We had only a few minutes left. I ended up responding so well to the process, though, that I've continued seeing her in private practice ever since. Yalom mentions it once when describing Marie but no more. Besides, it was by no means clear that we could have gone much further. That must be the six others who felt the same way in the dream. She looked up at me, and her face was a hideous mucous-filled skull. Perhaps it was generosity welling out of my relief that it was he, and not I, who was dying. Whatever has happened since then can never erase what he gave me then.. Love's Executioner Paperback - June 5, 2012 by Irvin D. Yalom (Author) 1,521 ratings See all formats and editions Kindle $12.99 Read with Our Free App Audiobook $0.00 Free with your Audible trial Paperback $12.99 61 Used from $5.64 31 New from $12.71 3 Collectible from $11.89 MP3 CD $12.95 1 New from $12.95 A NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER If youre caught in a dilemma, or have two strong conflicting feelings, then the best thing you can do is to share the dilemma or share both feelings with the patient. We know that. Whats helped in the past? 1. I never saw Blush (or Brazen) again. I understood what Saul meant. In the next stage of therapy, we explored the idea that one must learn to live with the living before one can learn to live with the dead. By now I have forgotten whether those were Pennys words or mine or a colleagues, but I am certain it was she who made me aware of the importance of this concept. Second, Im giving almost supernatural power to Phyllis to heal me or protect me., And then everything fell apart when you overheard her plaintive, repetitive chant., That was when I realized how frail she isnot Phyllis in particular, but all women. Perhaps (in an effort to conceal my negative feelings) I tried too hard, and I made the beginners mistake of suggesting other options. Therapy always presented a paradox for her. "If Rape Were Legal." 3. She had never done that before with me. Id get a pulse of about twenty-six in fifteen seconds. Weary of traveling alone on these little subterranean excursions, I decided to stay closer to Marvins concerns. She had grown up, an only child, on a small, poor ranch in Texas where her mother has lived alone since her fathers death fifteen years ago. All this cloak and dagger! She was incapable, or unwilling, to reveal herself in the immediate present that we two were sharing. But I had pointed out that Carlos had stretched his personal boundaries to encompass his work and, consequently, he responded to a mild criticism of any aspect of his work as though it were a mortal attack on his central being, a threat to his very survival. She could not remember the dreams except for two recurrent ones that had begun in adolescence, shortly after her fathers death. Then I noticed how critical I became whenever Saul got feisty. Though I could write a clinical article about Marge or tell colleagues about the course of therapy, I could never really convey the essence of my experience with her. . They call out to those who are forever lostdead or absent parents, spouses, children, friends: I want to see you again. I want your love. I want to know youre proud of me. I want you to know I love you and how sorry I am I never told you. I want you backI am so lonely. I want the childhood I never had. I want to be healthyto be young again. During this time, Carlos was particularly helpful. Betty insisted she was taking huge risks, yet, as I said to her, Betty, you rate yourself ten, yet it didnt feel that way to me. Perhaps that is sufficient., On Rereading Loves Executioner at Age Eighty, When I agreed to write a postscript for Loves Executioner, I had no idea of the emotional adventure ahead of me. He was still periodically impotent but brooded about it less. I insisted that we had made real progress. I think just a single three-way session would be sufficient, but we ought to do it soon because I think well need several hours afterward to integrate what we learn.. He said he had a bad back, but I knew him well for many years afterward and never heard him mention back trouble. You care about the poor, about ants and plants and ecological systems. But now the important thing is to turn toward the future. I had never seen him look worse. The relationship heals. And I think, too, that he realized that only through Thelmas release could he obtain his own. How many more layers would she reveal to me? But now it was his turn to be shocked. Ive got a one- or two-percent chance now that hell come around. Or the Thelma who was deceived by herself? Such pragmatic use of dreams is commonplace in therapy. She wept often and, at times, flashed into anger. But as Bettys ordeal continued, I began to feel guilty eatingas though I were acting in bad faith toward her. For example, right now hes trying to get someone to build a new glass dining-room table which will display his political campaign buttons. But he was still there, patiently awaiting my next question, his eyes blank behind his gleaming spectacles. In thousands of group meetings, whose members supposedly bare all, I have yet to hear group members disclose their incomes. I had strongly suspected from the beginning that he would likely drop out of the group. (Not delicious and clandestine but deliciously clandestine, for secrecyand I shall say more about this shortlywas the axis of Daves personality around which all else rotated. Thank you for saving my life.. Youve fallen in love with your own creation.. Within minutes Saul relaxed, his breathing slowed, his look of panic disappeared. During her four years of illness, many courses of chemotherapy had prolonged her life but left her, each time, bald and agonizingly ill. Chrissie had had dozens of painful bone marrow extractions and so many bloodlettings that finally there were no more veins to be found. She giggled at my question: Do you believe, Elva, that the more of these you eat, the thinner you will become? A plastic sack of old orange peels (You never know, Elva, when these will come in handy). I reiterated to Marvin that, all things considered, I still believed the treatment of choice to be behaviorally oriented couples therapy. I cringed when I reflected on all the other obese women whom I had related to in an intolerant fashion. As a result of her injury Marie had lost her job, and her financial situation was precarious. Existential isolation, a third given, refers to the unbridgeable gap between self and others, a gap that exists even in the presence of deeply gratifying interpersonal relationships. What happened was that a woman, Sonia, Here Thelma broke role for a minute and said in a loud stage whisper, Dr. You are you, you have your own existence, you continue to be the person you are from moment to moment, from day to day. When you say you never thought it would happen to you, I know just what you mean, I said. Failure had always inflicted terrible wounds, which healed slowly and deeply intensified his feeling of insignificance and loneliness; success offered stupendous but evanescent exhilaration. Number three,. Ignoring my gambit, he responded that Thelma had always been a good wife and that perhaps he had aggravated her problem by being on the go and traveling too much. What the hell am I doing in a group with people like her anyway? I mean exactly what I said. I . Let me try to get my thoughts out clearly. But Thelma never found this thesis persuasivewith, I now think, good reason. Thelmas life was saved only by heroic medical efforts. How did that come about? I asked. And from your individual standpoint, I believe it is possible at seventy to discover a new perspective that will permit you to flood retroactively, as it were, your whole earlier life with new meaning and significance. He had never had a male friend. I felt more like a philosophy or religious teacher than a therapist, but I knew that this was the proper trail. To read the exact words would only tear open the wound even more.. I needed someone to hate, too. Then she turned to me and fixed her eyes on mine. Im not talking about major or predominant feelings, but about any other flashes you had., I know what youre after. I remembered Thelmas telling me about his teaching hand-to-hand combat in wartime. Two weeks ago we had not been able to get far with the dream. I nodded but assured him that I had time to meet with him. I knew that Thelma would take the rest of the hour spinning obsessional webs. When I recommended that she continue therapy in New York and offered her the name of a suitable therapist, she was noncommital, stating that she wasnt sure whether she would continue, that maybe she had done enough. This was going to be worse than usual; she was speaking of me in the third person. The first call she made upon regaining consciousness was to Matthews tape machine. Not every thing you say is maaaaaarvelllous. The dual role of observer and participant demands much of a therapist and, for me in these ten cases, posed harrowing questions. You cant be intimate with me because another therapist, eight years ago, hurt you. I told you Phyllis doesnt like to spend moneyshe loves sales. He remembered them well and was convinced that they signified impact and connection. You tell me: Whats the perfect scenario to drive an ex-lover to suicide? For several months I had attempted to challenge her belief that life, real life, can only be lived if one is loved by a man. Pop psychologists forever talk about responsibility assumption, but its all words: it is extraordinarily hard, even terrifying, to own the insight that you and only you construct your own life design. One has a choice only of certain stances: to be resolute, or engaged, or courageously defiant, or stoically accepting, or to relinquish rationality and, in awe and mystery, place ones trust in the providence of the Divine. I escorted Thelma to the waiting room and Harry to my office. She was right. Somewhat bemused and willing to try anything once, I agreed and stored her clothes under my desk. From the ages of ten to seventeen, he sold newspapers in Brooklyn. First, your call would alienate him from me. The dream about the giant auger could not have been more clear: the ground under Marvins feet was liquefying (an inspired visual image for groundlessness), and he was trying to combat that by drilling, with his penis, sixty-five feet (that is, sixty-five years) down! Youve always shown compassion for others. Its just that she accepts me totally and takes me into her. After six years of teaching trigonometry, Marvin felt stuck. Second, he remembered my warning to him, the first time we met, that there were going to be times in therapy when he would feel worse; he trusted my word that his current anxiety was a stage in therapy and would ultimately pass. You treat me like a patient. I could live with that one-percent chance. Nothing in her life gave her pleasure. But, for a time, that was all right: I liked the obsession and savored it afresh again and again. I finally said, Lets go, a good lay might be just the thing to get rid of some of this tension. Marvin paused. . Bjrn Borgs pulse is fifty, Ive heard. Never will be!, Well, what do you mean by running wild?. Have you ever imagined a conversation in which he releases you?. For years he endured his friends jibes about dating his mother. Not much other therapy has gone on. Despite the discouragement (depicted in his dreams by such symbols as being unable to rebuild a house at night), he had nonetheless proceeded upon a radical reconstruction of his relationship to his wife. Love's Executioner is a collection of ten true stories (identifying details have been changed to protect anonymity, of course) of patients in psychotherapy with Irvin Yalom and how his work with them progressed. I believe youre operating in the having to mode right now. Then he turned into Matthew. No one had ever before asked such blunt questions. I was getting plenty of information, but we were not making contact. He went on to explain that they had not entertained guests at home for yearsindeed, for decades. Their chest wall vanished, just melted away leaving a square blue-red cavity with rib-bar walls and, in the center, a liver-colored glistening heart thumping away. But why? To my great surprise, Carlos made excellent use of therapy; and after six sessions, we agreed to meet in ongoing treatment. There was little of Matthew in it, norif love is a caring, giving, need-free relationshipmuch love. Then Penny told me that she had a deep belief in reincarnation, a belief that began when she was a teenager and miserable and poor and so tormented by the thought that she had been gypped in life that she could find consolation only in the thought that she would have another chance. I hadnt anticipated this. She hated even more those who offered false hope. He didnt seem to understand, we talked past each other, he had no interest in the inner meaning of events. So theres life after all in San Francisco. Ive waited my whole life away. My mother is a crazy, embittered lady, and I grow more like her every day. If we look at it that way, we can make more sense of the powerful fear the dream carried. 8. Dead and in his grave for over a year and a half. She had taken the ritualized widow walkthrough the cancer diagnosis; the awful, toxic, gut- wrenching chemotherapy; their last visit together to Carmel; their last drive down El Camino Real; the hospital bed at home; the funeral; the paperwork; the ever-dwindling dinner invitations; the widow and widowers clubs; the long, lonely nights. Matthews statement, I thought, bore an uncanny resemblance to the releasing scenario Thelma had shared in our role-playing session. Guinea pig litter. I dared not utter the word boringfar too vague and too hurtful. Since patients tend to resist assuming responsibility, therapists must develop techniques to make patients aware of how they themselves create their own problems. Usually she looked upward, as though lost in recollection. Tell me about the therapy youve had in the last eight yearssince your suicide attempt., During that time Ive never been without a therapist. WHY?! Rapprochements occurred; as her anger receded, family and friends reappeared in her life. Thanks also to many, many colleagues and friends who did not bolt when they saw me approaching, a new story in hand, and offered criticism, encouragement, or consolation. Was it possible that she knew all this from the start and had concealed it from me? These are true stories, but I have had to make many changes to protect the identity of the patients. One night she had two dreams about a lost twin brother. She hated the thought, but the stereotype was true: she was the jolly fat woman. Afraid of what Id say. He wasnt having a love experience, because he didnt know who he was. They chose that part of the dreamthe theme of secrecythat was most relevant to the way Dave related to them, and they whacked away at it beautifully. Second, how do you really feel about me now?, Lets be certain that you dont also finish our three-way meeting wanting to kick yourself for something you didnt ask. But in the group discussion, Dave took it upon himself. These discussions released a flood of painful memories about a lifetime of rejection by males. . As she said this, Betty broke down and sobbed. Basic anxiety emerges from a person's endeavors, conscious and unconscious, to cope with the harsh facts of life, the "givens" of existence. I often mistakenly think I see him, and rush up to greet some stranger. In addition, he effectively employed a systems approach and introduced, into the therapy process, both her husband and a lifelong friend (from whom she had been long estranged). Why did you decide to call me?, It was the third letter. In fact, she had not accepted that Chrissie was dead even now, four years later. But first, I want to say that I appreciate your recommendation last week. For example, he is quick to note in Therapeutic Monogamy that he made a colossal mistake. We shook hands, and as he left my office I became aware that I was glad to see him go. What had happened to his cravings for closeness? 3) Our ultimate aloneness. From what she had so far told me of her marriage, there was apparently little closeness between her and her husband. At our first session six months before, I had asked him, after a few pleasantries, What ails?, He responded, I cant get it up any more!, I was astonished. Often I feel I dont have much else to offer. Every person who knew about the situation had advised her to get rid of Elmer. She became preoccupied with the capriciousness of death. I like Yalom because he is raw and honest in this book and he is unafraid to showcase his mistakes, fears and vulnerabilities. Specialness is the belief that one is invulnerable, inviolablebeyond the ordinary laws of human biology and destiny.