2005-06-22 - 6:41 p.m.
A few weeks ago I saw my therapist for the last time. I�d originally gone to see her about a year ago for stress from breaking up with Alithea. Then towards the end of the summer I got a lot more disabled and I was having a hard time dealing with that. But we agreed that now I�ve come to terms with these issues pretty well and there�s no need to continue counseling if I don�t feel like it. Not like I�m �cured� (who ever is?) and I know there are people who stay in therapy like forever, but that�s just not me.
I had Brown student health insurance. I�m actually doubly insured, also with COBRA coverage as a domestic partner from Alithea�s old job. Undergraduate health insurance is not very effective for people with chronic medical conditions. There�s a presumption that those covered are healthy regular-age students who might get a tummy ache or the sniffles. Most of my MS treatments are covered through my Blue Cross insurance (which now that I think of it, has taken pretty good care of me).
But school insurance is pretty good about mental health coverage. I guess Brown students tend to go crazy a lot. You get 5 visits per year to on-campus counseling, which I first used in spring 2003 to deal with K.�s new job. You can also get a referral to an outside provider. I was lucky that I clicked with the first one I called. She works with a lot of terminal cancer patients, so I suppose I was one of her success stories because I didn�t die at the end. Plus she makes a lot of bedside hospital visits, so when she saw I was having a hard time climbing the stairs to her office at the end of the summer, she didn�t mind coming to my place. House calls! How cool is that?
I went for a routine check-up with my GP last year and he asked me if I was seeing any other medical providers. I said I was seeing a psychologist because I�d just broken up with my long-term girlfriend and I was having a hard time dealing. But I was a little embarrassed to even admit that I was seeing a counselor and this shame came across a bit. He told me a story about psychotherapy that I found very helpful and I�ll pass on to you.
Apparently, there are traditionally considered to be two kinds of depression. Endogenous depression is inherent to the person, possibly from a chemical imbalance. Reactive depression is a response to something that happens. Someone dies, you get divorced, you get fired. You�re bummed out. Endogenous depression was usually treated with drugs and reactive depression with talk therapy. But historically, there was a reluctance to admit that one needed psychological treatment as a response to life events.
Think of this. You walk into a physician�s office with a massive bleeding head wound. Oh my gosh, what happened? You say you were in a car crash and went through the windshield. What doctor would ever dismiss this? Eh, the same thing would happen to me if I were in that situation. You gotta expect that. Just tough it out. And yet, this was often exactly the reaction to reactive mental health issues. Your dog died? Your wife left? Get over it; the same thing could happen to anyone.
Difficult life events may indeed happen to everyone. But that doesn�t make handling them any less real of a health problem (kind of like combat trauma). There is a whole field that specializes in mental health. Psychotherapy often gets a bad rap, still evoking German-accented bald guys with pointy beards saying �Zo, tell me about your mother.� But there is no reason to go through a tough time without talking things through with someone, any more than you would recover from a physical injury alone.
I first noticed this entry�s title phrase, �Who needs a shrink when you have a pen?�, on MegMarch�s journal, but I�ve found that many other diarists have adopted it. I�ve found the consideration demanded to set out my thoughts here tremendously helpful and therapeutic. I�m going to keep writing here because I�m glad to have a place where I have to think things through. A few people have said that I tell stories well and should write more than �just� a blog. But at least for now, I really like doing this a lot.
� 2005 Geoff Gladstone
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