Psychoanalytic Therapy and The Right to be Heard

by Patrick Cleveland M.A.

    

     Many of the people I see in therapy initially feel as though their problems aren’t worth speaking about or feel guilty that they shouldn’t be ‘complaining.’ Many of these people were raised by parents who were too consumed with their own lives, issues, or addictions to pay them any mind and hence gave them both overt and covert messages to keep quiet and not complain. This is the perfect recipe for repression. This is actually teaching repression as a means of navigating ones emotions. These are the parents who say things like, “Don’t cry”, “Man up”, or “I don’t want to hear it,” and ignorantly wonder why their children have emotional problems currently or trouble following through with goals later in life despite having provided all material needs for them as they grew up . The fact is that children and people need to be loved and heard. Everybody has a right to tell their story and share their experience to someone willing to listen. We don’t have the right to be heard by everyone, because we didn’t choose our parents and thus we cannot control them or anyone else. We may wish for them to hear us and love us, but ultimately we cannot make them do so. They may not even be capable of doing so due to their own issues.
     In accordance with the tradition of psychoanalytic therapy, I view psychotherapy as a safe time and space for you to share your experience and tell your story. It is a place for you to talk about whatever you like and express yourself however you want. In that regard, it can also be a time to unlearn the rules and demands your parents placed upon you to “be quiet.” It is a place to share the emotions and thoughts regarding your experience that you’ve long held in and make meaning out of them. It is a space to say what was once regarded as unsayable.
     There are many false notions about what is ‘strong’ in society. Many people think that crying is weak and not showing emotion is strong. While it is true that we need to maintain some sense of composure and self-cohesiveness in order to get through day to day life, pay the bills, and survive, I think there is a great strength and courage to simply allow yourself to feel. To allow yourself to feel whatever arises. To breakdown, scream, cry, yell, or do whatever your heart intends to express yourself and release your emotions. Holding things in and repressing emotions leads to mental health issues. That is a very basic fact that Freud discovered by listening to his patients in the early days of psychoanalysis. Just think of what a bold yet simple move that was. He was first physician to ever entertain and put into place the idea that simply speaking and being listened to can be healing. While I’m sure that since the birth of language people have come to know that telling their problems to a friend or relative made them feel better, it was Freud who took the further step of creating the time and space of therapeutic hour to solely focus on listening to the patient’s speech as a curative act. Therapy is like an archaeological excavation of the mind, an uncovering, and an expressive space for one to tell and learn about all the unique mysteries of their psyche.
     Recently, one of my clients who had been struggling with a resistance to fully share her experience for many weeks finally revealed that she was sexually molested by her father and that she never told her mother or anyone out of the fear of not being heard and believed. Her mother never really listened to her or attended to her needs while she was growing up since she was always too busy working and drinking. As a result, my client was always afraid to tell her mother anything that would be the slightest inconvenience out of a fear of being beaten or ignored, and so she held in her experience of being sexually abused for all these years. When I asked her why she didn’t tell her mother, she responded by saying her mother had been through the same thing and that nobody listened to her either. I pointed out how in her immediate response to my question she justified her mother’s behavior of ignoring her and created some illusory right her mother possessed to not listen to her because she had gone through something similar. I highlighted out how she didn’t respond from her own feelings and experience but instead immediately empathized with her mothers. I stressed how this pattern of disavowing and disregarding her own experience and feelings is a major factor in understanding why she has such trouble expressing and coping with any emotion besides anger in the present. Anger is the only emotion she ever got attention for precisely because anger leads to aggressive acts that demand attention and was thus perceived of as strength in her family. After processing these insights, she began to speak from her own experience about the feelings of shame and guilt she still carries regarding the sexual abuse she experienced as a child. I commended her for speaking and owning her feelings and thoughts regarding her experience and asked what it was like to share it. She said it felt strange and awkward to finally speak it, but also tremendously relieving that she finally told someone. I thanked her for trusting me to share her experience with, emphasized its worth, and told her that in therapy she has a right to be heard.

Patrick Cleveland MFTI
www.patrickcleveland.com