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Authors: Mark Edwards
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position in the armchair. ‘No. I only got two hours last night, maybe three.’
She waited for me to continue.
‘I’ve got something new to worry about,’ I said.
‘Oh?’
‘Laura, my girlfriend, my ex -girlfriend . . .’ I sighed. ‘She’s leaving the country. Going to Australia. Fucking Australia. Sorry.’
A tiny smile at my apology. ‘You can swear if you need to, Daniel . And how do you feel about this?’
‘How do I feel ? I’m devastated. I don’t want her to go. I can’t let her go. She’s just trying to run away, after what happened. It’s insane. I really won’t be able to bear it if she goes away.’
She raised a hand, seeing how agitated I was becoming. I took five deep, slow breaths, closed my eyes, tried to visualise something pleasant. But all I could see was Laura, and then worse . . . I wrenched my eyelids open.
‘Do you think that Laura would be interested in coming to a session with you? It might be helpful to both of you. When a family experiences a trauma together, it’s common to treat them as a unit. The same with couples.’
‘She won’t do it. I tried to talk to her about it but she’s not interested. She won’t even speak with me about what happened. She certainly won’t talk to you.’
‘And what about you?’ she asked, her voice gentle. ‘Will you speak with me about it?’
So far, all I had managed to talk about was what had happened leading up to the walk along the rail tracks. I had spent the first couple of sessions telling her about the good stuff: our first weeks travelling around Europe, the fun times. I had also told her about our plans, our reasons for going. All the things that had been lost. And last week, I had told her what happened on the train, about finding ourselves at the deserted station with the feral dogs.
Post-traumatic stress disorder. That’s what the NHS psychologist had diagnosed me with, something that I associated with war vets or the firefighters who had tried to save people from the World Trade Center. But when they described the symptoms, I ticked pretty much every box. Intense, intrusive memories of the traumatic event. Nightmares. Loss of interest in life. Lack of motivation. Insomnia. A feeling of being on constant red alert. Being easily startled. Substance abuse—alcohol, in my case. The list went on for pages.
Dr Sauvage had told me that she wanted to try what she called ‘trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy’.
‘When you suffer from PTSD,’ she had said during our first session, telling me she agreed with the NHS psychologist’s assessment, ‘you want to block out memories of the trauma. You will do anything to avoid confronting it, or anything that reminds you of it. PTSD is where your brain remains in psychological shock, unable to shake off or move on from what happened to you.’
‘That makes sense.’
‘To get better, to move on, you need to face the memories, deal with them, which will allow you to regain control and feel able to face the future. To do that, we need to carefully expose you to those memories, to peel away the barriers.’
I had shuddered visibly.
‘The key word being “carefully”, Daniel. You have nothing to be frightened of.’
‘You don’t get it. I do .’
She had cocked her head. ‘Do?’
‘Have something to be frightened of.’
Now, I looked over at her, sitting on her designer chair with her notepad on her lap, e-cigarette in her hand, and wondered if I’d ever be able to tell her everything.
‘I can tell you what happened afterwards,’ I said. ‘That’s all part of it, anyway.’
‘All right,’ she responded. ‘That would be good. Take your time, go slowly. And if you start to feel distressed, stop talking, OK?’
‘OK.’
I sat back and closed my eyes.
‘I can’t really remember much of the walk into town. We started off running but our backpacks were so heavy we had to slow down. I know we didn’t talk
She waited for me to continue.
‘I’ve got something new to worry about,’ I said.
‘Oh?’
‘Laura, my girlfriend, my ex -girlfriend . . .’ I sighed. ‘She’s leaving the country. Going to Australia. Fucking Australia. Sorry.’
A tiny smile at my apology. ‘You can swear if you need to, Daniel . And how do you feel about this?’
‘How do I feel ? I’m devastated. I don’t want her to go. I can’t let her go. She’s just trying to run away, after what happened. It’s insane. I really won’t be able to bear it if she goes away.’
She raised a hand, seeing how agitated I was becoming. I took five deep, slow breaths, closed my eyes, tried to visualise something pleasant. But all I could see was Laura, and then worse . . . I wrenched my eyelids open.
‘Do you think that Laura would be interested in coming to a session with you? It might be helpful to both of you. When a family experiences a trauma together, it’s common to treat them as a unit. The same with couples.’
‘She won’t do it. I tried to talk to her about it but she’s not interested. She won’t even speak with me about what happened. She certainly won’t talk to you.’
‘And what about you?’ she asked, her voice gentle. ‘Will you speak with me about it?’
So far, all I had managed to talk about was what had happened leading up to the walk along the rail tracks. I had spent the first couple of sessions telling her about the good stuff: our first weeks travelling around Europe, the fun times. I had also told her about our plans, our reasons for going. All the things that had been lost. And last week, I had told her what happened on the train, about finding ourselves at the deserted station with the feral dogs.
Post-traumatic stress disorder. That’s what the NHS psychologist had diagnosed me with, something that I associated with war vets or the firefighters who had tried to save people from the World Trade Center. But when they described the symptoms, I ticked pretty much every box. Intense, intrusive memories of the traumatic event. Nightmares. Loss of interest in life. Lack of motivation. Insomnia. A feeling of being on constant red alert. Being easily startled. Substance abuse—alcohol, in my case. The list went on for pages.
Dr Sauvage had told me that she wanted to try what she called ‘trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy’.
‘When you suffer from PTSD,’ she had said during our first session, telling me she agreed with the NHS psychologist’s assessment, ‘you want to block out memories of the trauma. You will do anything to avoid confronting it, or anything that reminds you of it. PTSD is where your brain remains in psychological shock, unable to shake off or move on from what happened to you.’
‘That makes sense.’
‘To get better, to move on, you need to face the memories, deal with them, which will allow you to regain control and feel able to face the future. To do that, we need to carefully expose you to those memories, to peel away the barriers.’
I had shuddered visibly.
‘The key word being “carefully”, Daniel. You have nothing to be frightened of.’
‘You don’t get it. I do .’
She had cocked her head. ‘Do?’
‘Have something to be frightened of.’
Now, I looked over at her, sitting on her designer chair with her notepad on her lap, e-cigarette in her hand, and wondered if I’d ever be able to tell her everything.
‘I can tell you what happened afterwards,’ I said. ‘That’s all part of it, anyway.’
‘All right,’ she responded. ‘That would be good. Take your time, go slowly. And if you start to feel distressed, stop talking, OK?’
‘OK.’
I sat back and closed my eyes.
‘I can’t really remember much of the walk into town. We started off running but our backpacks were so heavy we had to slow down. I know we didn’t talk
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