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“I made it!” I think, panting. “I’ve beaten my client to our session!” My Gramercy office is a stage set—large, well lit, and esthetically coherent—and I loathe getting caught “backstage.” I hang up my tailored coat, inhale, and decide that I have indeed made it. I tear up as I recall myself floundering in college and my dad, the consummate professional, saying, “I just want you to do well.” He died too soon to see me costumed in the role of “established Therapist.”
I’m floundering through a tele-session in the basement of my Brooklyn home. I’ve had to relocate mid-“scene,” as our main quarters have become dominated by my husband’s board meeting and our toddler raging against his nap. I’m wearing sweatpants, a button-down shirt, and a king’s robe—a Halloween costume I found on the floor and wrapped around my shoulders to keep warm. As the session ends, and I prepare to be fired, my client thanks me for being “genuine” at this “challenging time for all of us.”
I tuck my son into bed, channeling my dad. I miss his humor, and his hugs. I decide to give up my Gramercy office.
I have a new office, close to home. I walk there, without the angst of clients catching a glimpse of me behind the screen. In fact I now approach each new scene as if they can see all of me—the human underneath the king’s robe. And that it doesn’t matter. If anything, it helps them to talk more openly about themselves. At least I hope all of this will be true. I don’t want to “go back.” Only to move forward.
To me, to make it is no longer to “beat” my clients to session, but rather to join them there.
And to tuck my son into bed every night.