Two Shrinks: Psychiatrist and Cognitive Therapist

He is a psychiatrist.
She is a cognitive therapist.

He was always on time.
She is sometimes late.

He ended the session after exactly 45 minutes.
She ends the session when we are finished talking, unless she has someone waiting to see her.

He would not turn off the lights, even though I don’t like artificial light when natural light is streaming in through the window.
She will work in the dark if I ask. She will also turn off the air conditioning and open a window if I ask, even when it is 90 degrees outside.

He told me nicely to deal with it when his dozens of keys on a large ring were swinging like a pendulum within my peripheral vision from the lock of a closet.
She does not have a large ring of keys, but if she did, and if I were to ask, she would make the swinging stop.

He wanted to know how it made me feel when I snuck out of the house in two feet of snow and walked 1 ½ miles to my friend’s house where all my high school mates were partying and, after my father found out, he arrived in a fury to pick me up and take me home.
She doesn’t know that I snuck out that day I made my father so angry; she knows little about my past.

He made me come at the same time every week, then I cut back to every other week, then one last time after I said I was moving on from him.
She lets me make an appointment whenever I feel like talking. I have seen her twice since August.

I saw him regularly for nine years. I saw her for less than a year and then felt chipper enough to cut way back. He might say it’s like when someone tries real hard to open a jar and then the next person opens it with ease. “I loosened it for you,” the hard trier says.

To be fair, I began seeing him during the upheaval my marital separation caused. Over time he helped me figure out how to guide my children through my divorce and how to mange my own reconfigured life.

Yet if therapy is going to be helpful, why should it take nine years, especially given that it can take less than one year?

In fairness, he was smart with a dry wit, and after getting over the divorce hump, I continued because he was fun to talk about myself with. I cut back on this shrink when my finances began to shrink. And, finally, I outgrew him altogether.

Time passed and I became curious to try a Cognitive. Keep in mind that probably not every Cognitive is flexible like my Cognitive.

LOTS ABOUT MARRIAGE, RELATIONSHIPS AND MORE IN MY NEW MEMOIR . . .

Confessions of a Worrywart: Husbands, Lovers, Mothers, Therapists, and Others                                                  Check it out on Amazon.com, Kindle, and Smashwords

Readers of all ages will relate to this deeply personal story, told with comical sensibility by a quirky, startlingly honest mother, daughter, ex-wife, and dog lover, who—à la Nora Ephron—will feel like a dear friend. Confessions of a Worrywart: Husbands, Lovers, Mothers, and Others will stay with you long after you finish reading it.”(adapted from Amazon description and culled from Amazon reviews)

Coming Soon: Lessons Learned from Cognitive Therapy.

What lessons have you learned from psychotherapy?

See my Life Goes Strong articles:

*Divorce and Children

*A Woman Talks About Sex From Her 20′s To Her 60′s (fascinating and relatable)

*Are You Having Less Sex Than You Think You Should? One Woman’s Story

*Hipster Dog Names and Quirky Dog Photos

*Joyce Maynard Adopted Two Girls From Ethiopia Then Gave Them Up

*He Asked, “Am I Going To Die?” I Had To Tell Him, “Yes You Are.”

*Can Separate Bedrooms Save Or Destroy A Marriage?

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