A short silence at the beginning of a group therapy session is not unusual.
Members learn quickly not to open the meeting capriciously because the first speaker is generally fated to receive much time and attention. But Philip, graceless as ever, did not wait. Avoiding eye contact, he began speaking in his unemotional, disembodied voice.
"The account given by our returning member last week--"
"Name of Pam," interrupted Tony.
Philip nodded without looking up. "Pam's description of my list was incomplete. It was more than a simple list of the women with whom I had sex that month; it contained not only names but phone numbers--"
Pam interrupted, "Oh. Phone numbers! Oh, well then, excuse me--that makes it all okay!"
Undeterred, Philip continued, "The list also contained a brief description of the lovemaking preferences of each woman."
"Lovemaking preferences?" asked Tony.
"Yes, what each woman preferred in the sexual act. Such as, likes it from the rear...sixty-nine...long foreplay required...begin with lengthy back massage...massage oil...gets off on spanking...breast sucking...likes handcuffs...tied to bedposts a big turn-on."
Julius winced. Good God! Where was Philip going--was he heading in the direction of revealing Pam's preferences? Big trouble ahead.
Before he could head Philip off, Pam shot out, "You are truly disgusting.
Repulsive." Pam leaned forward as if preparing to rise from her chair and leave.
Bonnie put her hand on Pam's arm to detain her and said to Philip, "I'm with Pam on this one. Philip, are you crazy? Why on earth would you brag about those things?"
"Yeah," said Gill, "I just don't get you. Look, here you are under blistering attack--I mean I'm wincing for you, man. I could not face what you're facing.
But what do you do? You throw gasoline on the fire and you say, 'Burn me some more.' No offense, Philip, but, shit, how can you do that?"
"Yeah, that's what I see too," said Stuart. "If I were in your situation, I'd want to put myself in the best possible light--not give the enemy more ammunition."
Julius tried to soothe the waters. "Philip, what have you been feeling the last few minutes?"
"Well, I had something important to say about that list and I said it--so naturally I feel entirely satisfied with the course of events."
Julius persevered. In his most gentle voice, he said, "Several people responded to you, Philip. What are you feeling about that?"
"That's where I don't go, Julius. That way lies despair. Better, far better, for me to keep my own counsel."
Julius pulled out another device from his grab bag--that venerable but reliable strategy of conditional voice. "Philip, try a thought experiment.
Philosophers do that everyday. I understand your wish to retain your equanimity, but humor me for a moment and try to imagine that you were going to have feelings about others' responses today. W hat might they be? "
Philip considered Julius's question, smiled slightly, and nodded his head, perhaps as a token of admiration for the ingenuity of Julius's ploy.
"An experiment? Fair enough. If I were to have had feelings, I would have felt frightened by the ferocity of Pam's interruption. I am not unaware that she wishes to do me grievous harm."
Pam started to interject, but Julius immediately signaled her to be silent and allow Philip to continue.
"Then Bonnie inquired about the point of my bragging, and then Gill and Stuart asked about why I was attempting to immolate myself."
"Immo what?" asked Tony.
Pam opened her mouth to respond, but Philip instantaneously said, "Immolate--to sacrifice oneself by fire."
"Okay, you're partway there," Julius persisted. "You've accurately described what happened--what Bonnie, Gill, and Stuart said. Now try to continue with the experiment-- if you were going to have feelings about their comments. "
"Right, I've gotten off track. No doubt you would conclude my
unconscious is making an appearance."
Julius nodded. "Go on, Philip."
"I would feel entirely misunderstood. I would say to Pam, 'I wasn't trying to make it okay.' To Bonnie, I'd say, 'Bragging was the last thing in my mind.'
To Gill and Stuart, I'd say, 'Thank you for the warning, but I was not attempting to injure myself.'"
"Okay, now we know what you weren't doing. So tell us what you were doing? I'm bewildered," said Bonnie.
"I was simply setting the record straight. Following the dictates of reason.
Nothing less, nothing more."
The group lapsed into that state of mind that always ensued from an interaction with Philip. He was so rational, so imperially above the strife of everyday discourse. Everyone looked down, bewildered, disoriented. Tony shook his head.
"I comprehend every point you made," said Julius, "except the last one--
that last phrase--'nothing less, nothing more.' That I cannot buy. Why volunteer that particular aspect of the truth now, today, at this juncture, in your relationship with us? You were eager to do it. You couldn't wait. I could feel your pressure to get it out. Despite the obvious negative consequences pointed out by the group, you were determined to jump in immediately today. Let's try to figure out why.
What was the payoff for you?"
"That's not hard," responded Philip. "I know exactly why I said it."
Silence. Everyone waited.
"I'm getting pissed," said Tony. "Philip, you've got us hanging; you do this all the time. Do we have to beg you for the next sentence?"
"Sorry?" asked Philip, his face in a puzzled scrunch.
"You've got us all waiting to hear why you said it," said Bonnie. "Are you being deliberately inscrutable here?"
"Perhaps you think we don't want to know, that we have no curiosity about what you're going to say," suggested Rebecca.
"It's none of these," said Philip. "It's got nothing to do with you. It just happens that my focus fades and I turn inward."
"This sounds important," said Julius. "I think there's a reason for that--and it involves your interactions with the group. If you truly believe that your behavior is capricious, something like rain that just happens, then you're assuming a helpless stance. There is a reason you periodically avoid us and turn inward: I think it's because some anxiety has welled up in you. In this instance your loss of focus had to do with how you opened the meeting. Can you pursue that?"
Philip was silent, pondering Julius's words.
Julius had his ways of ratcheting up the pressure when treating other therapists: "Another thing, Philip, if you're going to be seeing clients or leading a group in the future, losing focus and turning inward is going to be a real liability in your work."
That did the trick. Philip immediately said, "I chose to reveal what I did for self-protection. Pam knew everything about the list, and I was uncomfortable about her being able to drop that bomb at any time. Revealing it myself was the lesser of two evils." Philip hesitated, inhaled, then continued: "There's more to say. I still haven't addressed Bonnie's accusation of bragging. I kept that list because I had been extremely sexually active that year. My three-week relationship with Pam's friend Molly was unusual; I preferred one-night stands, though I occasionally went back for seconds when I felt particularly sexually pressured and couldn't meet someone new. When I saw the same woman a second time, I needed the notes to refresh my memory and make the woman feel I remembered her. If she knew the truth--that she was just one of many--I might not succeed. No braggadoccio whatsoever in these notes. They were meant for my private use only. Molly had the key to my apartment, invaded my privacy, forced open a locked desk drawer, and stole the list."
"You telling us," asked Tony, wide-eyed, "you had sex with so many women you had to keep notes so you wouldn't mix them up? I mean, what are we talking about here? How many? How'd you pull this off?"
Julius groaned to himself. Things were complicated enough already without Tony's envy-laced question. The tension between Pam a
nd Philip was already unbearably high. It needed defusing, but Julius wasn't sure how to do it.
Unexpected help arrived from Rebecca, who suddenly altered the entire course of the meeting.
"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I need some time in the group today," she said.
"I've been thinking all week about revealing something I've never told anyone, not even you, Julius. This is, I think, my darkest secret." Rebecca paused, looked around the group. All eyes were on her. "This okay?"
Julius turned to Pam and Philip. "How about you two? Are we leaving you with too many strong feelings?"
"Okay with me," said Pam. "I need some time out."
"And you, Philip?"
Philip nodded.
"More than okay with me," said Julius, "unless you want to mention first about why you've decided to reveal this today."
"No, it's better for me to plunge in while I still have the courage. Here goes: About fifteen years ago, about two weeks before my wedding, my company sent me to the Las Vegas computer expo to do a presentation on their new product. I had already handed in my resignation, and this presentation was to be my last assignment--I was thinking then that perhaps it might be the last one in my life. I was already two months pregnant, and Jack and I had planned a month-long honeymoon and then I was to turn to house and baby. This was long before law school--I had no idea whether I'd ever work again.
"Well, I fell into in a strange mood in Vegas. One evening, to my surprise, I found myself in the bar of Caesar's Palace. I ordered a drink and soon fell into an intimate conversation with a well-dressed man. He asked if I was a working girl. I was unfamiliar with that phrase and nodded yes. Before I could say more about my job he asked me my fee. I gulped, looked him over--he was cute--and said, 'One hundred fifty dollars.' He nodded and up we went to his room. And then the next night I moved to the Tropicana and did it again. Same fee. And my last night there I did a freebie."
Rebecca took a deep breath, exhaled loudly. "And that's it. I've never told anyone about this. Sometimes I've considered telling Jack but never did. What would have been the point? Nothing but grief for him and precious little absolution for me.... And...Tony, you bastard...goddammit, that's not funny!"
Tony, who had taken his wallet out and was counting his money, stopped in his tracks and, with a sheepish smile, said, "Just wanted to lighten things up."
"I don't want it to be made light of. This is heavy stuff for me." Rebecca flashed one of her remarkable smiles, which she could conjure up at will. "There it is--true confessions." She turned to Stuart, who on more than one occasion had referred to her as a porcelain doll. "So, what do you think? Maybe Rebecca's not the dainty doll she appears to be."
Stuart said, "I wasn't thinking that. You know where I went as you spoke? I flashed on a movie I rented a few nights ago-- The Green Mile. There was an unforgettable scene of a condemned prisoner eating his last meal. Sounds to me that in Las Vegas you treated yourself to one last piece of freedom before marriage."
Julius nodded and said, "I agree. Sounds much like something you and I talked about a long time ago, Rebecca." To the group Julius explained, "Several years ago Rebecca and I worked together for about a year when she was wrestling with the decision of getting married." Turning back to Rebecca, he said, "I remember we spent weeks talking about your fears of giving up your freedom, your sense of your possibilities closing. Like Stuart, I think that those were the concerns that got played out in Las Vegas."
"One thing sticks out in my mind from those hours together, Julius. I remember your telling me about a novel where someone seeks a wise man who tells him that alternatives exclude, that for every yes there has to be a no."
"Hey, I know that book--John Gardner's Grendel ," interrupted Pam. "It was Grendel, the demon, who sought out the wise man."
"Endless interconnections here," said Julius. "Pam first introduced me to that novel when I was seeing her for a few months about the same time. So, Rebecca, if that comment was helpful, you owe thanks to Pam."
Rebecca, flashed Pam a big thank-you smile. "You were giving me indirect therapy. I pasted a note with that phrase on my mirror: Alternatives exclude. It explained my block in saying yes to Jack even though I believed he was the right man." Then, to Julius: "I remember your saying that to grow old gracefully I had to accept the limiting of possibilities."
"Long before Gardner," Philip interjected, "Heidegger," he turned to Tony, "an important German philosopher in the first half of last century..."
"An important Nazi, too," Pam interjected.
Philip ignored Pam's comment. "Heidegger spoke of confronting the limiting of possibility. In fact he linked it to the fear of death. Death, he suggested, was the impossibility of further possibility. "
"Death as the impossibility of further possibility," Julius repeated, "a powerful thought. Maybe I'll paste that on my mirror. Thanks, Philip. There're so many things to look at here, including your feelings, Pam, but first, one more comment to you, Rebecca. This episode in Las Vegas must have happened while you and I were meeting, and you never mentioned it to me. That tells me how much shame you must have felt."
Rebecca nodded. "Yep, I decided to deep-six the whole episode." After pausing and considering whether to say anything else, she added, "There's more, Julius. I was ashamed, but even more...this feels risky...I felt even more shame when I fantasized about it afterward: it was a fantastic high--not a sexual high, no that's not right, not just a sexual high, but the excitement of being outside the law, of being primitive. And you know," Rebecca turned toward Tony, "that's always been part of my attraction to you, Tony--your jail time, your bar fights, your flaunting of the rules. But just now you went over the top; that stunt of pulling out your money was offensive."
Before Tony could reply, Stuart jumped in. "You've got a lot of guts, Rebecca. I admire you. And you've liberated me to reveal something I've never talked about--not with Julius or my previous shrink, not with anyone." He hesitated, looked in the eyes of each member. "Just checking out the safety factor here. This is high-risk stuff. I feel safe with everyone here with the exception of you, Philip, because I don't know you well yet. I'm sure Julius has talked to you about group confidentiality?"
Silence.
"Philip, your silence jams me up. I'm asking you something," said Stuart, who turned and faced Philip more directly. "What's going on? Why don't you answer?"
Philip looked up. "I didn't know an answer was required."
"I said I was sure that Julius told you about confidentiality, and then I raised my voice at the end of the sentence. That connotes a question--right? And also, didn't the context about trust signify that I needed an answer from you?"
"I understand," said Philip. "Yes, Julius told me about confidentiality, and, yes, I made a commitment to honor all the group basic ground rules, including confidentiality."
"Good," said Stuart. "You know, Philip, I'm beginning to change my mind--I used to think of you as arrogant, but now I'm beginning to think that you're just not house-broken or people-broken. And that does not require an answer--it's optional."
"Hey, Stuart--good!" said Tony, smirking. "You're showing up, man. I like it."
Stuart nodded. "I didn't mean that negatively, Philip, but I've got a story to tell and I need to make sure it's entirely safe here. So," he took a deep breath, "let's go. About thirteen or fourteen years ago--it was when I was just finishing my residency and was about to enter practice--I went to a pediatrics convention in Jamaica. The purpose of such conventions is to keep up with the latest in medical research, but you know many physicians go for other reasons: to look for a practice opportunity or an academic job...or just to have a good time and get laid. I struck out on all counts, and then, to make things worse, my plane back to Miami was late and I missed my connection to California. I had to spend the night in the airport hotel and was in a miserable mood."
There was rapt attention from the group members--this was a new side of Stuart.
"I
checked into the hotel around eleven-thirty at night, took the elevator up to the seventh floor--funny how clear the details are--and was walking down a long silent corridor to my room when suddenly a door opened and a distraught, disheveled woman in a nightgown stepped out into the hallway--attractive, great body, about ten or fifteen years older than me. She grabbed my arm--her breath reeked of alcohol--and asked whether I had just seen anyone in the hall.
"'No one, why?' I answered. Then she told me a long, rambling story about a delivery man who had just swindled her out of six thousand dollars. I suggested she call the front desk or the police, but she seemed strangely uninterested in taking any action. Then she motioned me to come into her room. We talked, and I tried to calm her about her belief--obviously a delusion--that she had been robbed. One thing led to another, and we soon ended up in bed. I asked several times whether she wanted me there, whether she wanted me to make love to her.
She did, and we did, and an hour or two later while she was sleeping I went to my room, got a few hours' sleep, and caught an early morning flight. Just before I got on the plane I made an anonymous phone call to the hotel telling them that they had a guest in room seven-twelve who might need medical attention."
After a few moments of silence, Stuart added, "That's it."
"That's it? " asked Tony. "A well-soused, good-looking broad invites you into her hotel room, and you give her what she's asking for? Man, no way I'd pass that up."
"No, that's not it !" said Stuart. "It is that I was a physician and someone sick, someone probably with incipient or full-blown alcoholic hallucinosis, crossed my path, and I end up screwing her. That's a violation of the Hippocratic oath, a grievous offense, and I've never forgiven myself for it. I can't let go of that evening--it's seared into my mind."
"You're too hard on yourself, Stuart," said Bonnie. "This woman's lonely, in her cups, steps out in the hallway, sees an attractive younger man, and invites him into her bed. She got just what she wanted, maybe what she needed. Probably you did her a world of good. She probably considers that a lucky night."