Cragen Household, Manhattan, New York
Wednesday 5th February 2016
3.18am
Olivia watched nervously as George read her journal. It was weird, even though she had written it because he'd asked her too and it was very specific to her postpartum depression symptoms, it still felt like an intrusion of privacy to have him reading it. To be fair, George had given her the option to read it out to him as he knew that there was a possibility that she would struggle with him reading it and knowing what it contained, at the end of the day there was nothing as personal as a journal.
"Well?" Olivia asked as George put the journal on the arm of the chair. Her stomach felt like a washing machine on spin and she was struggling to contain her anxiety.
"Well there's nothing surprising there based on what you told me last time we spoke." George replied hoping to calm her fears.
"You're not concerned about the safety and the welfare of my children?" Olivia asked, it was what she had feared most. George chuckled softly and shook his head, what Olivia was experiencing while not pleasant to her or the children he didn't see it causing any long term damage to the children and so there was no reason to have an immediate concern. "so what now?" Olivia asked.
"Well," George sat forward a little! His hands clasped together, his elbows resting on his knees. He was usually very relaxed when working with Olivia but he knew this was the first real breakthrough he had ever made with her that was going to be rectified through behavioural therapy and he wasn't sure how cooperative Olivia would be. "We are going to go back through this journal and together identify a few different incidents and how you dealt with them and then we can come up with ideas on how we can deal with them differently."
"I've been trying to change daily, but it isn't working, how will coming up with ideas with you make any difference?" Olivia was questioning rather than her usual making a statement which was giving George further hope that she would work with him.
"Some of these incidents, they're things that happen often, daily even like Alexandra and Liliana being uncooperative in the mornings." George explained. "We can see from your journal that this happened three times in just as many days. We can look at the emotions you feel when this happens, look at your reactions and the emotions that follow, then we can identify better and more positive reactions and then the hard work, you must try and put the positive reactions into action. By coming up with alternative behaviours together and having to log them down you should see a positive pattern start to happen."
"So a form of CBT?" Olivia asked and George realised that she was blocking all emotion as he couldn't read her whatsoever, he couldn't tell if she was willing or not and that worried him as he didn't know how else to help, if she rejected this she would have no choice but to go to someone else.
"Pretty much." He eventually said and Olivia breathed a sigh of relief and gave a small hopeful smile.
"Ok let's do this." She said and George grinned, he was ecstatic now that he knew she was willing to give it a go as every last attempt at any kind of therapy with Olivia had always ended badly with a very uncooperative woman unwilling to even put the effort in to try because she didn't trust therapy especially behavioural therapy for someone like her who he knew felt she wasn't entitled to her feelings.
"Ok so…" George picked up the journal and handed it to Olivia, "Pick an incident." He told her as she reached out for the red book.
She quickly flicked through it and looked for one of the ones she really had spent time dwelling on and regretting, there was some incidents that caused her to play on them for several hours if not days and caused her heart to race and her stomach to churn. Eventually she found one and sighed sadly as the same rush of guilt took over her.
"Melissa has forgotten the meaning of the word No. She asked if she could braid Nicole's hair which needed washing and so I said no. I was trying to make dinner. When I called them down for dinner Nicole's hair was braided and it was way too tidy for Nicole to have done it herself. I exploded with Melissa, called her an immature child who didn't know her place and that she was Nikki's sister not her mother. It ended with Melissa going to bed with no supper and not talking to me for several hours."
The shame Olivia felt was written all over her face, it hurt George, because unbeknown to Olivia he blamed himself that he had been too busy grieving for Don Cragen and excited about the birth of George that he hadn't paid as much attention to his best friend when she needed him the most and if he had done, then maybe things wouldn't have been able to get this bad.
"Ok, that's a good one, do you fight with Melissa often?" George asked, he needed to have some idea of the relationship, the issues that came up before he worked with Olivia on better responses to the stresses that she had with Melissa.
"Since Elliot and I separated, Melissa has taken it upon herself to mother Nicole. I mean they've always been extra close but she goes too far at times and even goes against what I have asked or said and that can't be allowed to continue." Olivia replied, it ground on her how much Melissa would ignore her requests when it came to Nicole.
"That's understandable, both her behaviour and your reactions, how do you feel when you think about how that scenario played out?" George was so pleased to see that Olivia was taking this seriously and being open and honest with him.
"I'm disappointed in myself. It was just a braid and while Melissa needs to learn that what I say goes in these kinds of situations, she doesn't need to be shouted at and called names and belittled, she's such a good kid, she's done so much to help me since we moved here and my behaviour could change her and I don't want that, I hate that I spoke to her like that over something so minor. There's a time for yelling, this wasn't one of those times." Olivia shook her head and blinked back her tears, she couldn't keep going like this and if what George was doing with her was too work, she'd have something else to be eternally grateful to him for.
"If you could go back to that moment when Nicole and Melissa walks into the room, how would you react if you got a do-over?"
"I would…" Olivia blinked hard, to was tougher than she thought it would be. How would she have reacted if she could have a do-over? "I would pull Melissa away from Nicole." Olivia started.
"Why?" George didn't make a habit of interrupting his patients but he was intrigued with this one why she wasn't jumping straight into what she would say differently.
"Because Nicole looks up to Melissa, they're so close, I wouldn't want to upset Nicole because Nicole hasn't done anything wrong." Olivia explained. "The consequence of the actual reaction was Nicole didn't speak to me all night either."
"Ok, so after taking Melissa to one side what would you say?" George asked feeling the progression that they were making was really good even though it was early days.
"I think I'd ask her why she went against my wishes. Maybe she had a sort of good reason for doing it. Then I'd explain that she shouldn't go against what I said and if I hadn't given her a reason when I said no, I wouldn't say it for the sake of it, that there was a reason and I'd explain that the reason I said no is because Nicole is a nightmare when you want to pull braids out of her hair and she was going for a bath and needed her hair washing and it would add a lot of time to the bedtime routine that I simply didn't have that night, then I would tell her that after dinner she would sort the dishwasher out so that I could have the extra time to sort Nicole out, as a reasonable punishment." Olivia knew how to be a good parent, what she had just described was herself before George, she had never been one to shout at her children, or punish them harshly. She was a talker, someone who believed that if you took the time to talk and to explain then you could prevent future issues and yes sometimes punishment was needed and necessary but the punishment had to be reasonable to the crime.
"How do you think Melissa would have reacted if this had been the course of events?" George asked, having Olivia work out a better way of reacting was only a part of the process, she had to see the whole image before she would be able to act in future.
"I think she would have apologised for going against me and would have eaten dinner with us without being upset and then I would have been able to bath Nicole without having to worry about coming down to sort the dishwasher out." Olivia chuckled, while she loved the idea of a dishwasher, she hated loading and unloading it as much as he hated manually washing the dishes.
"What about Nicole?" George asked as Olivia had identified that having a problem with Melissa caused problems with Nicole.
"She wouldn't have known a thing and would have been her usual happy self. Until I had to take the braids out." Olivia chuckled. "So what now?" Olivia asked.
"Why did you choose that incident?" George asked, ignoring Olivia's question for now.
"What do you mean?" Olivia frowned, she didn't know if she had an answer to that.
"You have a journal with pages upon pages of incidents that have happened just this last week. Why that particular incident?" George asked again.
"I don't know, I guess it's the one that has played on my mind the most out of all of them."
"Why?"
"Umm, because the incident annoyed me more than any other but also because Melissa has been incredible since we left Elliot and so helpful and she deserves to be rewarded for that not at the wrong end of my sharp tongue and on top of that, she probably cops the brunt of it more often than her siblings because she's older." Olivia's eyes filled with tears. She felt so guilty that she hadn't taken any time to really care for Melissa recently, her first child who was now a teenager was going through a time in her life where she needed her mother more, not less and instead of embracing her as a young woman, Olivia realised she was pushing her away and relying on her ability to take care of herself.
"So what now?" George repeated Olivia's question but Olivia knew he wasn't asking her that question nor was he asking himself, because he had the answer to that question. "This week, I want you to focus on how you react with any incident that occurs with Melissa. I want you to try and react more positively, it's not going to be easy, you're still in that stage where you're angry and frustrated and impatient and that's ok. What I want you to do, is try, that's all and when you feel you can't react positively I want you to walk away. Go into another room, go have a coffee, go be with one of your other children. It doesn't mean ignoring her, or what she has done but walking away is better than losing your temper and reacting in a way that will make you feel guilty." George explained and Olivia nodded almost enthusiastically. She could see what George was asking to do and how it would work, she understood that he wasn't expecting it to work over night and was giving her alternatives to both exploding and the way she wanted to react.
"I can try to do that." Olivia nodded as she spoke, her eyes sparkled with hope.
"And Olivia, if you do react badly, that's ok because you can't modify your behaviour over night. What's going to be important is that you continue to keep this journal and record the good and the bad and if you do react badly you haven't failed, you just need to record it and try and move past it." George smiled at Olivia softly, he knew her well enough that he knew she'd probably beat herself up even more now if she reacted badly because they were doing this kind of therapy and it was important for him to try and avoid that happening. "Now how about a glass of wine and you tell me how things are with Elliot and Mathew?" George instantly switched to friend mode and Olivia knew that for now, her therapy session was over.
Doctor Rosie's office, Manhattan, New York
Wednesday 5th February 2016
7.32pm
Having worked so well with George over the weekend and feeling a little lighter and more positive, Olivia knew she had to deal with her parents passing. She hadn't taken the mandatory therapy very seriously but knowing that what George was doing with her was having such a positive impact she had come to realise that this could have the same positive impact too because she'd come to realise she needed it.
"What brought you back here?" Rosie asked, they'd been sitting in silence for quite some time and Olivia hadn't said a word. Olivia had been cancelling all her appointments after the first, always coming up with some excuse or another and Rosie had decided to give Olivia some time before starting with the threats about reporting it to one pp. she'd been surprised to have received a phone call from Olivia arranging a new session earlier than the one she had scheduled the last time Olivia had cancelled.
"I have a lot going on." Olivia started, this was harder than she had thought it would be. "I'm working with a psychiatrist at the moment because I have postpartum depression." She felt like she was in confession or an aa meeting, hi I'm Olivia and I'm an alcoholic except this was hi I'm Olivia and I have postpartum depression and it's destroying me.
"Ok." Rosie said, making a note on her lap but saying nothing more, letting Olivia lead the session.
"Please don't report that to one pp." Olivia said suddenly, her therapy with George was confidential, but the grief counselling wasn't completely because Rosie had to report back to One PP.
"I won't." Rosie replied. "All they're going to want from me is a report that we have worked together and that I'm satisfied that you don't need to see me anymore. They're not going to want a record of all the files and if it makes you feel better, I won't add this to my computerised files so if anyone goes digging this won't be there." Rosie reassured Olivia the best she could, she knew if Olivia was going to give her a real chance to help her deal with her parents passing then she needed to get Olivia to trust her, she wouldn't be doing that if Olivia thought she was carrying everything back to her superiors.
"I'd appreciate that." Olivia smiled nervously. "So anyway, as I said, I'm working with a psychiatrist on that and I guess for the first time in many many years, I feel that therapy is having a positive effect on my life and I guess I realise that maybe the brass was right, maybe I do need help to come to terms with my parents death and you're the person who's been asked to do that and I need to give this a real opportunity to work." Olivia's hands rubbed against her thighs, she was nervous but she was also willing to try, she had to try.
"I'm glad you've come back to see me." Rosie started. "I definitely agree that you need support to process what you've gone through. Why don't you fill me in on what life is like for you right now?" Rosie asked, she needed to identify what Olivia's issues were and what kind of therapy she would therefore benefit from.
Olivia took the time to fill Rosie in on her marriage, her work, her family situation and her therapy with George, she even told her about Mathew and not once did Rosie interrupt only to simply clarify things. It was a real eye opener for Rosie, she'd got a sense last time that the woman in front of her was suffering a world of hurt, a world that had in the blink of an eye been thrown upside down, it was no wonder she wasn't capable of processing her parents passing, she hadn't had the time nor the support to do that.
What Rosie struggled with the most was the fact that she wasn't sure if Olivia needed grief counselling or grief therapy, while laymen used the terms interchangeably they were actually very different; grief counselling was just a form of support for dealing with normal grief where the support was lacking and grief therapy was more about psychotherapy where there was a requirement of drugs and active therapy to work through complex grief. Rosie wasn't yet able to identify which side of the fence Olivia fell on yet.
"I'd like to go back to your mother's death." Rosie wanted to start from there even though she had a feeling that they would need to eventually go back to discuss Michael and Cole's deaths too, she had a feeling that the inability to process grief stemmed all the way back to them but that would have to wait for now. Olivia simply nodded, happy to do things however Rosie wanted to. "Tell me about that."
Olivia told Rosie once again how they'd come home and found Anne, how it had broken her father, how her kids had all reacted, each one so different, how she'd been surprised at how much it had affected Elliot. What she didn't do and what Rosie was quick to pick up on was talk about how she had felt and how it had affected her. That was problematic, she was obviously ignoring her own emotions.
"Did you cry?" Rosie asked, even though crying was not a necessary part of grieving, some people went the opposite way and laughed in grief, she was looking for a way of identifying Olivia's thought process during that time.
"Yes." Olivia nodded, she had cried, crying was what had made Don let go of his wife's body so that Melinda could take it away.
"Did you take time to cry?" Rosie asked being a little more specific about the type of crying she meant. It was the type where one took time to themselves to release their emotions.
"Yes" Olivia replied again. "I went to my office, within an hour or so of finding her and I went there to be alone and I cried, I cried a lot." Olivia remembered back to that time with sadness in her heart, the hurt and the loneliness.
"Were you alone?" Rosie asked and Olivia shook her head, George had been there with her. "Did you cry properly, focus on your own emotions and cry until you couldn't cry anymore?" Once again Olivia shook her head, she had regained her composure when she had thought about her children and what they would have been going through losing their grandma.
"I was worried about my kids." Olivia replied. "I was scared about telling them, worried at how they would react and I had to think about my Dad, I know he was going to struggle when his first wife died he'd turned to alcohol and I felt it was my job to look after him."
"So you looked after your dad and your children, which meant you neglected yourself." Rosie was just talking her thought process out loud but little did she realise how much that hurt Olivia.
"They are my world, my children, I had to be there for them." It was her duty as a parent to be there for her children and she wouldn't have anyone, not even a grief therapist tell her that what she did was wrong in any way.
"Oh I don't mean that you should have focused on yourself right then and there, any decent mother worries first about her children and herself second and under the circumstances I can understand why you were so focused and worried about your dad." Rosie explained not wanting Olivia to think that she wasn't supposed to worry about her children, she'd have been more worried if Olivia hadn't worried about her children. "Do you feel like you have accepted that your mother has died?" Rosie asked, it was the most pressing question it was one of the reasons she was having to be seen.
"Yes." Olivia nodded. "I didn't have time not to accept it." She added thoughtfully. "For my family I had to accept that she was gone and adjust our lives accordingly." Olivia was sad at that thought, she didn't have the time to dwell and to be angry and to wish her back, she had to just get on with it, accept her mother was gone and move forward.
"Do you think about her?"
"Of course, every day." Olivia replied, damn she did miss her mother so much and she felt it so much especially now she was struggling with having separated from Elliot. Once again she found this need to have her mother there and she wasn't, she was gone.
"What do you feel when you think of her?" Rosie continued, they had so much to get through and so little time because this was the first time Olivia had opened up to her and she feared Olivia shutting down again before another session could take place.
"I feel sad… obviously… I miss her… I wish she was here and that we had more time together. I long for her and wish I could do anything to bring her back." Olivia blinked fast and hard as she tried to keep composed, she didn't want to cry but Rosie pushed a box of tissue towards her.
"It's important you let it out, you should cry for her when you want to, it's an important part of the grieving process." She explained softly, it was obvious Olivia was far too used to having to be completely composed.
"It's hard, it's been three months since she died and so much has happened since then" Olivia replied still holding back the tears but her voice betraying her, cracking as she spoke.
"It was ONLY three months ago." Rosie pointed out. "That's not a long time ago Olivia and
look at everything that has happened since then that has hindered the grieving process. While so much has happened, you haven't been able to work your way through your grief and that takes time, a lot of time, it's not something that can happen overnight. So, while I think you have accepted your mother's death, I think you've missed the other necessary steps of grieving."
"So what does that mean?" Olivia asked, because she knew for Rosie to be telling her this she had an idea how to progress, George never explained things unless he had a solid answer for it, otherwise he would have been making things worse rather than better.
"I think right here in this office, once a week, you need to come in and focus on your mother's death, the impact it had had on you and your life, and in the safety of this office we will grieve for your mother and the hope I have that at the end, that acceptance will be a more relaxed and less intense acceptance, one that won't make your heart scream every time you think about her. I know, that grieving doesn't make the grief go away, that grief will be there for the rest of your life, but the intensity you feel, the pain I see in your eyes when you talk, isn't something that should be there forever, we need to get you to a place where you talk about your mom positively, with sadness, but not dwelling on the tragedy of her death and the anguish that has caused you."
"Just my Mom?" Olivia questioned, thinking that Rosie had lost the plot if she thought that she didn't need any support with dealing with her father's death.
"For now." Rosie replied. "One at a time." She added with a warm and gentle smile that comforted Olivia and gave her hope, just like George working on the postpartum had done for her.
Olivia left Dr Rosie's office feeling a feather lighter than she had going in. Once again, as with George, she knew she had a long journey to get to the place she wanted to be but little by little she would get there, she would be ok or at least she would be where the grief was in question.