I've spent almost half my life by now in a psychiatric institute, Bucky. I can tell real fast who is good at their job when it comes to treating patients and who is full of shit.
[There's a long pause before Dex's next text. Mainly because it's long and broken up into parts but also because he wants to make sure he gets in all the important pieces.]
I started seeing this therapist when I was 8. Dr. Eileen Mercer. Someone must have realized there wasn't something right with me and wanted to get me the help I needed. Right from the very start something clicked with her I'd never found before with any other adult in my life. I only got it later on that I saw her as the mother I never had. And by the end she really was more like my mom than my birth mother was.
She understood what was going on with me right away. Anything good in my personality that I still have today came from her, like all the coping mechanisms she taught me to keep me on the right path. It wasn't strictly an ethical doctor-patient relationship because she got really close to me too. I know she saw me on some level as her son, because she had the option when I was turning 18 to sign the orders to keep me locked up indefinitely, knowing what she did about the way my mind worked. But instead she sealed my records because she knew I wanted to go into the military.
I would have been fine seeing her forever but she got lung cancer. Inoperable and fatal. She died just after I turned 18. I don't think I ever fully got over that. She left me tapes of all our sessions to listen to when I got off track so I'd remember how far I'd come. Sometimes I listened to them just to hear her voice again.
No wonder things turned out the way they did for you.
I mean-shit. I'm not trying to make excuses, but- you tried your hardest. You did all the right things, and- you were lucky to have her. I'm so sorry she passed away. Loosing that anchor- it can feel like the greatest kind of loss. Hard to come back from. Sometimes it seems hopeless, I get it.
But you pushed past that. Jeez, you made it so fucking far. That's commendable. Really commendable.
It's actually really gratifying to hear someone acknowledge that. It seems like everyone has always just taken for granted I was SUPPOSED to act the same way as everyone else. That no one ever realized what kind of monumental effort that was actually taking for me to stay in control every single day. And to expect anyone to give me praise for that was just a stupid idea.
I just wished at the time I realized I had been doing so good. That I could have stayed good and still improved if I hadn't given up.
I think it's hard for people to understand something like that, especially when they haven't been through it. They see everything through their own world view but the struggle it takes to get where you are doesn't click for them.
You deserve the praise for it. You really do.
There was a lot working against you. And- yeah, you did terrible things, and maybe you did give up then- but you aren't anymore.
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bakerstreet2025-07-11 11:35 am
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which era are we doing this as? feel like we should always tag with era xD
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[There's a story there but not one he's willing to tell unprompted. Not when it still hurts to think of his therapist all these years later.]
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I started seeing this therapist when I was 8. Dr. Eileen Mercer. Someone must have realized there wasn't something right with me and wanted to get me the help I needed. Right from the very start something clicked with her I'd never found before with any other adult in my life. I only got it later on that I saw her as the mother I never had. And by the end she really was more like my mom than my birth mother was.
She understood what was going on with me right away. Anything good in my personality that I still have today came from her, like all the coping mechanisms she taught me to keep me on the right path. It wasn't strictly an ethical doctor-patient relationship because she got really close to me too. I know she saw me on some level as her son, because she had the option when I was turning 18 to sign the orders to keep me locked up indefinitely, knowing what she did about the way my mind worked. But instead she sealed my records because she knew I wanted to go into the military.
I would have been fine seeing her forever but she got lung cancer. Inoperable and fatal. She died just after I turned 18. I don't think I ever fully got over that. She left me tapes of all our sessions to listen to when I got off track so I'd remember how far I'd come. Sometimes I listened to them just to hear her voice again.
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No wonder things turned out the way they did for you.
I mean-shit. I'm not trying to make excuses, but- you tried your hardest. You did all the right things, and- you were lucky to have her. I'm so sorry she passed away. Loosing that anchor- it can feel like the greatest kind of loss. Hard to come back from. Sometimes it seems hopeless, I get it.
But you pushed past that. Jeez, you made it so fucking far. That's commendable. Really commendable.
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I just wished at the time I realized I had been doing so good. That I could have stayed good and still improved if I hadn't given up.
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You deserve the praise for it. You really do.
There was a lot working against you. And- yeah, you did terrible things, and maybe you did give up then- but you aren't anymore.
And now- now you're the one giving me advice too.