We actually never officially said goodbye to each other.

And that may have been a mistake on my part.

But from the very beginning, I didn’t feel as though Shannon and I were compatible from a patient-therapist perspective.

She was cheerful and optimistic, which didn’t jibe with my more brooding and sarcastic personality, making it challenging for us to build a therapeutic rapport.

And to quote the last girl I went out with via Tinder, who initially accepted then later rejected my second-date request, it just “wasn’t a good fit.”

After watching my aunt die in California, I was in a very contemplative and agitated state. My depression had gone from moderate and manageable to severe and overwhelming. I’d cancelled my previous two sessions with Shannon, and during what turned out to be our final session, I basically spent the entire time complaining about my job, people in general, and nothing and everything all at once, to borrow a line from Green Day song.

As usual Shannon didn’t say very much. I wanted to vent, so that was fine.

She’d assigned me a writing assignment a month or so earlier. I completed that assignment, albeit hastily, and I think she was waiting for me to mention it in our session.

I never did.

Honestly, I was disappointed that Shannon showed no interest in reading my book. That was a writing assignment to end all writing assignments from a therapeutic standpoint. As I’ve said before, I sifted through 25 years’ worth of trauma and damage in isolation while acting as my own shrink.

 

And then, knowing I’d spent a year and half torturing myself to complete my memoir, Shannon goes and asks me to write a letter to my 16-year-old self (because my mom died when I was 16).

It was a perfectly reasonable assignment. But I’d already been there and done that. I mean, not exactly, but close enough.

She wasn’t going to read my book.

And there’s no way someone could effectively or efficiently analyze me without reading Love Songs and Suicide, my debut memoir.

I knew it was a big ask, but nevertheless I thought it was time to move on and find a therapist who might be willing to read the book. And more importantly, I hoped to connect with an experienced mental health professional whom I might be a little more compatible with on a personal level.

Someone who spoke the language of sarcasm, preferably.

Three Takeaways from Shannon

Shannon provided me with a safe space to explore my thoughts and feelings, and in doing so, I gained valuable insights. Here are a few lessons I learned during my therapy sessions with her.

1. I’m too self-deprecating – She commented on this frequently, and while self-deprecation is an essential component of my sense of humor, I know I need to dial it back, especially when I’m in the presence of others, on dates, etc.
2. Mindfulness works – In therapy Shannon presented me with several helpful mindfulness exercises, and I’ve made a point to be more mindful in my day-to-day life as a result of her guidance.
3. I need to watch how I talk to and about myself – “Broke, miserable, and alone” was a refrain during my sessions with Shannon. I assigned those labels to myself, and they came to define me in a way. Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard famously said, “Once you label me, you negate me.” Shannon encouraged me to stop assigning harmful labels to myself and to treat myself with a little more, if not compassion, at least tolerance.

Final Thoughts

I need to at least send Shannon a thank-you note. She deserves that. Not sure how to go about that, but I’ll get to it eventually. Since I only met with her over the course of a few months, and because she was my online therapist, I didn’t feel obligated to part ways with her formally in a session.

But on second thought, maybe I did owe her that courtesy. I’m not sure. We ended our last session five minutes early, and I promptly began searching for a new therapist.

Next: Therapy Journal 11 – “My New Therapist Gets Me and Is Amazing, But…”

Previous: Therapy Journal 9 – “Two Cancelled Sessions (and the Sad Reason Why)”

Go to the Beginning: Journal 1 – “Broke, Miserable, and Alone”