It Turned Out He Pitied Himself

“Susan, you can send in my two o‘clock now.”

In sauntered my next patient, whom I have been treating for over two years. “So how are we feeling today?” I asked.

“I feel the same as I always do, Dr. Salsbury, angry and empty,” he replied.

“Well, let me see if I can help you. It felt to me that we were about to have a real breakthrough our last session. Oh, by the way I‘m writing a book about the trust that needs to be in place between a psychiatrist and their patients for true healing to occur. I was planning on using interactions between my patients and myself as examples. I of course would not dream of using my patients‘ actual names. I am planning on referring to my patients as Mr. or Mrs. and then the first letter of their last name. For example you would be referred to as Mr. T, to protect your privacy. So do I have your permission to use you in my book?”

“That would be fine, doc, however calling me Mr. T wouldn‘t do a very good job protecting my privacy, because I am known world wide as Mr. T. You can see how using the name that I am famous for in your book would do a poor job of keeping my anonymity,” he said sarcastically.

“Yes? excellent point. I didn‘t even think about that. I‘ll have to come up with a better system. Enough about that, let‘s talk about you. You mentioned that you felt angry, this seems to be a constant part of your life.”

As was customary, when we officially began our session Mr. T laid down on my vinyl couch. On the couch he always clutched a pillow that read, “Whoever holds this pillow shall be protected from all cold pricklies and may receive only warm fuzzies.” This huge mountain of a man would not truly open up unless he had that pillow clutched in his hands, like a child holding on to a security blanket.

“It‘s hard not to be constantly angry with all of these people running around who just make me so mad. The only thing I can do is pity the fools,” Mr. T answered.

I noticed that once again Mr. T brought up pitying fools, so I decided to try and explore this concept a little further. “Let‘s play a little word association game, okay? I‘ll say a person or a thing and you tell me if you do in fact pity any of the fore mentioned fools or not.”

“I‘m ready when you are,” Mr. T replied.

“Me?your shrink.”

“Don‘t pity.”

“Cheesecake.”

“Don‘t pity.”

“Taxes”

“Pity.”

“Your siblings.”

“Don‘t pity, unless they ask me for money, then I‘d have to say I pity them.”

“Okay, try to keep it simple short answers, just the first thing that pops into your mind. Your grade school teachers.”

“Don‘t pity.”

“Your father.”

“Pity! I pity that fool! I have so much pity for that man that I could blanket the whole world with just my pity!”

After that emotional outburst Mr. T broke down sobbing. I was used to these crying episodes; some lasted for ten minutes, while others ended in just seconds. This looked like it was going to be a marathon sobbing fest, so I decided this would be a good time to work on my book. However, Mr. T pulled himself together in record time.

Now that the floodgates had opened, T was holding nothing back, “My dad was actually the one who dubbed me Mr. T. When I was about four years old, I handed my dad a picture that I had colored for him. He looked at it and asked, ?What the hell is this? Can‘t you stay in the lines when you color? What the hell is wrong with you? Are you retarded or something? I could bring a monkey in here and I bet he could stay in the lines. From now on your name is Mr. Tard.‘”

“Mr. Tard was soon shortened to Mr. T. To compound the situation I never got very good grades in school, later I found out that my dyslexia was the cause for my poor performance in school. Since my dad was not aware of my learning disorder, he chalked up my poor marks to being stupid and the name Mr. T was here to stay.”

After finishing his sentence Mr. T released the pillow from his clutches. The pillow had taken the brunt of T‘s sobbing and was left in a condition that I will not describe for the sake of good taste. I‘ll just say that Slimer would have been proud. I made a note to be sure and dry clean the pillow or set fire to it.

Following my instincts I asked Mr. T more about his father. Apparently T‘s father aside from labeling his child Mr. Tard also insinuated on a regular basis that T was gay, when in fact he wasn‘t. It was all becoming clear now. T‘s name was a constant reminder that his father thought he was a mental midget. The name was like a black cloud over T‘s head and since he had had the name for so long, he actually began to believe that he deserved the name Mr. Tard. Since T believed that he wasn‘t intelligent he worked extra hard to prove to his dad that he wasn‘t gay. T decided to become extremely muscular and develop an overly macho and tough persona.

The childhood memories continued to flow out of Mr. T. “Not surprisingly my dad made me cry on an almost regular basis. My crying had no affect on him, other than an increase in the number of gay jokes he made. After one particularly crushing exchange with my father I remember my mother comforting me. She told me, ?Don‘t pay attention to what your dad says. He‘s just a mean old man. You should really pity that fool for being such a horrible father.‘”

“From that day on whenever my father upset me, I wouldn‘t cry. I would just tell myself that I pitied the fool and I would never allow a fool that I pitied to make me feel bad about myself ever again.”

“If you made the realization that you would never allow your father or anyone else that you deemed a fool to make you feel anything but good about yourself, then where is all of this anger still coming from?” I asked rhetorically.

However Mr. T didn‘t realize that he was not supposed to try and answer my question and eloquently responded, “Hey shut up!”

“T, my question was not suppose to upset you. It was a rhetorical question that I asked to try and make a point,” I said, trying to calm my agitated and quite large patient.

T glared at me and with nostrils flaring said, “I‘ll make a point of kicking your ass if you don‘t start making sense real soon.”

“Um?well?(cough)?what I was getting at is that if all of your anger came from simply being mad at your father, then you should no longer be angry because you recognized the source of your anger. Maybe you‘re mad at someone who is a much more important part of your life then your dad. While you may say that you pity the fool, I don‘t buy it.”

I leaned forward, putting my folded hands on my knees and said in a soothing tone, “I think the person that you really are mad at is?yourself.”

“What you talking about Willis?I mean, doc?”

“Come on now, that isn‘t even your catch phrase. Think about it T. Everything that you are is just an act you put on to please your dad. You‘ve never let the true you see the light of day. There‘s a beautiful person inside of this facade. I know it and I think you know it as well. You‘re angry at yourself for allowing the true you to be smothered in favor of the person your dad wanted you to be.”

At this Mr. T stood up and walked over to me. To see this man towering over me was a very intimidating sight. He raised his right arm, as if he was going to hit me. Thankfully instead of hitting me, he fell to his knees and embraced me like I was the lone life preserver in a sea of bad feelings. He clutched me, crying the cry of a man who had a great weight lifted from around his neck. I am of course speaking figuratively because he still had well over five pounds of gold chains around his neck. In between the sobbing the only thing he said was, “You‘re right, dear God, you‘re right.”

While my ego received a boost, my silk shirt received a combination of tears, saliva and snot that was not as pleasant. T let me go after what felt like an eternity and sat back down on the couch. He downed a glass of water, I‘m guessing in an attempt to keep himself from dehydrating. After finishing a second glass Mr. T warmly said, “I‘d like to thank you, Dr. Salsbury. You‘ve cured me. I no longer feel all of the anger that I once had inside of me. I feel like I can finally begin to live my life, not as Mr. T, but as myself.”

I smiled and nodded my head as to say “all in a days work.” “You‘re welcome, but there are still several issues that I‘d like to work out with you. Like for example your need to be covered in gold jewelry is a complex mental disorder called the Midas Syndrome. And of course let‘s not forget your crippling fear of flying.”

“Mere details doc. My big problem, the real reason that I came to therapy is fixed. I feel so much better. Even if that “Where Are They Now” guy calls again I won‘t feel the slightest notion to swear at him and threaten the lives of his children, like I did last week.”

I sat in silence, still trying to get over the transformation that I had witnessed in just an hour. T had gone from a menacing thug to a crying, whimpering little boy to a confident and happy man.

Mr. T declared, “From now on I‘m going to let my true self shine through. I‘m a whole new person, starting with my name. I will no longer answer to the name that was a constant reminder that I was never smart enough. I will no longer answer to the name that had such a negative impact on my life. My name will no longer be derogatory to my intelligence or character in any way. I will only respond to the name given to me at birth. From now on I shall be known not as Mr. T, but as Dom Mass.”

With that Dom hopped out of the chair and marched swiftly out of my office, his chains bouncing and clanking like wind chimes.

Putting down my pen and notepad, I shook my head and sighed. I then hit the intercom button. “Susan could you please change the name on the chart from Mr. T to Dom Mass and pencil him in for his usual time for next week.”

“But doctor when he left he said that he was gone forever, never to return,” Susan replied.

“Never mind what he said, I have a feeling he‘ll be back.”