Monthly Archive for September, 2009

It is that time of year, the end of summer, when psychoanalysts everywhere flee their caseloads for their annual summer getaway. A reprieve from repression; a break from breakdowns and an escape from all things Oedipal. Igor is no exception. Igor is not in Beverly Hills. He is spending his Thursdays without me.

I imagine he is somewhere exotic and glamorous. I am guessing Monaco or the Amalfi Coast. He is splitting his day between lounging by the sea, deep sea diving, touring museums, dining at elegant bistros and putting my months worth of fees on red at the roulette table. I could be wrong. It might merely be an idealization in which I am giving Igor the glamorous life I wish for myself. For all I know Igor could be doing a staycation and is working his way through a honey-do list and taking short excursions to Home Depot. I think not, but you never know.

Having had no Igor for the last two weeks has not been easy. I have had a lot on my plate and a lot in my psyche and I could have really used his help. It is pretty classic that when one’s analyst goes away that the patient falls to pieces. I anticipated this and told Igor before he left, “I feel a moral obligation to not be the kind of patient that falls apart while you are gone. I don’t want you to have to worry about me. I want you to have a good time and I want to never come to your mind.” He seemed to appreciate my concern and commitment to stay consolidated when he was off in another continent. Hmmm… maybe he is in Cuba or perhaps he is on a cruise to the Galapagos Island.

When he is here, week after week, my dreams never seem as urgent and in need of interpretation as now that he is off somewhere sipping Sangrias in Seville. I would never, no matter the crisis, pull a “What about Bob?” maneuver and call him while he was on vacation. Seriously, even if I turned into Cybil or aliens told me to wear a aluminum foil hats, I would never call him while he is on vacation. If it was an emergency I know he wouldn’t mind if I interrupted his tango lessons or his touring of ancient tombs, if I had a real trauma, but still.

I decided to keep a notebook as a way to contain my anxiety while he is off on safari in Tanzania and I am calling it my “What I would tell Igor if he was here notebook”. At the top of the list is the dream I had at about being at Club Med with the cast of Big Brother and being really sad about leaving Club Med and feeling real grief about saying goodbye to my cast mates. I found the dream incredibly disturbing as it is so at odds with my sense of self. I hated working at Club Med and I would never go on Big Brother. As an introvert I treasure alone time and privacy and both Club Med and BB never allow for either. There aren’t even locks at the door at Club Med and in the Big Brother house they even video tape you when you are in the shower. I get chills just thinking about it. Any armchair Igors want to take a stab at this highly extroverted dream?

I have written a lot in the “What I would tell Igor if he was here” notebook about the roller coaster ride( with more ups than downs) of finishing my “Thursdays with Igor” book proposal without my Thursdays with Igor. It seems odd to not be seeing him when I am constantly working, thinking, writing an re-writing a book proposal in which he co-stars. The other things that have made it into the notebook are: things my mother said; the book he recommended; and my continual reluctance to change my cell phone number.

Since I am compiling a list of things to talk to Igor about once he returns from his cabin in Cape Code, I thought it might be a good time to ask you what you would ask Igor if you could. Go on, don’t be shy. He is not grumpy or prone to incomprehensible colloquialisms like Dr. Phil and he is not going to put you into celebrity rehab like Dr. Drew. If you could ask Igor or an Igor anything about anything what would it be? You don’t have to lie down on the couch to ask your question, unless that makes you more comfortable. He won’t really answer your questions as he is off hang gliding in Hawaii, this is just my curiosity.
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The photo above is not of Igor or of his office. He, as I have told you before, looks like Omar Sharif and his office is much more restrained and is older and is much more womb like. The photo is a self-portrait of Dr. Mark Gerald, a 64-year-old psychoanalyst who practices in NYC, and it is from his exhibition,“In the Shadow of Freud’s Couch: Photographic Portraits of Psychoanalysts in Their Offices”. Dr. Gerald “has taken advantage of his insider status to tackle a subject previously closed to portrait photography: psychoanalysts in their workplaces. To date, he has photographed 55 analysts, more than half of them representing a legendary breed: the New York psychoanalyst. “

You can see several of the photos of the psychoanalysts offices here. Some of the offices are so interesting that they would put me off of doing psychoanalysis with the practitioners. I won’t name names but I will name locations: Chelsea and Paris are not places I will be going for therapy. Which of these therapist’s office can you imagine yourself in? Do interiors matter in one’s pursuit of mental health or is a couch just a couch? I can tell you that I once quit seeing a therapist because she had a framed picture of Holly Hobbie in her office. I just couldn’t give access to the deep workings of my psyche to a woman who thought that Holly Hobbie was appropriate art work to hang in a professional office.