The tears the eyes will not shed the body will weep

I have for years preached to my patients that grieving does not start
when you lose a loved one or even when you burry him. Grieving begins
when you really let the beloved go, in your mind.

I thought I had cried enough, I was convinced that I raged plenty against
the slings and arrows of the outrageous fortune, but his food bowl stayed
on the floor, his favorite pouch next to the fireplace, his bed on the
family couch and his toys strewed all over the place. Any well meant
suggestion that I should be putting these objects away met with a mix
of tears and anger.

I constructed a mausoleum and Sadness and Guilt, the inseparable
companions of Grief, fanned the flames of an irrational, primitive
illusion: what if he is really not gone? As the flames of this insidious
illusion strengthened the headaches started, like a vise around my head
squeezed tighter and tighter every day for 2 months.
Then the “core could not hold anymore” the walls of denial crumbled.
In-between my sobs I heard myself asking: He is not coming back, is he?
No, sweetheart, he is gone my husband said.

As the tears subsided the vise around my head began to loosen itself.
In my mind’s eyes I saw Him prancing into the woods, his tail held
straight up like a little periscope, his ears erect. He turned his
head back to look at me: It was a great life, mom, thanks, and so long…..

J.R

Love is to fall head over heals for 2 huge bright eyes and a tinny mischievous face

Love is to lose yourself and life’s hard edges in joyous playing and laughter.

Love is to share life’s moments, the elation of success and the pain of loss.

Love is to nurse him with tenderness while your heart is shredded to pieces.

Love is to let him go although you want to hold on with every ounce of your body because his dignity demands it.

Love is to reach out and love again and gain because anything less is an insult
to the gift of love he brought into your life.

How many ruined lives will it take?

I was writing a few short weeks back that our technological advances have by far outsripped our ability to understand and integrate them in our ever day living with often disastrous consequences. And here I am again, sounding like a broken record, asking again what would it take for the community, the parents, the educational system to wake up?

Front page in the New York Times last Sunday: A Girl’s Nude Photo, and Altered Lives: At 14 she thought it perfectly logical to sext her boyfriend nude pictures of herself, he in tern found it self aggrandizing to forward these pictures to his best friend who in the penultimate wisdom of his own 14 years on this planet thought nothing of forwarding them to the girl’s archenemy. You can imagine the rest. Or can you? Did you know that circulating pictures of underage kids(even if they are circulated by other kids) is considered distribution of child pornography, a charge carrying imprisonment? Well the kids had no clue, even scarier; their parents had no clue either.

Parents think that it is totally innocuous to give a kid a phone or a computer and leave him/her alone with them. They never stop to think that they are handling their kid a loaded gun and license to destroy lives with impunity. But to be fair, how would parents know the apparently unending possibilities and applications of the new technology? Who is educating the parents?

Would, I wonder, break the budget to have classes for parents, starting from kindergarten all through high school, to educate them about the ethical and legal hazards of the new technology? How much money or time would you be willing to spend to save the live or future reputation of your child? Schools have mandatory inoculations to prevent the spread of epidemics, yet there is an epidemic that is spreading like a wild fire among the youth: the epidemic of ethical irresponsibility out of ignorance. Would it be too much to ask for mandatory inoculations for this epidemic too?

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar….

He came to therapy because of his mood swings. He would go from a sweet, laid back, funny guy who everyone loved, to losing his temper because someone cut him off while driving or the kids were too loud or the wind was blowing the wrong way. You name it, it could set him off. If I don’t get my Mr. Hyde under control I will lose my family doc, he said to me in tears.

So, we worked on stabilizing his moods. “Keeping it level” became his new mantra while his great sense of humor kept everyone in his life steadfast in “his corner” while he worked on his issues.

One day he came in with the familiar twinkle in his eye that invariably forecasted a joke.How are you doing? I asked expectantly.
Well, he said, yesterday I went to pick up a pizza for dinner. It smells great, I told Antonio as he handed me the steaming box of pepperoni, my mouth watering already. “Yes, man” Antonio said “keep it level.” I thought it was divine providence reminding me of my resolution not to lose my temper. You too man, you too, I shot back at him with a broad smile and walked out of the restaurant. It was not until I opened the box at home and saw that the whole cheese and sauce had dripped to the side of the box that it dawned on me: “keep the box even, keep the box even!!”

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar or… a pizza. Thanks for all the laughs Joe.

The little silver Treee

I have a little silver Christmas tree in my office. It went up a few years back with the 3 or 4 ornaments patients brought me as gifts, and just like that a new and wonderful tradition was born: Four weeks before Christmas the tree goes up; during the last 2 weeks patients come in, like the biblical Magi, ornament in hand; we walk up to the tree, they find a free spot, hang their ornament up and whisper a wish.

Today the little silver tree stands heavy with all its ornaments; its branches proudly holding all the dreams and hopes people entrusted it with. There is the shinning red ball for Good Health, and the glittery gold one for that Hoped for Special one, and oh… look, look; do you remember that pink one over there? It was for the much hoped for Baby, and many cat ornaments for the cat-loving therapist (yours truly). On the top sits a crystal star I call Hope because as long as there is hope to light up the path, Psych will unfold its potential and life will find its way.

Through the years a lot of those wishes came true, others are still hatching in the glow of Hope. This year with the dark cloud of the global financial collapse still hanging over us and still in the midst of uncertainty and fear; I too walked up to The Tree ,as I had done so many times before, hung up my ornament and whispered the same ancient but never dated word: PEACE.

How my cat taught me humanity

He is 38 years old very attractive with a stellar career
steadily unfoldingin front of him. He was brought up with all
the privileges that money affords and with a sense of entitlement
and solipsism that in his mid 30s left him empty and bored.
He brought his depression, existential angst, and frustrated
quest for meaning to my office, deposited them in my proverbial
lap and in not so many words led me to understand that he expected
me to address and cure all his plights, after all isn’t that what
he would be paying me for? A few months into therapy it dawned on
him that if he wanted answers he would have to roll up his sleeves
and work at it just as hard as I was. He proved to be a good sport,
however, as he did not complain too much about this first disillusionment
in this enterprise called therapy.

In our work together we came upon the same often insurmountable
obstacle: his ego-centered view of the universe. His multiple
relationships with women came to the same predictable and unhappy
end, he was told time and time again that he was not “listening”
and he was sincerely puzzled about it. How could they have a
world view different from his? How could they tell him that he
did not do enough for them when he knew what they really
needed a lot better than they did? When I told him that everyone
sees the world through his or hers own “lenses” crafted by unique
and individual life experiences he told me that if you are short
sighted you don’t keep bumping into furniture, you go to the
optometrist and get glasses. He saw himself as everyone’s
corrective lenses to emotional or intellectual myopia, you see.

And then a year into therapy it happened. He was passing by
Pet Smart one day with his girl friend de jour: “oh” she exclaimed
“kittens can we adopt one, pleeeeease?” “And I did” he said
dropping his eyes to the floor with shame and guilt, “to impress
her,” but then Tyson took total possession of my house and my heart.
Why the name Tyson? I asked. “would you believe it”he said,
“this fur ball climbed onto my chest and started boxing me” I did
not have the heart to tell this X quarterback that this “furball”
was “seeing” him as its mommy and was kneading his chest to
stimulate lactation just as it had done with its “biological” mom.

I sat back and listen with barely contained glee how the
“furball Tyson” steadily turned a elegantly and expensively
decorated bachelor mansion into a kitten’s playground. Pillows
and throws now covered the custom designed couch, cat toys
were strewed all over the house and a floor to ceiling
cat condominium featured right next to the humongous flat TV,
because “it is more fun to watch him playing than football.
” Into the trash went playboy and sports illustrated to be
replaced by an assortment of cat books and magazines.“And you
know something doc” he told me one day “I don’t need those
sleeping pills anymore. Tyson snuggles up to me
and begins to purr and I am out like a light”

The finishing touches of this “miraculous” transformation
came when Tyson got sick and required scheduled medications
and care. Gone were the after work drinks with his friends,
the 15 hour work days and lunch was spent driving home to
comfort Tyson. It must be tough for you, all these life changes,
I tested him one day.“Not at all” he said sincerely surprised
that I would say such an inane thing “I love taking care of him”

I thought that things don’t get much better than this, but he
surprised me once again. One day he told me beaming with joy
that he was now part of an animal rescue and adoption organization,
“ and the people are sooo nice too!” he tells me “a little eccentric,
but who am I to be talking”. He was exchanging the crown of
egocentricity for human camaraderie and tolerance. He was now
fostering 3 more cats. “You know ” he said “I think I am beginning
to get it, this whole thing about believing in something bigger
than yourself? You can tell Tyson’s story in one of your blogs.
Maybe there is another self-righteous, know-it-all guy out there,
like me, who needs to be rescued. I have a few Furballs willing
to volunteer for the job”.

“I don’t know if it is all these cat pictures in your office
that led me to adopt Tyson, but he is the best therapy ever.
Don’t take it personally, you are a great therapist, but Tyson
taught me humanity” he tells me.

It takes a village.....

The recent suicide of the Rutgers student has once more pushed the needle of our moral compass to the levels of outrage and moral indignation. The prosecutor is asking for a 10 year prison sentence, parents are outraged and the school is mortified for more than one reasons.


The fact is that our technological advances are speeding with such a velocity that have left our ability to emotionally integrate these changes and their repercussions in every day living in a blinding dust of confusion and ignorance.
The fact is that as parents, schools and society we have all failed both the kid who saw death as the only way out of humiliation and those who thought that their prank was innocent and harmless.

As a citizen and a tax payer I would like to know where the mandatory classes are, from Kindergarten to undergraduate levels, which teach our youth how to balance their right to free speech with someone else’s right to privacy. Young people think nothing of exposing every aspect of their lives as well as someone else’s on the world wide web for everyone to use and abuse. I would like see in the kids’ grammar and high school curricula classes on the Safe Use of Internet. I would like to see mandatory college courses on Ethics In The Age of Internet.

If we are assuming that we can de facto apply the ethical, moral and legal code of 50 years ago or even a decade ago to today’s technology we are dangerously naïve and if we expect our kids to figure it out on their own we are foolish and need to wake up before it is too late.

The internet is a powerful tool and in the hands of a notoriously immature and impulsive group, such as teenagers, can as we have already seen be deadly. Today’s culture encourages and rewards kids and teens to turn their lives into an open book. The same teen that would have a temper tantrum if the parent went into her draw will not think twice putting her whole daily itinerary including pictures of herself in all compromising positions on Facebook.

It takes a village to raise a kid especially in the age of information. Parents and schools have the responsibility of teaching our kids that with the freedom and power to publish what they want whenever they want comes a great deal of responsibility.