So I relented and even though I’ve openly scoffed about them for years and years and years I went to see a counsellor. That’s a mental counsellor. A shrink. Not my local Labour counsellor.
She was/is oriental. Aloof and mysterious. Like Yoko Ono. And as expected she sat and said practically nothing for an hour, prompting me to fill the awkward silence by wittering on about myself ad nauseum. I talked principally about my father who died last year, an expiration which prompted me to lose a little grip on my life and head for the anti-depressants. These innocent looking little round pills quickly robbed me of my emotion and the ability to ejaculate.
We covered a lot of ground in an hour. I like to bullet point things if you’re interested:
• I started producing art (first in the form of drawings, then words) because I was afraid of my father (who was pretty rotten to me when I was a kid).
• My father taught me to fear adults, which is why I locked myself away in a box to draw and paint and finally write. As I’m doing now.
• I associate the production of art with safety.
• I am detached from the real world. I live an existential existence, observing from a distance and eschewing involvement with real people and actual situations.
• The only people I interact with are the people who choose to enter my box, i.e. my wife and kids.
• Most of my books are about me. I already knew that.
• Most of my books feature parental retribution. I already knew that.
As far as I’m concerned these bullet points are reasonably true. And I may have mentioned that I already knew that they were true. But there is something about having to articulate them in front of an emotionless stranger that somehow reinforces the point.
I have seven more sessions on the NHS, which is jolly decent of them, my therapist says that she is going to encourage me to ‘heal myself’.
I will keep a sort of online diary, not for you in particular but as always for me.
No comments:
Post a Comment