In Treatment

Hello?

- "I'm, I'm sorry. I, I know it's late." - Are you okay?

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay. It's just this fucking dream, yo."

"Like, it's winter and I'm in a field,"

"holding hands with a, a little girl."

"She's supposed to be my sister or something."

"Starts to snow. I'm excited, so I catch some on my tongue."

"All of a sudden, my throat it's on fire. It's ash."

"The wing from a plane falls to the ground next to us."

"I turn, and my sister's face, it's gone."

Jesus... mamita. I, I don't, I don't want to tell you the rest, man.

- It's only going to make you worry. - "If I worry, I worry."

You don't need to protect me from my feelings.

- Am I allowed to worry about you? - "What do you mean?"

I mean, I didn't expect you to answer so late.

I have no other explanation for being awake, other than "the agonies",

"the mad midnight moments".

A Grief Observed. C.S. Lewis.

Well, N.W. Clerk, if you really want to get all technical about it.

"Yo, dude was an Anglo-Anglican problem, to say the least."

But he did write some meaningful shit on loss.

You cry?

"I can't, I can't picture you crying."

I'm the same way.

Remember that girl I told you I dated?

"She had this mode she could switch into that I fucking, I don't know, lack."

I mean, we'd get into a fight

and it was like a dam bursting open and she would just sob,

and it looked so free, like she fucking went some place.

"One time, she said, "El""

"you ever consider that maybe you're just a cold person?"

But I'm not a cold person!

No. Honey, you're not. Far from it.

I told her. I said, "Look, when you cry,"

"when you become a fucking river, that's how I feel."

"I want to point to it because that's..."

that's how I feel, but I just don't know how to get there.

I never have, and... You know, and...

Hey. Shit. Sorry, I gotta go.

"Wait, real quick."

Do some deep breathing before you go to bed.

Uh, in for four, hold for seven, out for eight.

I know. Gracias, mamita. You're the best.

"Hi, James, it's Dr. Brooke Taylor."

"I got your message about having to reschedule this afternoon."

"I have an opening tomorrow and another next week."

"I'm heading into session now but give me a call and we'll discuss times."

"Hey... mamita. Can you give me two seconds?"

"We just running a little behind over here."

"I just have to give Jeremy his seizure meds. Is that okay?"

- Yes, of course. The time is yours. - "Okay. Cool, cool."

- "All right, we good! Thanks." - No worries at all.

"Yo. These motherfuckers really think"

"they're running a Ritz Carlton up in here."

"The kitchen? There's less marble in the fucking Vatican,"

"and the espresso machine? Victoria Arduino."

I'm not familiar.

"Yo, it's like a twenty-thousand dollar machine, bro."

"All the medical bills for Jeremy"

"and they still enough left over for some fucking copper."

- "This shit is nice." - Eladio, I need to apologize to you.

"To me? For what?"

I shouldn't have answered the phone last night.

"No, I'm glad you did. The scary dream and all."

"Yeah, in that moment, in another life, I'd call my mom."

What would've happened if you had called your mother instead of me?

"Well, it'd be five A.M. in Florida."

"She'd still be stocking the grocery for another hour."

And when was the last time you spoke to her?

"Like, four, five months ago? She got COVID."

"A Doctor at Tampa General called me,"

"and was like, yo, your mom's real sick."

"Not, like, ventilator-sick, but sick."

"So, uh, I started looking at flights."

"The DeMarco's weren't cool about me traveling, but..."

"Well, anyway, it, it ended up not happening."

"You know, by the time I got my mom on the phone,"

"she was like, "Oh, don't come. You know, I'll be fine.""

- "And she was." - Must've been hard,"

her not wanting your help.

"I mean... I want a relationship with her, yo."

"That's my moms, but it's gotta run both ways."

"You know, we both got to want it."

"And what is her relationship like with your sister?"

You ha... you hadn't mentioned her before. Is she older or younger?

"Sister? Oh, from my dream!"

"Uh, I don't have one."

"My mom had a still-birth before she had me."

She shared that with you?

"Not until a few years back."

"But one day, I was, like, like, six,"

"and I walked into the kitchen and I asked my mom where my sister was."

"And my mom said, "You don't have a sister,""

"and I was, like, "Oh, I remember. She's dead.""

- What made you say that? - "No fucking clue."

"You, you know that, that woo-woo shit"

"that people are like, you know, kids are closer to the other side?"

"Well, it freaked my mom out."

"So, she kinda kept her distance ever since then."

And you think that's the reason?

"I mean, I would like to think it was because of something dumb I said,"

"rather than she just didn't like me."

What I mean is when we're children,

we don't always understand everything going on in our parents' worlds.

So, if a mother pulls away from her child,

it likely has very little to do with who that child is,

"or anything he's done."

- "Well, what are you gonna do?" - Well, listen,

in the future, you can call me offhours in an emergency,

but let's just keep it to that, alright?

"Yo, don't do that."

Don't do what?

"Slap me on the knuckles, or whatever."

"Like, you told me to call you if I needed you and I did."

You're right. I apologize again.

As your therapist, it's on me

to delineate the boundaries that are appropriate,

"and I will be better at that in the future."

"You know, I think I might just need a referral."

"You gotta know a good psychiatrist, right?"

Sure, but why do you think you need a psychiatrist?

"This insomnia, the nightmares, the fucking..."

"I haven't slept in six days, yo."

Six days? What about last night? Did you try the breathing; in for...

"Yeah. Yeah, I tried it, okay? It, it worked until it didn't."

Okay.

We can try something else.

"I just need to be able to function, yo."

"Alright? My job's not nothing."

"If I forget Jeremy's pills,"

"or I take my eye off the ball when he's out of his chair..."

"I just feel like medication could help."

"I mean, I nap. You know, a couple hours here and there,"

"but it's, it's like snatching a song out the air. It's snippets."

And you're afraid that that lack of sleep may affect your job performance?

"Look, I could do this job in my sleep. Alright?"

"I could talk you through this shit over the phone"

"from a fucking internet cafe in Pakistan on some Morpheus shit."

"Wake up, get Jeremy out of bed, get him into the chair, breakfast,"

"watch Rick and Morty, or some shit together"

"until the P.T. guy shows, and so on."

"I'm not worried about all that."

"Not to sound selfish, I'm worried about me."

"I don't feel good."

Well, you may need medication. But after only two sessions,

I don't feel I have an adequate picture.

"Meaning?"

In order to refer you to a psychiatrist, I need to know more.

There's something at the heart of your sleeplessness.

"Lyrical, I like that."

- "Say more." - You want lyrical? Okay.

Jung said, "There is no coming to consciousness without pain."

"Oh, shit!"

I like to think of that quote in relation to insomnia.

Maybe it's not about the difficulty of falling asleep.

Maybe we stay awake to avoid the moment we have to come to in our lives...

where the dream world falls away,

and reality sets in.

"Damn."

- "Man, sorry." - Is everything okay?

"Yeah. Mrs. D., she wants me to look at the cable box after this."

"I don't know. I don't know, I'll figure it out."

Is that part of your job?

I, I know you're Jeremy's home attendant,

but I thought that was primarily in a medical capacity.

"It is, but you know, these are my people, yo."

"Like, they look out for me."

"I mean, I couldn't afford this in a million years."

"The DeMarco's, they provide me with the esteemed Dr. Taylor,"

"because they know I can't sleep, and I mess around with the DirectTV."

Okay. Now, I need to be clear on the med's front.

I know a lot of therapists in this city,

they'll make sure you'll get Valium for a stomach ache, but I don't do that.

- So, if this some kind of angle... - "Angle? I'm in pain."

"I already told you, I, I don't sleep. That shit's serious."

Insomnia is the fever, not the malaria. It's a symptom. Okay?

And I'm not against medication. Not at all.

But when prescribed indiscriminately, it can be like fog on a mountain road.

You understand where I'm coming from?

But I need you to be patient because this work, it's not sexy. It's not fast,

but if you trust the process, it...