[sittingatwatersedge]

Judith Viorst, who wrote Necessary Losses, first came into my life with another marvelous book - Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day (available at Amazon or abebooks.com) in which a little boy has One Of Those Days, from waking up with gum in his hair to bedtime when the cat wanted to sleep with his brother, and not him. It's hilarious and real.

Yesterday T didn't have a client right before me. I was in her waiting room when she came rushing through, dashed outside, and rushed back to her office with a fleeting word. A few minutes later she did the same again. Later she told me that her last pen had run out of ink , and then she discovered that she had run out of Kleenex and it occurred to me that maybe my T was having a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

I was wondering, what else would constitute a Terrible Horrible for a therapist? For mine, it would be me coming in the door saying, I know your clock can't be fixed, and you really need one, so I have brought you a gift and I sure hope you like it [a clock that reads 'Kiss Me, I'm a Psychotherapist']."

any other ideas?

[Elli-Beth]

My T has a home office on his mini-farm and I came in one day and there were duck eggs in an incubator in the waiting room. So when the hatch day came I asked about them and he was so happy that most hatched just fine. A while later they were big enough to go outside and their first night out we had storms and tornadoes and they all ran away or blew away when their pen was blown over. He looked so disappointed when he told me.

On a lighter note, about the same time his septic tank filled due to the extreme rainstorms and the toilets wouldn't flush and the yard stunk!

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Elli-Beth

On a lighter note, about the same time his septic tank filled due to the extreme rainstorms and the toilets wouldn't flush and the yard stunk!

That is a lighter note!

[elliemay]

My therapist has definitely had some terrible, horrible no good days.

One day I saw him getting out of this ratty old car and rushing into his office. When I walked in he was in the restroom and he came out drying and sniffing his hands. The whole session smelled of gasoline. Poor guy.

Another day I walked into his waiting room and the fire inspectors were there citing him for his use of extension cords on carpet etc....

Still yet another time, there was construction work going on in the office next to his and there was this banging and sawing right on the other side of his wall. Just before my session I heard him over there complaining about how he couldn't even talk on the phone with all the racket. He came into the waiting room, shrugged his shoulders and sighed. We communicated largely through hand signals in that session, but spent most of it laughing as the construction workers cursed.

And, just very recently, I came into session and his expensive, outrageously gorgeous leather couch had scratch marks all over it. I asked him if there had been a cat fight on his couch and he just sighed and said, "that's not going to be easy to fix at all".

Bless his little heart. It happens to the best of us.

I remember one time I was running late for a really important session and I was in traffic feeling trapped and having an anxiety attack, and left him a message. When I got there, he was pacing and crunching ice. He said that the situation made HIM anxious.

The other day he was telling me how that morning he was feeling disconnected on his way to work. He told me recently that there was someone in his life that he was angry at but who he really couldn't say anything to, so he was sort of stuck. Both of those situations related directly to what we were talking about in therapy...

It helps me when T tells me about his hard days...because I can see how he deals with them, and that he makes it through them, and that my feelings aren't so "out there"...that everyone has feelings and hard days, even T.

[ladyjrnlist]

This makes me realize that I've never seen my T upset or short-tempered. He must be a good actor. I can't imagine every day for him for the past year has been roses.

These aren't work related, but they are things that have happened to my t that he has told me about and laughed at him uproariously.

T is a real outdoorsman. He goes camping, hunting, and fishing on his vacations. Talks about his "outdoor" life all the time. Last Spring he went hunting pheasant with his girlfriend and her father. They have hunting dogs. Well, the dogs scared up a skunk and got sprayed. Then the dogs proceeded to run up to t and rub up against him. Those jeans were definitely trashed.

Recently, he was out fishing in a pond here in town. He was walking around the pond with his 5-year-old grandson and showing him the ropes. Well, he lost his footing, slipped in the mud, and fell into the pond. It was a 2 mile trek back to the car in wet clothes.

My T has been having LOTS of terrible horrible days. Family medical problems, some remodeling problems that went badly, car breaking down multiple times, her dogs escaping out of her yard (once we went and chased them down... all the way down to the park and took them back to her house), she has the worst luck of anyone I have ever met which is one of the reasons I worry so much about her.

[dizgirl2011]

Hey ,

My T is very "professional" (maybe too much), in the sense that she doesn't really disclose hardly anything about herself, her family or her life. She doesn't say if shes having a bad time and doesn't come across as having a horrible day..but im sure she does.

My Mental health worker (who i rarely see) is a different story, she has lots going on, usually work overload with more case work than anyone should have to handle, husband being unwell or broken leg, children being unwell etc.

[granite1]

my T never seems to have terrable days.bye the way i love that book

[sittingatwatersedge]

thanks for your anecdotes!! actually I was wondering if anyone could come with (an imaginary, humorous) way that a T might have a terrible horrible ... no offense intended, just in fun. seeing as how they are in a sort of unusual business.

[PTSDlovemycats]

I think My T's terrible horrible day would have been the day when she was crossing the street and got hit by a car. She was ok. THANK GOD!

[googley]

Well, there was the day my T was in a car accident on her way to my appointment.

There was also the day that there was a fire in the office building during my session and we found out about it because someone came pounding on the door saying we had to get out. I had about 10 minutes left of my session and decided that I should just go to work since we obviously weren't going to go back inside.

[sittingatwatersedge]

Originally Posted by PTSDlovemycats

I think My T's terrible horrible day would have been the day when she was crossing the street and got hit by a car. She was ok. THANK GOD!

yikes!!!!!!!!!!! maybe we should stop here! the very thought makes me shudder (seriously). Glad to hear she is OK yikes!!!