Love's Executioner

by Irvin D. Yalom

Of course, all these sentiments remained hidden from Mike and Marie. Then I wondered about the two of them—their unfilled wishes, their hidden reflections and opinions about the consultation. Suppose, a year from now, Mike and Marie and I each wrote recollections of our time together. To what extent would we agree? I suspect each of us would barely be able to recognize the hour from the other’s account. But why a year? Suppose we were to write it a week from now? Or this very moment? Would we be able to recapture and record the real, the definitive, history of this hour? This is no trivial question. On the basis of data patients choose to provide about events taking place long before, therapists routinely believe they can reconstruct a life: that they can discover the crucial events of the early developmental years, the real nature of the relationship with each parent, the relationship between the parents, between the siblings, the family system, the inner experience accompanying the frights and bruises of early life, the texture of childhood and adolescent friendships. Yet, can therapists or historians or biographers reconstruct a life with any degree of accuracy if the reality of even a single hour cannot be captured? Years ago I conducted an experiment in which a patient and I each wrote our own view of each of our therapy hours. Later when we compared them, it was at times difficult to believe that we described the same hour. Even our views of what was helpful varied. ...