I'm not talking about puppy or bondage masks here, but maybe I should be. The masks of which I speak are the ones we wear to hide ourselves from the judgments and harsh views of other people. On of the things you learn when you work in mental health is how to compartmentalize...in fact, you couldn't do your job if you did not separate areas of your life from your work.
At the same time, many of us who work in mental health are like shamans...wounded healers using our wisdom and ability to empathize to help other people. When it comes to clients, I empathize...I connect on a deep level with my clients and I have consistently gotten feedback in my training that I have an uncanny ability to meet people where they are at and to help them make changes in their lives.
But who am I when I get home? That's more complicated. Most days, even to coworkers, I put on a facade of happiness. I do this with family, friends, Sir, my coworkers, even my clients. I know we all have to at times, but I exist in my mask. My therapist says I obtained this ability when I was younger by learning early in my development that to ask for what I want and need would result in punishment at the worst, nuisance at the least. But even in my adult life, this has not changed. I find when people tell me to truly tell them how I feel or what I'm thinking, they stop listening. They try to fix my problems or worse, tell me abstractly about their own problems as a way to change the subject. And like a good therapist, I focus on their problems and secretly hate myself for letting them know I had any.
Children have this unique ability to pick up on subtle cues. When you have childhood trauma, this is amplified many times. You can read people and situations...feel tension and pressure in a room or in an interaction at a level most cannot. You notice when people you care about frequently share about their own anxieties, tensions, stressors and worries...and from what they say and you have learned, you know that talking about yours will only add to theirs. You also fear they will look at you differently...like they will see how broken and cracked you are...and they will hate you for it as much as you hate yourself.
My own therapist once said that psychologists are a uniquely wounded bunch, because we are, in many ways, like the shamans of the tribe. We "suck out the poison" so others may walk around and feel less negative things, and we neutralize it in our own times. But when we get overwhelmed we become the poisoned and this leads to professional burn out. A humorous example of this was in the TV show 30 Rock when Kenneth acts as therapist for Liz and the staff, but then becomes overwhelmed by her problems that it takes Jack to act as HIS therapist to crush these problems in his "mind vice".
The point I guess of this is that it is not simply enough to write about one's problems to get them out. It's the feeling that someone actually CARES about the problems and is willing to listen without trying to fix or change them. It's knowing they will comment on them if its online, rather than simply reading it and pretending like they didn't unless it's brought up. It's knowing that they won't be in a foul mood afterwards or throw it back in your face if the information they learn makes them upset or depresses them. Maybe it's because I do this day in and day out that I can hear people's problems without making them totally my own. Maybe other people just don't do that. If that's the case, I'm going to be very lonely for a very very long time. I know in my current living situation, my roommates live with blinders on. I can see when they are in a bad mood when I walk in the door, but they walk around oblivious (or not caring) when I am upset. I should get to bed. Happy Cinco de Mayo everyone.
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