Previously, on The Invisible Black Woman…
I’m kidding—well, kinda. It’s been a minute and the post before this one was not a continuation because I ain’t posted on my IOP adventures in a minute. So, if you’re jumping into this feeling like you missed something, the posts that go with this one are here. Yes, they are listed in the order you should read them, but if you like to jump around, I’m not going to stop you:
For everybody else who ain’t miss a beat, you are free to move about the cabin and jump on in!
I begrudgingly trudged my way to group session. To kick things off, with expressive therapy, we got to choose between Pictionary and Charades. (I believe “expressive therapy” is the proper term but if I’m wrong, do set me straight in the comments.) The majority wanted Pictionary and so that is what we played. I decided to be a bystander and was grateful that today I wasn’t pressured into participating. In retrospect, it might have gone a lot faster if I’d participated, but I held fast to my decision. I tried to distract myself mentally with literally anything else. Every so often, someone would say something that was less Pictionary and more about their current state of mind or a bad memory that explained their reason for being there, and I was back in the thick of it. Sixty merciless minutes later, it was over and it was time for our 15-minute break for my least-favorite session: processing.
Nathan was up again. He almost always started the session with the same question: “what are we needing from the group today?” It was up to the group to determine what that was. There were a few people that were “graduating” or transitioning back into the real world minus group therapy. So he took that and ran with it.
“I figured we can talk about beginnings and endings to frame the discussion today,” he said.
I made up in my mind that either these therapists were super attentive and planned their classes and talking points together or they were listening in to our sessions. I was leaning heavily toward the latter. I mean, they did have cameras in the rooms after all, which made sense from a safety standpoint—and if you’re trying to come up with some talking points right quick before session. Nope, the skeptic in me wasn’t interested in leaning toward the notion they might actually prep in advance.
He asked the group to just say what they were feeling at the moment, particularly those being discharged. Answers weren’t terribly surprising. Anxiety. Fear. Denial. As people rattled off their emotions, he wrote them on the board.
Then he asked, “where does this fall in the feelings wheel?”
I hadn’t the foggiest idea what he was referring to. Sometimes (and by sometimes, I mean often) the therapists would forget that not all of us came to outpatient therapy from PHP, the partial hospitalization program. So they would use terms and concepts that were very familiar to the majority but not to those of us who only just joined the group for outpatient therapy. For the newbies like me, a lot of the terms were totally foreign. It felt a bit clickish because more than half of those in outpatient therapy graduated from the inpatient program together. Oftentimes it was as if you were out of the loop on an inside joke.
Thankfully, he decided to draw it out on the board. Folks called out answers and he jotted them along different parts of the feelings wheel.
“Something else to think about for ending. There’s possibly a loss of identity. I’ve been in this position, I’ve been this person doing this thing for this time and now that’s it.”
I couldn’t help but think about how very on the nose that was when it came to my current situation. I hadn’t made any firm decisions on what was next for me. Would I go back to work or would I walk away? But the idea of identity as it related to my job definitely hit me hard. I had been with the same organization for the better part of my career. Hell, it was the company I’d worked for the longest. By marriage/relationship standards, we for sure had a common law marriage. And here I was, if even on a deeply subconscious level, entertaining what life could look like without them in it.
Just that quickly, my brain told me we weren’t ready to really have that conversation just yet, so I filed it away and tried to lose myself in the session.
“So why are we feeling these emotions related to our ending? What’s going on with our ending? What’s ending for you?”
Several called out IOP—intensive outpatient therapy—where we found ourselves at the moment. I very much wished I could trade places with them.
“And what is it about IOP ending?”
“Because there’s relationships built in this setting as well. Like a built-in support,” someone said.
“I’ve heard people say it’s like having a chair and if you need the chair to sit, it’s there. We don’t always need it, but it’s nice to know it’s there in the background.”
I had to give it to him: that was a pretty good analogy.
He talked about loss and I felt myself squirming again. It was as if that thing I wasn’t ready to talk about was making its way out of the mental drawer I shoved it in.
He turned to the group to weigh in on why leaving IOP could feel like loss.
Janet, the more vocal of our bunch, said “I come in here. I’m in this group of people who are supportive. What I share doesn’t sound odd because they’re dealing with something similar. No one’s gonna hate on you for sharing what you’re feeling. It’s a safe space.”
Damn. Her comment was lowkey breaking through to me. Even though I spent a lot of time minimizing what I was dealing with against what others were sharing, I never felt judged by anyone there. And as I watched them interact with each other, I could see that they had a common bond.
I just didn’t want any parts of it is all.
After processing, break time came and went and it was time for the next session. Rather than Carrie leading the session and talking us through things, one of the nurses was in the room waiting. Right in front of him was a table with a tower that looked a lot like Jenga and several stacks of cards.
Oh boy.
Once everyone was situated, he explained.
“All right, guys. So we’re going to play a little bit of Icebreaker Jenga. We’ll each take turns pulling a card from the stacks here. Each card has a question. You pick who you ask the question of and after you pull a block from the tower, the person you ask the question of will come up and do the same thing.”
Great. Just great. It took everything in my power to suppress the eye roll and sigh that wanted so badly to get out.
“There’s different categories. Some of the categories can be heavy, so if you get a question you aren’t comfortable asking, you can skip it and pick another card.”
The game kicked off and some of the questions and answers were funny, but I refused to show any level of amusement besides a Mona Lisa smile or a very mild, contained chuckle. All the while I made no eye contact in hopes I wouldn’t be picked, but that only worked but for so long before I was called on. I wound up getting called on by Sarah. She had been trying her level best to connect with me ever since I started group. You know how you can feel eyeballs on you and you look up and someone is staring at you intently? That’s how Sarah did me and when I would make eye contact, she would flash a big smile. I really needed her to turn her energy down by several percentages. When I showed up for group that day, she called me by my name and tried to make small talk. I hit her with one-word answers until she eventually got the hint that I really didn’t want to chit chat. So it was absolutely no surprise when she called on me because it was yet another opportunity for her to connect.
My answer to her question was the most I’d uttered besides my name or hello since I started the program. I got up, pulled my block without fanfare then asked the question I picked from the pile of Judith, one of the few people there who said hello to me with no expectations of anything other than me saying hello back.
A few more rounds later and thanks to merciful Christ, it was time to head home. I hightailed it out so no one would use the fact that I said more than 2 words that day as a sign I was interested in making small talk.
Based on how I was feeling at the moment, I knew I was gonna have a whole lot to say during my solo debrief on the car ride home.
The Invisible Black Woman 
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