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Primal Institute 
Jack, Please stop using names on the blog. I think it’s not only unlike you but beneath you. Please think about that. I know you will. Gretch
Getchen: I understand what you are saying, but I don’t like J Guru phoning me and telling me what I should and should not do..
He ‘outed’ himself. Why should I have to use a pseudonym to someone I find so arrogant (almost as arrogant as me) and then to make a further threat and get you, Gretchen, to make it comfortable for him … publicly.
I feel Gretchen you got into this as I felt you did in the past telling Patrick that others felt the same way about me as he did. I felt then, that was a therapeutic no-no and it pissed me off … and said so. I feel you are cow towing to Jim’s desire for anonymity when at least one other person used his first name in the past.
Further, when he used to phone me he always used his first name with me and even told me where he lived.
I notice you haven’t publicly been saying much to Patrick (publicly) for what I consider to some outrageous stuff … not only to me, but about Art and others. The great thing I have always felt about this blog is that it triggers many into their feeling … in-spite of them not liking it. We should, I feel, accept our triggers and go for it. That, as I see it, is where Primal Therapy takes us all.
Finally I am somewhat pissed that you played into Guru’s hurt in this way and passed it onto me. I didn’t like it.
Jack
Larry once showed his last name on the blog by mistake. I wrote to him and warned him of it and it was removed.
Maybe I should follow Jack’s precedence and repeat Larry’s last name over and over and over again on the blog because Larry “outed” himself?
Since I am not doing so, does this mean I am kow-tow’ing to Larry’s hurt?
Guru: I have no idea what you are doing thinking or even feeling. You’ll do what you want to do … and I suspect I will do the same.
I would have thought with all that ‘assumed’ wisdom you have, that all this you would have been easily figured out … seemingly not.
Jack
I find the word ‘disease’ interesting………….in that it is a lack of ‘ease’ and basically I think that is true. In my own case I notice that no matter how ‘relaxed’ I am or want to be or try to be if I focus a bit on myself my heart is always pounding a little TOO hard, my pulse is racing a bit TOO quickly and that must have taken and be taking a kind of terrible toll on my body. So I would agree the ‘roots’ of disease have to do with that literally ‘lack of ease’ but on the other hand to just kind of shut one’s eyes to current reasons is a bit irresponsible. So one could be perfectly healthy from a ‘primal’ point of view but if you say drink flouridated water and sit in an office bombarded by ‘wireless technology’ all day it’s a fair bet you will not do so well. I don’t think the body ‘distinguishes’ between these kind of ‘insults’ they ALL cause dis-ease.
I find it very irresposible that you seemingly only take the present into consideration. There’s a whole histrory to it ALL.
Seemingly Dr. Kruses didn’t cure you of your pounding heart and racing pulse rate.
Try Primal Therapy … it worked wonders for me … laughing out loud.
Jack.
[Set up for Margaret]
scuze me…I just wanted to slip this in here, that i feel horrible. I don’t mean horrible…I mean FUCKING ANGRY HOPELESS MURDEROUSLY MOTHERFUCKING HORRIBLE. ok.
wow. having said that, now i feel a lot better! NOTTTTT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
..welcome on board.
Jack, So are you saying that because you were angry at Guru for calling and asking you not to use his name you decided to spite him and do it anyway? So this is not about him but about you expressing some anger at him or at something? I am simply saying that may not be useful to you in the end and you should think it over. I do feel people are entitled to privacy here and it is strictly up to the individual what they reveal or not. I assume we all want people to feel safe to express themselves on the blog. I have no problem with anger as long as it’s direct. I did notice this exchange myself by the way. I also don’t believe that is exactly what I said to Patrick but no matter, I just would prefer you not do this this. Gretch p.s. Isn’t Guru just collateral damage in the war between Patrick and yourself?
Gretchen – I don’t know if you’ve noticed but I have left that ‘war’ to the extent that I can. I have made a kind of uni-lateral ‘cease fire’ in spite of repeated attempts to drag me back in. And it is one of the ‘healthiest’ things I have done for myself, it feels good of course anything feels better than being in a ‘war zone’ where by definition everything I do is ‘wrong’. A kind of rigged ‘no win’ situation.
Sounds like a very important lesson, Patrick. It makes me think of a metaphor presented in a movie I recently saw. You can raise a cigarette to you mouth and clench it between your teeth, but it doesn’t have the power to kill you if you don’t light it.
Gretchen: it seems to me from this response of yours that you’ve gone a bit awry. In my response to you, I was:- “somewhat pissed” with YOU for, (as I felt), Kow towing to Jim/Guru’s request. Hope I cleared that part of it up
My pissed-off-ness with Guru I dealt with on the phone when he rang me DEMANDING (as I took it). to I stop referring to his first name. I told him to “Fuck off” and put the phone down on him. That I felt took care of my pissed-off-ness with Guru.
If you feel, (and I think you have grounds for that), I was “spiting him” maybe I was underneath … what I took to be going for me was that he was being arrogant. towards me. then following it up with a threat. On the matter of you suggesting that we all need to feel safe. I will take that for most of us, but I felt Guru was NOT respecting that. Not that I care about his respecting me … and I feel I have made that clear to him for sometime.
As for, to quote you “I am simply saying that may not be useful to you in the end and you should think it over.” Maybe it is not useful to me; but ‘hey ho’ I am not yet perfect and I get to know about ALL that on a daily basis from my Jim. So I have had a great deal of time thinking a lot of this sort of thing over. By the way is mentioning my Jim’s first name also something you request me to refrain from? I felt that was a silly remark of yours to not mention names … everyone does … but I knew what you were really referring to.
Now the “Privacy” aspect you mention. I am not sure that mentioning ones FIRST name on any blog, TV, Newspapers or whatever, , is an infraction of that persons privacy. It does break the spell from hiding (for whatever reason) behind a pseudonym. but as I stated he “outed” himself. He blew his own privacy/confidentiality or what ever YOU, or HE wish to call it.
So Gretchen, from your line “I have no problem with anger as long as it’s direct” I take it you felt I was NOT being direct. I felt I was … but let’s leave it that.
As for what you said to Patrick I can only ask that you go back and look it up. However I may not have quoted you exactly word for word, but I do feel that was what you intended and it was just that, that pissed me off with you at that time.
Next:- “War between Patrick and I”. Strong word. My take about Patrick from my 34 years of dealing with the guy (other than 34 months) is that he feels … and has done it to many others … that he can just blow off the insults and then with some later “pussy footing” render it all to naught. I did not take his insults to heart, but after deciding that I did not like him anymore, ignored him for a while and then decided to put in that aspect of me (being a Scorpio) to do some tail stinging. I felt it finally worked … he now ignores me. However I do feel for the sake of putting in my two pennuth for the blog; to pick him up on things I feel he’s totally ‘off the wall’ about re:- Primal Therapy/Theory. As for Guru he’s on again off again and equally not getting the essence of Primal Therapy IMO and uses Patrick like I feel others do to get at me. Not that I really care …. as I keep repeating I love blogging. Hope Guru will mull over my response to you.
Jack
You have no idea what you’re doing, Jack. You really don’t.
Pure brain-damaged hubris.
I have to leave the blog. It’s no longer safe.
Maybe I should hang my social security number out on the side of my house & car to see if it causes me any Primal discomfort?
……………and if it does (cause you discomfort’) be told to deal with it…………….a kind of throw back to the worst excesses of ‘primal therapy’ circa 1970………….maybe we can now call THAT ‘mock therapy’ lol…………….yesterday I was talking to my first cousin and he said ‘oh I didn’t know you were still involved with the “sect”……………now that’s a good one “the sect”
Patrick: Note that my statement didn’t denigrate Primal itself; I’m only trying to express an absurdity within a very specific context of accessing pain and discomfort.
Guru – I get that……………..none of us are against ‘primal’ it’s just I suppose there are different notions (like most religions lol) about what it really is or should be. I
am just trying to point out ‘mock therapy’ is a 2 edged sword and the person who came up with that notion deserves an “F” for that IMO, also if someone is not doing it ‘right’ how about ‘enlightening’ them or ‘educating’ them like being a bit helpful rather than the attitude of ‘i have to goods and you can only get them by coming to me, and anyone else is ‘dangerous’………….these are the kinds of attitudes which let it to be called a “sect”…….I like that word better than a ‘cult’ cult is too judgemental, sect is more um neutral I suppose but still NOT a good thing……………….
No !!!!!! Simply stop HIDING behind your pseudonym … or … tell us what you’re scared of.
My feeling has always been that your particular pseudonym is very, very conceited and extremely arrogant. I know Gretchen disagrees, but I have yet to see ANY WISDOM emanating form either your phone calls to me or your writing here on the blog.
Jack
YOUR arrogance AND conceit, Jack, easily outmatch anything by U.G., at any time. Your chronic abuse of the privacy boundaries of others, makes me so angry, that I would ban you from this Blog, for your refusal to respect anyone else’s boundaries here. Gretchen is far too nice to you, in that regard.
Just because someone mistakenly “outs” themselves ONCE, does not justify your repeated flaunting of your anger at them, abusively seeing how many times you can hurt them by repeating it, just because you can. That is so sick, I don’t have better words for it, or you.
(I have no choice but to post this here because I don’t know how to contact Vicki privately.)
Vicki: Your short post was exceptionally powerful & I agree with 100%. You clearly and succinctly stated what was floating around in my mind in a disorganized fashion these past few days.
One silver lining in this cloud: Jack has now permanently outed himself to me as someone whom I can never, ever trust again.
You have got that right. I have known that for years. Jack believes he feels so much, but is likely unable to feel bad about the bad things he does, and so cannot learn from them, and most often is not even willing to try, that he might have got it wrong.
I am delighted to learn that your knowledge of my BELEIFS and my inabilities to see my badness … perhaps even my utter ugliness.
I will duely take all you say and give it great thougth and see if I can actually change my very being, such that you and others will possibly be able to rest in peace.
I do acknowledge your talent for being able to do Freudian Psycho Analysis. Others also do that from time to time. However, I gave all that up some time ago in favor of Janovian therapy. But I am not here recommending it to anyone, as it seemingly is outdate and passe.
Thanks again for your knoledge of me Vicky.
Jack
I thought this was a very well written article about the grief people have to deal with sometimes.
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/aug/16/our-beautiful-sons-could-die-before-us
As much as I would like to say more here, I am going to wait until Jack responds to Gretchen. A bit of a struggle to keep quiet though, ya!
The article touched me, particularly the aspect of having to deal with unexpected shattering reality that can’t be escaped. Their entire future is shifted to a path they would never choose. Or I suppose there is choice. Either adult could escape by abandoning the marriage and the family. I imagine that happens in some cases.
Patrick,
I missed a few comments with the turning of the ‘page’, but saw in a reply you mentioned your heart beating too fast etc.
sounds maybe more like tension than some phusical ailment, though of course it might eventually turn into a physical problem.
I am very curious as to what your reply was to your brother referring to primal therapy as a sect..
where did he get that idea from in the first place and what did you answer?
will read the article in the Guardian now,
ps it is ironic some spam for a ‘spellcaster’ who claims to be able to give us real love within 24 hours, is being posted on some of the old blog post’s pages
the real witchdoctor, h, reminds me of John Lennon singing about the one-eyed witchdoctor leading the blind, smiley.
yesterday celebrated mother’s day, was pretty intense in various ways, but ended nicely.
my brother and me still getting closer by taking care of our mom.
M
the article was very touching to read.
now I am getting a bit confused, ok so it was not a brother but a first cousin but was that Patricks or Guru’s??
M
Margaret – it was my first cousin not brother. This is a guy I was set up ‘in competition’ with was in my class the same age etc. My father and his father had a ‘feud’ and did not talk to each other for years but used their kids as proxies in their little war (collateral damage indeed). So we were ‘competitive’ with each other and I generally ‘bested’ him academically speaking though he was pretty good too. But at around 18 and time to decide on a career I ‘blew up’ and could and did not want to carry on any more the way it had been. He however kept on a kind of straight and narrow and is a Medical Doctor and also has a Law Degree. So there is all this ‘history’ between us which by meeting with him yesterday I was hoping to kind of make progress in some way. But he made that comment in the beginning and it kind of coloured the rest of the ‘interview’. I felt uneasy and stressed as to what I said to his remark……………….nothing mumbled something about how ‘it’s interesting you would call it that. But felt unable to ‘defend’ it. And I have mentioned this before I find that a problem for me, I can’t stand up for what I have done, I feel snowed under by the atmosphere when it comes to that.
Also the day before I met these 3 guys at the beach (long story) and they were driving me in their jeep (Irish guys) and they were asking me my ‘history’ and I mentioned primal therapy. And they go ‘your’e not of those screamers are you’ and they knew some of these screamers who kidnapped a child etc. There WAS an infamous group in Ireland in the ’70’s inspired by Janov (and other things) who were called that. This guy knew a LOT about them, they went to Columbia (South America) later and he even knew a lot about that. So I tried to explain it was not the same, how it was based on it but nor really………..they seemed to regard me as some kind of ‘nutter’ but they liked me too. Insisted on buying me coffee and driving me home. Only in Ireland.
Do you tell them you built up a successful company from scratch?
Here is an article I found about the “Screamers” I had a little contact with them in 1976 in London but decided I better wait for ‘real therapy’ in LA and eschew ‘mock therapy’. These kind of were ‘mock therapy’ but go NO help from Janov though they were inspired by him. I remember in London in 1977 Janov was interviewed by the New Musical Express and they asked him about this group that has become notorious/infamous and his reply was “these people are dangerous” and even at the time and a ‘true believer’ in Janov that rubbed me the wrong way. These people were floundering it’s true but they WERE inspired by him and based their ‘therapy’ on his notions but that’s the brush off they got. At the time I was thinking it’s like if ‘revolution’ based on Marx broke out in a certain country and Lenin was to go there and say ‘nah you’re not doing it right and you are dangerous’…………….just seemed super unhelpful and another reason it has retreated to be seen as a ‘sect’
http://www.rte.ie/tv/oilean/atlantis.html
….requesting clearance to dock behind the scenes part 5.
I am dying here. Feels like she takes over the whole house when she gets up.
Patrick,
this background history sure makes it easier to understand some of the difficulties you are facing, having to deal with the bad name primal therapy must have gotten there because of all this..
I suppose Art could have come up with something more constructive but I guess it would be hard to do so in just a few quick words in an interview..
even if what he said is true in some ways, it still probably was not very constructive, is the only word I can come up with..
and another thing is he probably was still searching himself as well for which ways of therapy were useful or not or even dangerous..
but in that situation it would take an audience, in your case, that is genuinely openminded and interested to really be able to hear in an unbyassed way what you would have to tell them.
it does explain som of the mixed feelings you carry maybe, only you can figure that out.
I am glad you mentioned all of this, thanks.
M
I think this situation was a “no win” for Art. If he welcomed all the people who said they were Primal therapists after he wrote the book and dangerous things happened we would all be screaming that he should have spoken out. If he said they were not safe people to be involved with then he is overly possessive with his therapy. What should he have done? We are talking thousands of people from all over the world. The only thing he could do was to warn people of the dangers and explain they were not trained by us. After all what drew people to Primal was the Primal Scream originally. Is the implication that he should have found some way to work with or train all these people? It’s not possible nor is it possible to be in every country in the world. It’s interesting to note that these people often sold themselves as having been trained by Art. Nine times out of ten that is the claim and nine times out of ten they were not. I think it is clear why that might be said despite the fact it is almost never the truth. Gretchen
Jack, Maybe you should stop because I asked you to. That would be nice I think. I didn’t tell you to I asked you to so what’s the cost? I still think it’s beneath you. Gretchen
Gretchen: That would, for me, be a good reason, but the context of my doing so is bigger than what I feel you are suggesting. If Guru is going to stay away from the blog for whatever his reason is, then I doubt I will go on with it.
The context I refer to is:- that anyone using a pseudonym does so for reasons of hiding something. It’s not as if using a first name in anyway threatens “identity theft” Hence I am somewhat amazed that it bothers some. I don’t doubt their “being bothered”, but I do see some psychological reasoning for such ego trip ones, as I feel his is. I feel there is a bigger problem for them in doing so .. rather than anything you are suggesting to help me get beyond.
I know that Patrick has claimed … sort of quite recently, that he would like to see the return for ‘busting’. My feeling is as long as it is not he, Patrick, that gets busted. I’m almost certain he would hate that. However I am aware that there are those that could benefit from being busted,(and I could be one) but for most, I feel it would be counter productive as I have previously stated.
Let me just say one final thing in relation to you last comment. Doing so because you have asked me to do so is good enough … because I have a lot of good feelings toward you Barry and especially Vivian. But again I don’t see you as being symbolic of my mammy, daddy and certainly not my granny.
However let’s see where it all goes from here. I just hope this does not mean that we all have to be ‘lovey dovey’ to one another. I don’t see that as being altogether helpful either.
Jack
Gretchen: Just to add to that last comment of yours re:- Art’s response after writing “The Primal Scream.” Whereas it possibly appeared he was being possessive of his discovery and the ensuing practice of therapy (which I felt also, there was a great need) to add warnings about others practicing from what they merely read in his books. I too thought at the time of reading the book that it wasn’t that complex. offering therapy and … did feel that the Theory was extremely simple to understand. I believe it was just this factor that many (especially already licensed and practicing psychotherapist) thought they too could jump on the ‘bandwagon’
I have contended and will go on contending to my dying day; that unless one has had a reliving from ones very early childhood and/or life in the womb, one was operating from a left lobe only context. The re-living factor is, for me least-ways, one of the most profound experiences of my life. I also feel that until ones has one; Primal Therapy can be elusive. Although Art initially was merely an observer to Danny and Gary he did write later that he took two years off, to undergo his own therapy (I always presumed from Vivian, his then current wife. She having undergone it much earlier; I gather).
However, back to what I am trying to say. I offered my second book (a do-it-yourself) “Feeling Therapy”, to Art who read it and commented afterward to me (hope I’m not here using someones name out of context). that he felt it was:- “A good, concise and fine book”. In-spite of me using his theory and some knowledge of his therapy he seemingly had no problem about my book and offering it to the outside world. Vivian also said she thought it was a “worthwhile book”. So far, no other therapist, Primal or otherwise has commented on it. C’ est la vie.
My feeling is that his comment to me dispels the notion that he’s trying to keep this all to himself … but merely offering a warning of others practicing it without his, or his close staff’s, supervision. I contend rightly so.
I do feel that many who feel Primal Therapy was a failure, are in effect (deep down) saying “they failed to do Primal Therapy”. That said, it’s not that Primal Therapy is the failure … merely those hoping to do it failed … to do it.
Jack
Gretchen – I DO take your point about that. And you have said it before and honestly I don’t dispute it……….it’s just that’s the vantage point you had. I wanted to give you another one, mine and a lot of other people’s. We CRAVED help and guidance and again HELP from Janov, I don’t think we got it. Now again I CAN understand I read somewhere after John Lennon ‘came out’ there were 10,000 enquiries a month to the PI. That’s a LOT! It must have been very hard to know WHAT to do, like you had some kind of damn ‘revolution’ on your hands. Do you spread the wildfire or do you ‘control’ it slow it down and ;’perfect’ it. So I get that I really do………………….on the other hand I think Janov made a big mistake, that is understandable what IMO is not SO understandable is the direction he has continued to go in since. The same insistence on exclusivity the exaggerated promises, the refusal to be realistic in any way really to what has gone on the refusal to engage truthfully with the scientific community…………is this messianic fervour or is it hate to say the word but I have to ‘lying’. I would think Art Janov is not a fool so I am afraid I plump for the “L” word
I know of SO many people primal has not ‘worked’ for or if so very little including myself while I stuck to the ‘tried and true’ so rather than ‘blame’ those people, they ‘failed’ blah blah blah WHY did they ‘fail’ could it be even partly the ‘treatment’ of course it could and is, ANY treatment that makes such claims need to back it up, if it is SO good it should surmount the ‘failures’ again WHY does it fail. And please no answers blaming the victim from self appointed ‘success’ stories stories I am hugely sceptical of. To be fair I DO know some people who seem to have made it a success for them, who actually do themselves good with it but honestly I put that down more to the inherent ‘goodness’ of those people. They would have done well whatever they did they have a knack of taking the good and ignoring the bad (unlike me I get stuck on the bad) and honestly I sometimes feel it might also though it does them good also holds them back in some ways. So nothing’s perfect and Janov legacy is FAR from perfect IMHO.
….crying still about aloneness, emptiness and fear in my current life and in my growing up. Thinking about L and feeling how I have to be bigger and more polsed and able to man the helm in the flow of my life and deal with whatever reality comes my way, with her whether that means a casual relationship as is, or growing friendship, or more. Crying about the infinite highs and unbearable lows that reality has brought me so far, from finding Noreen to having her taken away, from needing normal childhood to being devastatingly alone in childhood, yesterday afternoon after work I cried letting in the losses in my life that will always be and are hurts that can’t be escaped. I cried accepting that my losses …horrible….awful….overwhelming…for no reason happened, to me, were beyond my control and are tragic threads in the fabric of my life. Thanks to this therapy my losses haven’t destroyed me and I still feel able to have some input into the weaving still left for me to do.
Last evening was a milestone for me. It was Friday evening and I didn’t want to spend another one alone at home. So I went to a movie. It was the first time in my life I felt comfortable being out in the evening alone at a movie. It was extraordinary how OK I felt being alone and how nice it was being amongst other people enjoying the evening even if I seemed to be the only one on my own, especially when only a year and half ago being out alone on a weekend evening rattled me so much I had to hurry back home or find someone to cling to.
The movie I saw was The Fault In Our Stars. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHlzhHaAQjA
It’s a bit of a sugar coated movie that says it’s not a sugar coated look about losing someone to cancer. There is a lot of reality in it too, and it stirred a lot of memories for me of being with Noreen, highlighting her cancer and her dying. This morning I’m going back in time and crying the feelings attached to those memories, the feelings of being together with her through her dying as we were through life and having to accept unacceptable loss, still now only able to barely touch on writhing screaming feeling the cataclysmic change brought with her last breath.
The feelings of the blow of Noreen’s dying are coming to the forefront as I open to L. and to the prospect of maybe having love again in my life. With such difficult feelings in the way, I don’t see how anyone in grief can open to love again without the help of this therapy. I doubt I could be worth it to L. I had hoped I would, but I haven’t heard from her today, nor do I really expect to.
A final song. I loved this song when I cruised the busy city…
Farewell bloggers. I shed a heavy tear and send love to Margaret, Fiona, Irena, Gretchen, and the mysterious Nunmy. Well-wishes go to Larry, Patrick, Phil, and to a lesser extent Daniel & Tom.
My final song. Peace to you. Be well.
Shriekback : “Faded Flowers”
This is the sound of poisons
The sickness no one knows
No one is crying for us this time
Our shapes are blurring
Under miracles of snow
Weave a circle ’round him three times
You have to plan your moves at these times
Our hearts are breaking
One more song to go
These eyes are blind
This is a pure thing
These hands I kiss
Tragic as anything
These eyes are blind
This is a pure thing
All splash and hiss
Beyond my measuring
Only the anacrucis
The main event remains
Shameful and naked, out there
In the great cold outdoors
We have to learn these things again
Bathe in this incandescent glow
The leap to something I don’t know
There is no doubt upon us when
The greasy men come back again
These eyes are blind
This is a pure thing
These hands I kiss
Tragic as anything
These eyes are blind
This is a pure thing
All splash and hiss
Beyond my measuring
These faded flowers
Precious as memory
A veil of cloud
Correct as energy
We had some good machines
But they don’t work no more
I loved you once
Don’t love you anymore
These eyes are blind
This is a pure thing
These hands I kiss
Tragic as anything
These eyes are blind
This is a pure thing
All splash and hiss
Beyond my measuring
These faded flowers
Precious as memory
A veil of cloud
Correct as energy
We had some good machines
But they don’t work no more
I loved you once
Don’t love you anymore
Oh yeah, forgot about Donal. Take care, man.
…and a sweet hug for Vicki. Goodbye..
Guru, I hope you will change your mind and stick around on the blog as I appreciate your presence. You are anonymous here by first name for random visitors. Phil
The blog won’t be the same without an Ultimate Guru.
guru please don’t leave..
M.
Guru – I have told you ‘privately’ on the side but I want to say it here for everyone to see I would hate to see you go from here. You and I have had out little (in my mind) disputes but I have ALWAYS liked you here. I have told you that on quite a few occasions.
I feel I know where you are at (kind of) with this ‘leaving’. I have threatened the same myself and for similar reasons to yours. In fact about a month after I ‘joined’ I also ‘left’ and you were speculating as to whether I was still reading the blog etc. (I was) as I suspect you are now, you also said another time to me after I had ‘left’ that you felt I couldn’t now even if I tried. And you turned out to be right about that. (Line in “Broke back Mountain” – which I have not seen “I can’t quit you”)
Not to play therapist (wot me?) but if you DID leave I honestly think it might well be quite a bad thing for you. Unless you really are ‘resolved’ and not just being in a lot of hurt. At different times during my life I ‘quit’ a relationship or more accurately tried to. It can hurt really bad but usually in my own case at least I would realize most of the hurt is self-induced. Like an animal in a trap that is gnawing it’s own leg off to get away the gnawing starts to hurt worse than the trap. (I could see though that could be seen another way, go through the pain and then you are ‘free’). The second way (in my mind ONLY please no need to ‘point things out’) is more ‘primevally correct’ but like a lot of such things is again IMHO usually ‘wrong’. The whole project of ‘feeling pain’ or ‘going towards or thought the pain’ is usually counter-productive………………my ‘advice’ right now would be forget the pain go towards ‘pleasure’ what feels good to you right now or next week or the week after. Don’t get caught up in the fact you ‘said’ you would quit you have to back it up. You don’t……………you have done nothing wrong or shameful or anything at all that I can see so feel free to change your mind. Nobody here will feel less of you because you do, pretty everyone would see it as a positive, you are ‘man’ enough to change your mind, please don’t be hurting yourself maintaining a stance or whatever.
I can imagine you want to quit for a while that’s fine of course it’s just I fear you might feel you need to maintain this and again for me you don’t. Do whatever the f… feels good to you and you can see from the responses already you will be welcomed back with open arms.
This turned out to be longer than I wanted (again!) I wrote this to you yesterday
“Just read the blog now, my first reaction is PLEASE do not leave the blog. You are valued there certainly by me, I know we had out little (in my mind lol) disputes but I have always liked you there and very much continue to do so. When you are ‘gone’ it gets a bit dreary and if you are gone all the time…………….well then maybe I will go too though I have threatened that before”
I mean that Margaret, Larry, Tom, Daniel, Miguel, Vicki, Donal, Phil, even Fiona and even Irena (lol) and anyone else I forgot to mention I am sure I will think s… I forgot that person are great and everything but there is ONLY one “Ultimate Guru” as your name suggests. I have a song too by that fine Irish band “Hothouse Flowers” and I read recently this was about a friend dying of cancer which added for me to it’s meaning because of my Mom’s passing. It simply enough called “Don’t Go”. I mean it (man)………….
Margaret & Phil: It’s always great to know I might be missed, thank you. I just think it’s best to stay away for a while.
Just send me emails, OK? I’ll try to keep up. And well wishes to Miguel, too.
Words to “Don’t Go”
There’s smell of fresh cut grass
And it’s fillin’ up my senses
And the sun is shinin’ down on the blossoms in the avenue
There’s a buzzin’ fly hangin’
Around the bluebells and the daisies
And there’s a lot more lovin’ left in this world
Don’t go, don’t leave me now, now, now
While the sun smiles
Stick around and laugh a while, yeah
And I lie on warm and soft sandy beaches
And my, my toes are submerged in the water
And it feels good
Children playing buildin’ castles on the shoreline
Like a painted little love and lord
It feels so fine
Don’t go, don’t leave me now, now, now
While the sun smiles
Stick around and laugh a while, yeah
There’s white horses and they’re comin’ at me
And they face now
And there’s a blue sirocco blowin’ worm into my face
The sun is shinin’ on the other side of the bridges
And the cars goin’ by with smiles in the windows
There’s a black cat lyin’ in the shadow of the gate-post
And the black cat keeps tellin’ me that love is on it’s way
Yeah, there’s a black cat lyin’ in the shadow of the gate-post
And the black cat tells me that love is on it’s way
Don’t go, don’t leave me now, now, now
While the sun smiles
Stick around and laugh a while, yeah
Stick around and laugh a while
Don’t go!
Don’t go, don’t leave me now, now, now
While the sun smiles
Stick around and laugh a while
I can hear you comin’
Comin’ round on down here now
Comin’ now
You don’t have to leave now, no
Don’t go, don’t leave me now, now, now
While the sun smiles
Stick around and laugh a while
Don’t go, don’t leave me now, now, now
While the sun smiles
Stick around and laugh a while
I am doing more to clean out and dispose of “stuff” that I have been putting off dealing with, for years. I find it hard, as each item has memories attached, feelings that overwhelm me sometimes, or hopes of things that never happened, that I need to let go of. Then, thinking about some of this, I was moved by something I came across on another blog, written by a woman I don’t know, so I’m editing out some personal details:
“It’s a rainy day here and I have been cleaning out my closets. I felt so good last weekend after doing my walk-in closet I started another one today. This is a much harder one to do. I have several boxes of paper work in there. I put them in there almost 10 years ago and just decided it’s time to go through them too. I started with what I thought was an easy one.” And then she details what she found, but says, “I would not think that would upset me but it brought back bad memories.” Just receipts from her former employer, but they reminded her of how her boss treated her after her husband died, and the boss “made sure she was laid off” from her work. Then she opened the 2nd box, and saw something about “coping with chemotherapy”, and had to stop going through it.
It’s imperfect, but I really liked how someone else responded to her: “Bad memories can come back so vividly that we can feel just as bad now as we did then. Don’t let this babe continue to control or inflict any misery on your life. Forgive and take the high road. Fate always repays in kind. Have some fun instead on a Saturday. No one ever got a Nobel Prize for tidy closets. Hope that you and [her pet’s name] both feel really good soon.” And the woman wrote back, “you made my day better thank you for being here”
“No one ever got a Nobel Prize for tidy closets.” I definitely want to remember.
Far better to dream of fly fishing. 🙂
You scoundrel, you!
It’s interesting now after I had written to Guru about ‘leaving’…..yesterday I had kind of the opposite experience that I had with my cousin who asked me if I was still with the “sect” (I LOVE that “sect” I could have avoided SO much trouble if I had talked about the ‘sect’ instead of the ‘cult’ cult is too ’emotive’ by far) This woman M. was a friend of mine in College, a year ‘after’ me but we ran in the same circles very much. She also was a philosophy student and went on to a Masters Degree in that and later a Law Degree and is now on the “High Court” which in Ireland is just under the Supreme Court (pretty much like the US)
Anyway a bunch of them are arranging a dinner for me in Dublin and it’s a kind of re-union,she happened to be vacationing near me here so I met her last week and I was very impressed by her ‘smarts’ and also in many other ways so we arranged to meet again yesterday. I had such a great day, we walked 5 miles each way on the beach, wading in the water etc though it was cool and cloudy (is there ANY other weather here lol). Talking and remembering the whole time, she bringing me up to speed on her life and vica versa. Then later we drove around here to some of the ‘beauty spots’ and it was that time of the day, still cloudy but with the sun shining through here and there, amazing variations of colors etc on the hills and mountains and beaches. Amazing beauty…………..but I just wanted to talk a bit about ‘leaving’ specifically me leaving Ireland and staying ‘gone’ in the US.
That was her question WHY? what were you thinking, what are you thinking? I said ‘alienation’ how we were bullied, how unwelcome we felt in spite of all the beauty, how pressured I felt in my family, how we were little slaves on the farm. We also talked a LOT about ‘primal’. She wondered about it she knew I had left to ‘do’ it but I had then fallen off the face of the earth. She seemed to know about primal I asked her if she did. “Oh yeah I read Janov, we all did” I asked her what did she think about it, she pauses “well it seemed like a typical American thing in a way” what do you mean ” oh like Timothy Leary or one of those a bit over the top, exaggerated, claiming too much” ok anything else “Fundamentalist” what do you mean “anything that claims to have THE answer like that almost certainly can’t be correct, it claims too much, it’s unbalanced and like any fundamentalism is usually harmful in the end” interesting anything else ” I don’t think he is correct about birth primals etc, I don’t think the brain works like that at all, I don’t think you can access memories like that in a ‘pristine’ way like that. Even later memories are always overladen with more recent stuff I don’t believe that we CAN access memory in that way. I believe there is or can be a great need from there and it colours and affects everything afterwords but I actually think he is probably wrong about the brain and memories”
This is more or less how the conversation went…………….and I have to say I was/am impressed by her. These are pretty much similar to how I see it. But I suppose more to the point was her question about ‘leaving’. Oh this would take too long……………maybe I write about this later…………
Guru – I ‘KNOW’ you are watching and I remembered some of these lines from Macbeth (Shakespear) not that you are dying or anything though as Bob Dylan said ‘some people are not busy being born/they are busy dying’
Malcolm. My liege,
They are not yet come back. But I have spoke
With one that saw him die: who did report
That very frankly he confess’d his treasons,
Implored your highness’ pardon and set forth
A deep repentance: NOTHING IN HIS LIFE
BECAME HIM LIKE THE LEAVING IT; he died
As one that had been studied in his death
To throw away the dearest thing he owed,
As ’twere a careless trifle.
Patrick: You have my email so we’ll keep in touch. No extravagant departure fanfare needed for me. Maybe I’ll come back some other time.
Guru – that’s cool, I understand very much. Yes we’ll keep in touch.
To be more complete about it M. yesterday said to me she thought my ongoing argument/obsession about the primal idea also struck her as a kind of ‘fundamentalism’ of it’s own , how so what do you mean “oh they way we were brought up, one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Faith, the one True Church, the need to believe in THE answer, that there IS an answer and it a way that answers ALL problems” oh ok I see what you mean “and in these kinds of matters therapies etc the answers are hard to come by whey you do they are often ambiguous and a bit maybe sketchy and not that clear” ok I see what you mean “and Janov if you really think about it it was probably a great way to ‘market’ and ‘publicise’ his business so he is just doing what is good for him and I think because of the way we were brought up are a bit gullible to those kinds of promises. Janov in that way very effectively set himself apart as unique etc” ok I see what you mean
…………I am aware this makes me sound like some dumb puppy dog but I was struck by how much truth there was in it for me at least.And again kind of brings home to me the importance of ‘culture’ she being Irish can see a lot of this more clearly because it is SPECIFIC to our situation. Janov had the idea of something that is SO true it transcends all ‘cultures’ but does it really. Easy to say it does and if even it does in theory I would say in practice it does not. To me if ‘primal’ is valid it gets more and more and more SPECIFIC specific to our situation and in the end to MY situation.
All these bromides about ‘you are in your head etc’ are just that cliches, way of shutting people up, bumper stickers that appeal to the lowest common denominator, instead of being specific they are very GENERAL and as such are pretty much useless IMO. I am so glad to meet someone who seems to ‘understand’ me someone who sees me maybe more clearly than I can see myself. I am going to spend several more days with her drive to Dublin and back maybe climb a mountain or two meet her family etc. But to be clear we are not having a ‘relationship’ in the way it is commonly used but it is a ‘relationship’ I already value a lot so we’ll see where it goes……………
Jack,
after all your lecturing on straight and crooked thinking you weren’t even able to give Gretchen a straight answer, yes or no.
M
Margret: Yes of course. Did you not think so?
Jack
Patrick,
I think you are generalizing your own experience and that of some specific persons you know when you jump to the conclusion primal therapy does not work.
nobody says it is a miracle therapy, it actually is hard work, but using your kind of arguments I could come up with loads of examples of people who feel primal therapy has improved or even saved their life.
but that is not what I want to do.
what you seem to search for, a general kind of therapy that works for anyone at all, even for those that have great reluctance or doubt about its usefullness, is utopic I’m afraid.
this therapy is great for the persons that want to actively explore and work on what does not fel right in their emotional life or in the patterns they live by.
the other great reward of primal ideas in general seems to me to emphasize the value of allowing and encouraging people’s emotions and their expression, in a therapeutic setting or otherwise.
your judgement of pri;al therapy’s succes or failure seems to have more to do with what your friend referred to as your search for some kind of solution, like a religion, that provides all the answers for everyone.
of curse you are entitled to your own view, but I htink you might look in vain for agreement here on the blog, as most people here seem to feel primal therapy has been very useful for them.
M
Margaret – it’s not that I am saying it does not work, it is more a matter of can it work better, is is being ‘done’ in an optimal way. And that can get into a lot of areas, is the basic theory itself faulty or skewed, is it unbalanced or one sided etc. I don’t think these issues should be verboten, they should be able to be explored in an open way.
I am honestly surprised that people patients and therapists don’t wonder more about the ‘failures’ I have at times kind of put myself forward as one of these very failures. Most ‘failures’ go away, drift off come various kinds of grief. I know many of them. I think most people do if they can get away from seeing the idea as a threat.
I would expect a more ‘scientific’ attitudes to these kind of issues, what I find I get a lot from ‘true believers’ is more of a ‘sect’ like or God forbid too strong a word ‘cult’ like atmosphere. Janov I believe made a big and very important ‘discovery’ but the thing then is why has it been so ineffective even so maybe even ‘harmful’ to a lot of people. It makes no sense to see Janov as having the ‘last word’ on everything. To me his legacy is very double edged and ok the PI is not Janov but nobody has tried to ‘update’ anything. Are the PI ‘different’ or do they have different notions or not. Barry is not saying, is not writing a book even printing a leaflet. I had this kind of ‘mad’ idea for a moment today maybe I should try to write a ‘book’ but it’s unlikely I would. I am too un-disciplined and lazy and who would ever read it anyway.
I thought of a provocative title “Janov got it wrong” but that would only annoy the handful of ‘true believers’ and would mean nothing to the general population or even much to the ‘failures’. Their attitude would be ‘tell us something we don’t know’ Sometimes I see myself like a ‘true believer’ Marxist who laments the fact it never seems to have worked properly anywhere but is still haunted by the fact it is a ‘good idea’. Most people give up on it, a few still ‘believe’ but I am in a kind of uncomfortable middle. Didn’t someone say also Christianity was a good idea just a pity it was not actually tried anywhere. That kind of syndrome. But you have heard all this before……………….
What makes you think no one wonders about the ‘failures’?
Is anything being ‘done’ about it…………….actions speak louder than words……………….and I don’t mean ‘done’ on an individual level, I would never fault Gretchen for her tireless work and caring for people, that’s not the issue. The issue IMO is a bigger one and it goes to ‘ideas’ and a big revamp is needed at least I think so………….primal is circling the drain the way it is being done………………..you only have to look at ‘hot shot’ here and his performance the last few days to me that demonstrates something seriously ‘off’ ………………if he is an ‘example’ God help us……………….but ok one swallow does not make a summer but still………………..makes one wonder…………..
am an outsider, but Janov has written several books these latter years…the therapy has progressed if you care to look. Also several videos free and to-pay-for. Will miss Guru’s humor, but totally understand, as exposure is attached to a high charge for me also.
I am going nuts with such a big feeling of not having anything. This is getting triggered so greatly by the significant other’s job loss, and the need to figure out how to cut stuff out of the budget so we can survive on my salary. The big trigger going on lately is that my job does give out overtime but the backroom dealing and the inconsistent rules by my bosses has resulted in little overtime coming my way. I was going to go to group yesterday with my last group pass, to try and feel some of this horrible feeling. However,it was so hot where i live, I did not feel it safe to leave my old dog alone, in case the power for the whole area goes down, and the a/c with it, and he could overheat and die a horrible death. Meanwhile, the s.o. gets free rein to go see the new grandkid in our only car instead of staying home with the dog. Of course, the first thing that gets cut out of the budget is always therapy; actually the first thing that got cut out of the budget was withholding our taxes, so i have that nightmare looming in April 2015. There is something I do that plays into this feeling, I am not sure if i am pulling this horror towards myself, beating myself with it, asking for more beatings. I feel hurt by the assholes at work and feel like yelling at them, but also i want to suffer in silence about the injustices they are doing to me. They have been fucking with me for such a long time now, and the guy who put in a complaint to the union about them, has now turned out to be their darling boy, leaving me to suffer in the cold. The darling boy, who I allied myself with, is hogging all the overtime to pay for the a/c in his car, but all the while bad-mouthing the asshole bosses behind their backs. I thought i felt a little relief yesterday, in that the s.o. and i were finally working together on handling our money better after almost 4 decades of not doing so, but today again, I wake up from a nap, and this situation at work has been festering in my nightmare and jolts me out of my sleep. I am here in the house minding the fucking dogs, while s.o. is out doing her brand of therapy, and I dont want to do anything, it is so fucking hot, it seeps through the a/c, and i just feel paralyzed. There is so much I need to do but i cant get in motion. I cannot feel at home, I have never been able to, I feel really really bad and beaten up, and at the same time, I feel like a mad dog because of it. We had to cut out most of the cable tv channels, so there is nothing much I can drug myself with anymore. The s.o. managed to find out how to watch on demand Real Housewives of Baghdad Hills, but I don’t see anything and I don’t really care and I am so fucking angry angry and psycho. The fucking bosses at work are pushing us to do impossibilities, and I am old and slow, so I am not measuring up, and they are plotting and plotting and talking behind our backs. I don’t think I am exagerating this, although maybe I am seeing through clouded lenses. I no longer have any allies at work, they have pushed us to move over to a different location to promulgate teamwork, and “knowledge-transfer”; in other words we are all together in one big room so that everyone can hear everything that goes on and we all know everything, and we all do the same work. Except for the guys who are at the outlying sites. Except for the lead boss, who gets on a conference call and doesn’t want anyone to hear what is being said so he slams his door shut. Except that nobody can really concentrate to do their work because we are all sitting in one big room with everyone making noises. Except that I am not over there anyways, I am over in my old place, because the work they are giving me is all in the old place. But I am sitting in an uproar of empty desks strewn all over the small area, and we are supposedly only allowed one computer for all of us technicians to use, but the darling boy has a laptop and his puppy has a laptop. And I like the puppy and i used to be able to talk to him about my woes, but now my woes include the darling boy who is hogging all the overtime and being the darling boy by doing his bullshit, so i cannot talk to the puppy about his master, because the puppy is also hogging all the overtime too, because as the darling boy says, “Well, me and S work so well together, thats why I dont want to work overtime this week with nobody else”. And there is a possiblity of getting some overtime next saturday, but s.o. is getting to take a camping trip on friday saturday and sunday so i am stuck with the dogs and the heat and my son’s old Buick, which may or may not make it to work on Saturday. And there may or may not be overtime but it would be with one of lead-boss’s inner circle, a creepy-looking guy who made jokes of how I didnt talk much until I told him that i was sensitive about that, and i dont trust any of the guys in the inner circle; i once heard my supervisor say shit about me on a conference call, where he thought the microphone was off, I had asked him previously for some overtime, and he was talking to the lead-boss on this conference call unaware that i was listening in at the other building. He was telling him, “how did you like how i handled that” in reference to me asking for the overtime, and he was saying “he can get off his ass during the week and do this, he doesn’t need a saturday”, so it is not my imagination that these creepy bossmen are plotting and badmouthing us, and lying to us, they said the overtime was going to end, month after month they keep saying it is going to end, but they keep handing it out to themselves and their favorites. And if there is overtime for me, it will probably be that i have to work with their creepy asses, and I feel like i am getting fucked in the ass when i am around these guys. And I applied for overtime installing windows on computers, and it was denied, and i applied for overtime for cleaning up our space that all the other sloppy technicians had trashed and it was denied, because it was not something that needed to be done on a saturday, but the next saturday, they were doing those exact same things and getting overtime. Now I am getting my thoughts together here, and I could make a concrete case to talk to these fucker bosses about, but i am scared out of my britches to talk to them, and i would get lost in my words, confused, so maybe if gets bad, I will write another email that they wont respond to. I might say something in the boring meetings about it, this is really hard for me to figure out my next move, i feel like i am in a battle without any guns. probably too many words for this blog, i will see if it can upload this many words or not.
and so i am sitting here in my room, surrounded by boxes and boxes of receipts and bills and meaningless objects, much as i did at one period in my childhood, sitting in an attic by myself with nothing to do, in essence it was like being in jail, i guess i might have been able to look out the window, but all i would have seen was the pigeon coop where the murderous uncle picked out baby pigeons and pulled off their heads like the fuckers in iraq, so why would i want to look out that window. so here i am in the present, i should listen to some music, see if i can feel anything when i am at home, but that is impossible, the radio is on a high shelf where i cant change the station, i dont feel like moving the radio, i am stuck i am paralyzed, if i get up and make any noise the old dog will start groaning for food or something, the monster dog in the bathroom will want something. the piano i got for christmas years ago sits unused in the closet. this pc needs to be reloaded since the hard drive is bad and the sound does not work, and i cant download music anymore for some reason, so fuck fuck fuck. the black cat has some fungus again, which cost us a lot at the vet, ok this is ridiculous, going nowhere, i am stuck stuck stuck, going to shove food down my throat to kill the pain.
What a struggle! Sounds like nothing much is going right for you.
jack,
so if I get you right, your ‘yes’ to Gretchn means you agree not to use Guru’s first name on the blog anymore, is that what you say?
M
Margaret: Yes.
Jack
The whole issue of “psuedomyms” and “first names”, has run it course and I feel in it’s own way will have left it’s mark … particularly for those concerned. In the annals of ‘words’ and their spin, we are left with two “privacy” and “hiding”.
Bloging, for the most part, is battle of wits. If one is super sensative I would suggest to leave blogging alone. One runs the risk of being slamed for ones ideas, comments, opinions and notions. It might be suggested that the Primal blog has another fuction … that being:- to give comfort and solace to the lonely souls and those desiring community … because in their own sphere they do not have that. I find that sad, but I do see the underlying reason for it:- …. early child-hood and womb-life. That said, I do feel that those manipulating for the latter are doing just that:- “manipulating”. Something I feel is not a healthy manifestation of Primal Therapy. It will inevitabley involve both. I feel that ought to be understood and both accomodated. We all have our different reasons for blogging here.
Jack
The Winston Churchill of primal, ‘fight them on the beaches, fight them on the land and it will be long and it will be hard but there will be no withdrawal and above all NEVER ADMIT DEFEAT’ even when ‘defeated’ never admit defeat pirouette and ‘spin’ out of it, change the shape of the field, change the game even spin spin spin, spin away from ‘the truth’ there is no truth just spin also in Hell there is no truth just spinning devils, ‘truth’ is for naive people stupid naive Irish bog people they had very primitive notions about truth, justice beauty fairness etc…………..forget them we are in modern world here, spin, dis-information, self promotion, advertising slick bitches slick devils…………………and they will take you to Hell if you listen………………DON’T.
I would not use the word defeat if someone is having the courage to make adjustments.
Sylvia and Patrick, No outsiders here! I was about to say the same thing Sylvia. I thought Larry’s comment ” what makes you think no one wonders about the failures?” was also to the point. The therapy has evolved and changed a great deal in forty years . Art has written many books addressing just that and we have written countless blog articles on various issues and in fact did a seminar on that very subject. Is it possible Patrick that you mean therapy has not changed in the way you wanted it to? Some part of you must recognize we have seen thousands of patients and had endless discussions about what works and what does not. We have thoroughly discussed all failures and successes and evolved accordingly. I do notice that you have often mentioned a handful of friends that also consider themselves failures. I would advise not discussing this with them for a period of time. We can tend to support each other’s neurosis without really meaning to. I notice you take very seriously the complaints of these friends and dismiss the positive comments others might make. That leads me to believe the agenda came first and then the evidence was gathered later. I feel you get very hurt if others don’t grab onto your views on diet or electromagnetic energy. I can understand that but that should not lead you to believe there is no change it should just lead you to believe that those things are not the top priority for those in the trenches. I do have the feeling this war between you and Jack is not over and maybe Guru somehow was dragged into the middle of all that. I also thought your cousins comment ” are you still in the sect?” was extremely passive aggressive . I might run for the hills. I believe you said Margaret told you that you were fundamentalist in your approach. I may have misunderstood but either way that is my perception – a kind of ” you are for me or against me ” mentality and of course the beginnings of ” cult” like thinking ! Gretch
Gretchen – I appreciate you taking the time, I ‘could’ go into kind of answering this point by point but that would miss the point I’m thinking. A few things though – it is not really a matter of me and my ‘loser’ friends getting together and re-in forcing our neuroses I know that syndrome and try to avoid it as best as I can. I am more talking about things I have seen, the last ‘primal’ house I was in I drove a (primal) guy to the homeless shelter out of money, friends and hope, someone I knew just went back to Europe utterly paranoid and ‘losing his mind’. Don’t want to dwell on these kind of things so much and actually I don’t I understand there is no need for this to ‘hijack’ my own course but these things are real. I would think the PI might ‘worry’ about them more than me.
One thing though to try to keep this as personal as I can…………I realize I am ‘bitter’ at the PI because of the ‘faith’ I had the hopes and dreams invested, all my life ‘put on hold’ for something well that did not meet expectations. But even so I realize it is/was my life nobody forced me to do anything and in the end am ‘mad at myself’ for some of the decisions I have made. I notice this about myself recently the things that make me the MOST ‘mad’ are things deep within me. Like I am fighting myself and the struggles and fights with myself dwarfs any others I might have ‘on the outside’. I hesitate to say this, it’s like once again I give the PI a ‘pass’ and that is a syndrome I do not like either. I sometimes think WHY has no one being able to write a ‘book’ updating PT or pointing out the imbalances in it, and it’s like people get so broken down and discouraged and the ‘it’s your feeling’ kind of cripples them of action or the wherewithal to do anything. In that way it can be insidious it drains people of will and power and bring them low………..
About my cousin’s comment I agree with you. I FELT like running for the hills, I found it extremely hurtful and I was quite un-comfortable afterwards. But what bother’s me more is I am unable to ‘defend’ it I feel so beaten at that moment, I felt similar earlier when my brother asked me about someone I knew ‘is she an LSD casualty also’ It’s like they never ask me anything but they have all made up their mind ‘patrick joined a cult/sect and never came to anything’. But that is a function of the ‘careerism’ around here I can ignore it for the most part.
Rather than make this some kind of long diatribe I think I will interject here and there in a while things I think have gone off the rails a bit. Try to be constructive though and helpful something I criticize Janov for not being. As the saying is “Better to light a candle than curse the darkness”. I have done too much ‘cursing’ I want to start lighting a few candles…………
Aaargh!!
OK, I have received multiple emails saying, “The coast is clear, come back to the blog! Jack agreed to drop the first-name basis now”
All sounds well and good when that is said and the sentiment is appreciated, but I already said he can never be trusted again. If I come back to the blog I would have to trust him not to do it again. See the problem here?
A special note for Sylvia: Although it’s nice to have someone missing my humor, I would really hate to have a stranger think that was the predominant facet of my personality. Many times I use humor as a tool to express a deeper message and to show absurdities when certain trains of thought in life are no longer tenable within specific contexts.
A veteran Primal patient and I were once walking along Venice beach when he told me, “You can be a laugh a minute, but then no one takes you seriously and you won’t even take yourself seriously after a while.” I was never wanting to try to be a comedian; humor is usually just a tool for me. I also would like to know I have very serious concerns as well….
Sylvia also mentioned Janov’s videos. I don’t watch his videos or read his blog much anymore (very rare occasions for me) for personal reasons way too lengthy to discuss here.
The very fact that I am posting this here tonight only shows my lack of discipline and that my warnings & declarations cannot be taken seriously. I really don’t like that..
Not sure what to do..
Maybe get some therapy to help kick the blog addiction. 🙂
Guru – I can relate trust me on that. And to at least support your ‘reality’ I have to say in my very considered opinion and based on many many years of interactions and betrayals beyond words Jack IS utterly untrustworthy. So to me at least you are correct in that…………….I have had to reckon with this too ‘here’ and I have so far run the gauntlet, put up with virtually constant sneering sniggering hissing from him but in a way I am ‘proud’ of myself I HAVE been able to ‘ignore’ (until now at least). And people should know it is not easy for a person like me I am ‘reactive’ I am the one who as a boy they threw my school bag into a field to bring me so low…………………and I have met another one a bully beyond compare an ‘intellectual’ bully but I actually think I am making some ‘progress’ I have been for 6 months now been able to ‘ignore’ and it was not that ‘forced’ I was busy with other and ‘better’ concerns here and I hope and intend for this to be a ‘one off’ I REFUSE to be dragged in the gutter and brought low AGAIN by his tactics and his insanity.
I also relate to what you say about ‘humour’………….I find myself falling into that here, I am not known for my humour but I can be humorous and it is so easy to slip into that but as you say as much as people ‘enjoy’ it they also kind of dismiss you in the process. My old friend from College days I met wrote to me and said it was wonderful to see me and mentioned my ability to be serious and humorous at the same time as a great gift. I liked that but I do tend to go too much towards the ‘humour’ It is well known too that ‘comedians’ as a group are often very depressed and sad as people, you only have to look at Robin Williams the ultimate ‘funny man’ and now……………I read somewhere recently in relation to him that humour was very much a ‘taking’ on the part of the audience and a ‘giving’ by the comedian. In that way the comedian ‘loses out’ he gives of himself and they take another syndrome I am VERY familiar with
I don’t agree with Larry (who may not being serious) about breaking the blog addiction. Why is it an addiction? To me it has little to do with ‘womb life’ (the latest ‘bragging point’ from YKW) or even ‘early childhood’. Modern life has ruined all ‘community’ and this at least gives us a chance to regain some of that in a different way. What’s wrong with that? Why talk of that in terms of addiction? We are all ‘addicted’ to many things like breathing, talking, seeing etc.Too much talk of ‘addiction’ is to me more self flagellation and denial I wouldn’t worry about that. You obviously enjoy the blog I would not let anyone push you off, I would not say it is ever productive to engage with Jack but hey you even might get something out of that here and there.
I would not see what you are doing as a ‘lack of discipline’ but I like your ‘not sure what to do’ that is honest, very honest…………..
Gretchen – I will address what you said later…………….need a little time………..
so, so, so depressed…..unbelievable old feeling kicking my ass every day now.
That ‘s gotta be really hard to live with.
Guru – this was the piece I was thinking about in relation to ‘humour’
The Grim Reaper never runs out of converts. Put another way, death never gets his full due. Comedians do not figure well in this – they are particularly attractive targets in the business of death. Ironic, then, that clowns are sometimes hired to make the ill in hospitals laugh, to give the impression that the world is not as dark as all that.
The more one is engaged in the business of making one laugh, the more one is taken from. It is a well that never runs dry. There is much to be said that the jovial one is the creative giver, and the one who laughs in response is a pirate of emotions, a recipient, yes, but a parasitic one. While we will never know the extent of what a comedian like Robin Williams was going through when he took his life, a tendency of exploitation is all too strong. The comedian is doomed to suffer, and when that life is taken by the joker’s own hand, questions will be asked.
The casualty list for such noble people is high, and it comes with its fair share of ailments – alcoholism, drugs, the softening blow of dejection. Tony Hancock, one of Britain’s finest, found himself mocking the Australian society he visited near the end of his life with well-targeted viciousness. There was a sense that he was coming to his end, brooding in the twilight of his years. He died in a Sydney flat in June, 1968. He did leave grief, but he left a stunning record of humour.
Speaking of humour here’s a ‘joke’
I’ve decided to sell my Hoover… well, it was just collecting dust.” –
hi Phil,
it sounds like you are having a good time..
wish I could eat a delicius zarzuela there with you.
and some boquerones and albondigas as a starter, some cava firsst and a good \Rioja to wash it all down, has, and then the good old mediterranean sea, mmm
A little bit more about comedians and comedy……………..
http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/aug/20/psychology-of-comedy-humour-psychosis-overlap
Patrick, I have mentioned a book I read many years ago several times on the blog – it is called “Wicked” and I will give you the short version. Some of you may have already read it or possibly seen the Broadway musical. Anyway it takes the story of ” The Wizard of Oz” , a tale most of us know well, and turns it inside out. It begins before Dorothy goes to Oz and asks the question ” what if the bad witch was actually quite good and the good witch was actually quite vain and shallow?”. Long story short it is about perspective – maybe what we think we know is only half the story . It allows us to explore the possibility that there might be an alternate point of view that is closer to the truth. So…. You made this comment ” the last primal house I was in I drove a guy to the homeless shelter out of money, friends and hope.” You added that you thought the “PI might worry about them more”.but what if I were to say not only did the PI worry but gave this person many hours of help and time, gratis, and did this for a very long time. What if I were to say the Primal community then stepped forward to pay all expenses for this person for over a year ( so hardly out of friends) . On top of that more than one member of the community set up job interviews that were never shown up for. What if I were to say that it is odd you might bring this person up because I can hardly think of anyone who was given more help with no expectation of anything in return. ” Showing up” for therapy is not enough – not for any of us. You have to be willing to do the hard work. You have to be willing to face the feelings that have brought you to the PI and you have to be willing to take care of yourself, even if only minimally. It is hard to believe but even those who are willing to come for treatment are not always prepared to take those next steps. We don’t sell ourselves as anyone’s new parents and we are not a hospital or halfway house. We can help you move toward the necessary feelings but the patient has to decide if they can find the courage to move forward. My problem is that you can see how inflammatory your comment about driving someone to a homeless shelter might be. You can also see, I believe, that you may only know a fraction of the story. Of course you can easily verify what I am telling you but I have the feeling it makes no difference. We have had these conversations before …you will tell a story as if it is fact, it is your proof ! When I say wait, that is inaccurate, that is not what happened, well, it quite simply does not seem to register. That is why I wondered if the thesis was first or the ” evidence” was first . Why has no one written a book updating therapy? Art has done just that. As I said in the previous comment Barry and I spend most of our time seeing our patients and as you also know we are completely booked – this blog is the most we have time for right now. This is also the perfect example of why I feel it makes little difference what the facts are – you lament that no book has been written. Sylvia and I both point out that Art has written many books since the Primal scream was written but you seem not to hear. It feels like there was something you wanted that isn’t entirely clear. You have said you wished Art was more helpful. I’m not sure what you thought he should do. I know you hate being told that you might be in feelings but I have to say this might be a time where that is the case. Gretchen
This new page is for comments
This reminds me of what I asked Gretchen earlier: When is hard work just a standard life’s difficulty and when is it a feeling? When life activities are difficult for some and easy for others, is it because of different abilities and talents or is it an outgrowth of a difficult earlier life?
When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure.
Lots of days go by where everything feels like an uphill slog for me and it’s all too easy to say, “Fuck this, is this hassle really worth it? We’re all going to die in the end anyway and no one’s going to give a damn what sort of imaginary prize we were chasing after on Earth….”
Also, when I do difficult or demanding things I do run into a lot of unpleasant body sensations that leave me uncertain whether they’re Primally-oriented or standard grist-of-the-mill body reactions to difficulties.
Or we could drop this matter entirely if you would just give me next week’s winning Powerball numbers.
UG, I have the same thing happen, i.e. inexplicable physical sensations. I do wonder where they come from too (either of your choices), but as they’re usually transitory, I don’t worry much. The more I feel I am doing what I need to do, to take care of myself (eating properly, getting enough sleep, etc.), the less I feel worried about those “physical side effects”.
Gretchen – it is VERY (to me) important that I am not mis-understood here. The whole account you give of this particular case is I am sure all true. I have heard similar things from others recently. And if you go back a few days I said I thought clearly I have no ‘issue’ at all with the huge amount of work you put in, your tireless caring and concern for people (including ‘failures’ like me) BUT and I think this is a very big BUT they WHY is this not enough? Is it possible even very likely there is something ELSE going on, something that all the caring and attention in the world does not seem to touch?
I am aware there is a ready answer ‘pain’ yes!……………..and I even ‘agree’ totally BUT how then to crack this nut or solve this problem. So really as much as I respect all your work and am impressed by your caring it does seem there is something ‘else’ something missing from the formula. Please please stay with that thought a bit, I don’t want to be a ‘smart-alec’ and say your story SUPPORTS my point(s) but in all honesty I think it does!
Your use of words also is interesting you talk about those ‘in the trenches’ and I am sure you mean yourself. You ARE in the trenches but is maybe that the problem……………to maybe draw a slightly ‘cheap’ analogy the papers here are full of remembrance of World War 1 and the horrors of ‘trench warfare’. The question for me is is staying in the trenches and keeping trying to ‘win’ in that way self defeating in the end. If it was up to me I would want to leave the trenches and get in serious touch with the Generals and Kings that were ‘causing’ all this mess then something might be ‘solved’. IMO you CAN leave the trenches but a good road map is needed to get you out of there. I believe I have that map…………………or at least a few torn out pages of it……………and I don’t mind sharing it…………..
In response to some of the lines in Patrick’s 3rd response to Gretchen.
1) “Is it possible even very likely there is something ELSE going on” Yes: YOUR feelings … that are NOT being expressed … but rather acted-out.
2) “…..BUT how then to crack this nut or solve this problem” Try re-reading “The Primal Scream” … you mis-read it the first time round … it cracked “the NUT”.
3) “…..you talk about those ‘in the trenches’ “. Idiot … it’s a figure of speech … meaning those doing the work as opposed to those staying home … pontificating about it.
4) “IMO you CAN leave the trenches but a good road map is needed”. Sooooo! what “road map” do you suggest? The one to Finisterre?????
5) “I believe I have that map………………… ” I contend you are fooling yourself … and there’s the rub
Jack
Home sweet home, still….Was being poignantly humorous; but the arising feelings are from having nowhere to belong. And can’t bring myself to use my old manipulations to weasel my way in somewhere to pretend I belong. Sometime wish I had my bullshit back; that is all of it.
david hardy, canada; ah don’t need to add that, Barry remembers
me.
Hello David. Nice to meet you. You sound like me. Earlier this week I broke down crying that I can’t do my life any more, I want to go home. I can’t of course. There never was the home I yearn for. I don’t feel like I belong anywhere. I have to make my way through this as best I can and that’s all I’ll ever have.
How has life been for you after returning to Canada?
finally managed to sort out the paperwork around my actual course and got signed up etc,, and soon the big fight with statistics will also start up again as well…
Patrick, what you say about people getting drained and losing willpower in therapy does not make sense, unless of course you pick out those few persons that actually either could not bring up the courage or energy to start working on themselves or their life, and I know one person you talk about and can assure you there has been loads of support and encouragment and the doors are still open, but well, sadly enough in some cases it does not seem to work out well.
I have buddied with that person at a retreat and you might understand some of it better if you’d know more about it, so please don’t jump to any conclusions about anything or anyone.
it is nice you’d like everyone to get better, so would we all like it to be, but at this point a hundred percent succes is only a dream.
I think the PI offers all kinds of help and support but some of it has to come from the person itself.
look at yourself, you are the one having to make the choice, the decision whether to really give it a go or not, noone can do it for you.
you can keep searching for the ‘drop outs’, luckily a minority or you can look at what other people succeed in doing, or better even, don’t look at anyone else and just focus on yourself and what goes on inside of you.
that fight with yourself you mentioned seems important, and the feeling you might be about to give PI another pass for a reason only you can unravel.
why not allow some help I wonder?
wishing you the best with whatever you decide,
M
ha, Gretchen,
I already had sent my comment to Patrick to Fiona to paste it on the blog at some point, before your great comment appeared, so I am not sure whether mine will come before or after yours, just clarifying as to not appear as if I’d feel I wanted to add something to yours, which I will enjoy rereading several times!
M.
hi Sylvia, hi David!
Elephant Man, how are you feeling today?
M
Re; earlier comments about the ‘trenches’ one of the famous ‘trench’ poets Siegried Sassoon wrote this:
Suicide In The Trenches
I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.
In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With cramps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.
You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you’ll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
Where do you want to take your life, Patrick, and where do you see it likely going?
Larry – that’s a ‘big’ question which I don’t feel able for now………………but I don’t want people (you?) mis-interpreting that poem. It is not any kind of proxy suicide note or anything like that, it was just I was playing with the idea of ‘trenches’ and was aware of some of these poets who wrote about it Wilfrid Owen, Sassoon etc. Take my life ? or it take me ? just too much to deal with right now. It just hit me now ‘take my life’ is also a euphemism for suicide again something I am NOT contemplating (at least I ‘think’ so)
Do you need a roadmap?
…this is Janov’s world of wild jungle animal atheism…we have to carve out our own roadmaps here..
ha, I better start shifting to a higher gear again, as things seem to be picking up here..
finally got the administration sorted out to get fully inscribed for the course of cognitions, have already read the entire course but am at the point where I realize myself I will have to go over it several times and take lots of notes, as it is pretty complicated, a lot of work.
then also, and finally, my statistics teacher sent me the next chapters of my actual statistics course, part 1, so I first will have to start working on that, refreshing all what already seeped into the crevices of my memory, far away, relearn to work with the software and try to incorporate all the new material..
we will also have to try out some of the new commands and see if I can make sense of the results, promises to get very complicated as this is the first real statistics kind of test, the student T test for those interested and the Anova test, big sigh…
then in september we will have some singing performances and I find it hard to motivate myself to start practicing on all those songs, old and new..
it even crossed my mind to give singing class a pass this year, but well, that would again diminish my social life so I guess I better try to deal with that as well…
feel I have some kind of flu or something, headache and throat ache, so that does not help, but hey, after cleaning out the cat’s litter box I will start reading the first new statistics chapter, hurray!
feels good to have to work too, apart from the stress and fear and worry, a bit like doing a tough kind of sport, I remember always having to force myself to go and train, to find it nice once I started and even nicer afterwards, haha!
guru, nice to still have you around, even while just testing, smiley,
M
Margaret: I was testing the previous blog page to see why so many posts were being misplaced into the middle of the pack rather than at the bottom. Wanted to see whether a secure connection made any difference….and it didn’t.
Not sure this is the answer … but as I see it:- if you respond to some comment in the middle of the blog it gets placed underneath it.
If you wish, I suspect , to start a completely new theme, unrelated to another comment … then, seemingly, it gets posted at the bottom, but don’t take my word for it. I’m just guessing.
Jack
Jack: In order for comments with a new theme unrelated to a previous post to be automatically posted to the bottom, it would require some sophisticated keyword analysis of the previous post I’m responding to and the differing lexical densities of the two posts being compared to each other would still create many posts slipping through the cracks.
I seriously doubt it’s the subject matter or the content of the comment fields that are causing the bug.
I posted at the bottom of the blog page and both test posts were lost in the middle anyway. There was some sort of problem that arose around the time Daniel asked the “Administrator” to reformat the posts. That is an initial clue from which a possible solution can be gleaned.
Maybe that’s the answer … as I said; I wasn’t sure The people to ask would be WordPress, as, as far as I know,,control the ordering and indenting..
It depends, as far as I have noticed, whether I respond to the email sent to me from them or, whether I go into the blog and respond to the button at the end of each comment. If I create a new theme independent of any comment then seemingly it puts me at the bottom. The one exception being is if I reply to something at the bottom of the blog.
I don’t find it a bother for me, as going into the blog or responding to an email is relatively easy. However, for those responding from cell phones it may well be another matter.
Jack
Patric,
it sounds like you are really going to give PT another pass.
I think you should assume the responsability for that, and not search for the blame in the form of therapy itself.
it is your choice, not to give it a real try, so far you have ‘attended’ groups and even some retreats but always very much with all your defenses up sky-high.
you are the only one able to make the choice whether to take some risk by lowering them, if you don’t I don’t think it is fair to blame anyone else.
you could bring in the fact that is how you are, or even that is how you were made to be, but you are smart and sensitive enough to know you would be able to do it if you’d want to.
I give up, so it makes me feel more free to have a guess as to why that is, and my guess would be you are afraid of allowing yourself to be vulnerable, afraid to let anyone in.
that is really very sad.
as I said, I wish you the best with any choice you might make.
Margaret
Larry talked about my giving up a blog addiction. Sometimes I think of my dad spending three hours staring at a baseball game…transfixed, hypnotized, mouth slightly agape along with countless other viewers.
No chance to express himself in any possible way unlike blogging….just another meaningless, anonymous spectator in the crowd brought a few hours closer to death where the final meaninglessness & oblivion takes place without so much as a cyberspace whimper.
One of the absolutely perfect renditions of being hypnotized by your television set was in the movie Looker (1981) where the lead actress Susan Dey visits her parents’ house while they are watching television. They ignore her and give her the short shrift so she breaks down and cries. Unfortunately YouTube doesn’t have a clip of this perfect scene, so you will just have to hypnotize yourself with that movie on your own.
(Every time I post a video I feel bad because Margaret may not be able to see it)
Here’s a trailer of that Looker movie, at least. Cool movie in it’s own radical retro way:
Okay, goodbye!
Nice dodge … I notice you did not comment on your own addiction !!!!!!!
Jack
Guru quivers in his boots and moans, “NOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
Guess I’ll have to go back to smoking crack cocaine, then.
That’s one possibility … Else … just cop to your addiction. No big deal, it’s one of mine also.
Nothing like an addiction to get ones ‘rocks off’
Jack
My comment regarding UG having a blog addiction was not serious. It was intended as gentle ribbing and teasing. I guess that only works in person with someone I know pretty well and the timing is right. I’m surprised the comment was taken seriously.
When Gretchen made the comment about being in the trenches, it seemed pretty obvious she meant us. I’m surprised Patrick that you took it that she meant herself.
When I asked where do you see your life going, Patrick, I hadn’t read the poem you posted. I still haven’t read the poem. I just really want to know, as a way to know you better, where do you see your life going and where do you want to take it?
Larry: Believe it or not I actually knew you were not being serious. I decided to go on a rather serious tangent (television hypnosis) based off of your whimsical comment.
Larry – I believe I even said at the time that you may have not being serious when you spoke of Guru’s ‘blog addiction’
I STILL think Gretchen meant herself (therapists) not us!
You got a week?
Hey Patrick, I have a couple of thoughts about your response. Hopefully it will prove helpful. First, I did not say I was trapped in the trenches or that I could find no way out and therefor needed a map. I simply meant I had done this work for quite a while and of course discussed what proved effective and what was not along the way. To be honest I am not clear what your response had to do with what you initially wrote or with my response. I was trying to say that you will sometimes use examples to make a point that are not at all accurate. You said the PI should care more about this person you had to drop at a shelter and I had to say that nothing could be further from the truth. I say this more for the Primal community than for the PI as I never fail to be impressed by the help and support offered within our community. I also felt it was important to say that though you may want to make a point the truth has to be the number one priority. In any community there is gossip of course but like that old childhood game ” telephone” things can get lost in translation. The other issue is your feeling that you have something to add to the therapy that the rest of us are missing. Presumably if we would only leave the trenches we would recognize that. I see this blog as a chance to do just that. We have encouraged everyone to say whatever they want and to express any and all opinions . I make it a point to read every word. In your case you felt you had something important to say and we asked you to put it in writing and we would gladly publish it. I am not sure how much more open we can be than that. If you have something more to offer that you feel will help others please feel free to say it. You have said you believe in Primal therapy but there is something more ( a piece of the map) that could make all the difference. Feel free to say it and those that find it helpful will respond. One last thing that may apply to some ( but obviously not all ) that struggle in therapy. Years ago I wrote an article that I believe was for the newsletter. It started with a joke that went something like this. A man prays to God ” Please God I must win the lottery, anything you might do to help would be appreciated!”. That week the day of the lottery arrives and the man does not win. He prays again to God ” Please God I need this win badly can you please help me win the lottery. I will do anything to win!” . Once again the lottery day arrives and nothing! He again goes to God and says ” Why God why? What do I need to do to win the lottery? Can you give me a sign, what should I do?” . Suddenly and surprisingly God speaks to the man and says with a thunderous voice ” BUY THE TICKET! ” . Gretch
Gretchen – I am amazed how much ‘controversy’ this business of being in the trenches causes. You talked about those of us ‘in the trenches’ which is fine and understandable and acceptable way to describe people in the middle of ‘doing things’ versus those on the ‘outside’ I even SAID when I ‘compared’ it to the trenches in WW1 I was using an analogy and admitted it might be a slightly ‘cheap’ analogy. And I STILL get called an ‘idiot’ by YKW like something I ‘mis-understand’ like the way I ‘misunderstand’ everything,……………….Jeez people talk about being in an ‘old feeling’ can’t see anything straight. I guess if you think about just about anything that makes life worthwhile like humour, irony a bit of subtlety would not classify as ‘straight thinking’ lol just ‘straight thinking’ belongs to the Fundamentalist Preachers of Primal that pound their dreary message day in and day out to no good effect…………..I am not lumping you into that Gretchen but even you a bit the debate about ‘trenches’ I mean is it ok to use an ‘analogy’ your talk about trenches did associate in my mind because of being here and reading about the commemoration of WW1. This is a blog after all where I would think it is OK to ‘free associate’
I totally give you your props about this blog and it being a place where these things can be brought up. I think this is one of the greatest things you have done and I give you major credit on that one. It takes courage and integrity to allow that and it’s that simple difference that makes the ‘difference’ I would not be interested in writing to Art Janov’s blog for that very reason the comments are ‘screened’. I would go so far as to say my ‘therapy’ only really started with this blog, I did not and still do not like the atmosphere in groups and even sessions. I find it artificial and forced and a kind of vacuum feeling where the purpose is to ‘suck’ a feeling OUT of me, I rather want something good put INTO me. Just because Freud kind of started ‘talk therapy’ or later in the 60’s or whatever ‘group therapy’ arose does not mean they are the only or even the optimal ‘therapy’ modes. Personally and I AM saying ‘just personally’ (no NEED for ‘primal ayatollahs’ to point out my ‘wrong ways of thinking or even ‘crooked’) I find ‘writing’ so helpful even better to a really trusted and empathetic and smart ‘audience’ and I am lucky there in that I have that too.
So on that point in the spirit of ‘lighting a candle’ and not waste time ‘cursing the dark’ I think this whole problem of ‘scheduling’ therapy in ANY way tends to cause a problem. If there is a way to express a feeling to oneself or another person to me at least it is very important to do it AT THE TIME. NOT wait for later to talk about where it becomes a ‘story’. This can be a bigger problem for some rather than others and I am one person it is a BIG problem for. It has to do with my ‘education’ or more correctly my ‘mis-education’ where facts and figures are given major precedence over feelings and spontaneity. So that is one suggestion as much as possible move away from ALL forms of ‘scheduling’ and encourage people to find their own ways that work for them that helps them. Of course ‘buddying’ is sort of one of those but even that I find too ‘scheduled’ at least for me.
The other ‘suggestion’ would be for you and Barry to take a month off (and leave the ‘trenches’ for a while I hope this does not cause ‘confusion’ to the simple minded) and ‘immerse’ yourself in the writing and work of Dr Kruse. Really really ‘give it a chance’ (his way of ‘thinking’) and see where it might take you. That’s a simple way of putting it it is way too intricate and ‘complicated’ for me to sum it up and actually a lot of the ‘deep science’ in it I don’t have enough ‘education’ to totally get but so many things point to it’s ‘correctness’ at least from where I am coming. I think I have mentioned before I feel in the middle I have tried to interest him in primal a little bit at least and this honestly I think is a bit of a blind spot for him just as from my point of view primal itself can and often is a big ‘blind spot’ to many other things. As I said before sometimes I feel like ‘little boy in the middle’ the middle of two warring parents ……………….not to get overly primal about it hopefully…………
Somebody just told me Art Janov was 90 yesterday I hope this information is correct……………that would make him a Leo like me. The last 2 Democratic Presidents (Clinton and Obama) are both Leo’s so ‘we’ have that, leadership, being the centre of attention (or trying to be) charismatic and thoughtful if sometimes a bit ‘wrong’ like Janov lol…………………..
Mick Jagger is a Leo also…………..one guy I would quite like to have been or more correctly someone I would like to have been like……….out-going, extroverted with no fear or embarrassment, charismatic, and loved by women not to mention a killer song writer and musician……………….somewhere deep inside I was/am that but only inside………..didn’t happen on the outside………..oh well……………
Andy Warhol was a Leo too…………I was more like him, an arranger of other people’s talent a kind of collector of others…………….an ‘aggregator’ of talent………….not so happy being that but if the real me is denied that’s what left I suppose………………
I am not really interested in astrology but I have to say just in particular cases it seems there might be something to it. I think in Ireland being a ‘summer baby’ versus a ‘winter baby’ could be a difference
I am off to Dublin today for the dinner put on for me, old college people wondering why I dropped off the face of the earth for almost 40 years…………….I am looking forward to it. So far this trip has been so good in so many different ways…………………Ireland can be a wonderful country it really can and is for the lucky ones.
“How is it I could come out to here/and be still floating……………….I opened my heart to the whole universe/and found it was loving/ and I saw the great blunder my teachers had made/scientific delerium madness”
I think the thing about the ‘scheduling’ being why you can’t do therapy is just kidding yourself, you are scared of intimacy, vulnerability closeness.
writing is so much safer and easier.
you will keep moving forward in some ways I am sure, but in my view you are taking the long way around, and I fear it might be a bit of a lonly path too.
it does make me sad, for several reasons, some of them being real concern for you, Patrick, some of them related to my own set of personal history of pain.
M
ps it is interesting you describe a session as ‘someone trying to (forgot the word you used) pull out some feeling out of you’.
that might be a good point of attention as to where your resistance really is situated, imho
I have to let go now, back to statistics.
M
Who would have thought I would say this, but Patrick has a point. In fact, he has two points. His first, regarding Janov and his students shunning others inspired by Primal thinking is a point I also tried to make in the past. It seems Janov stumbled on something that deeply shook him and put him on an intellectually creative journey. He had the mental stamina and independence to delve into the matter and produce his Primal Theory, emphasizing again and again how different it was and how mistaken others before him had been. Indeed, so deeply involved had Janov become in his effort to cure psychotherapy of a clinical technique that had disturbed the therapist’s capacity to help the patient reach his true feelings, that he rarely emerged from the intensity of his struggle to ask himself whether his views were shared by other writers within the psychological community.
Had he done so he would have found within Psychoanalysis Sándor Ferenczi’s Confusion of Tongues Between Adults and the Child (1933), and Michael Balint’s The Basic Fault: Therapeutic Aspects of Regression (1968). He would have read Donald Winnicott’s 1949 papers Birth Memories, Birth Trauma, and Anxiety and the very important Mind and its Relation to the Psyche-Soma in which Winnicott describes a birth Primal in detail. And there were others. Perhaps he was not aware of these gifted theoreticians and clinicians in 1970, but some 40 years have gone by since and there was ample time to link with prior thinkers.
This is true also of his contemporaries. I don’t mean the charlatans but the true clinicians who aspired to do some kind of Primal Therapy. If this level-headed article from the International Primal Association is correct, some of these clinicians founded the IPA in Montreal and invited Janov to be their first president. He declined and later sued them for using the word ‘Primal’ (and lost).
In fact, Janov and his students refused to see themselves as part of the wider movement they in fact were. I think this was an unfortunate turn of events because it looks as if there was a way to welcome the serious practitioners and cooperate with them, thus having more influence on the development and spread of Primal ideas and techniques. It also looks like it was possible to create a standard for training and certification of other institutes around the US and the rest of the world.
Perhaps Janov was swamped with work and just wasn’t interested. But it’s hard to accept the claim about other bona fide professionals practicing Primal Therapy being dangerous. It must be remembered that Janov and the first Primal therapists were rookies themselves, that techniques have evolved considerably since then – which means the way it was practiced in the beginning was far from optimal – and therefore all dangers that could befall other practitioners could also befall Janov and his first Primal therapists (Patrick keeps insisting that they have).
In general, it is quite uncommon for someone in a health profession to claim that only he and those he personally trained can do something beneficial while others are dangerous. Imagine what such a stance would do to, say, kidney transplants – a procedure no less risky than Primal Therapy. And experience shows that since Jean Hamburger did that first transplant in France in 1952, the knowledge and the techniques were spread all over the world and are now available in any major medical center on all six continents. Likewise, in psychology the theories of Psychoanalysis or CBT were shared with all those who cared to listen and with practitioners who wanted to practice it.
Quite the contrary, usually the danger is prolonged lack of input from other original thinkers and practitioners who can look at problems and difficulties from fresh angles and directions, and come up with fresh ideas and solutions, just as Janov did when he first stumbled upon his discoveries.
Thank you for the relief, Daniel. This should hopefully distract Jack for a little while.
Guru, I’m so glad you didn’t leave the blog.
Daniel: Just read your long, long comment and your apparent agreement with Patrick.
On reading it I was acutely aware that you were coming from what I call ‘a left lobe perspective’ as does Patrick. That, to and for me, suggests an unutterable bias.
If the concept that the brain of all creatures and especially we humans is that there is a right lobe to organize the feeling and a left lobe to express it .. then we entered a whole new means to look at, first ourselves and secondly to see our relation to the rest of all other living creatures. Precisely when and how Art Janov came to this fundamental shift in seeing our human problem (necrosis) as an aberation … especially in the field of medicine and more importantly in neuro-physiology. I contend, though I have no hard evidence), that it was this breakthrough in his own notions with respect to psychotherapy that put him on guard for allowing anyone to practice this very, very radical therapy.
Remember, Art had been practicing Freudian psychoanalysis for seventeen (17) years up to the point of observing Danny Wilson and Gary Hillard. From all that experience he had NO IDEA (as he mentioned in “The Primal Scream”) what he’d just observed.
Many professionals were eager to jump on the bandwagon without FULLY understanding what has now become known as Primal Theory … which turned all prior notions on their head. There was no way that a two month seminar on techniques for doing Primal Therapy a la Janov was going to create either practitioners or, give a fair crack at the therapy to patients. Just ask Gretchen or Barry.
This notion that abounds in many places that it can be ‘explained’ is where most go off the rails (Particularly my nemesis Patrick Griffin. He’s all about figuring it out in his head. That cannot be done). It has to be EXPERIENCED at a deep, deep and fundamental part of our being. If it were just a ‘left lobe thinking exercise’ Stephen Hawking would have been able to figure it out . It was/is just this that makes Arthur Janov an incredible genius. Nothing like it had EVER be done before …whatever you may claim to the contrary
There could be much more to say to elucidate much of this to the uninitiated, but I will leave that either to others OR a later date.
Jack.
Daniel, you wrote:
“And experience shows that since Jean Hamburger did that first transplant in France in 1952, the knowledge and the techniques were spread all over the world and are now available in any major medical center on all six continents. Likewise, in psychology the theories of Psychoanalysis or CBT were shared with all those who cared to listen and with practitioners who wanted to practice it.”
You seem to lament that Janov didn’t share his theory, seeming to overlook that he published many books on it for anyone to read.
Having experienced change from many “primals”, I have better insight to and understanding of myself, and understanding of other people. I don’t see how anyone could become a Primal therapist without first going through the therapy.
I don’t see what there is to stop, as you say, other theoreticians and practitioners from looking at problems and difficulties and coming up with fresh ideas and solutions. Are they?
Daniel,
I find that such a great comment you wrote and can entirely relate to what you say.
this interests me very much, as a matter of fact, as a beginning psychology student I had already started to take notes of for example Winnicott, sorry if I misspell the name here, and others, even Freud himself as you once pointed out, mentioning real primal insights .
if ever I can I’d love to work this out somehow and if you don’t mind I will copy your comment and paste it with the rest of my notes.
also what you say about the IPA sounds very interesting and to be explored, there is so much I still don’t know.
I’d love to hear the view of Barry and Gretchen on this, and I agree personal experience with primaling seems of major importance, but that should not form a real obstacle.
after all so many of the other psychological methods require a specific training.
I’d love to be able to expand on this with you at some point in the future you sound so well informed and schooled and intelligent on all of this, I’d feel privileged if at some point, when I am a bit further with my own study, we could get in touch, would that be ok with you?
Jack, sorry but what you say might sound meaningful to you but to me it does not make real sense.
i think your view of the brain is a bit too simplified.
very inspiring, Daniel, thanks,
Margaret
Margaret: I’d like to take you up on your remark about my apparent “too simplified” view of the brain. To start with it is not not my view, but Arthur Janov’s. Yes, I stated it it briefly.
“Simplicity” was one of the blog articles some time ago, I found it to be very revealing. My sense is that we humans love to make things very complicated and convoluted and thus it makes us sound very cleaver and educated.
I remember many years ago being invited to a discussion by a a group of professors hoping to create a ‘Photography’ faculty at an English university. I, at that time was very involved in photography. What took place at this discussion was how to make ‘Photography’ into a four year course at this university. The major part of the discussion was what to add to the study course to make it worthy of a degree. It started with such sections as:- the history of photography and then the physics of photography and the chemistry of photography, some of the great photographers during it’s inception and oh! what else???? … Ah!!! the study of artificial light and on and on and on. Now there was a viable reason for a faculty to be created.
Back to my theme ‘Simplicity’. Stephen Hawking; the designated greatest mind of our time, said in his best selling book, that if and when “Unified Field Theory” is formulated, it would need to be “simple” such that ordinary people could understand it rather than just physicists and mathematicians.
I feel the very same complication/convolution is being promulgated by the very thing you seem to be having trouble studying … that of statistics. Statistics is no more than the simple mathematical notion of averages. Doctors and now psychologists have gotten into the game of diagnosing based on statistics. BUT we’ve made it far more complicated and convoluted than just that. What we now have is to create “models” (groups to take an average from), from which to draw our averages. Herein lies the convolution and deliberate complication. Models are now designated false or viable … but sorting out between the two is where the problems lie. So now now make rules about “statistical models”. such that the student will find the study worthwhile (no doubt for an expensive study course).
My take on Daniels comment goes in the same direction. If we can make it more complex than Janov’s simple and hence brilliant notion … then we can have another school of psychology/thought.
Keep it simple … else one is likely to get trapped in the convolution and then we will need experts to figure it all out. Something I feel Patrick is dabbling with. He loves to acknowledge the initial concept BUT it’s way more complicated than that … he figures. It’s his “figuring out”.that is his problem. There is NOTHING to figure out … if one EXPERIENCES it.
Jack
Thanks Margaret. Of course we can be in touch. It does take an awful lot of time to learn depth psychology, which is a drag, but on the other hand you never fully get there, there is always something to learn, something you don’t know. And that is also part of its charm.
Margaret – it’s interesting how much credibity you give Daniel and that’s fine he deserves it. I thought him comments quite illuminating and I also like the fact he can ‘get out from under’ a little dispute with me. If ONLY some others could do half as well lol………………………….
But what I find interesting is you usually take major issue when I am essentially saying the same thing or reach the same conclusions but mine is based purely on what I have SEEN FOR MYSELF. Not to make this ‘personal’ but it shows simple observation or expierience is not much valued in the world but if you come with cites and quotes then you are on your way to a PHD.
It’s a sort of big problem today the downgrading of personal expierience but I am glad for Daniel’s knowledge let some air in this ‘chamber’…………………….
What you have “SEEN FOR …” yourself was nearly 30 years, at 17 hours a day, stuck in a moving office. `Try re-reading Gretchen’s responses to you. Your “seeing” is comaparatively miniscule … and feeds into your gripe about comming here and not getting what you hoped to get.
It’s a sad, sad, story. Jack
You really ARE an idiot and a mean, spiteful person. If any ‘proof’ were needed that primal as praticed by the likes of you does not work………………….just read your comments. An 80 year old with constant spite, resentments and chips on your shoulder………………..it is so so so sad to kind of quote your own demented lingo……………….
I don’t think someone should be granted credibility solely because the person has a PhD, or because they sound well informed, schooled and intelligent. I think Daniel’s or anyone’s comments earn attention based on whether new insights or a new angle of looking at an issue is presented and supported by credible information and reasoning.
I don’t see that Daniel’s comment offers any new insights. Janov shared his theory with the world. Anyone is free to experience Primal therapy as a first step towards becoming a practitioner in it. Anyone is free to critique it or come up with something better. That Janov firmly stands behind his theory is to be expected.
In advance of any new movement or discovery there are many who are cautiously moving beyond old ideas and exploring new ones, until visionaries come along who tie the new thinking altogether in a bold new theory that stands the test of time. The new information at the time had many academics thinking along lines that eventually became the theory of evolution. Charles Darwin (1809-1882), Alfred Russell Wallace (1823-1913), Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829), and Charles Lyell (1797-1875) were major actors contributing to the upheaval in ideas of how life on earth became what it is. Lamarck’s thinking went off track. Darwin didn’t let himself be swayed from his own views, and his theory offered new insights and truth that continues to hold up and is the basis of much scientific thinking and discovery today. The same can be said for Einstein’s theory of relativity. That doesn’t mean there isn’t room for other theories. Einstein disputed the theory of quantum mechanics, but quantum mechanics has helped to understand and explain phenomena that general relativity does not. If Primal Theory is underpinned by biological truth, Janov shouldn’t waiver from it or dilute it to accommodate the thinking of others. If Primal Theory is wrong or incomplete, someone will come up with something better. Only time will tell what the outcome will be.
My reading of the IPM ariticle that Daniel referred to suggests to me that practioners of Primal Integration therapy are developing their understanding and techniques much the same as my reading of early primal literature suggests practioners of primal therapy developed their understanding. As Gretchen has said, the practice of the therapy continues to evolve. I read Reich, Rodgers, and Perls before I discovered Janov. Those writers helped me discover feeling and expression of it. Janov was the one who opened the door wide open for me, who helped me really understand, who I intuitively knew hit the nail on the head. But I feel if he hadn’t formulated Primal Theory, someone else eventually would have, …maybe someone in the IPM group.
I’d be interested to see Janov comment on the work of the IPM group. Maybe he has. I haven’t read anything he’s written in the past 25 years.
To suggest an answer as to why therapy doesn’t work for some people, I’ll quote a passage directly from the IPM article:
“ Now it is obvious that a procedure like this takes time, and it is really best to go all the way with a particular COEX in one session, rather than trying to take up the tail of one session at the head of the next, which usually doesn’t work. This means that the primal integration therapist tends to prefer long sessions, which also enable the client to take a break or breather if need be during the session. I personally conduct some one-hour sessions, but I also have some 1 1/2-hour, 2-hour and 3-hour sessions; some people working in this area have used up to 10-hour sessions. One situation we like is the group experience over several days, where each piece of work can be a long as it needs to, because we often have two or three pieces of work going on at the same time in the group, either in the same room or in different rooms. We often have two leaders and one or two assistants to make this way of working possible.
In this process people open themselves up to deeper feelings, and thus become more vulnerable. So a high degree of trust has to be built up between client and therapist. But in reality,trust isn’t a feeling, it’s a decision. Nobody can ever prove, in any final or decisive way, that they are worthy of this trust, so the client just has to take the decision at some time, and it may as well be sooner as later.”
My summary…the client has to make the decision to do the work, to trust, and to be vulnerable. Otherwise the therapy can’t work.
Thanks for presenting the link to John Rowan’s article Daniel. It’s an interesting read.
Wow!!! Larry: We’ve got a very interesting theme going here. This, I feel, is one of the great aspect, of the Primal Institute’s blog. I’d like to add another of my (annoying to some) aspects.
Larry’s suggestion that Daniel did not offer any new insights is my sentiment also. It is the very nature of insights (especially those following a re-living event of ones very early life) that are the clue (glue if you like) to Janov’s formulation of Primal Theory. Insights do not arise out of mere thinking (conceiving), but rather are the result of that other brain function “perceiving”. Concepts arise out of thinking (something Stephen Hawking is past master of). “Perceptions” are a function of feelings … available to all of us. If we were to think about it (yeah! a head trip) we are mostly perceiving many things throughout the day. It is a very natural function of being alive.
Jack
Thanks for that, Larry — clearly thought through. I also liked what Daniel wrote, it was succinct, well-written, and I want to take a look at some of his references, as I don’t have the background.
I have read some of the IPA material, and know a couple of people who have been to the IPA in London. One of them liked it, and he continued. The other one told me that there was something that didn’t feel right to her, and so she did not go back — she also said Nick Barton told her that what they are doing is not Primal Therapy. But I also know two people in Switzerland, who have found a “primal therapist” there, who had come from Art’s place, and they say she is continuing to help them a lot.
I also remember when the Institute did try hiring three already-therapists from non-Primal backgrounds, and training them as Primal Therapists, with quite mixed results. One of them I felt was “doubtful”, as she seemed to need therapy herself, and another, her close friend, left when she was fired. The 3rd one I felt was not a bad therapist, would have likely kept getting better, but she left to take care of family issues out-of-town. It also felt like these three felt “different” as therapists, because they had not “gone through the trenches” like many of the rest of the patients have, over time.
I spent a few years going to IPA events and doing sessions. The IPA is a very diverse group. I found several people who, from my perspective, offer good primal therapy. Others, to me, seem very off track and have mixed in things like “past lives regression”. There is a general tendency to want to mix other modes of therapy with primal to come up with something optimal. That didn’t appeal to me in my comparison with what I experienced at the P.I. in New York. There are several people I know of who are past patients of the Primal Center and who feel more at home and helped within the IPA. I became involved with the IPA because they have a presence on the East Coast where I live. It’s difficult to be constantly travelling far for therapy and that makes sense if follow up by phone works. It is all a little subjective about what is and isn’t good therapy. Phil
Larry, you’re right, Janov did share, but I didn’t mean that kind of sharing. In the professional world – any profession – there are established ways for practitioners to ‘talk’ with each other and show their work and Janov as far as I know didn’t use those.
And the warnings against other practitioners obviously didn’t help.
Now if you might focus on where your spite and resentment of me REALLY comes from I might have a little more respect for you. Yes you ARE very annoying because you are never going anywhere except round and round in circles re-justifing yourself. I have made the mistake of breaking ‘Fiona’ rule’ again IGNORE you but I am ‘reactive’ I survived by punching back at bullies so it’s a habit that is hard to drop completly. After all it saved my life.
The truth is or at least the way I see it a lot of Janov’s ‘claims’ do not really add up whether viewed from an ‘academic’ vantage point like Daniel’s or what I say I saw for myself. Jack might like to represent that I am some dope but I have been around quite a long time. And I don’t think I am flattering myself in believing I am not actually a dope or a stupid person as wanna be intellectual might say. I WAS around for a few years in late ’70’s and early ’80’s and given what was going on felt I had no choice BUT to leave. Up to 20 suicides in a decade 5 of them that I knew personally is NOT a convincing ‘record’ but it’s not only that. The whole way things were done was not convincing in any way really……………..
I came back……………………really because of some of the people I ‘met’ here on the blog and later in person, I AM impressed by some of them and want to remain friends with them……………….but I STILL feel the PI could use ‘radical change’ I don’t see it coming for probably a long time. Things have gone awry, they WERE awry the whole time IMHO, Jack can re-peat and re-peat facts and ‘truth’ are stubborn and his ranting will not change a thing……………………if he would start ‘working’ on himself a little bit then he might start to get somewhere but it seems that ship sailed a long long time ago
You keep on mis-stating the truth about “the suicides”, Patrick. Over and over, you have been answered on that, by Gretchen and others who were at the PI at the time, actually, after you left. But you cling to callow statements, as if you must think that if you say them persistently enough, they will “become true”, or maybe you hope people will believe you, because you want to believe it, fervently, to support your “conclusions”.
Vicki – you are quite wrong, there is no reason I ‘want’ to believe there were a lot of suicides, I freaking told you before I KNEW 5 of them personally and there were MANY more. Jesus Christ almight is this a freaking cult ? Facts are freaking facts!! I am f……sick of this nonsense
Try going to bed and sleeping it all off. That might relieve some fucking fatigue.
If you are so SICK I am sure Dr Jack Kruse can offer you a pill or, maybe a diet OR who knows an exercise regimen
Laughing out loud. .
Jack
You are an idiot, and it’s not only me (idiot) Guru wants nothing more to do with you, Vicki thinks you should be barred from the blog, Fiona is the only smart one she really ignores you……………………I WILL go back now to ignoring you you waste of time. Dr Kruse well I will not sully his name by making any comparisons with you……………….and who is taking pills not me……………..aren’t you……………….
It’s great to know all those that have advesre feelings towards me …BUT I sort of knew most of it, but confirmation is always revealing. And yes I do take pills.
I feel if there was a concerted effort by all those people, Gretchen might be more or less compelled to BAN me from the blog. Then it would be all ‘hunky dorey’ for all you bloggers. To refere to a rock album :”Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”. Not that I wish to denigrate the “lonely” for I am aware of it’s devastating effects. I have had two buddies that suffered from it.
Meantime, all I can say if you ignore me; you can rest assured, I will miss the fun.
Jack
Larry – a lot of ‘science’ is bad science in my opinion. But NO I do NOT dismiss ‘science’ as such but it is really kind of simple………………..a lot of science is ‘bad’ and Janov is a pretty good example of that. He still says he is doing ‘research’ and is even asking for money to do it but just reading what he plans to ‘study’ is just the same old nonsense that he never got anywhere with already. Talk about doing the same thing looking for a different result said by a ‘real’ scientist Einstein
So STOP yakking on hypocritically about ‘pills’ then! Or take a pill for your yakking, do something different, stop looking for a different result doing the same thing over and over said by a real scientist………………
Your ‘laughing out loud’ sounds like death cackling to me, the hollow laugh of a devil. Your comment about ‘a pill’ shows your total lack of seriousness or integrity, I do not take ANY pills, you as far as I know takes LOTS of them, yet I somehow have to ‘defend’ something only you do. This is the kind of twisting tortured antics and tactics that led Guru to say quite properly that you are ‘utterly untrustworthy’ You ARE. I will now go back seriously to apply Fiona’s rule, I actually have things to talk about and I am sorry (for myself about all) to have wasted a day or two ‘talking’ to you………………
Patrick, as I have said before, i knew about 4 or 5, probably among those same people you knew — but you are the only one I have heard say “20” One of them was a friend of mine, another was a close friend of a friend of mine. You were already gone from the PI, when one or two of those people died and they were mourned and their suicides were discussed in groups, as I was there to hear it — you were not. You have said before that “no one seemed to care” at the PI, but Gretchen has said that’s not true, they did, and exactly how. So it sounds like you believe Gretchen is lying or delusional. And I personally knew about my friend who killed herself, and how it was talked about at the PI, and how she had been handled. But you were not there to hear patients and therapists alike caring about it, yet you keep repeating your so-called facts the louder to prove them. You seem frantic about needing to “prove” there were “MANY more” suicides. What’s really going on with you? They aren’t really facts if they are not true. Why are you so sick about it, as you say — there’s no cult, but you can’t see that.
Jesus Vicki you ARE tiresome! I never said anything about people not ‘caring’ to me you just confuse the issue in a lot of waffle. Facts are important, there WERE a lot of suicides, can we agree on that. Lots of places would be closed down by authorities with that kind of a ‘record’. I read of one Christian group in Missouri that was closed down because of ONE suicide.
Janov had the gall quite recently to ‘blame’ Dr Drew Pinsky for suicides of people he (Drew) dealt with on TV, how about himself. He flat out said Drew was ‘responsible’. This is the kind of ‘double think’ I find amazing and I see it here too exhibited by several people including yourself
No, Patrick, I am serious. I will have to go hunt up where you said, “no one seemed to care” at the PI about it, to be sure whether I’ve got that right, or not. Meanwhile, I did not think there were “a lot of suicides”. I thought there were a lot of desperate people, feeling themselves in massive pain they were not wanting to feel, and I was surprised there were not more who “packed it in”, and “left us”.
Jack, I’m not sure how exactly your two replies related to my comment, but I’d like to make something clear – I write here because I care about PT and its future. I write some of these things because I would like to see it continue way past the lives of the ‘founding fathers’ and make a lasting impact. And unfortunately, I feel that the necessary steps to make this happen were not taken.
Primal theory and therapy are not an emotional construction but an intellectual one, and all discussion of it must therefore be intellectual as well. You say it cannot be explained, only experienced at a deep fundamental part of ourselves. But if that is so, how would Janov write the Primal Scream? What faculties of his mind do you think he used when he published a book summarizing and explaining (yes, explaining) his clinical experience of only one or two years? Did he rely on his deep personal primal experience, or on the observations, deductions, analysis and synthesis of his curious clinical and intellectual capacities?
Nothing I say here takes anything from the achievement of the Janovs. For 40 years they kept their commitment to depth psychology in a culture that praises quick fixes and, as the song says, “has no time for the pain”. That is admirable. And during that time, Art Janov contributed significantly to the understanding and treatment of the traumatic child in the adult. That’s quite a feat for a lifetime and I look at it with awe and gratitude.
I forgot to add something – You say, Jack, in your response to Margaret,
So, if it’s that simple, why the warnings?
Thank God for a bit of ‘logic’. Should not be so extra-ordinary but in a blog dominated by the likes of Jack the ;’obvious’ has to be stated OVER AND OVER. F…. tiring!!
I don’t understand why you question the warnings Daniel. I think Gretchen recently commented on why the warnings. Janov himself would have to be the final source on why. From my perspective, if there are people out there practising something like Primal Therapy but not quite or actually not all, and people are wanting Primal Therapy as elucidated by Art Janov, it makes sense to me that he should warn about the copy cats out there who may or may not be actually offering something akin to Primal Therapy.
As for professional sharing, are you saying that Janov didn’t present his discoveries in peer reviewed journals, nor at conferences attended by his peers?
Of course Janov should have warned against those who falsely say he trained them, those unlicensed and the charlatans. My point was that there were other serious practitioners who were like-minded but were shunned by him and he went after them as well.
And yes, I do say he didn’t use the peer reviewed journals or the conferences, nor did he seriously connect his theories with prior psychological thinkers. The end result is he’s not taken very seriously by the profession. And this is a pity.
And his ‘science’ these days and actually always is shoddy and weak. He talks about lowering cortisol etc but the bit I know about cortisol is quite a bit more involved than he even approaches. I am sure ‘good eneough’ for people like Jack but for actual scientists……………….well NO!
Patrick, in the past on this blog several times you’ve dismissed scientists, scientific thinking, and the scientific process, yet here you are full of disdain for Art Janov because in your opinion his science isn’t good enough. It does seem like you have an agenda against him and will use any argument you think will stick, even if it’s one you use for contrary purposes.
I see. Maybe was a character flaw of his that maybe hindered the primal movement from becoming more widely accepted the way we wish it was. On the other hand maybe due to his quirks more of the general public was introduced to Primal Therapy than otherwise would have been. Maybe he trusted the public to latch on to his theory and push it forward more than he trusted the professionals. If only we could rewind the clock and play out different scenarios to see whether the outcome might have been different.
Daniel: you state that Janov “……nor did he seriously connect his theories with prior psychological thinkers” Not true … he paid great respect to Wilhelm Reich..and of course Sigmund Freud. Maybe others that I don’t off hand remember.
Jack.
Daniel: As I stated … so many of us are invested in complications and convolutions. It is the shear simplicity that is so elusive … in many fields of thought.
Jack
Daniel: I have no doubt that you write here because you “care” about Primal therapy. That, I feel, is why most write here … BUT caring is not necessarily enough. I care about many things, but do little about them … namely all the killing and wars taking place on earth. The Ferguson incident … and some others, nearer to home. This blog as I see it (I could well be wrong), is meant as a supplement to formal therapy … that is:- sessions, groups and retreats.
If you are not clear how exactly my replies relate to your comment then for now, there is little I can do about it, other than admit to my inadequacies at putting across my message. The rest is up to you … to mind read me
What inspired me to respond to you is what I contend is the:- “Janov is great … BUT ……… then a whole dialog attempting to justify the “BUT”.
For me, and I am prepared to admit that I am perhaps a loner in this regards … is that NOTHING has superseded Primal Theory/Therapy and so far I don’t see there is anything better than either the Primal Institute OR the Primal Center (the latter I have little inside knowledge of), for offering psychological therapy.
I made that choice many years ago and have had no regrets. I got the promise … though I am sure many might suggest that I am deluding myself. Some in a non direct way, I feel, have been saying this to me for quite a long time. So far I have not been convinced … but then that is perhaps my own problem. However I have no adverse feelings about that potential problem.
Jack
Larry, Margaret, vicki , and others Hi. Daniel spoke of the fear of the therapy not having a future. IMO the therapy is progressing and is alive. There are scientific studies going on in conjunction with primal theory/therapy. At the primal center website there is a section called excerpts from training with the title “the neurological trajectory of feeling”. About an hour video (free) and explains where feelings and thinking is mapped out in the brain and how repression works etc. For me it is easier to understand by listening to explanations than trudging thru books. The video explains how feeling determines thinking. You, Dan. might give this site a try. It’s one thing to say the therapy is going nowhere or may have a doubtful future, but another to not look for the answers where they are. As Gretchen says: buy a ticket. I know I want to learn where ever the action is–both here and there.
Thanks for that, Sylvia. At this point, I often find Art’s explanations tiring, or maybe I’m really not interested enough to hang in with them. But i may try a video.
Thanks for the information about the video Sylvia. I’m interested to watch it, and although ‘primal’ stuff especially this blog already takes up too much of my time, time I should devote to experiencing life…making friends, finding a lady love, having fun and adventure, I probably will watch it some day. Thanks again.
Patrick,
in my perception there is a big difference in what you say and what Daniel says.
what you say comes across as just another argument in your personal struggle to be able to give you a reason to dismiss the idea of doing therapy in a serious way.
that does not deny that what you say might contain some aspects of truth, but it feels like your goal is tainted very much by some kind of emotional duh… well, struggle, sure Larry would find better words for this.
Daniel is not out to dismiss primal therapy, not as it was in the old days or how it is now, but simply setting it in a greater perspective, which is also one of my own interests, and he very clearly oints at some obvious reasons why also Art Janov must indeed have been ‘a rookie’ in those days.
his
comment is matter of fact, clear and well founded, has no emotional hidden agenda and does not come up with any accusations, just points out some possible errors of judgement to which I actually can relate, and that open perspectives as to try different approaches, and to look with an open mind to possible improvements .
I like it very much, as it forms part of the dialectic of psychological theory forming, constructive criticism, thesis, antithesis, etc.
do you see the difference I refer to? M
ps Patrick how was it at the dinner with your old friends?
M
Patrick,
this is not a ‘new’ wave of fresh air blowing through this chamber, this topic has been adressed various times in this way already,so your image of our stuffed room full of navelstaring painfocused masochists that are stuck does not really apply, it exists merely in your mind.
M
LoL, Margaret! I have enjoyed a number of your lucid posts, recently.
At least you don’t say ‘hear hear’ lol (at least not this time)
wow, this taking of notes on my cognitions course is so very tedious and slowm painstaking really..
but it is useful for certain chapters full of names and theories with small different approaches about attention processes and filters etc, so I will have to continue this for a while.
luckily I feel able to cope with most chapters merely by attentively listening to them over and over and just putting some audio marks to some of the summarizing tables.
statistics also felt overwhelming to restart with, everything very far away in my memory, but once started the thrill of the challenge started itching again luckily.
will be a very long war with a lot of fights and struggles and frustrations, mostly with the soft- and hardware, apart from all those percentages, probabilities and significance rates etc, curves and tables and a hundred different kinds of tests, if ever I manage to pass the first of the six statistics exams I will definitely go celebrate and get drunk with some friends, smiley!!!
M
Daniel, if you know Art you would know that he wanted nothing more than to discuss Primal in front of Psychological associations and his colleagues in the field. In fact both he and Vivian did just that numerous times. But what you may not know is that there was not an openness to change in those days. The very thing you are wishing for was done but as you know people will tend to stick to their own ways of doing things. Change comes hard I think. I don’t think the original issue of people using the name Primal was the biggest problem or at the bottom of what disturbed Art actually. I think after the Primal Scream was published many people hung up signs or formed Associations claiming to be not just Primal Therapists but Janov trained Primal therapists. This was rarely if ever the truth and we still get calls asking about people who say they were trained and the Institute but did not. I , for one would feel some responsibility to set the record straight as I believe would you if someone used your name. After all people can say they do abracadabra therapy if they want to, why say you worked with Janov? I think the answer is obvious. As for your feeling that others did some version of Primal long before Art…..well, the people you reference I believe were deciples of Freud. If you reread the books I think you will see Art never claimed to be the first to discuss repression, regression or defenses. If you look at any one of his books or bibliographies you will see countless other therapists and their works credited ( and let’s not forget the likes of Leboyer and of course Freud) . The Clinicians you mentioned changed the face of Psychotherapy ( though I might add some felt Winnecot did not credit Klein properly either). All great thinkers are products of those that came before. But what they offered was not a therapy precisely but a theory of development that was new to the world of Psychology ( in my opinion at least). There are books out today that have a ” Primal flavor” with no mention of Art. Oh well. You said you agreed with Patrick. Do you mean in reference to his story about the people who said the were Primal in England? He went on to say Art in an interview said they were dangerous and in fact they turned out to be just that. I’m not sure what you might hope for – that he would open the doors and say train with me? Well he did that too. But he could hardly fly from place to place quickly training all those who felt they would be good Primal therapists. Frankly it’s just not practical. Should he endorse the work of those using his name though he has no idea what they are doing? Why should he accept the Presidency of an Association he knows nothing about? We all know there are many gifted therapists out in the field and actually there are probably many gifted non therapists who would be excellent at doing Primal Therapy. But I’m not recommending anyone whose work I have not seen. Are you? Gretch p.s. Barry said he loves the way you write!
Gretchen said ‘they turned out to be dangerous’ well yes in several ways yes…………………….just as Janov did to the ‘unfortunate’……………………….I object so much to this ‘exclusivism’ and Barry probably does NOT like my writing but ‘inconvenient truth’ can come in unlikely packages sometimes in ways that he might call ‘boorish’ but the truth often IS inconvenient.
wow Vicky, thanks, I always very much appreciate a compliment of yours, as you are so very honest, also when you are not particularly commplimentary on some occasions, haha, I just read your comment about you enjoying some of my late, ‘lucid’ comments and that was so nice, thanks, just wanted to say so before reading the rest of the 36 comments I just ran into while having my morning coffee.
up to reading those now, M
Larry,
i just read your comment, the long one about Daniel and the article.
I do think though Daniel id present some interesting takes, viewpoints o and insights as well into the general broader picture about what already did exist and started to develop in the psychological field, which primal ideas and experiences.
I totally agree Janov has a tremendous merit of writing a clear and very catching book about the essential value of what we now cal primal theory and its process. he was not all alone in doing so though, he did have a lot of valuable assistance.
also I think it is a point he kind of isolated the theory as if it was something completely new and different.
it was new in many ways, but I think part of the reason why it was not more widely accepted say in psychology textbooks etc, might be because it was not integrated in the general background of other psychological scientists discoveries and theories.
that is why Daniels comment interests me so much, as it fits my own search for connecting primal and its value with a wider field of people who are basically on the same track but all kind of separately seemingly.
it would be so intersting to search for ways to bring those kind of research together and bundle the findings and learn more from the possible different views and ideas that would rise.
so that is what I pick up and why Daniels comment to me feels so full of potential.
M
Gretchen,
thanks for your elaborate replies and the information they provide.
I tend to see different issues going on here.
on the one hand I find it inspiring how people like Daniel look for ways to help develop the primal practice and theory and its accreditation in the field.
I can only applaud the idea of many minds working together and joining their own experiences and knowledge.
on the other hand there seems to be a general concern for the future of primal therapy, which seems to be related to not having much of an idea of who will be the next generation of primal therapists.
most of us feel pt has helped them in a deep and basic way and brought so much more awareness and selfconfidence to their life, so we deeply care about that same future.
I guess we would all want primal practice to get spread over to more parts of the world in a good kind of way, and lok for in which ways that could eventually happen..
I understand all your points Gretchen, they make a lot of sense.
what would it take to for example give someone like Daniel, who seems to have done Primal therapy, and seems a smart therapist if my guess would be right, the entitlement of calling himself a Primal therapist?
I know there are practical issues of a California license and stuff, is that the mere impediment, that they would all have to do an official internship or training first?
I know these are questions you have the right not to answer here, they are personal and hopefully not out of line, but how do you and Barry see the ‘creating’ of good new primal therapists to go on with the fine job you are doing?
maybe a lot of our concern, mine for sure, sprout out of not knowing about all the efforts you sureely make behind the public scene, apart from all the hard work with patients you both do.
this might be more of an inside topic, so I hope you do not mind me asking here, I can only hope to learn some more about that Primal Institute we all care so much about.
I think there must be so many talented psychologists and therapists that have done therapy and I would love it if their experience and insights and energy could be joined in different ways as to find more and new ways to develop the primal adventure.
te mere hope to maybe, just maybe ever being able to publish even only one article about it already gives me a good motivation to keep studying, as it simply feels worthwhile to put my energy in, it is a good cause so to say, which I can stand for from my own experience and rational judgment as well.
I’d understand it if you would not want to go into this here, and I feel confident you and Barry are very capable of seeing things clearly and dealing with the reality as it presents itself.
I find Daniels entries inspiring and it would be nice to gather all of those ‘forces’ and use that energy in constructive ways.
too bad I still have so much studying to do first smiley, I am not even a rookie, haha, but luckily even the parts that do not directly apply to my primal notions also interest me as a general kind of knowledge, so I take pleasure out of the studying itself, otherwise I could not go on with it.
M
Perhaps in the future, Margaret, Primal Therapy will be absorbed into main stream “deep psychology” therapeutic techniques. New therapists will be trained by existing therapists who claim to be using Primal Therapy techniques, and there will no longer be accreditation as being a Primal Therapist trained by Art or Gretchen and Barry. Clients will have to take their chances as to whether theirs is a talented and skilled therapist. Perhaps if the client seeks help from an institution where there is a team of therapists, the chances are better of finding a therapist that works well for the client at doing Primal Therapy. What I’m saying is that in the future primal therapy techniques might be practised but not necessarily advertised as Primal Therapy, and you take your chances as to whether your therapist is knowledgeable and trained by someone who actually does Primal Therapy. Even now with someone trained and certified as a Primal Therapist, you take your chances as to whether that therapists works well for you. Hopefully in the future a gifted therapist will be drawn to wanting to use the techniques of Primal Therapy to help people, and will seek out to be trained by someone already proven to be gifted and skilled at doing Primal Therapy, but eventually no longer certified by Art, Barry, or Gretchen.
Larry,
I agree with all what you say.
in fact it seems to me exactly why it would be so useful if there could be, over time, be worked on forming some larger and in the best case scenario international structure to mentor, assess, school, form , control and gather therapists that might work more or less following some kind of primal protocol, if that could be designed.
that would have to be not a strict kind of structured guideline like in some other therapies but some kind of set of advices on how to conduct a proper patient-orientated primal kind of therapy, with possible supervision of skilled and experienced people.
all members would have had to have done a proper level of primal therapy themselves to make a chance of being accepted.
or something similar, I am only brainstorming here.
in this day and age it would not take travelling all over the world to keep supervision and to council as there are things like Skype etc. to keep in touch and follow what goes on in real time if necessary.
i think it could be done, building it up bit by bit and letting it develop at its own pace without rushing, letting primal processes with the patients show the way and educate the therapists while they practice.
in the beginning stages it would need more supervision as to set and keep it on the right track but once it is going it should find its own momentum and keep developing into the next generations.
the main thing would be to develop the standards and protocols and to find capable people with the licenses needed in the areas where any primal ‘centre’ would be developed, and a good structure to organize and supervise it at the start.
after all these years of good therapy I feel confident there must be a number of skilled and enthousiastic people to start working on such a structure.
this is maybe a wild idea, coming up at this very moment in this condensed form, but what do you think Gretchen, and barry, do you find it interesting at all?
it could be something like ‘primal-orientated’ therapy if it would matter to keep the copyright of the original name safe, or even something else, no idea, just throwing the idea out there to see what reactions it gets..
M
Isn’t that what Art Janov and the Primal Institute have tried to do for so many years, but the psychological community just wasn’t ready for it? This discussion seems to be going in circles.
This is mainly in response to Margaret, but I would like to hope that others would look at this new question about training Primal Therapists.
I’ll start by going into the need for any type of therapy. Therapy is ONLY needed where there is something/someone “broken” or damaged. If we had not been damaged in the first place there would never be a need for any type of therapy.
Creating therapist from those that were initially “broken” is a long an arduous job, since first it was needed to somewhat mend the potential therapist first.
Next: the training needs to take into account that the differing “broken-ness-ess of different people needs, by the potential therapist, to be taken into account. That is a long and arduous process as the potential for some entering the field as therapist, is to feel that how they got (partially mended) is the way others have to be mended. Not so … hence the enormously long time (internship) required for training.
The next and serious question arises:- But how did Art and Vivian in the early days manage to keep their own “therapeutics” on some straight path and allow for their practice to become more and more evolved (kept straight). My guess is that there was an enormous amount of INTEGRITY on both their parts, such then when they did did start training others they needed to keep even their trainees straight. Not an easy task, as I see, in hindsight.
Now there is the question arising as to how to progress on this slow, slow path while maintaining the absolute possible INTEGRITY within the confines we now know to be be Primal Therapy. In defense of Patrick, he sees that there is the NEED to push the process along. That, I give him credit for. Where I find Patrick goes off the rails is; in his thinking that he might have an answer. From my perspective, it is at once simpler and yet more elusive than that, I feel, he is NOT aware. AND I feel that applies to many of us who care and would wish to promote this therapy.
I thought ‘long and loud’ about just this, and after several years of observing the practice (mainly at retreats) and pondering the very question that I feel many also think about (especially on this blog) also wonder/ponder.
My take for what it is worth (and I cannot say with any certainty, that it has ANY great worth) … would be to eliminate one, maybe two factors that arise from the practice of Primal Therapy. The first of these being that how ever brilliant or experience another person might be … there is always the chance that a mistake with one patient or another can be made. The second being; the matter of trust and the willingness to enter those “deep dungeons” of the psyche that are required of the patient. I use the analogy:- “We can lead a horse to water … but there is no way in hell we can make him/her drink it”.
So! I came up with the idea to circumvent both these problems with a “do-it-yourself” therapy. Not, I hasten to add, Primal Therapy … that is the sole domain of the Janov’s. There are many drawback to this as it will inevitably take a far longer time to get to the point of making life bearable for those suffering, and hence desiring some form of help. Nevertheless, as with all forms of therapy (physical or mental) there is the need for the patient to be willing to do the work necessary. A factor that I feel was often misunderstood by many who entered Primal Therapy. I contend, (maybe wrongly), that those people hoped it could be done to/for them. If I had any luck before entering therapy, it was that I KNEW I had to do the hard work. the therapist was merely a catalyst to help me go there … but go there, I had to do myself
For all that I have contended that the process is in effect SIMPLE. the concept required to take that “simple” step was/is not easy.
Why that is so, is because, as I see it, Primal Therapy is a whole new ‘ball game’ from what took place previously. One needs to switch from the notion that all problems can be “figured out” in the head (left lobe usage) to feeling those feelings that are forever taking place in our bodies and to express them … in our very own unique way (right lobe usage).
I will end this epistle with one of my poor jokes and say:- “Here endeth the lesson …there will be no collection”
Jack
p.s. and there are so many skills and talents in the primal community, not only therapists but whatever, p.r. people, i.t. specialists, even contractors and artists to design logos for the retreat t-shirts in Europe or down under, just kidding but also serious, there is such a large pool of talent at this very moment!
M
Larry,
I think that discusion was more about the primal idea being accepted in a wider part of the professional field, which is another topic.
that would not be needed to start up the structure initially on a small scale, with just a limited number of interested therapists and other people willing to join in.
it would not even need to be therapeutic clinics even as also just organizing trainings and workshops could be some kind of starting point that could be build upon afterwards.
as I see it the sttructure, or organization, or whatever, could support and supervise all kinds of initiatives if they go along the primal way o f processing.
I see it more as the founding fathers as Phil if I recall said, backing up new sprouts with all their experience and knowledge, as they know which pitfalls to beware of, and can give so much sound advice that is so valuable and priceless.
I see it as a good way to preserve that treasure and to plant seeds and lite new torches with the still burning fire of the old torches.
it does not need to be on a large scale, I feel confident there must exist a number of therapists out there that have done some therapy and would be glad to get some more training and back up and become part of some kind of supervised network.
that is different I think than what has been tried in the past, and even if it would be the same now the tools are so much better to avoid having to travel all over the world all the time.
M
just trying to jump say forty years in the future, I would like there to be some kind of growing primal movement initiated by the primal institute, and not only primal Training Centre therapists.
I have no idea at all about the quality of the therapists that come out of the primal Training Centre, I do suppose there must be some very good ones as well as maybe some less good ones, as I say I have no founded opinion about it.
all I know is I like the quality of what is being done at the Primal Institute and want that to keep flourishing and growing.
if I could be of any help I’d love to and I am sure there must be many others like me, and plenty of them with degrees.
M
ps what iI mean is why keep discussing what happened forty years ago and what might have happened if something else had been done or said, that does not seem to lead anywhere.
now is the time and now is the moment we can work on whatever we dream of ourselves.
if you want something, all you can do is try to make it happen, and working on it feels better than waiting for someone else to do it.
M
Larry,
I could be wrong but are you feeling bad by any chance?
you sound kind of negative and that does not sound like your usual you..
M
Margaret, my last sentence “This discussion seems to be going in circles.” was in large part thinking out loud to myself.
I feel I’m at an important turning point in my life, one where I go forward, embrace new experiences and leave comfortable familiar ones, and meet new people and make new acquaintances and friends. The alternative is to continue the life I’m in, and feel numb and safe, remain isolated and alone, and become unhealthy and depressed or worse as I let life pass me by.
I had a pretty busy weekend. I went to a movie on Friday evening with an acquaintance. On Saturday evening I attended the surprise birthday of one of the fellows in the photography group I’m part of. I enjoyed myself at the party. Two of the people I talked to at the party were the technical director and the supervising doctor of the radiation unit that treated Noreen. I haven’t seen them since Noreen’s last treatment. After all these years, they still remember Noreen and I. I took the opportunity to thank them for the humanity and support they showed us during an extremely difficult time. This afternoon I went to a play with a group of people from a singles social group, followed by watching a football game on TV and having dinner at one of their homes. It’s been a nice weekend with nice people, a weekend I wouldn’t have had if I hadn’t made the effort, a weekend that makes me see how alone and isolated I am in part due to my own behaviour, and I’ve been having trouble sleeping…most likely because seeing and feeling the aloneness of my life is soon to erupt into a primal.
On another note, I think there already is a growing primal movement Margaret, and I think the Primal Institute and the Primal Training Center are a part of it, for what my two cents are worth.
To tell the truth, I sense there is some feeling emerging in you that is feeding your wish that a primal movement grows along the scenario you described.
Well Patrick, I think I am just baffled by your example of “exclusivity”. You are describing people who claim to be involved in Primal many years ago, Arthur then describes them as dangerous and it turns out he was correct, they were indeed dangerous. It feels to me as though you make Art’s argument rather than your own. After all isn’t this a case of the greater good? Isn’t your concern about exclusivity kind of irrelevant when you are speaking of violent and dangerous people? The other thing is that I have to come down on Vicki’s side in your disagreement with her. For me this is similar to your earlier inflammatory comment about dropping someone at a homeless shelter. Your comment about suicide is wildly inaccurate. This is not the first time you have brought something like that out of your arsenal and the last time you did several people stepped up to say ” This is not the truth!”. In fact when Vicki said to you this is not the case your story then becomes that you really know of five not twenty , it does not seem to matter if that is accurate either. You did imply there was a lack of caring as well. You said in the past that when there was an emergency at the Institute we should have a meeting with the patients and we didn’t. I told you that in fact we did have a meeting. I had the feeling that you decided that was not true either as you never acknowledged that I had said that nor did you say ” I guess I was wrong”. So that brings us back to the question…..why did you say twenty? For me that is a very important question. You say things as though these are the facts and when you are presented with reality you don’t seem to process it. What is it you are wanting when you say such extreme things on the blog? To be honest I keep wondering if this is about attention or is it something somewhat compulsive on your part? You have said your views a million times, why the need to keep going over and over the same material? You are hoping Barry and I will take a month to work with your Dr Kruse. … Well, first of all he is not calling us either. But why can’t he do his thing and those interested can follow his diet plan. At the same time we could continue our work and all is right with the world. Or is it? Gretch
Patrick, way above on August 23, 2014 at 10:23 pm, you wrote to me, “…I never said anything about people not ‘caring’ to me you just confuse the issue in a lot of waffle. Facts are important, there WERE a lot of suicides…” Well, we do agree there were 4 or 5 people who did kill themselves, and Leslie wrote she remembered only 2 from 1982-87, and that is consistent with the “3” I believe I heard about from my best friend who was at the P.I. from 1983-96.
When I checked “your FACTS” about what you have said before, I found you did not exactly say they did “not care”, but in your comment on April 02, 2013 at 6:39 pm, you did say, “you LOSE someone to suicide and nobody seems to give a shit”. Here is the context of that comment to Donal: “…Then I DID get here in 1978 and have to say I was NOT impressed by what I saw. Groups were a ‘zoo’ a zoo with very little possibility of anything like healing occuring. The suicides started around 1982 and I left……one of the suicides was a shy girl I was shyly planning to ask out. Killed herself NO reaction from the PI, NO big meeting……………..Donal can you imagine anything equivalent EVER happening in Ireland………..you LOSE someone to suicide and nobody seems to give a shit. The suicides kept on and on thru the ’80, I was ‘gone’ busy working but I always wanted to be in a feeling environment, it was a sacrifice for me and I suffered a lot behind being ‘gone’ but better be gone than dead was my attitude at that time. ”
And in two other comments you wrote 1) about Art “having ‘presided’ over a bunch of suicides for example and STILL no ‘remorse’ or even any attempt to re-calibrate his ‘theory’ and practice. “, and 2) you described Art Janov with “just hands stuck firmly in the ears ‘la la las I can’t hear you’”.
You really should write more about your memory of “a shy girl” you were “shyly planning to ask out. Killed herself NO reaction from the PI, NO big meeting”, as that seems the most truly personal and knowledgeable experience you have, about “the suicides”.
Vicki – I appreciate you are trying to help me but honestly this is not so much of a ‘personal’ issue with me it is more of a case of what does it point to? Without really knowing what went on I feel the PI made a big ‘adjustment’ but in a way or a ‘reaction’ not really what I call coming to terms with it.
But I am aware suicide is one of those things maybe we can’t come to terms with. There is a fair amount of talk here in Ireland about it how it impacts the ‘survivors’ and so on. It’s difficult to put it mildly and the effects it seems can go on like forever. But in the case of the PI or maybe more particularly Janov himself I find him less than ‘honest’ about it. It is a massive ‘fail’ and I don’t think he has even shown much ‘remorse’ or even questioning himself about it at least in public.
I am aware also how difficult it is for the PI, some people have said these people were ‘suicidal’ to begin with and it can be a fine line indeed………….but that’s the thing that struck me purely as a ‘non expert’ several of these people did NOT strike me as suicidal at all. Like I would not even consider it in the realm of possibility in their case, one was an Irish guy I worked with quite a bit. Seemed happy go lucky sang songs on the way back from the job in the truck etc just did not seem at all ‘suicidal’. That’s why I took the lesson from that that there was a ‘flaw’ in ‘primal theory and though of course I am in many ways myself a ‘true believer’ in primal I also have kind of being on the hunt for the ‘flaw’. What exactly is the ‘flaw’ where does it come in, how can it be avoided etc. I feel I have been on that ‘hunt’ for quite a while and am glad to say I feel I have kind of found it though of course I have my difficulties in life.
Gretchen – in all honestly I find your ‘arguments’ sloppy,self-serving and not at all convincing. And nice as you are not for the first time. One thing slides into another that does not quite fit but ‘close enough’ and that slides into another that is again not quite a fit but ‘close enough’ and pretty soon you have an edifice without a strong foundation an edifice tottering in the wind………………like your primal institute and your primal movement and even your primal theory.There is a phrase ‘close enough for rock and roll’ it reminds me of that.
I feel you ‘accuse’ me of the very kind of stuff you are doing. Like this whole thing of dropping the guy off at a homeless shelter…………..well I DID, and yet this becomes an object of kind of weird and pointless debate, you told me of all the help you gave the guy, I told you I didn’t doubt it for a minute so what’s the ‘dispute’ where is the ‘difference’ here, there is no difference about ‘facts’ the only difference is in ‘interpretation’ you interpret it one way me another. But at least it seems to me you still kind of talk like there is some ‘factual dispute’……………..there isn’t it’s a matter of how do we interpret it or what message do we draw from it. I draw a message that there is something awry here, something that is being missed and it has not to do with a lack of ‘caring’ on your part. I think of Dr Kruse’s statement ‘when you know better you do better’………to me there is some ‘un-knowing’ going on here and maybe on several levels.
About the group in Ireland similarly…………I’m not sure why you decide they were ‘violent and dangerous’ I have no idea where you got that from, I knew them a bit I have read Jenny James’ book nowhere do I see ‘violence’ or even them being ‘dangerous’ except AGAIN from a lack of ‘knowledge’. They were well meaning I would say but also were ‘wrong’ about what REALLY makes people tick just as I feel the PI and Janov in several ways are ‘wrong’. This might seem like quibbling but in the long run has serious consequences. I am not here to defend them as I say I went there and quickly enough felt they were ‘wrong’ but not so different to when I was exposed to the ‘official’ primal therapy groups in the late ’70’s and early ’80’s. I also felt they left a lot to be desired and well the history of especially the suicides in the ’80’s would tend to bear out my concerns and doubts.
I find the way you talk about the suicides quite odd……….maybe there is even possibly some legal reason you talk the way you do. Los Angeles as we all know is a very litigious place and honestly I am surprised some kind of law-suits have not resulted from all that. I have said many time I know personally of 5, do you want me to give the names, of course I won’t out of respect to them but I CAN and I COULD, as I said again I knew them ‘personally’ some closer than others. But that is the 5 I know of personally there were MANY more……………I don’t know names but almost at random the guy who drove his motorcycle out to the desert doused it and himself with gasoline set fire to all of it and shot himself, the guy who shot himself in the bathroom of the PI, shot himself in the head but did not actually die at least at that time, the woman who was found dead in the ‘primal box’ the Swedish guy who went home and later gassed himself to death with car exhaust the woman who went back to Australia and killed herself. There were more but again as I said before I was ‘gone’ I had decided that Janov and his followers were ‘dangerous’ and a super ironic comment on all his ‘warnings’
With all due respect Gretchen YOU are in a position to tell me to tell us how many EXACTLY died in this way, YOU know, I don’t but all I am telling you is my direct experience or else stuff I have heard and that I see no reason to doubt. Only YOU can clear this up if you care to, it seems that you really don’t. I get a bit of a ‘cult’ like feel to your arguments I am you say making these extreme and inflammatory statements, to me I am not. I am actually ‘polite’ I see no reason to drag skeletons from the closet but when I mention it and you challenge me in this way well then I will. And again sorry to repeat as I said before I am not even so interested in raking over old coals it’s just that the ‘mistakes’ that led to those results before I feel have never been properly reckoned with. I believe the PI ‘adjusted’ but none of this was really explained but as I say maybe for legal reasons too. But the PI did not ‘adjust’ as much as I feel was warranted, these events should have brought about a radical re-think a re-think that I feel is still lacking and needed……….
Both you and Vicki ‘muddy the waters’ big time or you try to about whether there were ‘meetings’ or whether it was discussed in groups etc. Again there is no ‘factual’ dispute of course there were meetings and people talked about it in group…………..my point was and is it should have been taken more ‘seriously’ there should have been an ‘all hands of deck’ attitude to reckon with all this but it seems there wasn’t. It was more of a sweeping under the carpet kind of arrangement.
Your last comment about Dr Kruse and his ‘diet plan’ I could call ‘insulting’ to reduce it to that, but again I will put it down to a lack of ‘knowledge’ and also genuine ‘curiosity’. We are dealing here or I though we were with the nature of the brain and the body and the human personality………….not a small subject I feel he has pushed into very deep territory in those realms and has several keys to well being and health mental and physical, total health you might say. To me the PI does not, not come even close it reduces everything to it’s own narrow spectrum, it is not genuinely ‘open’ it is ‘dying’ and it is no mystery to me why that is. Your last sentence I find ‘weak’ and not at all inspiring……………………
Patrick, ok:
so now perhaps for once you could answer Gretchen’s question?
Jo – not sure what ‘question’ you refer to, there are more than one. I thought I did cover most of them at least in my own way or as best I could but it seems you don’t think so with the ‘for once’ phrase. Why am I not surprised? Jo – could you ‘for once’ speak for yourself and not hide behind therapists skirts? Or is that too lonely?
Patrick,, in Gretchen’s last post she asked “…why did you say 20?”
I’m not hiding.
I am following everything, and its frustrating to read your defensive verbosity.
Me, I generally see and understand alot, but fail (or see no point in engaging) to react as and when, and often articulation fails me.
OK I can’t ‘prove’ it was twenty (Gretchen could but she is not saying!) I know there was more also if you count several associated with the Primal Training Centre (another guy there that I happened to know quite well) ……………but for argument’s sake let’s estimate it was 15 (which I think is low) does that really change much. I am baffled by these kinds of ‘factual arguments’ and everyone seems to ignore even ONE is ONE too many. How can people be this blase about a very serious issue. And an issue I believe changed the way therapy is done but IMO without a proper reckoning or discussion of what was changed and why. And was this change more a ‘retreat’ a going back to some kind of ‘talk therapy’ mixed in with a bit of ‘encounter group’ where is primal and what is primal in all this…………I accept you don’t have to ‘participate’ you do things your own way, that’s fine of course.
Patrick: Have you ever felt suicidal????? My feeling, for what it’s, worth, is you have not. If and when you feel suicidal … not that I would wish it upon you ….only then, do I feel you will have some genuine argument about it.
The Primal Institute never either permitted (caused) the suicides nor, in the case of those that did, were they, or anyone else (including Dr. Jack Kruse), capable of preventing it. All the discussions, if I remember rightly, were to patients to open up and start to say how their lives were so unbearable and they wished to take their life … end it all … the Primal Pain that is.
The suicide hot lines may often prevent an imminent suicide, but many I gather happen later when Primal Pain seeps to the surface … again … as seemingly was the case with Robin Williams. Suicide is, from my own experience:- “RISING OLD PAIN” Nothing to do with with present trauma, BUT the refusal to go into ones Primal Pain and make it current consciousness is a potential … which I feel is what Larry is writing about.
Jack
Larry,
of course there are always feelings attached to everything, but about the primal future I think my hopes and dreams are just pure true and honest caring mainly.
if any feeling might be attached to it it is the fact I am also concerned about my own future and where it goes, but that does not take away anything of what I talked about, those are real dreams I would like to see develop, if not in those ways in some other ways, it is just about primal continuing and growing, that’s all, not just about me.
M
Patrick, you say the guy you worked with sang while he worked and didn’t seem suicidal.so it is the fault of primal therapy that he committed suicide. I can understand why you’d feel that way. It bothered me when that girl committed suicide in the box. I was in LA in therapy at the time.
Robin Williams made a lot of people laugh and by all accounts had a very successful career. Did you expect he would commit suicide? It bothered me that he killed himself. Apparently he suffered off and on with depression and received treatment for it. Is that therapy to blame for his suicide?
The way I see it, some people wrestle with awful demons and do their best to cope but finally just give up and end it. I feel pretty sure I would have long before now if I wasn’t in Primal Therapy. Lots of times I’ve felt my life is unbearable and I can’t go on. Each time my last resort is to submerge into the feelings. Thanks to this therapy, I’m reborn and given a chance to try again to make my life better.
Gretchen,
After I read your comment I wasn’t sure anymore why I chose to follow that particular line of thinking. Regarding the spread of PT, looking back from now it looked to me as if things could have been managed to a greater effect. But, hindsight is always 20/20 and I actually have very little idea what it was like at the time. From your description it sounds things were very chaotic, where on the one hand the professional world pretty much ignored Janov, and on the other any Tom, Dick and Harry was putting up signs they were open for some Primal business. If only those two crowds traded places.
Perhaps PT got too much publicity for its own good and came to public attention too rapidly, in a revolutionary rather than an evolutionary way. Funny, this is exactly one of the points of discussion – whether PT was an evolution or a revolution of ideas.
Thank Barry for me for his compliment. My knowing him (or actually – him knowing me) made a big impact in my life, and like all such impacts it lasts a lifetime. Also, part of the internal image I have of what a therapist is – and therefore part of the way I work every day – is made of Barry. So, I internalized not only the process but the processor as well.
Patrick,
kind of a sensitive question but you can take it I guess..
if you’d feel like committing suicide now, who would you blame, the primal institute or yourself for not having given it a real try?
ope you don’t mind my asking, you know I mean well and care about you.
M
Margaret: I don’t feel that is what Patrick’s gripe is. As I understand his comments; he claims the Institute did nothing about them. That’s not my take and I feel that is definately not Gretchen’ feeling either … and some others. I attended some of those meetings and groups
My recollection was that Patrick after doing two years of therapy got involved in a Household Moving busines and spent 7 days a week, and 17 hours a day for almost 30 years; running it. I doubt in those days, he had much time or interest in Primal Therapy or the Institute.
Also, if my memory serves me rightly I had several discussions with Patrick about his excessive work hours in the offive and felt they were not good for his health. Still: just my recollection …. Patrick no doubt has others.
Jack
Daniel, What you said about Barry impacting your work as a therapist was very moving to me and I will pass that on to him. A couple of my patients that are also therapists have said similar things to me and it always touches me. I think we sometimes forget that we can make that kind of difference. As an aside I have to say I was one of those saved lives you mentioned above. Gretch
Daniel: I hate to break it to you, but I simply glanced at those numbers and I could see a serious problem.
15 suicides per 100,000 people in the general population would equate to 0.15 people per 1,000. (0.015%)
0.30 people per 1,000 is the corrected figure for the conservative doubling you proposed.
A person amputating one of his or her legs would be the normal going rate at 0.15 persons per 1,000 Primallers.
2 wooden peg legs would be expected at 0.30 persons per 1,000 (one leg & one arm would also work).
5 entire suicides or more? You’re looking at 33 times the normal population rate for 5 suicides and it only climbs from there.
Now you did bring up a reasonable point that people entering the Institute would suffer mental disorders at a higher rate than the standard population, but those questions can become ridiculously problematic all their own when we have Art and Vivian claiming “most people today suffer from neurosis”
Hence, according to Art’s definition there could be a close proportional correlation between self-admitted mentally disordered persons and the general population itself. One radical thought is that people who go to the Institute are actually healthier than most people because they are willing to admit something is amiss while most folks are on auto-pilot.
I will refrain from making further judgments on how to calculate such loosely definable groups. Have fun with that one!
I do suspect that a lot of people would like to bury the hatchet where past suicides are concerned. If these old skeletons from the past were re-awakened today it might bring down the reputations of all medical centers involved, and the hard-won lessons from the past would never be utilized for potentially lifesaving work on future clients.
Ahhh, the joys of medical research ethics….
..or “most people today suffer from neurosis” and most of those are functioning OK and some are even happy, while most who come to the Institute are not.
You sure know how to put a damper on things don’t you, Larry?
?
my mother is driving me crazy.
i call her to check on her and she comes up, not for the first time with a story about her neighbours getting water from her water supply, on her account.
although we have looked at that problem last year I tell her we will look at it again but she keeps going on about it, clearly not satisfied with my answers.
it turns into a long discusssionm me trying to reassure her, and she not taking my words really in as she supposes I don’t believe her.
I end up telling her it is her not believing me in fact, when I tell her we will look at it, and it becomes more painful as she starts acting hurt and misunderstodd and ‘apologetic’ and phonyly making peace.
shit fucking shit it is so frustrating, she needs to be looked afte as she turns off the water or causes other problems due to her fears and suspicions, but doesn not take my word for it when I reassure her, and makes it take fifteen minutes and lots of frustrations.
i will have to learn to keep it short and to let her go on with her delusion until we get there, if she does not listen to what I say.
she is still too good to take her to a home and she would be devastated if we did.
hard..
I guess with my mother it is so hard to walk the thin line between trying to stay out of struggles and to keep her from getting carried away with mistaken ideas and fears.
she wants to be in control so any time we need to take over it becomes painful for the three of us, but there is no other way and it takes a tremendous amount of patience and tolerance and energy.
i told my brother a few days ago he is so very nice and patient and caring, thank heavens we have each other!
i also notice I better don’t call my mom in the evening as I end up being all wired up and full of adrenaline and stress, blood pressure high, and difficult to unwind to go to sleep..
not good for me..
no other optio than to try and take care as good as possible of ourselves and of her at the same time..
I fear it will keep getting more diffficult in the time coming..
Gretchen, I am very sorry about what you said about the suicides you had to deal with, that must have been very painful.
M
wow, I heard in the documentary, which is about migrating birds, that the Sahara desert is as big as the United States..
I like unexpected bits of knowledge like that..
M
The first time it posted way up there. I’m trying again in hope it posts down here.
The long hot days of summer are over. My eager, conscientious summer students, who helped lift the load and ease the stress of a very busy field season, are gone, on to the start of their school semester and the rest of their lives. As autumn approaches and the sun and warmth retreat I still have more outdoor work to get done, over the next few weeks, before the snows blow in and the world freezes solid. As I brace myself against the oncoming cold and dark, against the solitude of my life, I feel nostalgia for the warm easy days of summer, and for the golden days when Noreen was mine. This tune I discovered yesterday captures the feeling for me. I want to share it, and posting it here helps me let the feeling wash over me.
Larry:
You’ve often talked about how cold & dark the Saskatchewan winters are, and I can imagine the long, desolate nights of endless chill could play havoc with the emotions of vulnerable widowers.
Why not move to one of the southern U.S. states? Something worth considering now that retirement draws near.
blah…trouble with blog posts again..
I have a general question: Does the blood of different people smell different? I donated a unit of blood the other day and the nurse who extracted it seemed to have a flirtatious sparkle in her eye upon holding up my sample. I would imagine she has seen a lot of blood extracted from a lot of people, so it left me wondering if she can detect different blood scents in different people…The thought didn’t occur to me until hours after I left the blood collection site and I regret not asking her this.
It was a refrigerated truck left running right outside a casino’s front door, so I did manage to crack a few multiple-level “bloodsucker” jokes, at least. Even the word “irony” for a blood extraction truck next to a casino didn’t escape me, since you lose a lot of “iron” when donating blood.
In Japan it is believed among many people that blood type is a personality determinant. I have A positive blood, so to no one’s surprise I am a top-grade individual. Perfect in every respect.
No wonder the nurse’s eyes sparkled upon receiving your blood donation.
Larry: Flirtation wasn’t quite the right word for it. I should correct it by describing it as her eyes seemed to light up with a sense of “knowledgeable intrigue” upon holding the sample up close to her at the conclusion of the whole thing. It was only for a few fleeting moments, but it really left me wondering what she was thinking! Her own sense of intrigue left me intrigued as well, LOL!
Anyway, just a minor missed opportunity where I should have asked for more details, but I was too weak to think about it at the time.
You do feel a sense of low-grade weakness in your body after it is done.
Spiritually it turned out to be discouraging, I’m afraid. It only showed me that people who lose a lot of blood teeter precariously on the edge of….permanent unconsciousness and the dark maw of eternal not knowing (ie. death and the permanent conversion of self into mindless fertilizer that all seven billion of us are doomed to experience).
although it seems pointless I can’t help but react to another of your offensive postings, Patrick.
the conclusions you draw out of the little facts you know about the Yugoslavian guy and what was being said to him, and the possible help that would be offered to him in the future, are so arrogant and unjust.
you seem to seek to be rude, after your own personal experience with all the very personal extra attention and time you received, which is something you conveniently forget.
you seek out one person, a pitiful and very very damaged one, use him and his history to suit your own goals of trying to bring the way the primal institute works down.
i have met these two guys, and none of your accusations to the PI deserve this attention really, but they do affect my sense of justice.
this last guy did not really want to do therapy, I have heard him say so myself several times.
you helped him to buy a transcranial magnetic stimulus device at one of the quack’s places you mention, which was supposed to stimulate his brain function, which in my view is pretty irresponsible and possibly dangerous.
and then you come accusing the PI, ful of self-righteousness and indignation.
you ignore all the people you kno that are helped very much with therapy and repeatedly say so and prove it by developing in positive ways, even while in many cases all the damage done in their past can never be set right.
here I can take myself as an example, and I tell you again, to do therapy was the best decision I ever made.
you seek out two persons that refused to follow the guidelines of the PI and use them as an example of the therapy not working, and as an excuse for yourself to cover your own fear of doing therapy yourself.
you were on the right track briefly when you adressed your fear of closeness in a former comment so please don’t get off on this crazy track again and say stuff like there is no curiosity towards the patients at the PI.
that is simply outrageously unfair.
M
Patrick,
you always sound as if you feel you are the only one that cared about those people.
I know on some level you do care, but maybe there is another thing which might make you pick them out as examples, I seem to remember you tried to ‘comvert’ them to your dr. Kruse plan, in vain.
why would that be you think?
I don’t think it has anything to do with dr. Kruse being right or wrong, do you?
M
(trying this post again to see if it sticks to the bottom)
Patrick:
You wrote this one sentence I had to respond to:
“And coming as we pretty much all do from backgrounds of ‘no help’ this is way like too much of a repeat story.”
I’m going to stay out of the Institute arguments, but from personal experience I know (and know of) plenty of people who received much, MUCH, MUCH more help from the outside world than I ever did. I tread carefully when I say this, because I don’t want to get dragged into another explanation today of all the seriously dangerous challenges I was facing.
Margaret, Margaret what will I do with you? Often I feel you take my ‘criticisms’ of PT personally like almost you feel it like an attack on you. I guess I could see feeling that but I don’t mean it that way I think it is a bit un-fortunate you take it that way.
You are quite wrong about me trying to ‘convert’ them to Dr Kruse’s way……….first off there is not really a ‘way’ I am far from being a doctor Dr Kruse MIGHT be able to help them I imagine he would. Also at that time I was only begining to get into the thinking of Dr Kruse so you are pretty much wrong here on several counts.
I also felt the ‘electrical device’ was most likely quackery…………but all I was doing was helping the guy he something HE wanted and he found out about by driving him to San Diego. But I DID get to know him quite well I had a lot of sympathy for the guy and I am not saying only me there was at least one other person who REALLY cares and cared about him. So my involvement was really peripheral but enough to see what was going on
And Barry DID tell him he had a ‘plan’ for him if the guy is to be believed which I see no reason not to. Now I agree he was a difficult case maybe even very difficult maybe even impossilbe to help. But given all that I don’t feel there was any serious thought put into HOW he could even possibly be helped just shove him into groups with all the rest. No ‘plan’ ever surfaced and as I say he went home in complete despair I think it is fair to say.
Another thing you mention is how I focus on these ‘failures’ I have been thinking about this a bit and they way I see it NO ONE is not important, nobody should just be thrown aside as some kind of ‘failure’ who did not follow the script. That’s called blaming the victim and just because you say it has worked for you……………well good for you I suppose but how about the people for whom it don’t. Maybe this is partly a cultural thing too I would say Irish culture is very strong on the ‘underdog’ or also has a concept of the “Common Good”…………….not the good of particular individuals. It’s true we live in an atomised alienated age but no reason to just totally give in to what works for me and not wondering much about the ‘unfortunates’……………..
Vicki’s comment below also strikes me as ‘blaming the victim’………….to me maybe we should focus less on their shortcomings and wonder WHY…….especially why in the light of a theory that makes so many claims…………….
Patrick: Defend, defend, defend. Defending yourself in the manner you do, gives the impression, (least-ways to me), that you just get upset that some others did not agree with you point of view. Said another way:- the way you VIEW things.
It’s ironic that you see the faults of other:- Arthur Janov, the Primal Institute (PI), Vicky, and sometimes, even Margaret … and me. The analogy that comes to my mind was the mother seeing her son in the military on parade and commenting afterwards “They were all out of step … except our Johnnie”
My suggestion (for what it’s worth … if anything) … is slow down … stop … and ponder your own psyche. I think Freud coined a word for your type of responses and if my memory serves me well it was the word “EGO”. Taking that word in the context I see it; I would suggest you are extremely “egotistical”
Perhaps Gretchen, Margaret or Donal (being into psychology) might be a better authority than I.
Jack
To quote you:- “….. some kind of ‘failure’ who did not follow the script”. There is NO SCRIPT. There are a few choice words such as:- feeling, emotions/expressions, buddying, defending, acting-out, head trips, et al … but these few words do no constitute a “script”.
We each of us express ourselves in our own unique way and in that sense we are all different. (No Script to learn off by heart and then follow). Maybe Dr. Jack Kruse has a ‘script’ and hence you feel other therapies do it the same way.
Certainly, for all my time doing Primal Therapy (33 years) I have never heard a consistent type of response. I see a great deal of unique ways that we each of us go about it.
Drop the word … I don’t think it is gaining any resilience here.
Jack
Patrick, you’re welcome to “wonder WHY” endlessly, since that’s apparently all you’ve decided to do, besides evade whatever anyone says to you, whether it’s Gretchen, Margaret, me or Jack. Since you see Margaret & I as ‘blaming the victim’, you must see those two guys you chose to befriend as “victims” of PT, and you must see Primal Therapy as “parents” who should just “take care of” these “victims”, since they are unwilling to take care of themselves. And it follows that you must feel the PI somehow “dropped the ball” and didn’t take care of you, too — rather than that you failed to stay in therapy and stick it out, and feel your feelings. Instead you choose to go away angry, find that intolerable, and therefore marshal all your defenses with fabricated “evidence” of why you’re not the one who quit, really, instead the therapy “failed you” — that’s amazing!
Your own parents couldn’t manage to take care of your needs adequately, and your abusive schoolmates and neighbors did not help you, and those two guys’ parents were likewise unable, so why do you imagine the P.I. is somehow “responsible” for the tragedies in all our lives resulting from that?
You don’t really know what Barry’s “plan” for the guy was, and yet find it easy to draw conclusions that there was no plan, or not one that could possibly work. Where is your crystal ball on that, or is it really that you’re convinced the same thing happened to you? You keep coming back here to tell us about “the evidence” you’re always managing to find to support your feeling that therapy let you down, so you’re sure the therapeutic method is to blame.
You also said you didn’t try to convert the two guys to Dr. Kruse and were “just beginning” to get into that, and are not a doctor, so Margaret must be wrong about you — but that is just more evasion, since you have been “tub-thumping” for Dr. Kruse for months here, and indeed, asked Barry & Gretchen to take time off to study his methods, as your “solution” to what you think is wrong with Primal Therapy. Almost every response you make here, slithers and evades what’s really being said to you, that you don’t want to hear. You’d rather fall back on your belief that you’re a victim of P.T., than the fact that you quit on yourself, and didn’t believe that you could feel your own feelings, so you angrily ran away.
Vicki – small ‘errors’ can get magnified so no they are not ‘victims’ of PT they are victims of what ails them and what caused it. But then (next step) PT seemingly does not or cannot help them so then rather than look at PT and possibly figure out WHY that might be the case you blame them the ‘victim’ in this case. Your ‘loose logic’ goes on in that kind of loose style so I cannot really bother to answer you in detail.
I have one rather simple question for you Vicki…………do you see yourself as one of the ones that ‘continues to feel your feelings’ and are you a ‘sucess’ in that sense if not in other more conventional senses?
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/the-case-for-printing-money—–and-handing-it-out-to-the-public-185640856.html
quantitative easing — or mass asset purchases — have cost basically $2.8 trillion dollars so far, if you divide that by the taxpaying population it would come to about $56,000 per household. “Imagine if that had just been given to households
There’s a real simple solution which I have stated a number of times, BUT seemingly no-one gets it. Ah well! WTF.
JUST ABOLISH MONEY … then so many problems just evaporate. No-one really knows what would happen if we did … BUT most actually believe they know exactly what would happen. I’m not sure what crystal balls they are looking at. All I know is that I don’t have any crystal balls … that I know of … BUT I will keep on looking.
Jack
Jack:
The economy is like a car engine. It needs motor oil. The economic engine has millions of parts. Oil needs to be fed to as many of the moving parts as possible to keep everything lubricated. Giving money to the people directly is feeding the oil directly to all moving parts of the engine.
ABOLISHING money is taking all oil OUT of the engine. You won’t need a crystal ball to see what happens next.
Giving money directly to the people creates a risk of repeating Germany’s hyper-inflation fiasco in the 1920’s, but it’s the lesser of two evils since everyone wants a bailout for their bad decisions now and we are reaping what we have sown…
Patrick,
I think Vicky hit the nail on the head with what you again just choose to ignore.
what she says about how you struggle like hell to evade the responsability that you yourself quit therapy,is the core point.
you keep looking for ‘victims’, so do you see yourself as a victim of PT failing to help you?
please answer this one straightforwardly.
and please do not bring up what happened decades ago, but talk about your last experiences with the current PT.
i understand your utopic drean about some therapy able to make things ok for everyone but that is not for today, and specially not for an outpatient clinic like the PI.
so do you feel it is your own free decision to not do therapy, and it is your own free decision not to make yourself vulnerable to the closeness you mentioned in earlier posts that is so threatening as it might hurt like hell for quite a while before it getss better?
who would you blame for that choice, the PT, your family and fellow school kids or do you feel you have at least some kind of a free choice here?
and don’t you dare insult Vicky or hurt her, she is far more intelligent and sensitive as you are, she has a lot of real wisdom you completely disregard as you have always been too arrogant to really bother to get to know her and mostly anyone else.
you are the one missing out big time here on the company and support of some fine human beings.
take a close look at who you tend yourself to surround with in your daily life and take some time to reflect on what you are most afraid of.
you are the only one to make the choice whether you want to really get to know yourself or not.
don’t blame anyone else if you make a wrong choice.
This is good, Margaret (your Sept. 1 at 11:36 am), and so is the next one (posted two minutes later). And thanks.
just for the record Patrick,
if you want to call it taking something personally to stand up for what you agree with and what is unjustly accused and attacked, well, fine.
you bend the truth when you say you did not try to change the diet of those guys, I was there.
you probably quickly gave it up as they were not at all complying, but you kept commenting to me about it.
then another outrageous accusation of yours, noone was ever ‘thrown to the side’ by the PI as far as I know, on the contrary.
that nice ‘homelesss’ guy you keep bringing up as the poor victim did have a lot of pasive agression as well, and actually seemed to aim for being totally looked after without having to do anything himself., I cared about that guy a lot specially knowing his background, but his defense act was hard to get through to make him start doing what he needed to do.
I once offered him a good sum of money to do a tiny bit of grocery shopping with me and he said yes but then left me waiting in vain for three hours.
then he appeared, and was about to go out to go shopping for some junk food for himself alone, and I asked him to at least bring me home a roll of toilet paper which I really needed…
he said ‘no, I don’t feel like doing that’
so you see, the poor victim was not very coooperative in earning his money in the easiest way or not even decent in treating others who tried to help him.
I still care about that guy but hey, here the horse and the water really make so much sense.
you have no basis at all either to say the Yugoslavian guy was simply ‘dumped’ in group without any other means of advice or guiding or plan.
without an intensive that is already exceptional anyway, so well, to get really personal, please stop the bullshit.
in this case Jack’s advice to slow down and reflect on yourself does make sense.
if you really want to face your own monsters the PI offers you a safe place to do so with good feedback and suport of other honest people, there is no script you have to follow, there is only your own truth to face there, but that seems to be very scary for you.
no plan or treatment is waiting there to ‘fail’ you possibly, only the challenge to really look at what you ccarry inside.
i htink if you carry on the way you are doing, you might keep skipping the surface and spiral off into repeated act-outs and desperate attacks forever.
I say all of this because I care, while I know I keep taking the risk of a nasty lash-out.
but by now I have about said all I can say, in the future I will only try to react on facts I see represented in a distorted way.
M
just had a call from my mother’s landlord’s secretary.
my mom keeps calling her for a socalled water problem iwith the neigbours, that does not ei exist.
she went over there to check it, together with the neigbour and with my mom, so I did call my mom to explain her but it was so frustrating and aggravating and painful.
she did not give up starting over ad over with ‘but why in that case etc…’, 8 times or so, with me explaining her again and again how things really were, and how my brother checks all her bills etc. and how she should not turn off her water because of her central heating etc., in vain, I tried to reassure her she should only enjoy her life and trust us to keep an eye on everything, that we all want her to live in that house as long as possible but she has to be willing to cooperate, but then she took off again on a new round of the same discussion.
I lost my patience almost and told her I refused to go over this discussion another time, and at some point where she said,’ok ‘ I said ok and just hung up thephone, but felt not good at all.
I mailed my brother and feel bad about worrying him too, with his busy stressful job.
makes me both very scared, very angry and very tense and in pain.
M
I did call my mom’s boyfriend to give him the details about the water and the infomation I got from the landlady, with the meter specifications to prove things are ok.
I asked him to try and help to reassure my mom and he romised to try to do so when he visits her on thursday.
I tried to call my mom a number of times just to briefly chat with her as to dissolve the tension of the last few words we changed, but she does not pick up the phone.
it makes me feel scared as she has a tendency to want to walk ‘ off into the woods’ as to not have to finish her life losing her mind.
so far it always were merely thoughts but it would be horrible if the ‘argument’ I just had with her pushed her over her thresh]hold.
i gave it some thought and what I was trying to do was trying to protect her from worrying and feeling upset, but her struggling made me feel so very frustrated I lost my patience and hung up the phone on her sort of, on that moment she said ok, me just saying ok too and quickly hanging up as to avoid to get in a struggle again.
but it is not at all of our habits to hang up the phone like that so maybe she took it the wrong way, so now I will only be at ease when I hear her on the phone..
shit..
I hope things like this won’t happen too often cause they take up all my energy and make me feel so tense and worried..
it reminds me of those times when my dad lost his patience and got really angry at her for not giving up certain discussions, going on relentlessly to get it her way..
he’d say ‘stop fighting like that!’ and I can relate to him now..
M
finally got hold of my mother.
discussion almost started again but this time I could keep it simple, tell her I believed her but that everything was fine now and then I could change the subject..
whewmscary…
i told her we would help her to live there in that house for many more years if ossible, and she replied noone would get her out of there..
strongminded she is that is certain..
M
J. Murphy!!! I’m posting this again, this time at the bottom of the page where I intended it to go the first time.
I leaned a new phrase today. It refers to a behaviour we are all guilty of, a little or a lot. It’s important to ourselves to be aware of it. Here is the link to the article in Wikepedia, and below it I pasted a copy of the introduction.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias
Confirmation bias, also called myside bias, is the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one’s preconceptions.[Note 1][1] People display this bias when they gather or remember information selectively, or when they interpret it in a biased way. The effect is stronger for emotionally charged issues and for deeply entrenched beliefs. People also tend to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing position. Biased search, interpretation and memory have been invoked to explain attitude polarization (when a disagreement becomes more extreme even though the different parties are exposed to the same evidence), belief perseverance (when beliefs persist after the evidence for them is shown to be false), the irrational primacy effect (a greater reliance on information encountered early in a series) and illusory correlation (when people falsely perceive an association between two events or situations).
A series of experiments in the 1960s suggested that people are biased toward confirming their existing beliefs. Later work re-interpreted these results as a tendency to test ideas in a one-sided way, focusing on one possibility and ignoring alternatives. In certain situations, this tendency can bias people’s conclusions. Explanations for the observed biases include wishful thinking and the limited human capacity to process information. Another explanation is that people show confirmation bias because they are weighing up the costs of being wrong, rather than investigating in a neutral, scientific way.
Confirmation biases contribute to overconfidence in personal beliefs and can maintain or strengthen beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. Poor decisions due to these biases have been found in political and organizational contexts.[2][Note 2]
Larry: Most of the article you gave the link to, in your comment and, my very strong feeling; was that it asserted very little to the average reader … least-ways those that were able to plow through it. I personally found it almost contradictory … in that it seemed to be talking from (all the writers), of their own biases … even in the event of talking about bias.
I personally would prefer (least-ways for me and my grasp of this enormous subject) that I would rather look at it as “my perception”, and/or “their perception”. Seen that perceptions rather than conceptions, make it far easier for me to grasp.
Following this to some sort of logic (and I use that word sparingly, since to me, the only logic that is reliable is the computer). I would like to get away from what is deemed “THE TRUTH”. I see only ‘my truth’ and ‘your truth’ whomever “your” is supposed to be. That way, I thus conclude, in my own mind, that there as many truths as there are folks assuming ‘this’ or ‘that’ as “THE TRUTH”.
I come back to the theme of many months ago, when Gretchen wrote a blog article on “Simplicity”. I do confess it is my favorite word, and one I attempt endlessly to pursue. The ultimate search in all searching (especially science) is to seek that “Simplicity”. How else (I ask myself) are we able to “grasp” anything?????
Jack
I wonder why you take that stance. Up to a point I think the same as you that there is my perception of the truth and there is your perception of the truth. And then there is the truth. The closer our perceptions or interpretations are of the truth, or of reality, the better we are able to deal with reality, and that’s what the article is about.
Science seeks to uncover reality, or the truth. It’s something we’ve been doing since the beginning of time, in our discovering and learning about our world, long before the term “science” was coined. Science is a relatively recent more rigorous way of discovering the truth ideally by gathering as much data as is feasible and by looking at all possible interpretations of it to arrive at the interpretation that best explains it all.
I wonder why you want to sidestep the truth.
My Sept 1 2:28 post should begin with…..”Jack, I wonder why you take that stance..”
Larry: I find the question:- “I wonder why you take that stance.?” somewhat irrelavent. I take that stance because … I take that stance. Should there be any other reason?
But here goes; I’ll make a stab at it. I have for quite some years now, particularly in view of my many years blogging … seen the un-resolvable nature of argument, debate, discussion, In my opinion; and whatever. I’ll start off by rephrasing what I implied in my first response by asking WHO can we rely upon to give us “The Reality” (as oppesed to “my reality”). Just because something appears to be YOUR reality is not to say that it is the (universal) REALITY.
So! what that did for me (philosophically) was ‘to get from under’ the notion of the Universal Realities and/or the Universal Truths. If I did not do that, then I was into the ‘for ever’ discussion, argument, debate or, opinion of …….. So I quickly, and my therapy seemed to help me in this regard, kept it to the “I” statement. Another way of saying this was “That is my feeling”/. Why that was such a revelation to and for me was, that my feelings were not ‘arguable’ to anyone outside of me. Whereas if I stated what I felt was the FACT, or the TRUTH; then I was caught up in the endless and un-resolvable debate (or what you will) of the relevant comment by the other person.
It grounded me to only considering MY FEELINGS and not getting caught up in other peoples notions. I can read (and do) other peoples notions, sentiments, ideas, but I don’t have to BUY into them. Sadly, that is what I had to do in my early child-hood by my father who was for ever telling me “The Reality” … which had a ring of ‘it did not make total sense to me’ BUT, because he was the AUTHORITY, I had little option but to accept it. It took many years for me to begin to realize that daddy was not the ‘be-all-and-end-all’. He had some very crazy idea. One I will relate here to demonstrate my point. He was stating to me and my younger brother that we HAD to obey all authorities. So my brother then asked:”- “So! if the ‘authority’ told you to turn on the gas in the gas chamber … you had no option but to obey” My father paused for a second then replied:- “Yes”.
My bother then responded with “You dirty bastard” and walked off. That to me was when I realized my father was as ‘fucked up’ as most others that I met out there.
Hope some of this lets you into why I take that stance. Jack
Yes it does Jack. Thank you for giving me your time and explaining.
Thanks, Larry (for the link on Confirmation bias). That is something to think about.
The automobile and the internal combustion engine is one of the most complex invention before nuclear energy was discovered. What you seem to argue (as I have previously asserted) is:- “you miss the wood for the trees” (crooked thinking). How about abolishing the automobile (or better still, never concocting it) such that you might have had a mommy to take care for you, until your adult-hood.
Why your thinking is so “crooked” is that one the one hand you are a second hand victim of the automobile … YET you indirectly assert , that it is a necessary piece of ironmongery; to both run around inside of, AND to play duck and dodge, on the highway. There was a time, and not too long ago when the automobile did not exist. To re-iterate from another perspective. If we can create it … then we can abolish it. Either the automobile and/or money. Go figure.
Jack
Jack: I could have just as easily used the human body and blood as a lubricant as an analogous example as well. You decided to latch onto the car analogy and turn it into something personal about me instead of actually considering how the analogy factors into the argument.
You are right that I am not a fan of all the blood-soaked death & destruction the automobile has wrought without a moral care in the world, but I’m not out to ban automobiles.
Four year old children start to hurl insults when they feel they are being challenged. Like yourself, I’ve seen Janov do this sort of stuff as well when I used to read his blog. Thankfully those days are over for me.
quote:- “Thankfully those days are over for me.” That begs a few question to my mind.
Why the fuck are you still, presumably, paying tribute to Arthur Janov’s Primal Therapy via the Institute? He created that Institution.
What brought you to the Institute in the first place? … seemingly, not the writings of Arthur Janov. yeah?
What do you feel are the primary requirement for doing this therapy?
That Arthur Janov is a 90 y/o man why, as you made reference some weeks back, should that make the guy irrelevant … to you?
Is there anyone else who’s writings you are following? I doubt Dr. Jack Kruse … but who the fuck knows? Only you I guess
Finally;- who’s version of Primal Therapy are you into?
Jack
P.S. It is my feeling that you won’t answer these question but WTF
Jack: I am almost finished with making this perfect voodoo doll of you. My pincushion is full of needles and all I need now is a lock of your hair. Are you ready?
Fuck! NO.
Jack
LoL, U.G. and Jack! “Scary stuff!”
Vicki: My apologies for spelling your name wrong … again. Spelling was never my forte
I had a teacher once tell me that I had spelled “rain” three different ways on one page. My reasoning was that I would at least get one of them right. She never said I spelled even one correctly … so! I’m still in the dark
I am ever so grateful for spell checkers.
Jack
Maybe I should take Gretchen’s advice when she wrote:- “Jack, Please stop using names on the blog.” (:
What adult calls himswelf, “Guru” ??? Why not purple hulk. It’s nice to read something meaningful and not infantile self absorption from the folks who occassionally appear on the Patrick , Guru, Jack and Larry Show. Patrick , I think I understand is a Ninja Toitle with several point the claw issues. He does have some valid point, I’m sure, but lost by exaggeration and thus blown into incoherent fantasy. So what motivates you moooskittears to saturate the site with your self absorbed drival ??? Boring !!!!! PTI deserves a huge nod for allowing anyone to say anything, and I learned genuinely respects all speakers. How many organizations would tolerate let alone promote zany sounding naysayers to have a non edited voice ? I also learned early that your can’t make, “daddy and mommy”, like you better than the other kids by ragging on or ratting out one of the other , “kids”………………..
Dvddoodle99: An interesting take on this blog; I figure. Yeah!!!! one kid ratting on another and hoping that it achieves what one needs … is something I never got into, since daddy thought the other kid (brother) was more of a man than me. He loved the same sport as my daddy and I (stupidly) let it be known that hated all sport.
What I got out of the therapy was that I was perhaps even more fucked-up than most; since many were telling me so … so!!!! eventually I caught on. You can see just how fucked-up I am by being part of the Patrick et al ‘show’… and reading my comments.
Not sure what a “moooskittear” is:-, but suspect I am one of them. Least-ways, I certainly do a lot of ‘moooing’ … and in a perverted sort of way; I love it. What better way to celebrate the last lap of life????
Jack
Thanks for noticing my real name, Jack — that seldom happens, and I appreciate it. Even if it doesn’t “stick”.
How did the world manage to function and survive pre green back ????? Everyone equally having needs met seems a relatively sane idea.Money is alreadygiven hand over fist to the deserving manifest destiny clawsses.
Who knows where this will appear but I am commenting on Guru’s “The economy is like a car engine. It needs motor oil. The economic engine has millions of parts. Oil needs to be fed to as many of the moving parts as possible to keep everything lubricated. Giving money to the people directly is feeding the oil directly to all moving parts of the engine.
ABOLISHING money is taking all oil OUT of the engine. You won’t need a crystal ball to see what happens next.”
I thought that was an apt and simple ANALOGY says nothing about the desirability of cars or not. And for Jack to go back at him about cars aside from being kind of cruel and sadistic knowing what we all do about Guru’s situation also seems like a good example of ‘crooked thinking’. In fact the whole notion of ‘abolishing money’ seems like ‘crooked thinking’ to me some kind of simple(ton) ‘solution to a very big problem
Guru, you’d realy love this excellent film (if you haven’t seen it already).
Daniel: I watched the entire thing, thank you. I already knew about 75-80% of the people and the materials in the film, but I learned a few new things.
I wouldn’t say I love this sort of thing. I think it’s interesting and complicated, but in the end money is still just a product of the human mind…a psychological construct that gives certain people power over others.
I just want a quiet life in the woods by a lake under a clear sky with lots of stars.
The world is already too hopeless to be fixed. I just want to salvage what I can from it for myself. That’s it.
Anyway, thank you for the film. It was exactly the sort of thing my mother was involved in a long, long, LONG time ago. I’m afraid it’s a different universe to my actual life now even though I already had good working knowledge of what was in the film. I already incurred too much vocational damage to be a power player in that stuff…
I very much liked that movie, although it makes the blood boil. A side issue in the movie, but an interesting one, was whether the academic world was academic only in name and actually corrupted by the financial system.
I know your mother worked for the financial industry, but what do you mean by saying she was involved in that sort of thing? Do you mean to criticize her line of work even back then?
The above was supposed to be a reply to Guru’s comment of Sep. 1, 03:08
Daniel:
I carelessly used the phrase “involved in that sort of thing” with “worked in the financial industry” in an interchangeable fashion. No, she didn’t help to promulgate the financial crisis.
This is going way back into the very early 1970’s around the time Art opened the Primal Institute. An entirely different era when the financial industry was nascent and mom was using FORTRAN computing language with her co-workers. She would simply give radio interviews about the financial health of various US companies, etc. etc.
A bit more innocent than even the ancient Charles Keating era.
I remember growing up my dad would give me a Standard & Poor’s stock guide booklet (thick yellow booklet) and even this weird “Millionaire” game.
At the time I never understood why dad gave me those things. He didn’t say much and I didn’t understand what was going on. It was a complete blank spot of empty air with no explanation at all.
Sure, the answers are clear now, but that horse left the barn and died of old age long ago.
I ended up being the only person in junior high school with a rudimentary understanding of the Black-Scholes options model and butterfly spreads. But why? Why did I need to know this stuff? It just seemed like black magic with no reward and a prison all its own with no encouragement from anywhere. Instead, my beer drinking and pot smoking buddies seemed far more enticing than empty air in this newfound $30K per year school district.
Why did you need to know all this stuff? Maybe because it was a way of keeping a part of her alive. But I can see how you felt trapped in that.
(2nd attempt to place this post correctly; not optimistic on its chances, though)
Daniel: That’s not quite it. I did not know at the time she was into this stuff. I didn’t know what she did for a living until I was about 30 years old, so it would have been impossible for me to study it while I was a teenager for the sake of my consciously trying keeping part of her alive. It’s some strange, wordless, abortive series of studies that ended in my teenage years when peer pressure took hold and I started to do stupid things to be “cool”, “fit in”, etc.
Without dragging this on any further, during my early 20’s I did make a note on my autobiography to the Institute that she was a “financial analyst”…but that meant nothing to me at the time because I couldn’t connect it to anything or any organization. I might as well had written down “senior underwater basket weaver”.
Everything is a dark, murky haze when there is no information in life.
There is such a thing called the unconscious, and it carries among other things precisely those issues that we don’t know, so having no conscious knowledge doesn’t mean that keeping part of her alive wasn’t an unconscious agenda of those grieving over you mom, especially you dad.
My own mom spoke very little about her childhood, and only much later in life did I begin to understand how that life she never mentioned was nevertheless alive in me.
Some things are ‘known’ but unthought, and therefore can only be lived.
Daniel: I quote you:- “There is such a thing called the unconscious, and it carries among other things precisely those issues that we don’t know,” It is the phrase “… among other things” that I am taking exception to.
My take is that Arthur Janov DEFINED precicely what the “unconscious’ was, and what it contained. I have always prefered to call it the ‘Subconscious’… meaning that it is just below our consciousness. The very nature of what Art was referring to when he wrote of “reliving” was that he was stating that the ‘unconscious/subconscious’ was available to us … and to bring what the “unconscious” contained into the consciousness. He termed it “Having a Primal” and stated that ALL it contained was those feelings that got REPRESSED, in the womb and/or very early childhood. Nothing more; nothing less.
It was just this that was the genius of his finding/discovery and the subsiquent formulation of Primal Theory. It is my contention (and I believe Art’s) that we muddy the waters if we start to assume that the unconscious is a mystery; and further that it is no more than what Carl Gustav Jung referred to as the “collective unconscious” and merely leave it with that vague notion. Thus making little or no attempt, to figure out what it ‘actually’ contained.
This for and to me, suggests that you too Daniel are inversted in ‘comnplications and convolutions’. In so doing you don’t have to be specific and can leave it all as generaizations. I wish to refute that means of commenting, particularly since Arthur Janov has been way more precise. It is his preciseness that is seen as some sort of arrogance on his part, and a great desire from the uninitiated to ‘knock him’ for his work, findings, therapy and.theory.
To further press my point … it is far simpler than we first assumed … but then “simplicity” was never a sexy notion.
Jack
Jack, I wrote about the unconscious as a place where I actually intended the unconscious as a process. But, do you mean to contend that awareness and expression of one’s feelings reduces the ‘size’ or ‘volume’ (so to speak) of the unconscious? And, if we take that further, is it your belief that once all feelings are felt there is no unconscious at all? And, is having no unconscious a desirable state?
By the way, the unconscious containing repressed mental stuff is an idea of Freud and not Janov. Freud called it the dynamic unconscious and he based a lot of his theories and therapy on working with these repressed ideas and emotions.
Daniel: Thank you for sharing the Freud post earlier. It was an interesting read. Testing this post to see if it sticks to the end of the blog.
Daniel: I will respond to your last paragraph first, as that is the easiest one for me. From all my reading of Freud, Jung, Reich, Addler, Fromm et al, I was never aware that any of them researched or investigated the contents of the “Unconscious” The nearest was perhaps Freud. in that he attempted to interpret dreams. However he started off his whole career by studying hysterical women who, I gather, assumed sexual abuse by family members (fathers in particular). Freud eventually deemed that a fantasy on the part of these hysterical women. I think, if my memory serves me correctly, Janov in his writings has contended that a great deal of this was that he, Freud, was reluctant to imagine that his own father might have been guilty of sexual abuse. Not I gather towards Sigmund himself.
Now to your initial paragraph … quote:- ” But, do you mean to contend that awareness and expression of one’s feelings reduces the ‘size’ or ‘volume’ (so to speak) of the unconscious?” Yes, yes and yes … emphatically. Coined in the early days of Primal Therapy, as “emptying the Primal Pool of Pain” You then continue with:- “And, if we take that further, is it your belief that once all feelings are felt there is no unconscious at all?” Again; yes, yes and yes … if felt and EXPRESSED. “And, is having no unconscious a desirable stat?” Absolutely and unequivocally.
“Primal Man” as both Michael Holden and Arthur Janov in their book of that name, termed that Neurosis actually created the unconscious (my word “Subconscious”).
(Holden later went off on a tangent and became what is known as “a Jesus Freak)
If, as stated in “The Primal Scream” Neurosis is the “pathology of feelings”. Pathology implying the ‘death of feelings’. If t’were possible (to a major extent), I feel, that there is a ‘relative’ cure of neurosis … through entering the “feeling zone of life” and fully integrating the right and left lobes of the brain … then the unconscious/subconscious has not further function; and will evaporate.
We are not born with an unconscious unless severely damage in utero. It is created (Primal Theory) through traumas of birth and early child-hood’s repressed feelings and their expression. As such, it is a factor of neurotics and neurotics ONLY. If there happened to be a human that was NEVER traumatized … that human would not possess an unconscious/subconscious … but would have a totally integrated brain and know instinctively and intuitively what it needed and how to get those need met … provided that in it’s earlier days ‘Daddy and Mommy’ were to meet the needs of the child until such times and the child was old enough to take care of it’s own needs.
One caveat:- that is NOT to feed into that child’s “WANTS”. Unmet ‘wants’ merely create frustration … which is NOT life threatening. Unmet NEEDS, on the other hand ARE life threatening.
Hope this answered your question Daniel, and explained my reasoning’s.
Jack
For what it’s worth I find Freud idea of the ‘dynamic unconscious’ more useful than Janov’s ‘pool of pain’ imagery where the unconscious is picture as like a lake and we slop out buckets of pain until it is all gone. Probably a very misleading image and it HAS misled a lot of people………………who try to cry and cry until there is no cry left. Except we never get there as is shown by the guy who almost 3 years later STILL goes on and on about how I got on the blog which should hardly be such a big consideration.. GET OVER IT DUDE!
Since there is much talk of loss lately – Patrick and Gretchen’s moms recently and UG’s in the distant past, Larry’s Noreen, and other losses not so tangible – it reminded me of a short and beautiful paper by Freud which he wrote toward the end of the Great War (as it was called before we began to number them) in 1916. It’s a bit longer than our average comment but I think you may like it.
On Transience / Sigmund Freud
NOT long ago I went on a summer walk through a smiling countryside in the company of a taciturn friend and of a young but already famous poet. The poet admired the beauty of the scene around us but felt no joy in it. He was disturbed by the thought that all this beauty was fated to extinction, that it would vanish when winter came, like all human beauty and all the beauty and splendour that men have created or may create. All that he would otherwise have loved and admired seemed to him to be shorn of its worth by the transience which was its doom.
The proneness to decay of all that is beautiful and perfect can, as we know, give rise to two different impulses in the mind. The one leads to the aching despondency felt by the young poet, while the other leads to rebellion against the fact asserted. No! it is impossible that all this loveliness of Nature and Art, of the world of our sensations and of the world outside, will really fade away into nothing. It would be too senseless and too presumptuous to believe it. Somehow or other this loveliness must be able to persist and to escape all the powers of destruction.
But this demand for immortality is a product of our wishes too unmistakable to lay claim to reality: what is painful may none the less be true. I could not see my way to dispute the transience of all things, nor could I insist upon an exception in favour of what is beautiful and perfect. But I did dispute the pessimistic poet’s view that the transience of what is beautiful involves any loss in its worth.
On the contrary, an increase! Transience value is scarcity value in time. Limitation in the possibility of an enjoyment raises the value of the enjoyment. It was incomprehensible, I declared, that the thought of the transience of beauty should interfere with our joy in it. As regards the beauty of Nature, each time it is destroyed by winter it comes again next year, so that in relation to the length of our lives it can in fact be regarded as eternal. The beauty of the human form and face vanish for ever in the course of our own lives, but their evanescence only lends them a fresh charm. A flower that blossoms only for a single night does not seem to us on that account less lovely. Nor can I understand any better why the beauty and perfection of a work of art or of an intellectual achievement should lose its worth because of its temporal limitation. A time may indeed come when the pictures and statues which we admire to-day will crumble to dust, or a race of men may follow us who no longer understand the works of our poets and thinkers, or a geological epoch may even arrive when all animate life upon the earth ceases; but since the value of all this beauty and perfection is determined only by its significance for our own emotional lives, it has no need to survive us and is therefore independent of absolute duration.
These considerations appeared to me incontestable; but I noticed that I had made no impression either upon the poet or upon my friend. My failure led me to infer that some powerful emotional factor was at work which was disturbing their judgment, and I believed later that I had discovered what it was. What spoilt their enjoyment of beauty must have been a revolt in their minds against mourning. The idea that all this beauty was transient was giving these two sensitive minds a foretaste of mourning over its decease; and, since the mind instinctively recoils from anything that is painful, they felt their enjoyment of beauty interfered with by thoughts of its transience.
Mourning over the loss of something that we have loved or admired seems so natural to the layman that he regards it as self-evident. But to psychologists mourning is a great riddle, one of those phenomena which cannot themselves be explained but to which other obscurities can be traced back. We possess, as it seems, a certain amount of capacity for love—what we call libido—which in the earliest stages of development is directed towards our own ego. Later, though still at a very early time, this libido is diverted from the ego on to objects, which are thus in a sense taken into our ego. If the objects are destroyed or if they are lost to us, our capacity for love (our libido) is once more liberated; and it can then either take other objects instead or can temporarily return to the ego. But why it is that this detachment of libido from its objects should be such a painful process is a mystery to us and we have not hitherto been able to frame any hypothesis to account for it. We only see that libido clings to its objects and will not renounce those that are lost even when a substitute lies ready to hand. Such then is mourning.
My conversation with the poet took place in the summer before the war. A year later the war broke out and robbed the world of its beauties. It destroyed not only the beauty of the countrysides through which it passed and the works of art which it met with on its path but it also shattered our pride in the achievements of our civilization, our admiration for many philosophers and artists and our hopes of a final triumph over the differences between nations and races. It tarnished the lofty impartiality of our science, it revealed our instincts in all their nakedness and let loose the evil spirits within us which we thought had been tamed for ever by centuries of continuous education by the noblest minds. It made our country small again and made the rest of the world far remote. It robbed us of very much that we had loved, and showed us how ephemeral were many things that we had regarded as changeless.
We cannot be surprised that our libido, thus bereft of so many of its objects, has clung with all the greater intensity to what is left to us, that our love of our country, our affection for those nearest us and our pride in what is common to us have suddenly grown stronger. But have those other possessions, which we have now lost, really ceased to have any worth for us because they have proved so perishable and so unresistant? To many of us this seems to be so, but once more wrongly, in my view. I believe that those who think thus, and seem ready to make a permanent renunciation because what was precious has proved not to be lasting, are simply in a state of mourning for what is lost. Mourning, as we know, however painful it may be, comes to a spontaneous end. When it has renounced everything that has been lost, then it has consumed itself, and our libido is once more free (in so far as we are still young and active) to replace the lost objects by fresh ones equally or still more precious. It is to be hoped that the same will be true of the losses caused by this war. When once the mourning is over, it will be found that our high opinion of the riches of civilization has lost nothing from our discovery of their fragility. We shall build up again all that war has destroyed, and perhaps on firmer ground and more lastingly than before.
Vicki,
good this is pointed out, I remember spelling your name with an i in the end until someone told me I should spell it with a y..
now it seems I was right to start with..
M.
Guru,
did you e ever ask your dad why he gave you those books or would you consider doing so?
where those books your mom’s by any chance?
M
Hi Margaret:
No, none of the materials were mom’s. They were what my dad thought mom would give me if she were around. It never occurred to me to ask dad why he gave me the books. I thought it was strange for him because he never was big on money or finance at all. More like physics and engineering.
That’s the danger of not knowing something. How can I possibly know what to ask him when there’s nothing there to guide the questions to begin with? (ie. “not knowing that you don’t know….a really deep black hole there”)
Yes, Margaret, I had made a point about the spelling a long time ago, then gave up, but wondered why you had it wrong. I’m glad that’s fixed.
When I was 10 yrs. old, my teacher spelled it wrong, insisting on “Victoria” as a “christian” name, and refused to listen, and refused to honor my birth certificate, so my father had to take off work for a meeting with the nun, to angrily tell her what my name is, before she would accept it. At least my dad got that right!
UG, What I’m hearing sounds somewhat like what I experienced. There were few conversations about my mother as I was growing up and even as an adult. I have a lack of information about my mother and can’t say I knew her as a person. What I recover through therapy are negative things, for the most part, I’m afraid. Phil
Well, sorry Phil. I don’t know what to say here, bud. Just know that death will nail us all in the end anyway regardless of credentials or criminality.
UG, You didn’t need to say anything, I was just looking to compare histories. In my family, my father never really recovered aftermy mother got sick and passed away. I would say he was a depressed person and that certainly had aneffect on me. He never was energized to get things going for himself after that. Phil
Date: Wed, 3 Sep 2014 23:48:46 +0000 To: phiban@msn.com
UG, it really sounds like you desperately needed and could have used more COMMUNICATION from your dad, in so many ways and on so many levels. But from things you’ve said, he was too lost in his grief about your mom, to be there for you much, or for that matter, for himself. Sounds like it was terrible depression for him, and then you too, I’m betting.
Patrick, you make it clear that you believe there’s something wrong with PT, for “seemingly not helping” the homeless guy, the Croatian guy, and yourself, as you still want us to “look at PT and possibly figure out WHY that might be the case,” instead of looking at WHY you might be delusional. You just evaded really hearing what I said to you, again, and dismissed it all as “loose logic”.
I don’t believe your “simple question” is really just that, I don’t think that you are the least bit interested in me, but are really just hoping I will give you something you can use to attack me, like a stick to hit me with. But the simple answer to your question is, “Yes”.
And Patrick, yesterday Gretchen said some really clear and useful things to you, ending with, “…what is it you felt should be done when all offers of help are refused? Maybe you are just wrong. I tend to think that might be difficult for you to come to terms with.” And you insisted you could not answer because of “some serious issues” of your own and a “glitchy computer”, and “This is way too much for me to take on right now”. But early today, you had no problem writing to me, and then you wrote another comment about Hyde Park Corner’s speakers, imagining yourself holding up a sign saying “SAVE PRIMAL THERAPY FROM THESE MEN” with pictures of Art & Barry. Did the “glitches” and your “serious issues” clear up suddenly, but you still need to ignore Gretchen’s question and comments? It seems you can’t even be honest with yourself or us, about being unwilling to face things.
Vicki – you are paying a little too close attention to me I think. Also kind of implying I am ‘lying’ all of what I said was happening to me I don’t know why you need to cast doubt on it. As for what Gretchen said I may or may not address it…………..it’s up to me and nobody can make me I will do as feels right to me. In general it seems to me you get ‘strenght’ from the seeming agreement of others, like if you have the majority you are right, in my opinion you could hardly be more wrong if you believe that…………………………………
Patrick, just to be clearer, I do think you are either lying (to yourself and us), or delusional, but I am not sure which, or maybe both. Of course no one can “make you” do anything, just as no one could make the homeless guy or the Croatian guy do what was suggested by the PI, others, or you. And no one could make the few who killed themselves, want to stay alive.
Recently, I have been clearer in saying what I want to say, in responding to your comments, regardless of whether others agree. I admit that the support of others feels good, especially when you have been really mean to me — but it always occurs to me that their support does not “prove” anything. If I did not already feel I was right, I could not have said what I did. You place too much importance on thinking I “need the strength of others agreement” to say what I feel. Since several people have made quite similar comments to you on the blog, more than once, I wonder if you perceive them all like some “gang of bullies” as from your childhood. The way you block out almost everything that’s really said, reminds me of that.
Daniel,
thanks for that very nice extract from Freud’s writings. very nice to read, M
Patrick,
it is very true you have not answered any of the straight questions we asked you, and which all adressed important aspects of the messages you keep giving us.
maybe you are tired or jetlagged or whatever, but your last replies to Vicki seem to have dropped down to kind of a meaningless level, for example mentioning ‘little’ similarities you see with Scientology etc.
if you just keep ignoring the very real feedback you have gotten so far, very soon you might put yourself in a position where it would seem wiser to just ignore most of your postings, as it seems impossible and pointless to try to communicate.
if you feel like dismissing what I say, first please reread the comments that were adressed to you during the last weeks with their questions, and your replies, or the absence of your replies.
it is a shame as you can do so much better imo.
M
There’s an irony in Primal people insisting that Patrick should be an adult about things.
I think it’s time we relinquish our unconscious fantasy that Patrick should relinquish his own unconscious fantasy.
There is another IRONY here … that you Daniel ASSUME that “Primal people have an “unconscious fantasy” about what is going on with Patrick.
All any of us have is a ‘perception’ of Patrick through his written comments, ideas, notions, and if we go back into the not too distant past … his (Patrick’s) “rants”
Lest you are unaware of it, Patrick entered this blog site, ranting and raving … about me.
Jack
Well, Jack, you surprised Patrick by costing him anywhere from $50K-$300K in lost income over five years with one swift decision. I’m sure a lot of people would have been ranting and raving about that.
Correction:- It was Patrick’s ranting and raving that cost him, all the benefits that he hoped for,.from the new owners of his business.
Jack’s decision came AFTER Patrick ‘blew his top’.
Go figure
Jack
And it seems you will NEVER forget it or ‘get over it’. A find example lol of a guy who ‘resolves’ things LOL who knows anytime anyone of us are talking we are talking about ourselves etc………….but can NEVER seem to apply any of it to yourself. Is there SOME kind of ‘statute of limitations’ on this I guess not the vindictideness and relentless resentments go on and on and on……………once again a very poor indication of what ‘primal therapy’ at least as presently practiced ‘achieves’ seems to be more or less nothing………….an 80 year old man seemingly consumed by childish and silly resentments……………that NEVER ends………….
I don’t have the slightest intentions of forgetting it. The more you keep bringing it all up and refusing, as you deemed, to “ignore’ me … the more I’m apt to use that word that is used frequently on Facebook “POKE”. You are so easy to poke. Seemingly your friend is also in the game of bringing it all up, I assume, for your benefit.
I’m tempted to suggest it’s all ‘back firing’.
Jack.
This friend: Are you referring to THE Ultimate Guru? (myself)?
i feel so worried and concerned about my mother, she deteriorates fast, her short term memory failing and at the same time she seems to be getting paranoid of the neighbours stealing her water and even loggging in on her cable tv or computer.
then she unplugs the wires and can’t make things function again when she wants to watch tv in the evening, but also denies having touched anything. she seems to really have forgotten or maybe admitting it is too scary.
we are not sure what to do, she really does not want to go to a home, as it reminds her of the institution in which she grew up.
she also seems to be functioning so well on many levels still, that it would seem so utterly cruel to force her to go there, where they would then probably have to keep her locked in to keep her there..
my brother considers going over there to sleep there one night a week, but I fear it won’t be enough in a near future..
we might try to put her tv back from digital tv to ordinary cable tv so she can’t mess it up so easily anymore, hopefully..
we go there on saturday and will see what we can come up with..
not an easy situation not in the least for my mom herself, as she sounds more and more beaten and scared.
i hope this post will not immediately be washed over with more pointless pickering this blog seems to be so full off lately.
it would be nice to get some supportive feedback or to hear how other people cope with situations like the one we have with our mother here..
M
Margaret, I understand how distressing this is for you and your brother.
My father became paranoid at times, then while I was out of town he became delusional in the same way and had a psychotic episode and was taken to a “mental institution” where I found him when I returned. It was really shocking.
I would hate the same thing to happen to your mum, though i get that you or your brother are around. Although you feel it would be cruel to put her in a home, or other institution, it sounds as if it has come to that point. I had to make that decision, and I felt awful too, but I had to put those fears and guilt on the back burner.
Long story short, it was such a relief that he was in good hands, had 24 hour care, appropriate medication, and he suddenly found he liked constant companionship! (he tended to isolate himself).
It was still very hard for me to experience his not being “my usual Dad” during this time, but he really settled down in the nursing home, and eventually I had good affectionate connection with him right to the end of his life.
Jo
just called my mom.
she feels distressed. her spare car key is misssing and althugh my brother also has a spare set she wants to have two sets in order to feel safe.
at some point she confessed she seemed to remember having buried it somewhere in a box, in order to be able to get back in if she’d loose her keys.
when I pointed out that might ‘make sense’ for the key of the door, she hesitated and said it was about the car key nevertheless..
I managed to keep our talk very gentle and calm, and was able to mention the option of future staying at a home, and one moment she was very defensive, and ‘no way’, and other moments she said stuff like as a child being at a home was not all bad as she was taken good care of really..
in any case even if she would want it finding a place in a home would not be easy, they are all full and very expensive.
but I don’t see her agreeing to it soon..
I checked on the option to change her television from digital to analogue again to at least solve one problem of her always switching off the connecting device because the lights are still on, and then later on umplugging the cables of the tv set in her attempts to fix it.
this has happened about ten times so far, and she keeps promising not to touch the connections again…
have also contacted the health care to check for different options of assistance, but none of them seem ideal really..
it is very sad, and worrying..
the good thing in all of this is that even though I was extremely tense upon going to bed yesterday evening, wnting to deal with the situatin of taking care as well as possible of our mom did give me that bit of motivation to not take a relaxing painkiller.
that is very good as it helps me to feel at least I am in control of myself to deal with this as best I can, without needing to feel guilty or bad about myself.
it does interfere with my ability to concentrate on studying but that is the way it is and will also have to deal with that as best I can..
feel sad and worried..
M
Hi Margaret, my mom’s been gone 3 years now but I’m remembering some of the things we went thru with her dementia. I think it was about a year I was in constant attention to her when we lived together; doing the cooking, laundry, etc. She could dress herself and eat okay if the food was creamy–she liked the taste better. She really liked playing with the tv buttons and raising the mini-blinds ten times a day. She would swear my brother was on tv and would worry about the stories as if they were true. I reassured her they were just actors. My brother really helped me too. He was always able to come by and calm her down. It was difficult to see a once no-nonsense personality lost in another world. We would have good times too; we sang every day, though neither of us could carry a tune. She would even tear out a ditty at the doctor’s office–the doc would give a little smile. She always insisted on wearing her black satin PJ’s to appointments. Her doc warned us to start looking for a place well ahead of time, as he used to work with a nursing facility and knew what to expect. She did have paranoia and confusion. Once when my brother came over she told him someone was stealing her clothes–but it was just that I hung up the wash on the clothesline and she recognized her things as not being where they should be. I didn’t want to give her up, but it came to a point where she needed more help. She was having more delusions. It was difficult to take her there (the home), but we were in daily communication and the staff really cared about her. I hope you can get the help you need. Just know a lot of people are going thru this same thing. My best, Sylvia
Jo,
my brother and me are more or less around but not very nearby.
I live at about 20 minutes driving but can’t just go there and help her out anymore, and my brother lives more than an hour driving away and has a very busy job.
but today I did start contacting social care institutions and inquired about the options and formalities.
I also called in the help of my half sister, and will go check out some of the places and see if we can put my mom on a waiting list somewhere, which really matters as even then it remains very difficult to get a place there, as the waiting lists are very very long..
some people have to wait 8 years, while on a list, so if you aren’t even on the list forget it..
if a person gets hospitalized chancces get a litte better, but then they might put you in a psychiatric ward for months first, and that is really horrible for a person that is still reasonably well.
so we will start working on different levels to prepare as well as possible.
I fear my mom’s consent will be necessary to get her on a list and that promises to become a struggle.
we will try to find the best way possible to ressure her and convince her to inscribe herself maybe with the help of her boyfriend..
what you told me about your dad sounds so painful, specially when you retruned home that time from out of town.
good to hear all ended relatively well, that is also what I hope for with our mum..
long way ahead still though I am afraid..
xx Margaret
thank you so much Jo, I am finally able to cry.
thanks for sharing your story here with me, it really helps.
Margaret
cried hard..
amazingly enough almost immediately turned into toddler and then tiny baby wailing..
just a physical kind of distress wailing, seems to tell me I must have felt something was not right from a very early start.
this reminds me of something I thought reading recent comments.
the value of this therapy lies not in seeking to be ‘cured’ in my opinion, as that is a word without proper meaning, but in being able to let the healing process take place.
that simply feels so very right the results afterwards are almost secondary.
if any comparison could be made I would compare it to broken branches of a living tree being properly put togehter again in the right way to restart growing together and then to continue growing on and expanding.
the broken spot will always remain visible but at least the opportunity to grow and even blossom is reestablished.
M
Now I see what Larry and Guru are talking about – as I responded to your last post Margaret and it printed way back up there!
Leslie,
thanks for your kind words.
and getting the comments by automatic mail seems to save a tremendous amount of searching and potentially ‘missing out on’ some comments..
all those pearls that get so lost even the swine would not find them anymore, smiley!
M
my halfsister told me today about how when I was in the hospital with my meningitis, back in ’97 when I lost my eyesight, they were told by the doctors I might not make it much longer.
it is amazing how they all remained suportive and pleasant, not bothering me with their fear and grief.
specially my mum, making the long drive to visit me and stay with me all day every single day of those three months.
today I helped her through the phone to retrieve her cellphone by keeping calling it while we were on the landline, until she finally found it in her hiking backpack.
as I noticed she seemed more accessible I actually ended up mentioning the usefullness of putting her name on a waiting list to be sure later on to make a chance to eventually get a place in a nursing home.
to my pleasant surprise she was kind of cooperative, even suggesting herself she might inscribe herself on several lists at a time.
she also mentioned back in the institute as a child they actually took good care of her.
of course she also insisted on the fact she does not yet want to go there, but it seems a shift into the right direction she starts allowing the idea bit by bit.
it is hard to see or hear her so vulnerable, but it might be the right way towards real communication hopefully.
I count on the probability of her shifting back to her more rebellious and stubborn side, but it is good to hear she occasionally gets more cooperative.
feel worn out.
sent my statistics teacher some question and he replied in a very useful way, but it is scary to know how much more there is I need to learn..
specially as his time is so limited as his schedule is more than full.
will just try to keep working bit by bit, giving my energy to what is most of priority at a given moment.
today it was finding ways to help our mum and at the same time ourselves.
thanks, Fiona, Jo and Leslie for the support which was so very welcome.
M
Thanks Sylvia.
sounds like a difficult stage to go through for so many people.
so sad that after a often difficult life people still need to go through such a case of actually having to lose their capacities and freedom.
feel pretty depressed this morning.
will go visit our mum this afternoon, me and my brother.
sigh..
M
Margaret,
You’ve taken an important first step, and I’m glad you felt supported by me and others.
Jo
ahhh, to hell with it. WordPress has a serious blog bug problem.
Maybe there should be more maternal orphanages in warm, tropical climates to stabilize the clients and to symbolically fulfill missing emotional “mommy” warmth on a continuous basis?
such a coincidence..
now that my mother finally let go of the idea of taking a dog, when we were there and my brother went out to his car to get something, a cute small dog ran up to him and started following him around.
it is a busy street and noone was there to keep it from being run over, so my brother brought him in.
first we planned to call animal rescue to hand him over and let them search for the owner, but then gradually as we all grew fond of it, it was wearing no collar, and it was saturday we went to buy dog food, and a bit later also a collar and a chain..
I stayed home with the dog while my brother and mom went out to the stores, and it jumped up on the couch besides me and snuggled up for a nap with his head on my lap.
we helped our mom to get familiar with the leash etc., and hope it will work out fine.
of course if she finds a sign in the supermarket someone searches a dog she will hand it over again, but in the meantime well, it did and does seem to cheer her up, which for us right now is a priority..
to be continued for sure..
M
UG, being around friendly fun loving supportive people helps me to get through the winter.
sequel dog story..
early this morning dog ok on bed but mom bit distressed as she could not find the leash etc.
on second call she was more ok, leash turned up but she still thinks she might decide not to keep him as it takes a lot of energy.
told her to enjoy the company while it is there and to take her time to decide, and that we would take care of things..
it is a very sweet dog, energetic and funny and affectionate, and he loves to snuggle up so I hope my mom will simply enjoy it on this moment instead of worrying about what might happen etc.
have to try to focus on my own life as this takes up too much of my energy as well..
good thing is still the idea of writing herself in on a waiting list for a nursing home still is acceptable to her, to my great relief.
might of course change somewhat on the moment of going there and signing up, but that is for later.
Guru, don’t worry, smiley, very kind of you to feel concerned of how I might feel.
I can relate very much to what you write about temperatures, warm summer always makes me feel much more safe, in general..
Tom where are you, are you travelling again?
M and cat
got hold of mom in the evening,it now.
managed to try some statistics trials after solving a few computer problems today, but mostly relaxed and rested…
M
just called mom, she has called the police to come and fetch the doggy, as it gets too hard for her to cope with it all.
she says she worries about what will happen to it if she’d get ill, but I think it is more a matter of her losing the collar and leash etc. and then going out with the dog and it almost running away etc.
I said to her it was ok if that is how she feels, and now they will certainly check the implanted chip all dogs have here, and bring it back to its original owner..
I texted my brother and his reaction was ‘that’s a shame’
it struck me then it is sad indeed, as it was such a cute dog, has not barked or yapped once, just wagged its tail all the time and played and snuggled up with anyone.
it could have cheered my mom’s life up. but if it indeed puts too much stress on her..
she just called, in tears that she does not want to give it away again..
but when I reassured her they will bring it back to its owner she felt relieved again..
I will keep calling her from time to time until the police has come by..
she is so impulsive, in the morning when things get too much she decides one thing, and a bit later regrets..
but under these circumstances it is probably the best decision anyway, sad as it remains..
sigh..
M
Tom, I look forward to hearing more about your trip!
M
so strangely quiet on the blog?
am busy finding out about nursing homes and their ‘prospect’ lists and waiting lists.
it seems important too to go check them out as some of them are awful and others relatively cosy..
then their situation in regard to where we live is also important, so we will try to make some selection before bringing the choice of a real waiting list with the start-up of a personal file needs to be made by my mother..
in the meantime I am trying out statistics exercises and how to unravel the at first sight, and on second and third sight misterious result outputs of the software.
glimpses of light are dawning here and there, and more questions rising.
but the good news is I managed to get some time, a few hours in occtober and a few hours in november, one on one with my statistics teacher when he is in town.
these hours tend to be worth months of home study, so that is good news, and will help me tackle more exercises to prepare.
I feel tired but am glad to have canceled singing class, and have not renewed my painkiller prescription so am going without having them in my home for a little while already.
feels good, except on the moments tension in my neck and shoulders keeps me awake…
but it is one big concern off my plate, and the certainty I give it al l my best shot..
one step at a time..
best girlfriend is getting a partial knee prothese today, tried in vain yesterday afternoon to find her a proper gift in town, only could buy a nice card in the end..
a young girl that was my weekly assistant for a few months for an hour or two, to do some administration and like yesterday to go in town, stopped as her own study restarts now.
at saying goodbye she started crying saying she will miss me, which was so unexpectedly sweet..
now a new one for two months and then my former one agin, who was on leave for half a year..
feels like I have some tough times ahead somehow, good to form a team with my brother and half sister when possible..
M
my brother had asked me to give our mom a call today, so I did and for a while she talked about how difficult it is to deal with forgetting and how she keeps searching for stuff.
but then she started talking about the neighbours again and how she does not trust them and the water etc. etc. and I repeatedly explained her things were ok.
but she kept insisting they had been wrong at some point and stealing her water, and I kept explaining that had not been the case, until I started to lose my patience..
it is so difficult to not do that, as the only option seems to give in and go along with her paranoid memory, and somehow that is very hard or impossible to do for me at this point.
maybe because I’d feel I stimulate the paranoia or maybe because iI’d feel like I give myself away and let her control me
anyway we could end the conversation more or less in peace, but she must have felt some of the tension as five minutes later she called again, saying she had one more question about the water, but I should not get angry..
of course she asked the same question as she did fifty times bed
fore, in an attempt to provve her point.
I don’t remember how, but I managed to keep it short this time, and tell her she should not even ask herself that question anymore as things were completely ok.
she immediately responded then that that was fine then, that that was al she needed to know.
I actually think she was trying to make peace and dissolve the bad feeling, as she also said ‘you have a lot of trouble with your mom don’t you?’
I said that was ok, no problem etc.
two minutes later she called again to ask me if it was right drinking tab water was ok, and I said yes it was.
again it seemed her way to restore the friendliness…
it is hard for me to make myself call her regularly to check on her when chances are so big she makes me lose my patience to some degree.
it is a very unpleasant mixture of irritation and pain and sadness and tension that triggers in me, not to forget fear..
i guess I also can relate to how scary it must be for her to be like that by herself, and to struggle frantically to cope and keep up the appearance of functioning well as much as possible..
sad and scary and exhausting..
Margaret, that is very sad with your mom losing her mental coherence. But I think at some point, instead of becoming more desperate to convince her, or angry, you might be humorous about it, telling her, “Fine, you want to believe that crazy thing, go ahead, I am not going to argue with you anymore about it, but you’re being silly, and you don’t realize it.” And just let it go. Have you perhaps tried something like that already? It does sound hard, and painfully disturbing, to know you can’t count on her to be the mom you knew in the past.
My mother had a little of that happening, near the very end. One time, it was funny because she had convinced herself that the bank had taken her photo for her ID card through her telephone, since her ID card picture showed her in a house-dress that she believed she never had worn anywhere outside her home. She seemed to feel her dignity was affronted by the idea that she could have embarrassed herself by wearing “that dress” in public, to the bank. So my brother and I had a heck of a time convincing her that the phone-photo was not possible — not only because the old landline telephone has no camera, and there’s no way to take a picture through the wire — but also because no one would allow a bank to take someone’s photo with no warning inside their home, where they might not have clothes on. It was hard, but we repeated the logic, and she thought it through a few times, and finally agreed. Your mom sounds more vulnerable, in terms of her fears overwhelming her fading ability to remember the reality of conversations.
Vicki,
thanks for your story, it sounds very familiar..
I have tried a variation on your approach, but I think the hard thing is my mom tends to pull the guilt trip card in the end, agreeing in a tone of voice which shows she does not agree, and also saying ‘well, if you don’t believe me then that’s it..’ in a very victimlike tone of voice.
as it is never clear when she really hurts or subconsciously or more consciously manipulates, it is hard to just let that happen without reacting.
I usually start to tell her then it is her not believing me, and that I would prefer not having to start lying to her..
it becomes such a long struggle far too often, and I hate it.
I often try to keep it from happening by saying stuff like let’s not get into this again, things are fine, but my mom is extremely stubborn and tenacious and knows how to play us, or me..
i specially hate it when I get angry and start raising my voice to her, all in an attempt to reach her and in fact protect her.
it is so painful but I will have to learn ways to deal with it, maybe by trying to simply change the subject as soon as possible in any way I can think of..
writing about this I start feeling how sad this makes me and how much it hurts, triggers a deep kind of loneliness.
feel like crying now.
am busy calling and ‘netting’ around looking for cosy nursing homes where we can put our mom on the waiting list, today found a few options, that seem interesting, which is encouraging.
one has really nice pictures on their website, so mom can look at them and it is possible to fill in a form by mail, so that seems accessible as it is in the village she prefers, close to her boyfriend.
all for later, just the waiting list, but very important in case of emergency!
did a lot of household chores and a bit of studying, now feel kind of empty and tired, but still no painkiller in the house!
nerves a bit on edge but otherwise ok..
M
Sept. 11th is posting on Aug.25th !!
I can’t find a recent post of yours Leslie, but fortunately it’s sent to my email so I saw it there. Your comment in essence that you miss my presence on the blog hit me unexpectedly. It opened a dark, empty, musty cavern devoid of childhood feelings of being missed, and I was touched by what you said, thank you.
I think though that when I write here less, we see you here more, and I want to hear more of how you are doing, so….
I do want to write how things are and I expect to have time for it in the next few days. Being part of this blog helps my life move along. Been busy in my personal life and at work. Worked from 7 am to 11 pm yesterday, a 16 hour day, harvesting far away research plots. It is tiring work but I enjoy it. One more long work day next week and then return to normal work hours.
Leslie,
yes, that is what I told my mom too, when she said ‘you don’t replant an old tree’, that many people once they made the step regret they have not done it sooner, and that she is on her own too much and would probably love the company.
she seemed to kind of get that, I thin often feeling miseable lately slowly makes the idea of a home more acceptable.
she is in a hiking club and goes out with them and her boyfriend every sunday, but her other girlfriends have drifted away mostly.
M
what I write and how this is not just some ‘simple’ feeling one can resolve and be done with, but a painful situation which triggers a complex web of current and tangled up old feelings of pain, does seem to affect you Jack for reasons of your own in mu opinion.
as if there being a good health care system solves it all.
you seem to ignore the fact there are the fears of my mother needing to be dealt with and the problems her diminishing capacities cause in the present, while she is not at all ready to go to a nursing home.
it is simply good for me to talk about it here, and if that bothers you in any way youd better look inside to find the reason why.
maybe you felt adressed by what I said about meaningless pickering, there suddenly was a tremendous silence on the blog afterwards except of us chicks, which seems to indicate more than one person felt addressed.
if that is the case it is a case of whom the shoe fits.
if it is just you caring about me and my feelings and my study, I find that hard to believe, and tend to think there is something else, but that is only up to you to find out.
your comment feels just a bit more like a criticism than like meant to be caring or encouraging.
and don’t change my words again to that what I want is just lovy dovy, I am merely giving you the feedback of my perception..
can I please get the time to work through my feelings here, these are not small issues, not for me nor for ny mom but I write here for me.
M
will go visit a girlfriend in the hospital with a new knee today.
my brother can’t come this weekend to go to our mom.
after almost a week without even having a painkiller in the drawer here, I notice what wears me out is the continuous backgound feeling of loneliness, fear, hopelessness, and there being no relief.
if I look back on this week, it seems like there have been no really nice moments, or if they were they were fleeting, like moments with my cat or the satisfaction of having studied for a while.
also having found some possibilities for future nursing homes was satisfactory, but right now it feels like there is nothing that can make me feel good in my life.
a feeling, to some extend, but also in reality too much loneliness.
i remember a big feeling I got into in barry[s group after he asked me how long it had been since somebody touched me, and he made me lay down and someone sit against me and put his arm on me.
pure and loud pain pouring out instantly..
it is a misconception this or any therapy can give short term miracle cures for any painful situation or feeling, it can only help to endure it better and to function nevertheless and to process it as well as possible, with varying results.
so Jack, your comment did irritate me and also hurt to some degree I guess, and pissed me off a bit probably as well.
it sounds so judgmental to me.
but in fact, if anyone gets bothered by what I write, even while there is nothing else at all on the blog, I think it is not about me but about them.
only it does make me feel more lonely.
it seems women are the ones who can relate best here so far on this topic.
of course there are lots of feelings involved for me, but it is by writing I try to explore them, as there is hardly anyone around I can really talk to most of the time.
so all I can say, Jack, if you have nothing constructive to say fuck off, or if you genuinely care, ok then, and don’t worry, I still study, only mentioned it is much harder while other painful stuff goes on.
M
in the bathtub had another early wailing feeling that can best be described with terms as ‘utter aloneness’ and ‘unsafety’.
now off to cook lunch.
M
Margaret: I have read both your responses addressed to me twice, and will respond more fully a little later, after giving your responses to me more thought. For now I will accept that it hurt you … that was not my intent.
This after all is a blog and re-actions to others, I feel, is valid.
Jack
Margaret: I have not only given your responses to me, a great deal of thought, but also talked about it with Jim. His feeling is that I should give the blog up completely. However, that is not what I will do as I keep repeating; I love blogging. Maybe there is some sickness within me that encourages this desire, but so far, I have not gotten to it.
But, there is something I have felt for a long time about children having to take care of parents in old age, and I have seen many, particularly daughters that seem to take on this burden. I say burden since that is how I perceive it. I am aware that in the larger context of the nuclear family this may seem more natural and I saw much of this whilst living in Ibiza Spain. Maybe it’s a cultural thing that I have not been privy to.
I do know that my own mother stated many time that she did not want any of her children to take care of her in old age. But then she did have a husband up until her death. My youngest sister, who lived close to my father after my mothers death, did visit him often. She did his washing as she had a machine and he was in a sort of hospice with a room of his own, kitchen, bathroom and bed. From what I gathered this arrangement was not a bother for either of them.
So after a great deal of thought I just know that I would NEVER have wanted to take care of an aging parent. If that is selfish; so-be-it. Since I will not ever have children, then all I can rely upon is that Jim and I will be compatible and take care of one another (each in our different ways), until one or the other of us dies. I don’t relish that moment for either of us, either way. Since I don’t see this in the animal kingdom, I have a tendency to feel/think that the practice is not fully natural.
As for giving thought(s) to much that goes on with me … I do it almost daily. I know, and have stated and written that there is the good, the bad and the down right ugly of me. Knowing all three of these things has been very useful to me in my life, and my relationships with neighbors, friends and lovers and even casual acquaintances. Maybe I am just lucky.
Hopefully this might give some idea of why I responded the way I did to you Margaret. You do seem to be in perpetual difficulties. I would like to hope that things were better for you … having known you.
Jack
Jack,
ok, it is your intention that matters most to me, then it is ok, no harm done, M
Great Margaret: That is fine with me too. I was also pleased that you felt you could express your feelings towards me. I rarely, these days, get upset by others expressing their feelings … knowing that the feelings belongs to themselves. However, I also appreciate feed back to know how others react to me.
Take care and good luck Margaret.
Jack.
Phil,
thanks for your reply.
yes, it does trigger a lot of stuff, and it is quite a challenge to function on both levels, acknowledging the feeeling that goes on and not acting it out.
sometimes I allow myself to express some of it, in some discussion with my mom, but usually it only makes her shut down and become defensive and is not constructive.
I am becoming better at finding the right dosis so to say to remain true to myself while remaining kind to her. which does not mean I always agree or give in, on the contrary.
the most painful part is when she gets frightened and distresed and insecure, that is heartbreaking so it seems normal to make a lot of effort to try and give her kind of a safe environment as much as possible.
have been 8 days without any painkillers around now.
in my dreans I often lose important stuff like cane or backpack, and then people I am with disappear, and I can’t follow them or can’t hear them when they shout where they are going and disappear.
lots of dreams of getting lost, and one dream of being viciously attacked with a knife..
one or two dreams with some hilarious laughter though as well..
i feel afraid my social life seems to be diminishing still but I also find myself having a very hard time to make the extra effort to go out to dancing or yoga, it all seems too much effort for too little reward, and too scary..
will have to accept this for the time being and not be too hard on myself, as I already am facing a lot of challenges, no pills, statistics which is becoming truely serious now and very very complicated, another course, about cognition for which I decided to summarize the whole textbook in order to get it ‘under control’, and then the taking care of and dealing with our mom..
her boyfriend seems to be disappearing more and more out of the picture when it comes to practical help, she sometimes only sees him once a week.
so momentarily I think my social life will have to be brought back to the occasional meeting with girlfriends,.
I can’t do it all at once, but I do feel being alone so much of the time tends to be depressing occasionally.
summing it all up here though does make me feel I am not doing all that bad in the situation I am in.
the visual and hearing impairment and the streets that seem more and more full of renovation works, noisy, chaoticc and scary, scare me more than they used to as well.
on bad moments I feel older than I am and with nothing to look forward to, but on other moments I do feel strong and ok about myself, and luckily those feelings seem to still be just a timy bit stronger than the negative ones, smiley..
M
I don’t really seem to be that depressed, after cleaning the house, doing two loads of laundry, solving some problem with mom not finding her cellphone and informing her boyfriend about some stuff he could help with, and getting some very useful feedback to some questions about statistics to my teacher, feel actually kind of ok..
incresing complexity of statistics is scary but also challenging, I should not put any time pressure on myself but go with the flow and concentrate on the other course as well..
off to do the shopping soon.
this might not interest most readers, sorry, smiley, just making up the accounts here for myself..
some people are very silent lately..
M
Tuesday will be our last long day of field work. We’ll start the day at 7 am and either stay overnight in a motel near the site of our research plots and return home on Wednesday morning, or return home very late Tuesday night. I feel a growing need to write here, but might not have time to until next week.
This past Friday I watched the movie Walking With the Enemy, and I thought of you Tom, and your recent trip to your old friends in Hungary. What a horrible, shattering experience people had who lived at the time in the countries at the heart of World War II, especially people who were targeted to be rounded up and sent to concentration camps. Canadians are so very lucky to have never experienced war in our homeland, and to never have had to live in fear of being over run and slaughtered by our neighbour, the US.
Could someone even TRY to fix this freaking thing……………
Larry – maybe not but not so lucky if you are an Arab country ahd have the bad luck to have a lot of oil………………..Syria, Iraq, Libya, are not so lucky………….they not only have “fear of being over run and slaughtered by our neighbour, the US.”………….they not only have the fear they ARE being run over and slaughtered again and again and again……………..also how many ‘holocaust’ movies are there…………..every year there are about 5 or 6 MORE……………..ok we get the message bad things happened to certain people……………but wny not focus on the holcausts and yes genocide that is happening NOW to the the Palestinians………….a full on holocaust and genocide and ongoing…….but you can’t have eyes for that………………..only for what ‘happened’ 70 years ago…………………we KNOW what is happening now……………..but it seems in a way to be a primal style talk forever and ever about the past…………….but be thorougly deaf and blind to what is in front of our eyes right now………………
Reply
Could someone please fix this thing……….or it like the PI where we can ONLY ‘express our feelings’ nothing will actually even be DONE about it. The way it certainly was and IMO still mostly is…………………
I’ve just woken from a dream, which really was a big feeling about being separated from my mum.
I was raving then crying and that’s how I woke. I cried some more,
This is the second time in a few days this has happened. ( I didn’t remember in my session earlier Gretch)
The packing of my flat contents, and uncertainty of the move are without doubt a trigger of my going to boarding school.
I’m connection to the deeper emotions of that time, finally.
Leslie, after I’d cried, I checked my phone and saw your post. It encouraged me to write here.
I think that’s good, Jo.
Not anonymous, me.
Victoria: You might want to explain the sidebar instructions again at the bottom of the comments stream since your original post on the matter is stuck deep in the middle of the comments. I would do it myself for you, but you should have the credit for coming up with that smart Band-Aid fix.
Sometimes when life is going well and you’re breaking out to new challenges, that’s when big feelings (therapy) happens.
Sept 16 11:15 pm was to Leslie.
Seems like ever since you’ve been on the blog, Patrick, you want everyone to see life the way you see it, think the way you think, believe what you believe, and look at what you think it important to look at. You seem to think you are the only one who sees the way.
Show how you’ve got your life sorted out, share some life lessons you’ve learned and benefit from, if you want people to consider buying into your view of things. Why would anyone give their time to someone who rants and raves on his own pet topics and has no respect for other persons’ thoughts or opinions, who won’t even enter a dialogue to dissect and explore points of view, who is blinded to only his own point of view and shuts out any other way of looking at things!
Oh Larry grow up for fuck’s sake. You mewl on about some ‘holocaust’ movie you have seen and my honest opinion is I am so tired of this kind of crap. Weak nostalgic/melancholic attitudes and reflected in the primal way of being. Always natter on about ‘history’ and ignore what is in front of your face. We are bombing the crap out of these countries and I am not supposed to have an opinioon?? Excuse me very much Pastor Larry I DO………….I effing do!. Is that bad?? Am I meant to be an infantilized apolitical ‘primal weakeling’ according to Gospel of Janov and Pasor Larry. I am tired of your tearful self righteousness and you have all lthe other ‘weakelings’ on your side. I am not impressed you can get hundreds of them for all I care.
One other thing and I might as well get it out now. About a week ago Gretchen said she was aware of only THREE suicides at the PI. I held back saying anything but I might as well say it…………..Gretchen is a total freaking LIAR. Yes LIAR!! I know of FIVE personally and i was around only a year or two in the early ’80’s How come I know 5 from like a year then and she only knows THREE for like the whole period. It almost makes me want to get a lawyer and despose these freaking LIARS make them come clean for once. The PI miust know some good lawyers even to be ‘in business’ given their record. They have a shameful record of failure on almost every level…………..yet the pretense continues. Why am I even still here?? Count me as one who ‘believed’ in Janov’s notions but the reality is sad indeed. I used to think I was a failure now I see ‘failure’ is built into the system…………..failure is even inevitable given the mistaken notion it is based on and the practice which is horrible…………..it is only supreme ‘delusional’ artists like Jack that can ‘see’ it as a sucess……………..
Have a good life Patrick.
You too Larry. Keep going to ‘holocaust’ movies and keep refusing to see it is that very propoganda that allows continued holocausts everyday to occur now. Keep thinking it is all in the past, keep blind to the present and future. Keep you melancholic nostalgic self righteousness going, keep being miserable, keep thinking you have something to ‘get’ from the PI, keep your illusions, be happy.
Patrick, Why do you continue to hang out here? Primal is about personal history. Not world history and politics which are all debatable and not really relevant here. If you feel that strongly about the Palestinians maybe you should get directly involved where you can make a difference. Phil
Patrick you are the only one with true insight but it is propaganda and not prop-O-ganda.
M
Patrick, I wonder if it would be as easy to make those accusations to Gretchen in person, face to face. For me forums don’t do much therapeutically. It is too easy to say a bunch of stuff I wouldn’t say in person. To say it in a detached way. Phil
Phil – I think now I would/could. When someone mis-represents ‘facts’ to such a degree I ask myself what else in being mis-represented (lied about). To me PT had huge ‘promise’ and terrible delivery and all of this is reflected in the reality of the situation now. A dying movement, virtually the only new people entering it are children of the original people in it. Is there a better definition of a dying movement.
Me maybe I’m crazy but I still believe there is a kernal of a good idea in it, there is something very impressive about Janov’s key insight but it has been bolloxed up so badly, all we have now is palliative care and a kind of raking off of the existing patients. I have tried to interest Dr Kruse in it he does not seem interested, it has also got a very ‘bad reputation’ Janov ‘science’ is basically rubbish \and not respected. But one day who knows but I don’t believe it will be advanced particularly by the PI. To me that is more of a problem than a possible solution.
Patrick,
I still feel all this ranting about PT dying and the exact number of suicides that happened over thirty years ago is just a smoke screen for your own fear of experiencing real closeness and the grieving it might involve.
if you continue on htis path you risk ending up as a very bitter unsatisfied person.
if you still see value in the primal theory what keeps you from really engaging in it for your own sake, which I think you have not really done so far, you mostly kept up your defenses and the anount of your hostility does indicate your despair.
if it would all be that useless why spend so much energy in cursing it?
are you such a coward Patrick?
M
It’s a minor point, but you’re gonna be wrong again, Patrick. One of the “5 suicides” you mentioned, I remember you once said was a guy who had been at the PI, and then went to Art’s Training Center, and then killed himself. Like you, I thought he had too, but upon researching him later, I found out that actually he had started using drugs again, and he overdosed. It was not a suicide, although very sad. So your “personally known” list of 5 is now down to 4 — although you have never really described in detail that list of 5 people you say you knew “personally”, assuming you really remember who they all were, and are not just misremembering the numbers after over 30 yrs.
I’m glad Jo. I knew you were there 🙂
I’m wishing you the courage to continue – for the release and relief that we both know does come…
ox L.
I appreciate your support, Vicki, Leslie, Larry, Margaret…..thank you. ☺️
I’m glad you did, Jo.
Margaret: There is something a wee bit way off in your relationship with your mother and the pletherora of comments on the blog relating to it. I can understand ones concern for a parent who is not fuctioning very well, but to the best of my knowledge The Netherlands, Belgian and the Scandinavion countries have some of the best care facilities for geriatrics.
It seems that for you at least you are suffering a great amount of frustration and seemingly not resolving it. I learned form my therapy that to love someone dearly, is to love them just the way they are. Trying to change them seems like a forlorn task and is doomed to failure. I gather that your mother has a boy-friend and ostensibly they should be able to help one another. Maybe not, but I don’t see you going about helping her is doing anything for either you or her. Maybe it requires a differnt approach.
I also am aware just how helpful it is to express ones frustration, hurts, sadnesses and angers on the blog, but this too seems to go on endelessly. I am saying all this just to let you know how this affects me, since I know you reasonably well from the retreats and the blog and would love to see you able to get beyond it and put most of your efforts into your studies. I would wish you well whatever direction you take Margaret.
Jack
Margaret, I think you are pretty much ‘spot on’ here. And in your next comment, too — when I read Patrick’s, I wondered whether he tried to expose the two guys to Dr. Kruse, as it might have helped them, had they been at all willing. But from your comment, I guess they were not able to hear that, either. The “homeless shelter” guy, I remember well — he was utterly unwilling to make any effort on his own behalf, and couldn’t “get” what an emergency it really was for him, that he “needed to do something”, he just kept saying he couldn’t do anything — and her refused to try, over and over. I also remember times when he was manipulative, not asking or giving people a choice of whether they gave him something, but rather demanding what he wanted. So I was surprised so many people were willing to support him so much, for so long.
I think a person can only be “saved”, to the extent that they have not already given up on themselves. The more they have already given up on themselves, on each level and aspect, then the less anyone else can help them. I felt this about myself, before I ever applied for therapy — I didn’t think the Institute would want to help me, if I didn’t manage to show myself that I could do something I needed to do for myself, and start to make changes.
The last time I gave blood, after the nurse hooked me up then went on to others in the room, as I lay there waiting for the bag to fill I grew queasy imagining that she might forget to return in time, and the bag will overfill and my life would spill out of me onto the floor while I shrivelled into an empty husk.
Larry: That almost sounds like you’re trying to express a metaphor for your life after Noreen.
That was responding to Larry’s 8/31 post 5:50am
UG, the last time I gave blood was many years ago, well before there was any inkling of Noreen’s looming health crisis.
Larry: Regardless of the chronology, I sensed a common thread between that blood donor visit and your post-Noreen life….(eg. “afraid the nurse will leave and forget, letting my blood bag overfill and I become an empty husk”….)….There’s just a resonance there to me…
Maybe I am wrong about that.
I am trying to let this panic attack wear off without meds, so I am not at full attention at the moment.
Do you have any inking what brought on the panic attack UG?
I’m posting this a second time, hopefully this time at the bottom of the page.
Patrick, why are you returning to the US? You seem to not have anything to tie you down there.
Larry: The panic is pretty much over right now, but I am exhausted (the anxiety feedback loop exhausted as well) and I have a hard day ahead of me that I need to rest for.
Smoked too much pot and read too much into Art’s works when I was younger. The panic attacks are exactly the same as when I used to get high a lot: Feverishly pace about the room, over and over again…fear of dying of a brain aneurysm.
Today’s attack was much more transitory since I am clean, but being under the influence of marijuana would force this panic onto me for hours rather than 15-30 minutes today.
Despite the horrific panic that high THC/low CBD pot would bring, I would occasionally have brilliant creative breakthroughs as well. I suspect it altered my own psychological research pathways towards Janov’s books during a pre-Internet age with little help from others, but those days are long past.
50 panic attack highs with 1-2 brilliant realizations sprinkled within the set was my going rate. Lots of rocks mining for insights with only occasional flecks of gold…
It’s funny I talked about the smell of blood here the other day. When I was high I would briefly imagine I could smell blood in my nostril and I would think, “Oh, God, that’s it!!! The brain aneurysm has popped and the blood is trickling down my nose.” I would then ponder Janov’s jungle animal atheism and what it meant as to how I will die alone with a popped brain and no one will ever care at all. I would run to bed in a dark room squirming in fear to let the nightmare of these thoughts wear off….and the anxiety feedback loop finally exhausts itself to a very peaceful sleep for me.
That’s a pretty heavy, mean monkey to have to carry around. An unfair burden.
Good grief, posts don’t appear where I expect them to. Posted again, this time written I hope with more clarity to compensate for information missing from intended but absent relational positioning of the comment:
UG, that touches me as a pretty heavy, mean monkey you’re cursed with to have to carry around. An unfair burden.
Larry: I had to grow up in a much less affluent and culturally sophisticated school district since my mother wasn’t around ($30K/year household income school district instead of $70K/year). I doubt I would have done all this silly marijuana nonsense had I grown up with mother around and been in the preppy school district I was genetically intended for, etc.
It’s the stuff that $75 million wrongful death suits are made of, yep yep!
Yeah UG, I can easily imagine how your life would have been entirely different had that crash not happened, and I can readily appreciate how you’re unfairly afflicted because of it.
Thanks Larry, but I was just making conversation. It’s nice to know someone at least understands what I am talking about.
The occasional panic attacks while clean seem to be a legacy of the old pot smoking days for me. A bit like LSD flashbacks, so to speak.
Just shaking my head in disgust at it. Back to the difficulties of life without Quantitative Easing and eye-popping lawsuits now (ie. Monopoly money). Bye.
Starting life all over some where else isn’t easy to do UG, and I’m not convinced the effort would succeed or be worth it. A far better move to put my energy towards I think is to make more friends and find a lady love.
We have a local football team, the Saskatchewan Rough Riders, that plays in the Canadian Football League. Many Americans who don’t make the cut in the NFL come to Canada and have stellar careers in the CFL. When their sports carreer is over, rather than going back home to the southern states. some ex-Rough Riders choose to settle and become part of the community here. Life here has something to offer that they don’t find back home in the south. Even my dentist, a gregarious happy man who is from California and is of retirement age, prefers life here and has no inclination to all out retire or move.
Maybe I’ll answer differently in mid-January when I’ll have a perspective from the other side of the sun, when the world is a monochrome, silent, wind blown block of ice and snow, and doubts creep in that maybe this time the rules will change and summer won’t return.
The crux is, I didn’t so much mind winter, I kind of embraced it, when Noreen was with me.
Patrick, I don’t think there is much I can say that will be useful as I always know there is a problem when the response I get back is basically everything you said about me is true about you. I don’t know where to go from there. I think Daniels statistics are helpful and I can throw in a few of my own as best I can remember them. Over the 40 odd years I am only aware of 3 patients that either tried or did take their lives. As you said one is too many but as we know the greatest predictor of suicide is previous attempts. In the last 35 years there has been nothing of that nature that I know of. Does that mean we are better therapists now? I like to think so but I think the truth is that we became more careful in who we accepted. It may also interest you to know that 45 percent of patients that attempt suicide are in therapy of some kind and I believe 80 percent are seeing their primary physician. The bottom line is you can’t save everyone though you can certainly try. I may have a different view of this issue than others have because of having grown up around suicide. Not only my father but my Grandfather and my Uncle not to mention numerous family friends. I will say I understand it in a way that some might not. I will also add that you will find suicidal people in any organization that see thousands of people over a period of years. That is where the suicidal people are. That would include UCLA Neuropsychiatric or the Veterans Administration. Any place where you are dealing with depression. I was reading your responses to myself and others today and what I started to wonder is whether you really did not know what question Jo was referring to. Were you unaware that you did not answer my one question which was ” why did you say 20?” . Similarly your apparent confusion over why we brought up your comments about the man you dropped at the homeless shelter without money or friends or hope or why we mentioned your comments about the ” trenches” ? I have to say after giving it some thought that I don’t think you are confused at all. I believe those comments were meant to elicit specific reactions. You now respond with a confused ” well I did drop him at the homeless shelter!”. But you said that as a way of illustrating a lack of caring on our part. In fact that is exactly what you said. But here is where I become confused … You then say you knew that we had done all the things I mentioned but that caring just was not enough ( I should say we did more than just ” care” from afar). So my question is if you knew all that why mention it at all? Or maybe you could have mentioned it while adding all that had been done for this person. Frankly if you felt so badly about it you could have chosen to take him elsewhere. Many in the community did just that until it proved counter productive. That being said It feels to me that you wanted to paint a picture ( and this has occurred on several occasions) and the picture could only be seen as negative. You have a point to make and from your perspective these are the ways you can prove that point. Much like the way you described these suicidal people with as much shock value as possible. Much like the way you threw out the number 20 without concern for accuracy . The truth is you really know little about these people and I think if you did you might be surprised. For instance do you know which one of those people received a terminal cancer diagnosis a few days before deciding on suicide? I think you don’t . Also and hopefully for the last time. Yes, whenever there was a major issue at the Institute we had a meeting – not a group but a meeting. As for my comments about the people who called themselves ” Screamers” . When you first mentioned them you said they were accused of kidnapping ( and the kidnapping charge was on more than one occasion – they were also accused of brainwashing by the way). So why are you baffled that I then said they were in fact dangerous? Anyway enough said for now. Gretchen
Gretchen, you wrote: “Over the 40 odd years I am only aware of 3 patients that either tried or did take their lives. As you said one is too many but as we know the greatest predictor of suicide is previous attempts. In the last 35 years there has been nothing of that nature that I know of.”
But 35 years ago is when I started therapy, and I knew 2 of the people after that: a friend of mine who saved up her meds and then took them all, I went to her funeral. And then the guy who left the PI and went to the Training Center, and then killed himself — I remember another patient talking about him, as they were friends. And I heard of at least 1 more (but I think there were 2) from my best friend at the time he was there, after I left. Then there was the “shy girl” Patrick knew, so that would be four. Leslie said she knew of 2 people between 1982-87, when she was there, but I don’t know if they are the same people I mentioned, or not. So that looks like 4 or more, I’m not sure, but none in about the past 25 years. So I can only think you have forgotten the timing of the years.
Otherwise, I liked what you wrote, found it thought-provoking, and that continues, thanks.
(A change of subject)
With my Title: “And The Show Goes On…” (meaning like Mr. Toad’s ‘Wild Car Ride’)
Yesterday at group, feelings were triggered as I listened to someone, when he took time for himself for the 3rd time. I just went to another room and pounded the wall, feeling how insane with pain his talk makes me, as I said, “You’re selfish! You’re just so selfish! You’re so self-absorbed!”, “You don’t care about anybody else, you don’t! You’re lying!” “It just makes me fucking nuts! I can’t stand it!” “I am so angry!” “It just makes me crazy!” “I feel like my head will explode!”. Years ago, when I complained about him relentlessly (until I was forbidden to), I sometimes said I felt like what he was doing made me feel like someone was just “pounding on my head”, like I was being hit in the head. Yesterday, after howling & crying in the pain for awhile, I felt again, like somehow I was being “whacked in the head” on my left side. When I first thought I was done feeling about it, and I tried to leave the room, I started crying again, realizing I was still afraid, that I felt too vulnerable to have to hear his voice again. So I spent more time crying and recovering from that. Finally I again felt “done” for the day, and when I came back to the group room, I felt less “charged up”, and was not reacting quite the same to his voice. I was still a little fearful, but it wasn’t really bothering me.
“Being ‘whacked in the head’ on my left side” has been a part of my feelings many times over the years, with many different triggers.
For example, I had a feeling awhile back, that left me with the idea that when I was an infant, I got hit for peeing, maybe when my grandmother was changing my diaper. I don’t actually remember it, it’s just that’s the kind of thing I could easily imagine her doing. I never had that thought before I had been crying one day about being hurt when little, by her and my mother, and the thought suddenly came to me. What I do remember is that when I was 5, I had to share a bed with her, and she would kick me awake at night, when she angrily said I had kicked her in my sleep. I remember how mean she was at other times, too.
Another time in group years ago, I was freaked out, in some extreme fear, and as I looked across the room to where the therapists were, I suddenly realized that I was almost hallucinating that Gretchen would get up and come over and just “clock me”, angrily backhand me across the head, on my left side. In my feelings I was almost expecting it. Later I told her about it, and she looked horrified as she asked me about it.
This morning, as I was getting into my car to go to work, I got frustrated when my bags got stuck on my back, the straps mixed, and one hooked on the other. I was suddenly yelling about it, that “no matter what I try”, “I can’t do it”, “it’s never going to be right”, and I started driving, but was crying. I suddenly saw my mom’s face, and it clicked-in, and I remembered that I had a dream, it must have been last night, where Gretchen came to my house, and met my mom for real, she was sitting across the table from her, I can still see it. In the dream, I remember thinking it “was great I had that movie”, so Gretchen could see with her own eyes, how my mom was as she talked, the deadness in her face (and my mom died 5 yrs. ago).
But then, in the car, I was back to seeing my mom’s face, and was crying, talking to her, and telling her, “You didn’t care about me. You didn’t!” “You damaged me, so I can’t make my way in the world. You did contrbute to that.” “You just didn’t care, you really didn’t.” as I felt it.
I have been kind of awash in all that today, up to my eyeballs. It has been harder to just function at work, than “normally”. I am sure, of course, there is a lot more waiting for me.
Wow, your pain sure impinged upon your reality Vicki. I’m impressed how you function well and stayed a good human being.
Thanks, Larry. Yeah, sometimes reality gets lost — like the time I dreamt someone was having a baby, when they were really just getting married, but I unknowingly went out and bought them baby shower gifts, which I mentioned to someone, and they clued me in to my embarrassing mistake, and I suddenly realized I had dreamed it.
My original therapist, Patty, told me back then something like, “You must have had to put a heavy lid on everything, very early.” At that time, I could only talk about things, but couldn’t shed a tear, except alone. And after I opened up, I started becoming more and more disfunctional, until one year I had 11 auto accidents (all minor, luckily). An extremely rough time followed, with all my weight gain, until I finally returned to therapy years later, after starting to lose weight, and having a lot of feelings come out.
Done Daniel but no worry I do get what you were trying to say! G.
I get the feeling I have REALLY annoyed Gretchen so…………..I better be careful though she has in the past re-assured me I would ‘never’ be barred but never say never I might be able to annoy her enough there is always a first………..
I take Guru’ s point that bringing up old things like this seems quite useless and I suppose it is. I am not sure why I even go there but it is connected with kind of ‘life review’ I do and am kind of plagued by where I ‘review’ the past and wish it was different. Or ‘regret’ decisions I took or directions things took. This is deep deep in me, regret about the past, it goes down to regret in such a deep way, I wish things had happened differently (tears), such a deep feeling of regret thought that is only a word a label that points to a feeling of things they way they were were ‘wrong’ I think I will die with that feeling, whatever twists and turns I made myself to avoid it or get over it or make it different just ended up ‘re-playing’ it.
‘Primal’ was my biggest effort to make it come out different…………..I have talked here before about the struggle to get there, how ‘serious’ I was about it, how ‘messianic’ I felt, how I might even bring it back to Ireland and ‘help’ help the people there but most of all help myself with the people there. Make it all come out ‘different’, re-make life re-do life but this time ‘properly’ (tears)………but I was dealing with ‘moving targets’ life was not just a drama from my own past that needed to be re-written.
Jack is onto something because he knows me better or longer than most people here the sequence is not quite correct but no matter, it is connected to starting the moving business. He sees it like I started that so had no time for therapy which is true in a way but what it neglects is I started it out of ‘despair’ I had already several years before ‘despaired’ about the PI for the reasons I have been talking about. Then I seriously wanted to go back to Ireland and do a medical degree but for reasons too long to go into now did not or felt I could not. That was another big ‘defeat’ so now it’s like I have 2 major ‘defeats’ I start the business out of ‘despair’ have to do something the 2 things near and dear to me have ‘failed’ either I have failed them or them me, no matter failure all around so I start and weirdly enough become a ‘success’ but only in the eyes of the world or at that only of some people in the world. The kind of people (in my mind) who don’t understand, I am a ‘success’ in the eyes of people I don’t respect so to speak the people who really ‘know’ know I am a failure a failure in the true sense.
So I am haunted by these kinds of things but like I said ‘primal’ was my biggest effort to make things come out differently and they………..didn’t and this being a primal forum well that’s what comes out of me. Yesterday at the beach I had this deep connection……………that what sustains me and nourishes me also ‘hurts’ me and hurts me a lot but it also sustains me and I ‘love’ it. Like Ireland itself which I am leaving in a few days it starts to hurt so bad. And it’s connected to all this kind of thing like I KNOW how beautiful the culture and people are, how incredible is the old ways going back and back with the old music and language but it was ALSO what hurt me the most. When I went to school at around 4 and a half years old it started almost immediately……….the bullying and hurting…………the very thing that I ‘know’ in my bones is so good is also hurting me.
I have had very ‘ambiguous’ feelings about really everything as a result, what’s good is bad, what’s bad is good, what loves me hurts me etc etc. I even thought of the way you see ‘criminals’ with ‘love’ and ‘hate’ branded on their fingers,……….they are probably feeling that. And I became an ‘intellectual’ to resolve and understand all this stuff but it is not ‘understandable’
And I suppose to try to make sense of this ‘primal people’ I have almost ‘decided’ will in the end too hurt me, as alluring as they are or as good as they seem they will hurt me and have in my mind at least, they will even hurt me the most because I ‘open’ to them a bit.
I have been crying almost the whole time while writing this so it may not make a lot of sense…………
I’m maybe the “wrong person” to say, Patrick, but what you have written does make a lot of sense.
Well hey Patrick, I have a ton of regrets too….
In 2000 I bought a lottery ticket and I had the numbers 4-5-18-27-28-29
5 out of 6 numbers were drawn and I won $596. (Actual numbers: 3-4-5-18-27-28)
If I had had the “3” instead of “29” I would have won $4.5 million in one lump sum after taxes.
Guru, Well, if you keep trying, maybe you’ll hit the big one. Phil
Makes sense to me.
Patrick,
what you wrote in that last comment seems of major importance in all of this.
you seem to be on the right track here, M
This thing about what or who loves me the most also hurts me the most…………my last Sunday at Mass here and I was thinking (again) of my First Communion and what ‘undid’ me the most was something someone SO close to me my own Mom, so close it might have been me (myself) at that age in life there is not much of a ‘separation’ from her so it felt in a way almost it came from inside me came from myself………………and I could see how that set’s up ‘self hatred’ the ‘revolution’ came from within, the civil war was already starting to happen. People say civil wars are the worst and in personal terms that’s true too, a civil war there is no escape from because it is happening at HOME. My ‘argument’ with primal is also a kind of civil war (maybe not so civil in terms of being polite)
Speaking of ‘civil war’ I always thought this was “Guns and Roses” one of their best and kind of unknown songs. And I have a lot of concerns about wars and how we are drifting towards another big one……………………….with Russia and they protrayed as the ‘aggressor’ but in reality it is us. Guru I wonder if you can indentify that little snippet of ‘dialogue’ at the beginning of this…………..
Patrick: Nope, I couldn’t hear what he was saying very well (I assume you weren’t referring to the lyrical beginning of the song itself.)
Guru – it’s from “Cool Hand Luke” ‘what we have here is a failure to communicate’ which I suppose is a place where most ‘wars’ start from.
Patrick, more beneficial IMO is that you stay with your personal hurt if you can.
I agree with this that in the end what is important is the personal hurt. Isn’t that why we all went to therapy? But about suicides, people seeking primal are usually wanting major change and a little desperate I think. In my case, quite desperate. Others choose a milder therapy. I would have considered something increasing my chance of suicide (an option I gave a lot of consideration) if it offered transformation. If it didn’t work, it still would have been worth a try. I would think that people who “failed” in the therapy didn’t get the transformation they wanted but probably have a little more of their feelings I would hope. “Therapy” maybe begins at the Institute or some other clinic, but doesn’t end there. It is really a personal journey not just therapy at the Institute. For someone with terminal cancer it could seem OK and appropriate for them to commit suicide. For others, they must be in the middle of an extremely bad feeling, and then “acting out”, I would think. We all are responsible for ourselves and the decisions we make for whatever reason, and in the end there’s no one else to blame. That’s what I think. Phil
Phil writes:
We all are responsible for ourselves and the decisions we make for whatever reason, and in the end there’s no one else to blame.
And what about the banks and huge re-insurers like AIG that wanted a multi-trillion dollar bailout from the federal government in 2008-2009?
UG, Those organizations were at that time expressing deep parental needs, which were fulfilled. If only that would have happened for us as well. Phil
Our opinions go on a serious divergence here, Phil. I will respectfully decline to disclose all the reasons why.
Patrick, I am not annoyed with you and it never occurred to me to ban you or anyone else. I won’t say you don’t push the boundaries a bit and yes, on occasion I have the sense you could use a little ” tough love” but once I say what I need to say it is over for me. I thought what you wrote was very important for you. Gretch
I am about to decide to take a year’s break from singing class and performances.
I received new chapters of statistics and noticed I will have to give it my best investments of energy and dedcation, as it is complicated and we will have to do a lot of work to sort out the software hassles and hopefully at some point start preparing a case study to do or to try to do an exam…
that in combination with another difficult course about the biological basis of cognitions and the increasing problems me and my brother have to deal with with our mom who is getting older at a fast rate, seems like enough on my plate for this coming year.
i will miss the singing class and the singing and the performing, but I already noticed last year it became a struggle to combine it all, and now the courses get more complicated, specially this first statistics class gets in a crucial case, so…
dealing at best with our mom losing more of her memory with the resulting practical and emotional problems drains a lot of energy as well, so I think it is a good decision I will probably have to make one of these days about the singing..
can and will restart next year, that should be no problem, and maybe I will also have some more energy left to go dancing again from time to time..
nobody seemed to share my enthusiasm about a possible primal kind of web, or maybe I just need to be patient and let things take their course.
thing is I am also curious, smiley, like to know what options are existent etc.
will have to work on my own business in the first place and try to not put my nose where it does not belong.
still I really think my idea has some potential..
M
Margaret, Sorry it has taken me a while to answer your questions about training . I really needed to think about it as I think the whole thing can be a bit complicated. In California to practice therapy you have to have a degree in Psychology and then put in a certain number of Internship hours plus pass the licensing exam. Similar to the process of becoming a doctor or a lawyer. I think different states and countries will have slightly different criteria. You know we often focus on the Institutes standards for training but there is also the need of the trainee. I have trained and supervised many people and most of them felt the need for quite a bit of direction as they learn how to do this therapy. I felt that as well. The point is I don’t believe there is a quick way to train people even though some may be very good therapists in there own right. I mean if you drop me off at the Jung Institute and put me in a room with a patient I’m likely to do Primal as I know little about Jung beyond some theory. It takes time and then there are other issues as well. I do think to do this therapy you have to have felt your own feelings. I don’t think what school you went to is so important but I do think the ability to read people and to trust your instincts is very important. That, and an ability to deal with the feelings that will inevitably be triggered as you work with those exploring their own pain. The last thing is very tricky as it is difficult to explain – it’s intangible . There have been other venues for Primal as we know. For instance I flew to New York many times to supervise that Institute. Now this is strictly my opinion but I think in all groups and businesses there is a unspoken something that makes them work or not. That does not mean they don’t do business or function at some level but you can often feel there is something missing in the ” vibe” of the place. Ultimately I think it has something to do with the configuration of people involved. I think Barry and I have worked well together because we are so different and bring different things to the table- that and the fact that we are able to say what we think to each other . It may also have something to do with an understanding of what is important in a particular situation. For instance I think we have had a pretty good grasp on how to approach our retreats. I believe you can feel the energy of that experience from beginning to end. I also know that there are some who have tried to mimic that experience without success. This applies to most group experiences as well. You can have a brilliant therapist in charge, they can do all the right things and still something does not gel. So my point is there is more than training involved and though it can be done it will be a huge job. I don’t worry too much about the future of Primal. I think it will absolutely continue because it is effective. I tend to think the right people will step up when we are all gone. Possibly it won’t even be a therapist who pulls it all together when that time comes. It will just be the right person to do it. Gretchen
Gretchen – sorry to be flippant but it sounds a little bit like the ‘secret sauce’ in Coca Cola or the Colonel’s ‘secret gravy’ in his chickens. I guess I was looking for something a bit more ‘scientific’ As for ‘business’ I know of quite a few where the ‘vibe’ is a bit off IMO but they seem to continue year after year. It seems many of them are based on the vibe BEING off. Small and big ones……………..I wonder how the ‘vibe’ is at Goldman Sacks for example and that ‘works’ pretty well at least for them.
Also Gretchen and I hope this is not too much dragging up a dead issue………..this thing about me dropping the guy off at the homeless shelter. I feel you DISTRACT from the issue with all this business about what I said, what I meant, what I could have done, what you have done, whether I said/implied a lack of ‘caring’ on your part………….to me this is ALL irrelevant, irrelevant to the FACT that this was his ‘end’ or his ‘progress’. I am not asking anyone to even ‘care’ but I am asking you to WONDER and question WHY, why does this kind of thing happen and not for the first time………………this may be hard to understand but I believe you have a duty to try to try to ‘understand’ and not pass it off in ‘distracted’ issues……………….
Patrick, Well as I recall Goldman Sachs settled their recent fraud lawsuit for 550 million so maybe not the best example. Also why would you come to me for science? That’s not at all my style is it? Maybe that’s the ultimate struggle … Trying to turn one thing into another. You know there are other things to appreciate about me 🙂 ! I did say there are many business’s that function just fine even with that sense of being slightly off. But for our purposes I am simply saying there are many relevant issues to explore in becoming a therapist or running an Instittue – training is just one part of the equation . Gretchen
A pile of $550 million in $100 bills is generally considered charcoal flame starter material for employee summer barbecues at Goldman nowadays thanks to the Federal Reserve’s QE programs.
LOL!!
Patrick, Distraction never occurred to me for a minute. I really don’t think like that . I believe I asked you to dig into the reason you mentioned this person and the way you mentioned this person for reasons specific to you. Obviously it is your choice. There are a million and one reasons why people fail and why people succeed in this or any other program. I’m not sure with neurosis being what it is if there is any one thing that could help a hundred percent of any population despite varying levels of motivation or illness. Therapy is hard work as you know. I think however we could cut to the chase if instead you answer the question. What is it you believe kept this person from succeeding ? You clearly have something specific in mind so what is it? G.
Well since you ask though I ‘lived’ with him there I did not get to know him so well. Though I did a bit at the end and I felt he was a good person, a nice guy you might say, I liked him as much as I got to know of him.
I felt he was depleted of energy, flabby and out of energy. To gain some (quick) energy eat a lot of ice cream and things like that, I felt his problem had become ‘physical’ any ‘mental heath’ stuff would be missing the mark. He needed help starting from where he WAS not not where somewhere someone might want him to be. I felt he needed major Dr Kruse type interventions to help him physically above all to start with without that I could not see much hope for him. And I still see it like that.
And that’s what I mean when I complain about the ‘mental health ghetto’ it’s often not getting it, it is not precise enough, good enough for rock and roll maybe ok but not when someone life is at steak. I think the PI have has a ‘close enough’ kind of attitude for a long time and it is not good enough. I knew another guy recently who came from Croatia with a host of physical problems and Barry told him he had a ‘plan’ for him……………..he went home no plan that anyone could see…………
Patrick is apparently aware of so much … from so little.
Jack
Patrick, I agree with you one hundred percent and that is exactly what Barry and I suggested. Those issues had to be dealt with first and would have gone a long way toward taking care of himself. That in turn would have paved the way to other feelings. He declined that suggestion. As for the other person you mentioned I just think you have a bad habit of listening to half a story and building conclusions. I try to avoid that myself as it has gotten me into a mess or two in the past. G.
Gretchen,
thank you very much for your long reply.
they sure make it hard in California, I did not know about that last exam for the license..
imagine having done everything and then that license commission does not let you pass..
I think over here it is enough to do all the stuff up to that license exam which is not needed, if ever I’d make it and would want to practice, which I don’t see ahppening, but just theoretically, with the degree of a Dutch university I would be allowed to practice in the Netherlands and Belgium as far as I know, but not for any official belgiian government institute as my Dutch diploma is not regarded entirely at the same level than the Dutch, despite that last one being up to most international standards.
It is nice to hear you feel confident, that is what matters as I know your instincts are very sharp, and I should know, smiley..
Margaret
she just called me to let me know there was a nice documentry about animals on one of the tv channels.
in a way a gesture to make up, nice, but still there is so much fear and despair right under the surface of everything, so much pain.
all we can do is to make the best of things and to be kind to each other..
The Laugh Factory in Hollywood hired a psychologist 3-1/2 yrs. ago, after the owner became alarmed by the number of premature deaths in the comic world.
“This psychologist helps comedians keep laughing” By Christopher Goffard
http://www.latimes.com/local/great-reads/la-me-c1-comic-psychologist-20140825-story.html#page=1
The long hot days of summer are over. My eager, conscientious summer students, who helped lift the load and ease the stress of a very busy field season, are gone, on to the start of their school semester and the rest of their lives. As autumn approaches and the sun and warmth retreat I still have more outdoor work to get done, over the next few weeks, before the snows blow in and the world freezes solid. As I brace myself against the oncoming cold and dark, against the solitude of my life, I feel nostalgia for the warm easy days of summer, and for the golden days when Noreen was mine. This tune I discovered yesterday captures the feeling for me. I want to share it, and posting it here helps me let the feeling wash over me.
Patrick:
I had a laugh out of your comment about Barry having a plan for that Croatian guy. You realize that could mean anything, right?
I think it was Barry’s sense of humor in action, but maybe I am wrong…
I didn’t see anything that was vaguely laughable about Patrick comment that you replied to. It sounded somewhat sad to me … but then I was not aware of the guy, or his problems.
Jack
Guru – I honestly have no idea, this only happened last year and he was a friend of a friend but I got to him fairly well and he had a host of (physical) problems. Some were stemming from the war there he was brutalized and kind of tortured I suppose you could call it that. But he had ongoing physical pain that would never let up. I even drove him to some ‘quacky’ type of place in San Diego who were pushing some kind of electrical stimulation device that needed to be rubbed on his body for long periods. He tried that with seemingly little or no effect.
He had been to many ‘legitimate’ and ‘quacky’ kinds of places even to Russia and so on, so the guy was it’s fair to say a very difficult case. But Barry did tell him at one point he had a ‘plan’ for him but he hung around for a few weeks no trace of any plan that the guy could tell. Certainly no serious plan was ever mentioned or devised and the guy just upped and left in I would say total despair. It’s not fair to ‘blame’ Barry for this I suppose or certainly for any of the guy’s problems but once again the way I see it (excuse me Jack) it’s only what my own two ‘stupid’ eyes see is not impressive. A lack of seriousness, a lack of curiosity also like WHAT was going on………………the ‘plan’ seemed to be to lump him into ‘group’ like everyone else and ‘treat’ him like everyone else……………..a kind of ‘one size fits all’ approach that I am quite familiar with (from what I saw for myself with my own ‘stupid’ eyes or at least so Jack tells me (that they are ‘stupid’)
It just occurs to me now there were those two car trips one with the guy to the homeless shelter and one to San Diego with the Croatian guy……………and you know the way on a car trip you have kind of time to ‘think’ and it’s like (my thoughts) things have not changed THAT much here, if you actually ARE in serious trouble better have some resources of your own. There is not ‘much’ help here, no ‘help’ much at all. And coming as we pretty much all do from backgrounds of ‘no help’ this is way like too much of a repeat story. Repeat stories are not good for recovery, they cement the problem in place. And in my honest opinion that is what happens at the PI in the vast majority of cases including my own. Are there some ‘lucky geniuses’ like Jack…………….maybe anything is possible but again my ‘stupid’ eyes can’t see it there either…………….
Patrick, Is it you don’t feel helped by the P.I.? I don’t think it would be the place to go and expect to recover from every single problem including medical ones. I’m responding to what you said about the fellow from Croatia but also wondering what it is you expect or expected and didn’t get. Phil
Patrick:
You wrote this one sentence I had to respond to:
“And coming as we pretty much all do from backgrounds of ‘no help’ this is way like too much of a repeat story.”
I’m going to stay out of the Institute arguments, but from personal experience I know (and know of) plenty of people who received much, MUCH, MUCH more help from the outside world than I ever did. I tread carefully when I say this, because I don’t want to get dragged into another explanation today of all the seriously dangerous challenges I was facing.
And Gretchen said this to Patrick:
“As for the other person you mentioned I just think you have a bad habit of listening to half a story and building conclusions. I try to avoid that myself as it has gotten me into a mess or two in the past”
I wish I had never read Art’s books in the years before the news media’s multi-trillion word 9/11 onslaught. “The other half of the story” finally became clear at that point after so many dangerous years of not knowing where to look.
I had a horrible panic attack just writing this out.
Patrick, why are you returning to the US? You seem to not have anything to tie you down there.
Larry – I will go into this later but thanks for asking. One thing though even if I am not in the US you still would have to contend with me ‘here’ LOL!
I don’t concern myself much with having to contend with you, Patrick, anywhere, even if I were to live in the US. Odd that you would suggest that.
I’m just interested in what you plan to do with your life, and am a little worried for you.
Not sure how that group worked out for me. Too conversational maybe. But the f do i know. I got to a bit of a feeling, which I guess is good, about how fun it was smoking dope with friends in my teenage life. And then how that same drug wiped out a lot of my teenage and young adult, and actually adult life. And seeing the face of my murdered friend, who was stabbed to death by a junkie. Anyway, go to walking the dog with the executive officer in the L.A. park. Can’t go to group much anymore since the XO was demoted from her job to no job. But I think that I dont feel as bad as some of the others in that group. My relationship is bad, or at least nonromantic, but it lingers on. I don’t ask for that much. Can I please buy a roll of tape and a tomato plant and some dirt? OK.
I always like your posts, even though I worry about you. Take care of yourself.
You earn it, but you ask whether you can spend it. That doesn’t seem right eman.
Patrick, I am with many of the others on the blog in saying you might be better off discussing your own story. So much of what you say about others is not based in reality or truth. I tend to think you hear the tail end of something and decide it proves your point – frankly you may want to get those eyes checked after all . So this guy from Croatia that you say you knew so well- so how long did you know him? Did he ever do a three weeks and with who? Was he ever in a group and if so how many? When he was interviewed by Barry and Barry offered him a plan for treatment did he find out what that plan might be or as you want to suggest did Barry heartlessly refuse to give it to him ? What brought this guy you knew so well to the states? Therapy?? The other guy you continue to bring up as an example of someone who was not helped … So many have told you this person was offered help way beyond the norm – you can’t hear it despite admitting you knew that info all along . You then say diet would have been useful which apparently more than one person including yourself suggested. So what is it you felt should be done when all offers of help are refused? Maybe you are just wrong. I tend to think that might be difficult for you to come to terms with. Gretchen
Gretchen – I can’t really answer right now I am in London in transit to LA to-morrow and also at a glitchy computer (latest version of Windows a true ‘nightmare’) I am dealing with some serious issues of my own here not good at all so hopefully I will be able to write when I get back later in the week. This is way too much for me to take on right now but at least going by my past record I will bob to the surface hopefully later in the week. Thanks for asking it is just too much right now
Gretchen you kind of bombard me with questions that you probably are in a better position to answer than me. But all of these things I mention I say and go only as far as I know. I am not ‘lying’ as you and some others seem to want to imply. These kinds of things are not very impressive for an organization that has very good press at least by itself and for itself. But to me they are uncomfortable examples ‘inconvenient’ truths if you want to call it that. And again Margaret and Vicki particularly seem to want to always make it as something about me……………….well I am sure there is a ‘feeling’ there but in everyhting there is a ‘feeling’ and if we always did that ‘communication’ would be little indeed. I see that always putting things back on the questioner as ‘sect like’ thinking………………and a refusal to engage with ‘inconvenient truth’……………….as far as all this questioning of me about Barry’s ‘plan’ why doesnt Barry explain he knows what his ‘plan’ was I don’t………….I am only goint by what I heard……………….
As I mentioned before I am in London at the moment and yesterday went down to Hyde Park Corner to see the ‘speakers’. My first thought was Jack would really be at home here promoting you know what, he would fit in fine with the Jesus Christers etc
But then I thought if I was there what would I be doing……………..I saw myself with a BIG picture of Janov and a SMALL picture of Barry and a big slogan saying “SAVE PRIMAL THERAPY FROM THESE MEN”. That’s the kind of absurd situation I find myself in I hope one day to emerge from that very absurd situation but for now that is I am afraid where I am at. I think it important for myself to see where I am even if it IS ‘absurd’
Post Script:- All I feel I know, is that what we currently have AIN’T working … and I contend it couldn’t be worse. BUT then what would an old fart like me know.
Jack.
just for the record Patrick,
if you want to call it taking something personally to stand up for what you agree with and what is unjustly accused and attacked, well, fine.
you bend the truth when you say you did not try to change the diet of those guys, I was there.
you probably quickly gave it up as they were not at all complying, but you kept commenting to me about it.
then another outrageous accusation of yours, noone was ever ‘thrown to the side’ by the PI as far as I know, on the contrary.
that nice ‘homelesss’ guy you keep bringing up as the poor victim did have a lot of pasive agression as well, and actually seemed to aim for being totally looked after without having to do anything himself., I cared about that guy a lot specially knowing his background, but his defense act was hard to get through to make him start doing what he needed to do.
I once offered him a good sum of money to do a tiny bit of grocery shopping with me and he said yes but then left me waiting in vain for three hours.
then he appeared, and was about to go out to go shopping for some junk food for himself alone, and I asked him to at least bring me home a roll of toilet paper which I really needed…
he said ‘no, I don’t feel like doing that’
so you see, the poor victim was not very coooperative in earning his money in the easiest way or not even decent in treating others who tried to help him.
I still care about that guy but hey, here the horse and the water really make so much sense.
you have no basis at all either to say the Yugoslavian guy was simply ‘dumped’ in group without any other means of advice or guiding or plan.
without an intensive that is already exceptional anyway, so well, to get really personal, please stop the bullshit.
in this case Jack’s advice to slow down and reflect on yourself does make sense.
if you really want to face your own monsters the PI offers you a safe place to do so with good feedback and suport of other honest people, there is no script you have to follow, there is only your own truth to face there, but that seems to be very scary for you.
no plan or treatment is waiting there to ‘fail’ you possibly, only the challenge to really look at what you ccarry inside.
i htink if you carry on the way you are doing, you might keep skipping the surface and spiral off into repeated act-outs and desperate attacks forever.
I say all of this because I care, while I know I keep taking the risk of a nasty lash-out.
but by now I have about said all I can say, in the future I will only try to react on facts I see represented in a distorted way.
M
I leaned a new phrase today. It refers to a behaviour we are all guilty of, a little or a lot. It’s important to ourselves to be aware of it. Here is the link to the article in Wikepedia, and below it I pasted a copy of the introduction.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias
Confirmation bias, also called myside bias, is the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one’s preconceptions.[Note 1][1] People display this bias when they gather or remember information selectively, or when they interpret it in a biased way. The effect is stronger for emotionally charged issues and for deeply entrenched beliefs. People also tend to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing position. Biased search, interpretation and memory have been invoked to explain attitude polarization (when a disagreement becomes more extreme even though the different parties are exposed to the same evidence), belief perseverance (when beliefs persist after the evidence for them is shown to be false), the irrational primacy effect (a greater reliance on information encountered early in a series) and illusory correlation (when people falsely perceive an association between two events or situations).
A series of experiments in the 1960s suggested that people are biased toward confirming their existing beliefs. Later work re-interpreted these results as a tendency to test ideas in a one-sided way, focusing on one possibility and ignoring alternatives. In certain situations, this tendency can bias people’s conclusions. Explanations for the observed biases include wishful thinking and the limited human capacity to process information. Another explanation is that people show confirmation bias because they are weighing up the costs of being wrong, rather than investigating in a neutral, scientific way.
Confirmation biases contribute to overconfidence in personal beliefs and can maintain or strengthen beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. Poor decisions due to these biases have been found in political and organizational contexts.[2][Note 2]
Making a brief note: I cried a bit when writing to Daniel that I wanted a quiet spot in the woods by a lake under a clear sky with lots of stars.
Light Pollution Map
Don’t know exactly why I cried about that, but since this is a therapy blog…have at it, I suppose.
(this post was misplaced, trying again)
Making a brief note: I cried a bit when writing to Daniel that I wanted a quiet spot in the woods by a lake under a clear sky with lots of stars.
Light Pollution Map
Don’t know exactly why I cried about that, but since this is a therapy blog…have at it, I suppose.
To all of you planning on abolishing money I have a simple solution – give it all to me.
To all of you planning on abolishing money I have a simple solution – give it all to me.
Well, that didn’t work. It was supposed to post down under.
Jack, ” Moooskittears ” translation Mouseketeers! These were the kids who performed on the Mickey Mouse Club. DVDDoodle99 ( henceforth to be known as 99) ” zany sounding naysayers” too funny! But how did Larry get in the mix?? Gretchen
Jack, ” Moooskittears ” translation Mouseketeers! These were the kids who performed on the Mickey Mouse Club. DVDDoodle99 ( henceforth to be known as 99) ” zany sounding naysayers” too funny! But how did Larry get in the mix?? Gretchen
Gretchen: I see … Muscketears – Mousekatears. It wasn’t until Jim told me that I even got to Muscketears.
“99” will do me for now. I haven’t a clue how Larry go into the mix other than he’s a regular commentator at the moment.
Other than that:- “…….blogging away with a smoothing iron … he stole my heart awayyyyyyyyyy”.
Jack
Daniel: That’s not quite it. I did not know at the time she was into this stuff. I didn’t know what she did for a living until I was about 30 years old, so it would have been impossible for me to study it while I was a teenager for the sake of my consciously trying keeping part of her alive. It’s some strange, wordless, abortive series of studies that ended in my teenage years when peer pressure took hold and I started to do stupid things to be “cool”, “fit in”, etc.
Hi Vicki:
You’re right about the desperate need to communicate at that point, but I also am very protective of my dad here. I really feel like he did his absolute best.
He had an ear tumor operation the same year of mom’s loss and he also had to maintain a position with “secret” level security clearance with the US military at the same time. It was an extremely difficult time for him. I asked him how he pulled through. He said: “If I hadn’t been in my 30’s at the time I wouldn’t have made it,.”
Maybe I will sound defensive here to some people yet I really feel that it unfairly shifts all the burden to my dad when he is required to step up to the plate and cover absolutely everything when I’m seeing all these super-rich people benefit greatly from automotive transportation without any accountability for the dire human costs whatsoever.
A country needing hundreds of millions of 4,000-80,000 pound automobiles/semi-trailers travelling at deadly velocities is a much larger force than a couple of 150-200 pound pipsqueaks needing a special chat.
He did absolutely all he could. I really believe that. I’m only sorry I can’t make his retirement better than it is (even though it is “OK”).
Vicki: I responded to your post a few minutes before Margaret’s, but it was lost up above. Let me know if you can’t find it. Thanks.
Vicki: I incorrectly placed my response to you way up above. I don’t know if this one will do the same. Let me know if you need to find my response, thanks.
dammit…
I’d be remiss if I didn’t say Vicki touches me with her empathy. I can just feel it in her posts during the times she’s reaching her heart out to me (like I felt she did yesterday)
Everything I write to Vicki is doomed to blog oblivion!
LoL, U.G. I finally happened to see all your comments, thanks. Before, I had wondered a little why there weren’t any. I’m thinking of contacting WordPress, to let them know there’s an indexing problem with our comments postings.
Gretchen: Could we please have a new blog page soon? This comment placement mess will continue to grow until there is a fresh start again. I don’t know how to fix it, but it’s definitely some server software bug on WordPress’ part. It only seems to happen after a certain amount of text has been cached onto the page (around several hundred posts).
Daniel,
thanks for that very nice extract from Freud’s writings. very nice to read, M
Vicki – this strikes me as kind of typical ‘primal slam’ (if not slam dunk) kind of ‘thinking’. Make some kind of over the top unsupportable statement (i.e. I am ‘lying and delusional’) and ‘back it up’ or ‘prove’ it by support from something you happen to know about the person. Some personal information about the person’s ‘pain’. Reminds me just a little bit and I do say ‘little’ of Scientology. Proves nothing but is meant to put the person back on their heels.
Well, Patrick, I can tell that you feel “attacked”, no matter what I have said. I am sorry that that’s how you feel, every time.
Joan Rivers the comedian and show host once apologised for an incident concluding in her being taken off air: ‘I’m sorry I fucking swore’……………………..somehow I can relate to that lol
thank you so much Jo, I am finally able to cry.
thanks for sharing your story here with me, it really helps.
Margaret
I am sorry to hear what you have to figure out with/for your mom Margaret – and then her history to further complicate the situation.
I agree and enjoyed your take on therapy. That you can allow yourself to feel what you need to in this situation is the best thing you can do for yourself and in turn your mom.
When I have issues to face I am grateful to truly know or get to know how I am responding. For example, something may happen with my co-workers and I recognize that I feel left out. Definitely, a feeling I could deny or ignore and even stamp out by ‘proving’ my popularity. However, to just acknowledge and stay with that feeling is so different now – almost freeing that it is not a frantic race. I feel human, (and of course being at work will act accordingly), but comforted that I can be with these emotions.
Such a good place to start – to then in time find what may need to be felt and/or done.
That is what Primal Therapy, Gretchen, Barry and Vivian have made possible for me to unearth and explore. I am forever and ever grateful for their expert and loving care, direction and guidance!!
ox L.
Margaret,
You’ve taken an important first step, and glad you felt supported by me and others.
Jo
Margaret: I am very sorry if this seems like I am ignoring what is going on with your mother. I can’t really say much about it right now, but I’m glad Sylvia & Jo are there with you today.
I just wanted to write this to Larry.
Larry: You wrote on August 30th about winter approaching soon. The warm weather seriously took a dip today for me as well (a week later than you).
It’s always a feeling of foreboding & survival anxiety for me here each year when it happens. A week later than you, today is the day I also realized, “The situation is real now and winter’s coming.”
There is a certain comforting warmth to temperatures in the 80’s-low 90’s F throughout the summer, but when the first layer of warmth is stripped away and it starts dipping into the 60’s-low 70’s F that warm reassurance is no longer there.
Like Mother Nature pushing me out of her warm womb and into a starkly cold harshness where I am on my own and no one’s going to comfort me.. Summer pushing into fall has always been my most meaningful seasonal change.
Vicki turned me on to Lennon & Maisy, so Goodbye Summer:
Thanks, U.G. I hadn’t heard that Lennon & Maisie tune before. There’s something about the way they are with each other, that I like — and their harmonies!
Thought this was appropriate for Paleo Diets
http://www.bizarrocomics.com
Does this say it all.
http://www.bizarrocomics.com
Hi Margaret
I am reading the saga of your mum. It isn’t easy to either you or your brother. It is a difficult period to go through, and there is no divine guidance to assist. In my case, as i didn’t have the heart to put my mum into a nursing home, I waited for an “event” to happen. It did. My mum developed multiple urinary tract infections and his doctor had her go into the hospital for treatment. While there, I was called in by the hospital’s social worker and the doctor treating her. After finding out my about my mum’s life, they insisted that she will go into a rehabilitation hospital for up to 7 weeks and while there, they will send out a team of assessors/social worker, nurse, etc, to decide the next step for her. Three weeks into her stay in rehab they came and decided that as there is no one living with her to assist with daily chores, including bathing, cleaning, etc, she is to stay in ” a high care” nursing home.
The decision was the best for her, as she had already advanced dementia.
Why I am going through all this is that I am wondering if this type of social service is available where you live? A team of experienced people would form an informed decision to help you.
On an other note, yes, I’ve been away. I went back to Cluj-Napoca, Romania to participate in the 50th year class reunion in my school. I’ve met people that I haven’t seen in 54 years. I never finished high school there, I finished schooling in Australia. But they were nice enough to invite me.
I am still digesting my short stay in both Budapest, with my school mate, who sat on the same bench next to me, and meeting people at the class reunion in the old school in Cluj, and the subsequent dinner, that went on till the early hours of the morning.
I vacillated whether to go, or not to go, as I only met 4 school mates, on my last trip to Budapest in June, this year. Luckily I went. I was blown away by the warmth and kindness of both male and female class mates. They approached me already knowing who I am, asking about my life, family etc. The majority are retired and are active grandparents. Out of the 85 who graduated, 11 passed away, about 15 were too sick to travel the long distances, 15 couldn’t be fussed and the rest came. A lot of them kept in touch over the years. I was an oddity, as I left while still young. Most people left Romania due to the pressures under the communist system, and being of Hungarian descent, not Romanian, as most people were in Transylvania.
People came from Hungary, Sweden, Austria, Germany, USA, Canada, just to nbame a few exotic places.
Anyway, I’ll close now, as I am getting tired. Will write more about my experiences later.
Tom
I’ve never heard of something like this before.
A woman has reached the age of 24 without anyone realising she was missing a large part of her brain. The discovery was made when the woman was admitted to a hospital in Shandong Province, China, complaining of dizziness and nausea. She told doctors she’d had problems walking steadily for most of her life, and her mother reported that she hadn’t walked until she was 7 and that her speech only became intelligible at the age of 6.
Doctors did a CAT scan and immediately identified the source of the problem – her entire cerebellum was missing. The space where it should be was empty of tissue. Instead it was filled with cerebrospinal fluid, which cushions the brain and provides defence against disease.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22329861.900-woman-of-24-found-to-have-no-cerebellum-in-her-brain.html#.VBHwoqMXO4s
I know a few people who have been so against living in a home and then once there for their safety etc. have been so pleased. Realizing how isolated and lonely they have been compared to the easy and accessibility of socializing has made all the difference for them. Of course, there are homes and there are homes, and there are caregivers and then there are horrors…
Hopefully, when my time comes it will feel like a retreat! And I always loved summer camp. Not that I loved everyone nor everything – but always found special people and times.
A beautifully written book is by Margaret Laurence and called Stone Angel. Funny and sad and all about a woman who does not want to go into a home. I just re-read it over the summer and highly recommend it!
Does your mom get together with any groups of people Margaret? I know there is you, your brother and the boyfriend, but that is not enough day in and out. Sometimes there are walking groups etc. to have her out and feeling involved. ??
ox L.
How weird is that! My last post was sent way, way up there and there too was a post from Tom – with great info, and another very intriguing one from Vicki.
Now where are you Larry? Hopefully, so busy with all you are now doing in your life – but still, we do want to hear about it… Your input is genuine and kind and this is a Primal Blog after all!
ox L.
Hi everybody — for the Comments Sort Order problem: I found out that WordPress “Support Contact” is currently unavailable until Sept. 23. So to help with the problem meanwhile, I have added a “Recent Comments” section to the sidebar on the right side of each page. The links there will let you go immediately to any of the most recent comments, without hunting.
Vicki, I find it easier to reply to blog messages from my email, but I don’t know where they end up. Phil
I appreciate that Vicki – thanks for your time and expertise.
ox L.
Jack,
only just now I read your long reply to me.
thanks for that, it does explain your first reaction .
and yes, the caretaking might be engraved in n
most daughters’ souls in one way or another..
I do think even in animal social groups that might be the case to some extend, not that that really matters too much as to how I feel myself of course..
good thing is my mom seems to become more aware of how much we are giving her lately in terms of attention and care, and expresses her gratitude more in a more direct way, which is good.
she seems to become more cooperative to, which makes it all a lot easier.
wish you and Jim the best as well, no need to stop blogging, specially not in this way.
M
Margaret, I haven’t had any comments to add about this situation with your mother maybe because it’s mostly outside of my experience. I lost both my parents many years ago. But our family faced this decision when I was a child. My mother had to be put in a nursing home when she was about 41 and stayed there until the end of her life. I have very bad memories of visiting her in that place. I had nothing to do with the decision making on that but from what I know she probably continued living at home far too long. My father did well until the day he died at age 72. Much too young but probably a better way to go. In my fathers last years I found being around him difficult to tolerate for long periods of time. This was already a long time after I had started with primal therapy. I don’t know what would have happened if his functioning became greatly reduced and I had to help take care of him. That certainly would have been hard for me. More that I could add is that in this country I believe it’s very difficult to find a good quality nursing home. I say that as a healthcare worker and from many stories I’ve heard. I hope if it comes to that you’ll be able to find an acceptable place for your mother where you are. It certainly sounds difficult to deal with and I can see that it would bring up a lot of feelings. Phil Date: Sun, 14 Sep 2014 22:05:50 +0000 To: phiban@msn.com
Larry – maybe not but not so lucky if you are an Arab country ahd have the bad luck to have a lot of oil………………..Syria, Iraq, Libya, are not so lucky………….they not only have “fear of being over run and slaughtered by our neighbour, the US.”………….they not only have the fear they ARE being run over and slaughtered again and again and again……………..also how many ‘holocaust’ movies are there…………..every year there are about 5 or 6 MORE……………..ok we get the message bad things happened to certain people……………but wny not focus on the holcausts and yes genocide that is happening NOW to the the Palestinians………….a full on holocaust and genocide and ongoing…….but you can’t have eyes for that………………..only for what ‘happened’ 70 years ago…………………we KNOW what is happening now……………..but it seems in a way to be a primal style talk forever and ever about the past…………….but be thorougly deaf and blind to what is in front of our eyes right now………………
Patrick
since you seem to consider yourself the only one in or maybe not in the primal community not to be deaf and blind, could you please also stand up for all those women and girls threatened to have a major part of their genitals cut off by the IS warriors?
and for those that risk to have their head chopped off or to be executed if they don’t submit to the religion and ‘laws’ of the ‘islamic state’?
or do all the interviews and documentaries I saw so far also belong to the great evil conspiracy of false information?
you seem to select your ‘victims’ in some peculiar ways sometimes.
but hey, let’s not start this all over hopefully, didn’t you already point out a number of times we are all deaf and blind in the primal community?
so who are you actually talking to if not yourself, we can’t see or hear you, isn’t it?
M
I am finding out most nursing homes would not allow my mom to go out on her own.
that would create a big problem for my mom I am sure, it is such a restriction of one’s freedom.
i can see why that rule exists of course, so now it is a question of weighing the pro’s and con’s of mom living by herself feeling scared and lost a lot of the time, or mom being safe but not entirely free in a home, which she is not at all ready for I am afraid.
will become a dilemma, no right solution at this pint..
even a service flat would not be an ideal solution, there is no solution without pain of some sort for all concerned..
M
Hi Margaret. Sounds like your mom might could use someone like a part-time companion. Someone to be there maybe 2–3 hrs. a day. My cousin had a job where she looked after a woman (with dementia) while the husband did errands. I think the presence of someone on a regular basis could make your mom feel more secure and establish a routine to look forward to. Not sure how you’d go about that–perhaps employment office. Just talking here. Sylvia
OMG Patrick – can there be any self reflection with you!!! Enough with your rants – and begin to do what you need to do. If you feel you must convince people of all you know – find the venue you need!
I have been in big feelings all afternoon today – (quite unusual for me, unless I am at The Retreat) and felt so comforted knowing that I could talk to people here tonight who care, are caring and understand. As quiet as it has been I felt the bond and that the totally unique, feeling environment was returning here on the blog…
My feelings of having to feel inadequate and needing help are so horrible and actually hard to access. I think my façade of being strong and capable had to click in very early on.
In reality my life is going well – which I love! Perhaps with that and some challenges I have taken on for myself – this ‘other child’ begins to appear. There is so much I don’t want to know about and /or show.
I wish I could have been that child I needed to be – the one who was feeling alien, afraid and inadequate. Its so friggin’ deep now – and I hate it all so much!!
Leslie: Wow … all I can say is you are “doing it”. It’s so refreshing to read someone WILLING to go through the shear and utter hell and I just know; getting to the other side.
Yes it’s true the blog sometimes goes silent, but when you and others need to say, talk (write) there are quite a few here, reading and knowing what’s going on and feeling REAL empathy.
Good Luck Leslie. There are more, I feel, reading than we are likely to know.
Jack
Sylvia, Leslie, Vicky, Jo,
nice to read all your comments.
yes, Sylvia, that is one option that occurrred to me, but not such an easy one to realize.
I also dreamed about my mom, about her leaving while we were in a conversation, and how I felt very hurt and abandoned and distressed, until she suddenly showed up looking confused, and instead of feeling ‘indignified’ I just felt relieved to see her agin and concerned about her.
that dream seems to have contained several feelings that neeed more attention ..
isn’t it great if our dreams help us to resolve these feelings that are otherwise hard to access?
Jo, Leslie, hope to hear more whenever you feel like writing..
thanks to all of you, M
Patrick,
the level of your anger on us so-called weaklings makes me wonder if allowing yourself to be what you call ‘weak’ and what I’d call vulnerable, is exactly what you desperately would want to do yourself but could never alllow yourself to do in your past.
I say so because I recognize that pattern as I had some of it at some stage.
wxploring one’s weak or vulnerable side does not exclude the capacity of being strong on another level, on the contrary, they are linked together intrinsically.
if you can’t go one way, it might be hard to go the other.
you sound angry and desperate about something Patrick.
I wish you could find a way to let down more of your defenses and let someone like Gretchen in again.
wouldn’t you like to have some safe heaven where you could just break down if necessary?
you sound like you need it desperately and it is there.
wish you’d accept some help, we all care, I do and feel sure others do as well.
we are no weaklings Patrick, all living our lifes as fully as possible, while also exploring the pain we carry in order to process it and get stronger still.
you will always be able to sift out details to prove your point, but isn’t it time to stop that kind of struggle?
you are not the only one caring about all of the issues you mention, but this is not a political forum but a primal blog where the focus logically lays on unmet feelings.
that does not mean we have no political or social engagments but you don’t know aything about that side of any patient at all.
it is ironic you call Larry self-righteous, that seems to be one of your strongest defenses.
can you see all your rage is at the pi and the primal community out of line? does it not tell you something else must be going on?
M
I appreciate your support, Vicki, Leslie, Larry, Margaret…..thank you. ☺️
I appreciate your support, Vicki, Leslie, Larry, Margaret…..thank you. ☺️
One more go….😅
I appreciate your support, Vicki, Leslie, Larry, Margaret…..thank you. ☺️
Patrick, You do know that you original number was twenty and you said that as well with certainty and authority. Are you conceding you were wrong or exaggerating about that? Is it five or twenty? As an aside … i have read some of the info you suggested on Dr Kruse .. don’t you think there are some interesting similarities when it comes to your complaints about Janov? That does not seem like a coincidence and I am sure you have wondered about that as well. Worth exploring I would think. Lastly, I have the sense that you can dish it out but you truly cant take it. I see no real effort to look at your own issues and motivations. When confronted for your lack of accuracy, wild accusations or even blatant prejudice there is absolutely no response, you can not back up what you have to say… there is only silence. I think this is why Barry made the comment he did to you … it was not to hurt you but to point out your obvious disinterest in anyone else’s opinion. It seems that when you have no where else to go with your views or you are asked to back them up with facts well, then you attack most often using the ammunition of the average eight year old, the “No you are! ” approach. The funny thing is that I don’t really think you like this behavior any better than any one else does. Maybe I am wrong. G.
Gretchen: Are you sure it was Barry that made that comment? I thought it was Gary, or maybe Mary?
Margaret, I was very sorry to hear about your mom. I remember the process with my own mother and how difficult it was for us to accept it and decide what to do. The initial deterioration was very rapid and it started one day with her using a plastic dish to the gas cooktop. We got help. We couldn’t help not getting any. And then legal guardianship so we could make decisions and take care of what needed to be taken care of.
It worked fine at home for 3 years, but then the help wasn’t enough anymore (she wasn’t able to lift my mom anymore and my mom wasn’t helping with her own legs) so my mom had to go to a nursing home, where she stayed for another 3 years before dying.
In the process my sister and me made all the decisions, but we had constant advice from people specializing in the field of geriatric care. All I can say is I wish you go through this and come out the other side all in one piece, trust your feelings but also consider the advice of professional.
Margaret:
I thought this was a nice post from Daniel just now, and one reason I haven’t directly talked with you about your own mother’s case has to do with my maternal grandmother’s geriatric care. Even though she was a heavy smoker and made it to 90 years of age (feisty Irish curmudgeon), my mother’s fatal collision drove grandma into a horrific alcoholism that she was never able to recover from until the state forced her to have a conservator watch over her well-being and finances. The major turning point was a deputy sheriff doing a welfare check on her one day and finding her passed out on the floor. When 85 year-old women blow a BAC of .25 at the hospital their fate is usually out of their hands at that point…
Too many painful stories with lots of regrets over mistakes made.
I’ll be as honest as I can and say I am always fearful that what is happening with your mother could happen to my dad one day soon, so I can appreciate what you’re going through. I have to avoid the topic altogether, though, because I simply have too many other concerns on my plate at the moment, I’m afraid.
Patrick: I have to agree with other posters in suspecting you might have something serious going on with your current life. Anger is often intention contaminated by helplessness, so do you feel helpless or powerless about anything going on in your life now?
Do note that I am not arguing against you about the Institute or Jack, et al.
Lots of times you’ll see me railing against the lawsuit/personal injury jackpot lottery system, but on a deeper level life’s a total bitch with all kinds of impossibly hard feelings everywhere when there’s no one to take care of me and I have to completely figure out everything on my own or work on everything on my own without any significant outside financial help or someone to intellectually guide me to glory.
Does this mean my complaints about the schizophrenically unfair civil law system are any less valid? Hell no! But unfortunately I’ve come to realize trying to change the big system out there is a waste of time for me except for an occasional gripe when I need it.
Just cut it one gentle level deeper to what’s wrong with your present life today. Trying to change how an Institute is being run 10,000 miles away from you won’t help your situation today.
This reminds me of when I went apeshit on Barry about those 9/11 settlements so many years ago…
My last post to Patrick made me want to say a little more. I’m not really mad about what I am going to explain right now at all, but it’s almost a complete reversal to the 1800’s slavery situation for me.
See these black guys getting settlements ranging from $7 million to $11 million each for being wrongly imprisoned for some years? Judge approves $41 million settlement in Central Park jogger case
I am a white guy. I receive no damages for what happened to my mother so long ago. My best efforts at working hard might earn me $40,000 per year.
At a going rate of $40,000 per year it will take me approximately 250 years of wage slavery to earn $10 million. By then I would be a bit old and hard of hearing to enjoy it, ya know?
So yes, even though it’s not an overtly racial situation compared to the past….I sometimes feel I have entered a new era of reverse slavery where white guys like me who were invisibly wronged and economically enslaved by a deadly traffic system will never be explained in the history books.
I wish you could have received some kind of compensation or support after such a devastating loss when you were so very little, UG.
I just posted a new page G.