The One Thing To Remember When You Find Yourself Climbing Out Of The Darkness
The breakup happened outside my office. She said goodbye as our cherished moments flashed before my eyes. What about sushi next Tuesday, I almost asked. It was our thing to grab lunch at Sushi on Bloor every Tuesday. I’d choke on clumps of wasabi, teary eyed. She’d laugh. So would I. But now I was struggling to swallow the inevitable retreat into solitude as it swept over my entire being. I stood there sheepishly, watching her walk away from me until she slowly disappeared into the bustling downtown core.
And then I walked into my office. I was expecting clients. Four of them, back to back. And I was their therapist.
Staying with them, engaging with their hopes and fears, listening to their stories, fighting back my tears, struggling to keep my mind from drifting into my own inner storm – for four hours straight, right after a breakup – was one of the hardest things I ever had to do.
“How do you do it?” I asked my own therapist later that week.
“How do you do what?” she asked.
“How do you put all the shit you’re going through – the pain, that feeling of impending doom, the foreseeable collapse – how do you put all of that aside and keep yourself together so you can focus on your clients’ pain and suffering – instead of your own?”
Her answer was simple, and yet so meaningful.
“Because you remember that someone did it for you.”
We are taught to be resilient because an-other was resilient for us.
From our caregivers to our friends, teachers, mentors, partners, support networks and therapists, there are those along the way who taught us how to keep going, how to survive, and how to turn the page. Because we watched them do it. We experienced it. And we took it in.
Of course, my therapist was also talking about herself. And through that insight, our therapeutic relationship became stronger. Because I knew I could trust that she could keep going for me, and that she’s probably had to do so already, even when she was braving her own inner storm.
So when you find yourself climbing out of the darkness, remember that you have the capacity to pull through. You can do it. Because someone did it for you.
