Blessings

City Bakery Melted Chocolate Cookie-Part Cookie, Part Chocolate Bar

I've gone back and forth on whether to write about the termination of my analysis, after the fact. I did write about it in Termination, before it happened. Somehow, this is harder.

So, my analysis ended. The last session was difficult and confusing, and probably will remain confusing for a long time.

First, there was the cookie saga. I decided to get my analyst a parting gift, and since it's impossible to encompass the entirety of an analysis in one object, I decided on cookies. I wanted a specific kind of cookie from a specific bakery (the melted chocolate cookie from City Bakery), but then I wasn't sure I'd be able to get that kind of cookie, so I baked my world-famous-awesome brownies (see This Post for the recipe), but then I felt uncomfortable giving her something I baked myself so I went back to the original cookie idea. And all of this got experienced, acted out, and narrated in the last few days of my analysis.

Another thing I did in the last few sessions was talk about all the things that made me uncomfortable about the process of terminating. Like which words my analyst would choose to end the last session, and how I felt about the intimacy of shaking her hand when I left.

Yet another thing I did, as a larger gesture, was make a blessing. Having been raised as an Orthodox Jew, many, if not all of my fundamental references are Judaic. And one thing observant Jews do is make blessings, which follow the specific formula of, "Blessed are you, lord our God, king of the universe, who is/does something." The italics are the part that varies.

There are blessings for all kinds of things, from rainbows to acknowledging scholarship to thunder to hearing bad news. There is a blessing for every type of food, categorized in very specific ways, of course, but pretty much everything is covered: bread, wine, potato chips, strawberries, and yes, cookies. And even though I'm not as observant as I was growing up, I still make blessings over food. It's a way of reminding myself that I am privileged enough to have food.

In the last few weeks of my analysis, I tried to think of a suitable blessing to make over termination. It was tough. One idea I had was the blessing parents make when a child becomes a Bar or Bat Mitzvah, which goes something like, "Blessed are you....who has removed this one's punishment from me." It sounds awful in translation, but simply means that the child has attained an age at which one begins to take responsibility for ones own actions. That has something of the right idea for a termination, but I told my analyst it seemed more suitable for her to say about me, than for me to say about her.

A friend suggested a blessing about healing a broken heart, which was pretty good, but not quite right.

In the end, I invented my own blessing. It's based on the prayer that's said at funerals and other types of memorial events, such as a Yahrzeit (anniversary of a death), which seemed suitable, since termination has an element of death to it. The end of the prayer translates to something like, "...May he rest in his resting place in peace..."

The Hebrew word that's translated as "resting place" is Mishkav, which literally means, lying-down place. Like a couch. So I used the same word but tweaked it a little to, "Blessed are you, lord our God, king of the universe, who raises (me) up from the couch in peace."

For me, it captures the idea that I leave not "cured", but in more peace than I was in when I started.

So the last session went something like this:

I came in and handed my analyst a bag with the gift. She laughed and asked if these were the brownies or the cookies. I told her they were the cookies, but then I felt bad. Maybe she really wanted to try my world-famous-awesome brownies, and I could have brought both those and the cookies. Oh well. There went that opportunity.

I felt like I should say something momentous that encapsulated the entirety of my analytic experience, but all I could think to say was that my analyst had been very kind. I felt like she should say something broad to summarize our work together, but she just said she'd enjoyed working with me. She also said the door is always open, should I wish to return. I felt like that was decent of her, but it made me wonder if she thought I might not be able to manage on my own.

In the middle of the session, I silently made my blessing, then told her I had made it.

All the old doubts were right there. Have I done enough? Can I manage on my own? Does she like me? Can I share the things I'm inclined to keep to myself? Is she disappointed that I didn't bring her brownies? Can I tolerate the pain of this separation?

It was like a miniature version of my whole analysis, reliving all these feelings that I had grappled with over the years, and made some kind of peace with, only to re-experience them right at the end.

There was a lot more laughing than I had expected, on both our parts. I felt like my preemptively bringing up my discomfort with her final wording, or with shaking her hand, had lessened the pain of those experiences, but also lessened their power. They became more awkward than sad, and I wondered if she was feeling sad too, but was uncomfortable showing it, or felt it was inappropriate to let me see her feeling that way, and maybe the laughter was more nervous than fun. I was disappointed that she wasn't obviously sad. I might have been more disappointed if she had been.

In the end, she said, "We do have to stop." And she laughed. I smiled. I got up, walked to the door, and we shook hands with a quiet, nervous laughter. And then I left.

It wasn't our best session. It wasn't our worst session, either. It was just one of many sessions. I'm grateful for my whole analysis, and I'm also glad, and sad it ended.

So, cookies for closure, discussion for honesty, and a blessing for peace.

Amen.