From about 2016-2019, I had about 90 first appointments with therapists. Very rarely would I book a second appointment. I did, however, keep a journal describing most of these awkward initial experiences. Someday, when I'm brave enough I’ll put these entities into a published collection.
Here is one:
******2018 Dry Toast******
My new therapist opened the door to her office and silently invited me in with a smile and a series of hand gestures that would make any super-caffeinated flight attendant proud.
I put down the three-year-old issue of Men’s Health that I was fake-reading. I had found it under a slew of similarly dated Vanity Fair mags. I had chosen the Men’s Health tabloid specifically to act like I was reading it so I could make a good impression with my latest mental health provider.
I wanted her to see that I was a modern man who was taking his health seriously. Which, of course, was an image that was hard to pull off because my body is precisely shaped like a penguin who was constantly carb-loading.
The article that I was (poorly) acting like I was reading was instructing me on how to maintain a productive relationship with my abs during the upcoming winter months.
A relationship with my abs?
My ab muscles and I have never actually met in person. We weren’t even long-list pen pals who wrote tender missives across the pond to each other. If anything, my relationship with my abs was more of an ancient family blood feud. The writer of the well-intentioned article assumed that my abs hadn’t filed a restraining order against me in the late 80s.
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