that, at any point, I can pull the plug. I never do: nearly
two years after our fi rst session, in April 2014, I give
birth to a daughter. It’s the best decision I’ve ever made.PROPER CHANGE TAKES TIME
I assume I might have a few months of sessions over
the summer to iron out some issues, then call it a day ,
like taking myself to a garage for an MOT. But because
I haven’t sought out therapy after a big T trauma – a
divorce, a bereavement, a breakdown – I realise that,
after nearly four decades of ingrained behaviour, there
is no sudden U-turn; rather, I’m like a large tanker slowly
starting to alter its course. By autumn, I realise I may
be here some time.
The early weeks zip by; I feel euphoric, my sessions
fi lled with wave after wave of insights, revelatory eureka
moments of “so that’s why I’ve a lways done t hat!”
But then things quieten down. Sessions sometimes
feel like a waste of time; I feel grumpy and frustrated.
This, I’ve read, is when the hard, unsexy work happens.
A therapist is part detective, part archaeologist, scratching
at the surface, fi nding something of potential interest
and digging a little deeper. These quieter, less emotional
sessions are where the deep excavation takes place. We
s t a r t t o w o r k a s a t e a m , t r y i n g t o p i e c e t h i n g s t o g e t h e r,
make connections.
Meanwhile, in the real world, life starts to get a
little easier. One day, I ask for something at work that,
almost overnight, makes my job more interesting and
rewarding. This real-world application of my therapy
makes all the hard work feel worthwhile.
I learn never to second-guess a session, however. Out
of the blue, I have one that leaves me feeling not just
that a weight has been lifted, but that a large blockage
inside me has been surgically removed. But then I
realise that, of course, these breakthroughs come out
of all the plodding, apparently unsatisfying work of
the previous months.THE PAST HOLDS CLUES
Before I start therapy, I am vaguely aware – from TV
shows, from the little I know about Freud – that most
t h e r a p i s t s r o o t a r o u n d i n y o u r p a s t. I a m s c e p t i c a l a b o u t
this: how relevant can it be? I want to dive straight
into my pressing present-day issues. Delving into my
childhood feels distracting and time-consuming.
Yet, from our very fi rst session, my therapist and I
start to make connections between how I experienced
the world as a child and how I experience it today.
Surprise, surprise – they aren’t too dissimilar. We
survive (in the broadest sense) our childhoods by
fi guring out how to fi t into our families, our roles, our
small world; we learn about relationships from our
parents. We then carry these ways of being into our
adult lives where, in many cases, they are no longer
useful, or relevant. To me, this joining-the-dots seems
like magic. To understand that there is a sound reason
why I behave a certain way is revelatory, exhilarating
and a huge relief: it’s like fi nding a key for a door that
has been locked your entire life.
An example: I wonder regularly why
I have often been unsure how I feel
about things. It’s frustrating: feelingsThe Guardian | 30.04.22 | SATURDAY | 41person inside me trying to get out, but I don’t know how
to reach her. I am existing with a low-level frustration,
without being able to pinpoint what I am frustrated
with, let alone fi nd the tools to address it.
I have been wondering for a while if talking to a
professional might help. But something has always
stopped me: who am I, with a loving family, good friends,
a roof over my head and food on the table, to need
therapy? I don’t come from a family of therapy- seekers.
My Yorkshire-born parents, from working-class homes,
would no sooner have sought out something so self-
indulgent than joined a circus. In the world I’ve grown
up in, therapy is seen as a rather shameful last resort
for someone in need of help, not for someone with a
functioning life who’s feeling a bit directionless. Just
cheer up and get on with it was the message I learned.
As a result, it has taken me a long time to convince
myself that, even though I am not suff ering from what
my friend (and also a therapist) Ellen calls “capital T
trauma”, it could be helpful. As Stephen Grosz writes
in his 2013 book The Examined Life : “At one time
or another, most of us have felt trapped by things
we fi nd ourselves thinking or doing, caught by our
own impulses or foolish choices; ensnared in some
unhappiness or fear; imprisoned by our own history.
We feel unable to go forward and yet we believe that
there must be a way.”
I want to change. In fact, I want to be a diff erent
person altogether. I am like an old house whose electrics
keep shorting in the same place, and I want someone
to rewire me. I have a very strong sense that unless I
do something, I’ll be stuck here for ever. So here I am,
sweating on a doorstep, asking for help. I am about to
learn a huge amount.TEARS ARE USEFUL
As I sit down for my fi rst session, I notice a box of tissues
on a table within arm’s reach. I get through a lot of them
that afternoon. The release of talking, of being listened
to, is an emotional experience.
We sit in a book-fi lled room; I am on a comfy sofa, my
therapist is on a chair. Light pours in. Over the years, I
c a n a l m o s t m e m o r i s e t h e t i t l e s b e h i n d h e r, s o l o n g w i l l
I spend gazing at them when stuck for words. Likewise,
the tree outside her window becomes as familiar as
the view from my own fl at: I will witness its full cycle –
from summer fullness to bare winter branches – many
times over.
In these early weeks, I do a lot of talking as my
therapist gets to know me. When she speaks, it is often to
affi r m w h a t I ’ v e s a i d : “ I t s o u n d s l i k e y o u ’ v e a l w a y s ... ”
or, “It’s OK to feel ... ” At fi rst I sit upright; as I start to feel
more comfortable, I sometimes curl my legs under me.
My therapist refers to the talking we do, week in,
week out, as “work”. There’s a reason for this – it’s hard.
Many sessions, particularly in these early days, are
emotionally battering, tearful, and leave me feeling
wrung out for days.
But therapeutic tears feel diff erent from normal-
life tears. They often appear out of the blue. They are
real, but they are confi ned to the session, leaving me
feeling a little shell shocked afterwards: “Where did that
come from?” I think. When I sob about something, my
therapist is sympathetic, but instead of comforting me,
she is detached enough to be curious about my tears,
what they reveal. They are like a truth-seeking missile,
a d i rec t l i ne to what rea l ly mat ters.
It is during one of these tearful moments that I
acknowledge how much I want to be a mother, despite
the fact that I am single. And so we start to talk about
what I could do. She challenges me: is it that I don’t
believe I could cope as a single parent, or is it that I feel I
must fi t i n w i t h s o c i e t y ’s n o r m s? D o I w a n t t o w a i t u n t i l
I’m in a good relationship – which could take years – or
d o e s t h i s f e e l m o r e u r g e n t? O v e r a p e r i o d o f m o n t h s , m y
ingrained prejudices start to shift, and my perspective
changes. I take a few baby steps – an appointment with
a fertility clinic; a check up with my GP – telling myselfI
am standing outside an ordinary house in a
tree-lined street on a midsummer afternoon,
about to change my life. I glance through a
window and see the reassuring domestic
ephemera of books, a computer monitor, a
child’s drawing. Next to the front door is a
small, typed sign with the details of a psycho-
therapist. I draw myself up, feeling both grown
up and childishly nervous, and ring the buzzer.
It is June 2012, and I am nearing 38. The
country is preoccupied with whether the
O l y m p i c s w i l l b e r e a d y o n t i m e a n d i f E n g l a n d
might crash out of the Euros. I have other things
on my mind. A few weeks earlier, I made a call.
The woman on the end of the line was polite, warm and
to the point, and we agreed to meet. Waiting for her to
answer the door, I start to sweat: will I like her? Will she
think I am a time-waster? What am I going to say?
I feel like an outlier: in 2012, therapy carrie s
something of a stigma. Beyond one or two close friends,
I haven’t told anyone I’m here. The open conversations
we have today around mental health weren’t happening.
Now, Covid has sharpened everyone’s awareness of
their own mental health struggles: according to a report
by Mind last November, over a third of Britons say they
don’t have the support or tools to deal with the ups and
downs of life. Ten million people will need support for
their mental health as a direct result of the pandemic,
according to the Centre for Mental Health. Demand for
therapy is outstripping supply. A study by the New York
T i mes i n D ecember revea led t hat t herapist s i n t he US,
where it has always been more accepted, are turning
away patients. Even in the UK, demand for mental
health advice has soared since the start of the pandemic.
It hasn’t taken a crisis for me to seek help. I’m doing
so because I feel stuck: at work, in life, and certainly
in love. I feel there is a braver, happier, more fulfi lledBy Hannah Booth
Portraits: Pål Hansen