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Speaker 2: If you have a dilemma you'd like to discuss with us,
Speaker 2: email us at Laurie and Guy at iHeartMedia dot com.
Speaker 2: Our executive producer is Noel Brown. We're produced and edited
Speaker 2: by Josh Fisher, additional editing support by Helena Rosen, John Washington,
Speaker 2: and Zachary Fisher. Our interns are Ben Bernstein, Emily Gutierrez
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