Saturday, December 7, 1996
|
|
Sunday, December 8, 1996
|
|
Monday, December 9, 1996
|
2 pm. Tenth Session with Sarah Wright. Sarah had an encounter with her best friend's husband, Glen. It could have been innocent, and then again it could have been the initial tentative feelers of a developing extramarital relationship. Sarah finds herself thinking and dreaming about Glen frequently. As we explored her feelings, she realized that Glen is really a substitute for Robby--both physically and in his personality differences from Jeff. Sarah has suffered through multiple rejections, including several from Robby and from her husband whom, as much as she detests, was her intimate for a number of years. Now she finds herself completely alone, even while surrounded by both Jeff and Robby. Sarah plans to deal with her feelings towards Glen through complete repression. I told her that it might not be as easy as she thinks. Her contempt for Jeff grows with each week. Now she's threatening to expose his sexual preference to his parents unless he toes her line. As a strategy, it seems to be working too. Sarah has the whip hand and is feeling increasingly free to wield it. Sarah is jealous of Jeff's relationship with Robby, probably intensified by her own loneliness.
|
Tuesday, December 10, 1996
|
4 pm. Twenty-Second Session with Sylvia Bows. Sylvia has been ordered to bed rest. She met with Dr. Malleson who now believes that the pressure on her cervix necessitates her staying off her feet essentially for the remainder of her pregnancy. Sylvia is not thrilled, but at least she understands the medical necessity. This bed rest has been imposed upon her not through Tom's legal machinations but upon the orders of her own obstetrician. Sylvia is still ascribing evil motivations to Tom's actions which, under other circumstances, would be considered normal for an expectant father. He has decreased his outside travel and is staying closer to home. He has been going to Sylvia's appointments with Dr. Malleson, he has been reading books and watching videos in an effort to inform himself. Sylvia believes that he is a complete enigma, but I suspect that it is her own perceptual framework which is trying to stuff his actions into a motive with which she is comfortable. If she had to admit that Tom had a genuine interest in the children, she would have to confront issues of guilt, regret, and shame which she is clearly unwilling to do. Sylvia has always believed that she is completely justified in all of her actions and that Tom is a monster. I suggested that Sylvia try to talk to Tom--for starters just about why he is decreasing his travel. A non-threatening subject but one which I assume that Tom will use as an entree to tell Sylvia how important the twins are to him.
|
Wednesday, December 11, 1996
|
Received another fax this morning. A misshapen male figure, at the bottom of a pit of skyscrapers, looks up in appeal to an angel floating in a kneeling position above the skyscrapers. We see the scene from her view, looking at the pathetic, groveling creature who looks like he feels trapped inside the skyscraper hole. Could this be more suicide imagery? Is he appealing to the next world for salvation? But since the point of view is that of the angel's, it also feels like he may be identifying with her and looking at himself from that perspective. There is a strong sense of alienation from the modern business environment depicted in the image. I wonder if that's a clue to his profession? Is he someone who works downtown with a flair for art? Since he knows my fax number, I assume that he's looked up my office address. Perhaps he is someone nearby--at one of the neighboring buildings possibly. With SII across the street and with so many people working in computer graphics there, it's really quite possible that he is an SII employee and has found my fax number through the materials distributed to him. It certainly is an odd, one-way sort of therapeutic process that he has defined. When I look through my windows, I sometimes wonder if Anna is looking at me. Now I can wonder if the Faxer is looking at me as well. Paranoia does lie this way. I know that Hal sometimes is watching the office doors for Sylvia, or perhaps I can worry about the FBI or Mazurka's killer Irishman.
|
Thursday, December 12, 1996
|
4 pm. Twenty-Third Session with Anna Green. Anna just left and the blood is coming back to my head! She said something about torturing John by being naked around him and then suddenly she was taking off her clothes in the office! She calmly removed her blouse, while telling me that she was a sick patient that needed to be naked. I was totally staggered. I told her to put back on her shirt and then she removed her pants. She wasn't wearing any underwear, so I assume that this was planned, unless she doesn't usually wear underwear. Great. Something else to think about. While I tried to impress upon her that her scheme wasn't going to work, I have to say that I drank in the sight somewhat greedily. She really is breathtaking when naked. She crossed to the windows and probably could have been clearly seen by anyone casually looking in, not to mention by the contingent already peering into my windows--the FBI, Joseph Mazurka, Hal, The Irishman, and maybe the Faxer. They all got an eyeful. I used the desk as a defensive position. I was afraid if I got up and tried to leave the office, she would have put herself in my path and made it impossible for me to leave without touching her. Instead, I sat like a statue behind my desk, gripping the sides for support. They don't really cover this in medical school. Anna made a great show of bending over to recover her pants--and then looked straight back at me through her legs. When she left, she said that she would think of nothing else all week. Yeah right. Like I'm going to put this right out of my mind. I guess this officially makes Anna my favorite patient. Oh, she also talked about isolation, loneliness, using her sexuality to entrap men for the attention. But all that was driven out of my head somehow by the end of the session.
|
Friday, December 13, 1996
|
|
Charles Balis' Personal Diary & Log