Post by Josh Kennedy on Jun 16, 2017 15:05:01 GMT -5
Off-Camera:
28th July 2015
Reno, Nevada
The waiting room Josh sits in is minimal and almost clinical in nature. It’s spacious, with sterile white walls, pale wooden tables with neatly stacked piles of old magazines and metal-framed chairs set out in neat, perfectly regular rows. Nothing is out of place. Josh finds the perfect, precise symmetry of the place nothing short of maddening, and he feels restless. A big part of it's probably down to his nerves. This is the first time he's actively sought help, more often leaning towards suffering in silence. He faced his problems alone 'like a real man would', as his father would have said. Josh had inherited his father's stiff upper lip, as much as he hated to admit it. Josh looks completely out of place in the waiting room, his slightly scruffy, disheveled look immediately clashing with the snobby atmosphere that fills the air. He drums his fingers on the armrest of the chair starting with a regular pattern, which eventually devolves into an irregular, arrhythmic tic as he gets more and more restless. A young woman somewhere close to Josh’s age emerges from the corridor and approaches the waiting room. She is wearing a white button-up shirt and neatly ironed black trousers. She almost scans around, but sees that Josh is the only person waiting.
“Mr. Kennedy?” She asks. Her voice is soft and restrained.
“Here.” Josh responds with a nod.
“Oh, hello, Mr. Kennedy. I’m Dr. Nicholls, and I’ll be speaking with you today. Is that ok?”
“Yeah, that’s fine.” He says. His voice is as calm as always, his strong Southern accent adding a hint of warmth and friendliness to his tone.
“Right this way then, please.” She instructs, leading Josh down the corridor. There are a lot of rooms arranged perfectly symmetrically on either side of the corridor. The carefully and meticulously perfect layout seems artificial to Josh in some strange way. Eventually, Dr. Nicholls reaches a door with a metal plaque reading her name and position upon it. She leads Josh in and he is greeted with the sight of a generic psychiatrist’s office that looks exactly like the ones Josh had seen in movies and TV. The room itself is just as clinical as the exterior, filled with glass and pale wooden surfaces; a feeling of sterile perfectionism permeates everything. A long reclined chair padded with cushions is the centerpiece of the office, with an assortment of chairs and sofas arranged perpendicularly to each other. Josh stands awkwardly, unsure of what to do.
“Take a seat.” Dr. Nicholls instructs as she digs through a stack of papers on her desk. Her voice sounds more friendly now, softer and far less formal. Josh plumps for the nearest chair, and Dr. Nicholls takes the one directly opposite, a file now resting on her lap, presumably his.
“So, Dr. Nicholls, what’s the plan here?” Josh asks with a gulp.
“Oh, please, call me Andrea. What do you prefer, Josh or Joshua?”
“Josh.”
“Ok. So, since this is your first session, we’ll be just generally gauging your mental state, and what it is that you’re struggling with. I’m sure a lot more problems will come to light as we go forwards, they almost always do; but for now, we’ll start with the immediate. So, Josh, can you explain to me what it is that drove you to book an appointment to seek my help?”
“A friend of mine recommended you to me, Jess Hardy.”
“Ah, yes. I thought that might have been the case. Jess has spoken about you before.”
“She has? What has she said?”
“I’m afraid client confidentiality must be upheld here, I can’t divulge any information on what she’s spoken to me about. You could ask her yourself if you wanted to, though. So, what is it specifically that you’re struggling with?”
“Well, the most immediate thing is my work...”
“Yes. I see that you’re a wrestler, is that right?”
“Yeah, that’s right. See, I feel like I haven’t been getting anywhere. I haven’t achieved anything, y’know? And in a line of work like mine, it’s all down to my capabilities. My physicality, my strength, my endurance, my skill is what’s being tested. If I’m not succeeding, it’s off my own back. I’ve only been here three months, but I just haven’t been feeling that satisfaction that I used to. I’m becomin' disillusioned, I think. I’ve been gettin' a fairly reasonable win-to-loss ratio for someone just starting out, but wins and actual achievements aren’t really equivalent. I haven’t been achieving, and it’s not for a lack of opportunity, the General Managers and owner of the company have been extending some great chances to me. I’ve just not been makin’ the most of them.”
Andrea writes on a sheet of paper while she listens carefully to Josh’s words. Her deep blue eyes never break contact with his. Josh finds the intense eye contact unsettling.
“Hmm. Have you been feeling somewhat distracted from your work whilst you’ve had these big chances?”
“I’m always distracted. I’m always worryin’. What if I’m not good enough? If I win a title, where does that take me, where do I go? Am I ready for the scrutiny that comes with it? Am I prepared to be the best I can be, and how long can I keep it up? I’ll fall behind eventually if I’m not hungry enough. I’ve gotta keep goin’, so how do I avoid fallin’ off? Am I creating a good story for the viewers? Am I really giving every ounce of strength I have to give?”
“You seem to have a somewhat neurotic personality, Josh. Is there anything else about your mental state you can provide?”
“Well, I’ve struggled with depression on and off for the past eight years.”
Andrea frowns as she skims through the file.
“I have nothing on record about depression here.”
“I’ve ain’t seen or talked to anyone about it. Nobody knows. My Mom never knew, my sister never knew, my friends never knew.”
Andrea gives him a stern look.
“That’s an incredibly toxic approach, Josh. Now, I need to know this, have you ever had suicidal thoughts?”
“Yeah, kinda. I mean, I’ve never considered it seriously, but it’s something that’s popped into my head before, just as a concept. Just as a comforting notion, I guess. The fact that the option exists puts my problems into perspective for me. I ask myself ‘will these problems drive you to suicide?’ And the answer’s always ‘no.’ Is that a weird state of mind? 'Cause I have to explain that I’d never go through with it. I’m scared of leaving my sister and niece behind too much. Hell, I fear death too much or somethin'.”
“Have you had a family history of suicide?”
“Yeah. My father.”
“Is that why you think you fear leaving your loved ones behind? Why you fear death?”
“Absolutely. No question about it. I remember how abandoned Lexi and I felt when Dad died. Mom was workin’ non-stop, I had to take any job I could to help pull my own weight around the place and ease the load on Mom, plus I had to care for Lexi as she grew up. Mom never had the time to look out for us. Household chores and all that kinda stuff was left to us. I ain’t blamin’ Mom for that, she worked from 5AM to 11PM every day just to pay the bills and shit, but I was 11, it wasn’t an easy thing to keep up with. I’m lookin' out for Lexi and my niece Clara right now. I’m payin’ the bills, I’m earning the money to keep us with a roof over our heads. I have been ever since Lexi got pregnant.”
“Why was all that put on you after your sister’s pregnancy?”
“Mom got sick of us. Lexi got pregnant at 16. Mom couldn’t deal with that ‘hit to her reputation’, apparently. I’d been doin’ some wrestling for fun through high school, so I tried out for some indie divisions, got one in Reno, and moved out there in a trailer park with Lexi before Mom kicked us both out for good.”
“And the father?”
“The guy had committed a felony, he was like, 22. He bailed the morning after conception. He knew she was underaged.”
“And Lexi refused to terminate, presumably?”
“Yeah, of course. I didn’t want her to terminate either; she wasn’t in a place where that would have done anything good for her. She needed that baby; Clara gave her direction, Clara gave her purpose.”
Andrea writes all of this down.
"Very interesting life you've lived, Josh."
"Hell, you ain't know the half of it. And I don't tell nobody about any of this. You're lucky that I'm feelin' ready to open up, I was afraid I was gonna be a closed book today."
"Hmm. So, let's talk about your father a little bit more. Did you know he was depressed? Was he distant?"
"Nah, I didn't pick up on it. He was great. He was loving, he was attentive, he was alert, he was present 100% of the time. I've looked back on my Dad more times than you can imagine, tryin' to make sense of it. Nothin' comes to mind. He just lived his entire life in this haze of depression, and put on a brave face for everyone else's sake. Now I've caught myself doin' the same thing. In a lot of ways, I'm my father's son, as the saying goes, but I'm not doing what he did. I can't allow myself to hurt the people I love in the same way he did."
"Well, you can see how this approach is damaging, which is an incredibly crucial first step that you've made on your own. Now, I have to ask, was there any sort of event leading up to your father's final days that triggered the need to take his own life?"
"Not that I'm aware of. He was just... tired of putting up all these emotional walls, tired of keeping people out of what was happening in his head. But the way he saw it, that was life, you can't let nobody in or they'll exploit you. That's as much sense as I've been able to make of it. There was no big fall from grace, no suicide note, no explanation at all. It was just one day he's there as always, the next morning Mom finds him, and..." Josh falls silent, his facial expression clearly stating that he's being pulled back into living that moment again. He shakes his head and doesn't continue his sentence. Andrea writes something else down.
"I'm sorry, Josh. I know this must be painful, maybe we should move on?"
Josh nods.
"Ok, so you're feeling pressure at work which has been affecting your confidence, right?"
"Yeah, that's what I came here for. Recently I had this little... meltdown, I suppose."
"And why was that?"
"Shit's just spiralling out of control, it's all too big for me to comprehend. I came here to get pushed out of my comfort zone, to reach my peak and never stop, but I gave up a job in Japan where I had everything I could have ever wanted. Working for UWF had been my dream for so long that I would never have forgiven myself if I didn't try it, if I didn't sacrifice what I had gained to become more. I mean, the federation's full of people I watched as a teenager, people I idolised. My heroes are all there, to get a chance to work with them, I just couldn't pass it up. But I left a wonderful woman that I wanted nothing more than to start a family with, a beautiful apartment in Tokyo, and some great friends to take this job. I just feel like what I've gained doesn't outweigh what I've lost. But if I stayed I would have been takin' it all for granted. I would have tortured myself with the question of 'what if I had gone?' until I became so bitter that I burned it all to the ground anyways. At least this way I have a chance to do some damage control and get back some of what I've lost, maybe. Hell, I'm really torn up about all this."
"You seem to be a very perceptive person, Josh. You understand your situation well."
"Too well. Often this kinda thing distracts me, or worries me way more than it should. I get caught up in the trivial shit and I lose the bigger picture because of it. That's what leads me to make stupid decisions like this. I'm battlin' hall-of-famers I have no chance in hell of beating, I'm gettin' title shots just three months into my career here, it's just so much to deal with, and I'm completely alone."
"Don't you have your sister and Clara?"
"They're their own unit now, I'm just the one that supports 'em. They've got enough to deal with without my shit."
"So, you desire companionship?"
"Hell yeah. But, they need to understand my work, and what I have to deal with there. Lines between fantasy and reality are so blurred there. Like, Ricky Stanton and I got into some Twitter beef, and like, I know it's in-character on my end, but this guy doesn't know that and he doesn't know me, so does he think his talk for real, or...? Like, I don't really care, but it's confusing, so I have no idea what's goin' on in that kinda situation. I can assume that it comes from the same place as me on his end; but if I do, I'm in for one hell of a surprise when he sees me and beats the shit out me backstage or somethin'. I mean, that's just an example, I don't think I'm in any danger of that, but I can't be sure, y'know? I have to tread carefully, just in case. I gotta deal with weird things like that on a daily basis."
"Ricky Stanton? Is he the one on all of those billboards? I would assume he's a big deal in your line of work, if that's the case."
"Yep. Hall of Famer, and he's won almost every championship in the company. He's very skilled, he's pretty much the face of the company."
"And you and him had discourse online?"
"Well, we had a match comin' up. Gotta play an angle, create some tension, make a story, y'know? Everyone does it, but that line gets blurred. Some people take it real personal, others know it's just for the character. And even then some of it's real, and not just misinterpretation."
"So you feel like you have to tread carefully and be mindful?"
"Yeah. Again, the lines between characters and reality are so blurred nowadays, it can be pretty tough. I wanna keep my family and friends out of that, but it takes a toll, confuses you."
"I see."
"Yeah, all this shit floatin' around my head, I don't want that on them, y'know?"
"You sound very protective over your sister and niece."
"Of course I am. They're all I got. I've been raising Clara like she was my own daughter 'cause she got nobody else to be the father figure. If either of 'em got hurt because of me, I'd never be able to forgive myself. I don't care if it's technically someone else's fault for their actions, they'll have done it to hurt me, which would make me as guilty as they were." Josh says with a sigh.
"You don't give yourself any slack, it seems."
"I'm disciplined when I want to be. I feel like I've had to be that way."
"Because of the support you've had to give to your sister and niece?"
"Probably. It taught me an important lesson, that I wouldn't have learned at the age of 18 if I hadn't had to. I've always been too harsh on myself. Dad was an architect, and my mother's now the head researcher in theoretical physics at the University of South Florida, so I had high expectations put on me from them, which I also tried to enforce on myself. It's a force of habit by now."
"Well, Josh, you're certainly an interesting person, and you obviously feel like you have a lot of pressures weighing on your mental state. Depression in a case like yours is an understandable reaction. You've been fighting it with a stubborn determination, and you've obviously had enough of doing so alone. It's really crucial that you came to me to seek help, because your mental state would have been so much worse had you not. But, I'm afraid until we have another session, I can't take any action. You have my phone number, so you can call me any time you're struggling. And in the meantime, I'd recommend reaching out to your friends and loved ones, letting them know what you're going through. Shall I re-schedule another session for next week?" Andrea summarises as she looks at the clock on the wall and sees that they've run out of time.
"Ok. I... uh, yeah, please." Josh responds, being taken out of his thoughts suddenly. He's surprised by the sudden way in which their session is cut off, but stands up anyway.
"Thanks, Doc, this really helped." He says, lying slightly.
"It's what I do, Josh. I'll see you the same time next week." Andrea says.
Josh shakes her hand, thanks her for her time and makes his way out. He's not sure what he was expecting, but in truth, he doesn't really feel that much better off, beyond the slight relief of the weight of everything he's bottled up easing ever so slightly from his chest. Perhaps that in itself was miracle enough...
28th July 2015
Reno, Nevada
The waiting room Josh sits in is minimal and almost clinical in nature. It’s spacious, with sterile white walls, pale wooden tables with neatly stacked piles of old magazines and metal-framed chairs set out in neat, perfectly regular rows. Nothing is out of place. Josh finds the perfect, precise symmetry of the place nothing short of maddening, and he feels restless. A big part of it's probably down to his nerves. This is the first time he's actively sought help, more often leaning towards suffering in silence. He faced his problems alone 'like a real man would', as his father would have said. Josh had inherited his father's stiff upper lip, as much as he hated to admit it. Josh looks completely out of place in the waiting room, his slightly scruffy, disheveled look immediately clashing with the snobby atmosphere that fills the air. He drums his fingers on the armrest of the chair starting with a regular pattern, which eventually devolves into an irregular, arrhythmic tic as he gets more and more restless. A young woman somewhere close to Josh’s age emerges from the corridor and approaches the waiting room. She is wearing a white button-up shirt and neatly ironed black trousers. She almost scans around, but sees that Josh is the only person waiting.
“Mr. Kennedy?” She asks. Her voice is soft and restrained.
“Here.” Josh responds with a nod.
“Oh, hello, Mr. Kennedy. I’m Dr. Nicholls, and I’ll be speaking with you today. Is that ok?”
“Yeah, that’s fine.” He says. His voice is as calm as always, his strong Southern accent adding a hint of warmth and friendliness to his tone.
“Right this way then, please.” She instructs, leading Josh down the corridor. There are a lot of rooms arranged perfectly symmetrically on either side of the corridor. The carefully and meticulously perfect layout seems artificial to Josh in some strange way. Eventually, Dr. Nicholls reaches a door with a metal plaque reading her name and position upon it. She leads Josh in and he is greeted with the sight of a generic psychiatrist’s office that looks exactly like the ones Josh had seen in movies and TV. The room itself is just as clinical as the exterior, filled with glass and pale wooden surfaces; a feeling of sterile perfectionism permeates everything. A long reclined chair padded with cushions is the centerpiece of the office, with an assortment of chairs and sofas arranged perpendicularly to each other. Josh stands awkwardly, unsure of what to do.
“Take a seat.” Dr. Nicholls instructs as she digs through a stack of papers on her desk. Her voice sounds more friendly now, softer and far less formal. Josh plumps for the nearest chair, and Dr. Nicholls takes the one directly opposite, a file now resting on her lap, presumably his.
“So, Dr. Nicholls, what’s the plan here?” Josh asks with a gulp.
“Oh, please, call me Andrea. What do you prefer, Josh or Joshua?”
“Josh.”
“Ok. So, since this is your first session, we’ll be just generally gauging your mental state, and what it is that you’re struggling with. I’m sure a lot more problems will come to light as we go forwards, they almost always do; but for now, we’ll start with the immediate. So, Josh, can you explain to me what it is that drove you to book an appointment to seek my help?”
“A friend of mine recommended you to me, Jess Hardy.”
“Ah, yes. I thought that might have been the case. Jess has spoken about you before.”
“She has? What has she said?”
“I’m afraid client confidentiality must be upheld here, I can’t divulge any information on what she’s spoken to me about. You could ask her yourself if you wanted to, though. So, what is it specifically that you’re struggling with?”
“Well, the most immediate thing is my work...”
“Yes. I see that you’re a wrestler, is that right?”
“Yeah, that’s right. See, I feel like I haven’t been getting anywhere. I haven’t achieved anything, y’know? And in a line of work like mine, it’s all down to my capabilities. My physicality, my strength, my endurance, my skill is what’s being tested. If I’m not succeeding, it’s off my own back. I’ve only been here three months, but I just haven’t been feeling that satisfaction that I used to. I’m becomin' disillusioned, I think. I’ve been gettin' a fairly reasonable win-to-loss ratio for someone just starting out, but wins and actual achievements aren’t really equivalent. I haven’t been achieving, and it’s not for a lack of opportunity, the General Managers and owner of the company have been extending some great chances to me. I’ve just not been makin’ the most of them.”
Andrea writes on a sheet of paper while she listens carefully to Josh’s words. Her deep blue eyes never break contact with his. Josh finds the intense eye contact unsettling.
“Hmm. Have you been feeling somewhat distracted from your work whilst you’ve had these big chances?”
“I’m always distracted. I’m always worryin’. What if I’m not good enough? If I win a title, where does that take me, where do I go? Am I ready for the scrutiny that comes with it? Am I prepared to be the best I can be, and how long can I keep it up? I’ll fall behind eventually if I’m not hungry enough. I’ve gotta keep goin’, so how do I avoid fallin’ off? Am I creating a good story for the viewers? Am I really giving every ounce of strength I have to give?”
“You seem to have a somewhat neurotic personality, Josh. Is there anything else about your mental state you can provide?”
“Well, I’ve struggled with depression on and off for the past eight years.”
Andrea frowns as she skims through the file.
“I have nothing on record about depression here.”
“I’ve ain’t seen or talked to anyone about it. Nobody knows. My Mom never knew, my sister never knew, my friends never knew.”
Andrea gives him a stern look.
“That’s an incredibly toxic approach, Josh. Now, I need to know this, have you ever had suicidal thoughts?”
“Yeah, kinda. I mean, I’ve never considered it seriously, but it’s something that’s popped into my head before, just as a concept. Just as a comforting notion, I guess. The fact that the option exists puts my problems into perspective for me. I ask myself ‘will these problems drive you to suicide?’ And the answer’s always ‘no.’ Is that a weird state of mind? 'Cause I have to explain that I’d never go through with it. I’m scared of leaving my sister and niece behind too much. Hell, I fear death too much or somethin'.”
“Have you had a family history of suicide?”
“Yeah. My father.”
“Is that why you think you fear leaving your loved ones behind? Why you fear death?”
“Absolutely. No question about it. I remember how abandoned Lexi and I felt when Dad died. Mom was workin’ non-stop, I had to take any job I could to help pull my own weight around the place and ease the load on Mom, plus I had to care for Lexi as she grew up. Mom never had the time to look out for us. Household chores and all that kinda stuff was left to us. I ain’t blamin’ Mom for that, she worked from 5AM to 11PM every day just to pay the bills and shit, but I was 11, it wasn’t an easy thing to keep up with. I’m lookin' out for Lexi and my niece Clara right now. I’m payin’ the bills, I’m earning the money to keep us with a roof over our heads. I have been ever since Lexi got pregnant.”
“Why was all that put on you after your sister’s pregnancy?”
“Mom got sick of us. Lexi got pregnant at 16. Mom couldn’t deal with that ‘hit to her reputation’, apparently. I’d been doin’ some wrestling for fun through high school, so I tried out for some indie divisions, got one in Reno, and moved out there in a trailer park with Lexi before Mom kicked us both out for good.”
“And the father?”
“The guy had committed a felony, he was like, 22. He bailed the morning after conception. He knew she was underaged.”
“And Lexi refused to terminate, presumably?”
“Yeah, of course. I didn’t want her to terminate either; she wasn’t in a place where that would have done anything good for her. She needed that baby; Clara gave her direction, Clara gave her purpose.”
Andrea writes all of this down.
"Very interesting life you've lived, Josh."
"Hell, you ain't know the half of it. And I don't tell nobody about any of this. You're lucky that I'm feelin' ready to open up, I was afraid I was gonna be a closed book today."
"Hmm. So, let's talk about your father a little bit more. Did you know he was depressed? Was he distant?"
"Nah, I didn't pick up on it. He was great. He was loving, he was attentive, he was alert, he was present 100% of the time. I've looked back on my Dad more times than you can imagine, tryin' to make sense of it. Nothin' comes to mind. He just lived his entire life in this haze of depression, and put on a brave face for everyone else's sake. Now I've caught myself doin' the same thing. In a lot of ways, I'm my father's son, as the saying goes, but I'm not doing what he did. I can't allow myself to hurt the people I love in the same way he did."
"Well, you can see how this approach is damaging, which is an incredibly crucial first step that you've made on your own. Now, I have to ask, was there any sort of event leading up to your father's final days that triggered the need to take his own life?"
"Not that I'm aware of. He was just... tired of putting up all these emotional walls, tired of keeping people out of what was happening in his head. But the way he saw it, that was life, you can't let nobody in or they'll exploit you. That's as much sense as I've been able to make of it. There was no big fall from grace, no suicide note, no explanation at all. It was just one day he's there as always, the next morning Mom finds him, and..." Josh falls silent, his facial expression clearly stating that he's being pulled back into living that moment again. He shakes his head and doesn't continue his sentence. Andrea writes something else down.
"I'm sorry, Josh. I know this must be painful, maybe we should move on?"
Josh nods.
"Ok, so you're feeling pressure at work which has been affecting your confidence, right?"
"Yeah, that's what I came here for. Recently I had this little... meltdown, I suppose."
"And why was that?"
"Shit's just spiralling out of control, it's all too big for me to comprehend. I came here to get pushed out of my comfort zone, to reach my peak and never stop, but I gave up a job in Japan where I had everything I could have ever wanted. Working for UWF had been my dream for so long that I would never have forgiven myself if I didn't try it, if I didn't sacrifice what I had gained to become more. I mean, the federation's full of people I watched as a teenager, people I idolised. My heroes are all there, to get a chance to work with them, I just couldn't pass it up. But I left a wonderful woman that I wanted nothing more than to start a family with, a beautiful apartment in Tokyo, and some great friends to take this job. I just feel like what I've gained doesn't outweigh what I've lost. But if I stayed I would have been takin' it all for granted. I would have tortured myself with the question of 'what if I had gone?' until I became so bitter that I burned it all to the ground anyways. At least this way I have a chance to do some damage control and get back some of what I've lost, maybe. Hell, I'm really torn up about all this."
"You seem to be a very perceptive person, Josh. You understand your situation well."
"Too well. Often this kinda thing distracts me, or worries me way more than it should. I get caught up in the trivial shit and I lose the bigger picture because of it. That's what leads me to make stupid decisions like this. I'm battlin' hall-of-famers I have no chance in hell of beating, I'm gettin' title shots just three months into my career here, it's just so much to deal with, and I'm completely alone."
"Don't you have your sister and Clara?"
"They're their own unit now, I'm just the one that supports 'em. They've got enough to deal with without my shit."
"So, you desire companionship?"
"Hell yeah. But, they need to understand my work, and what I have to deal with there. Lines between fantasy and reality are so blurred there. Like, Ricky Stanton and I got into some Twitter beef, and like, I know it's in-character on my end, but this guy doesn't know that and he doesn't know me, so does he think his talk for real, or...? Like, I don't really care, but it's confusing, so I have no idea what's goin' on in that kinda situation. I can assume that it comes from the same place as me on his end; but if I do, I'm in for one hell of a surprise when he sees me and beats the shit out me backstage or somethin'. I mean, that's just an example, I don't think I'm in any danger of that, but I can't be sure, y'know? I have to tread carefully, just in case. I gotta deal with weird things like that on a daily basis."
"Ricky Stanton? Is he the one on all of those billboards? I would assume he's a big deal in your line of work, if that's the case."
"Yep. Hall of Famer, and he's won almost every championship in the company. He's very skilled, he's pretty much the face of the company."
"And you and him had discourse online?"
"Well, we had a match comin' up. Gotta play an angle, create some tension, make a story, y'know? Everyone does it, but that line gets blurred. Some people take it real personal, others know it's just for the character. And even then some of it's real, and not just misinterpretation."
"So you feel like you have to tread carefully and be mindful?"
"Yeah. Again, the lines between characters and reality are so blurred nowadays, it can be pretty tough. I wanna keep my family and friends out of that, but it takes a toll, confuses you."
"I see."
"Yeah, all this shit floatin' around my head, I don't want that on them, y'know?"
"You sound very protective over your sister and niece."
"Of course I am. They're all I got. I've been raising Clara like she was my own daughter 'cause she got nobody else to be the father figure. If either of 'em got hurt because of me, I'd never be able to forgive myself. I don't care if it's technically someone else's fault for their actions, they'll have done it to hurt me, which would make me as guilty as they were." Josh says with a sigh.
"You don't give yourself any slack, it seems."
"I'm disciplined when I want to be. I feel like I've had to be that way."
"Because of the support you've had to give to your sister and niece?"
"Probably. It taught me an important lesson, that I wouldn't have learned at the age of 18 if I hadn't had to. I've always been too harsh on myself. Dad was an architect, and my mother's now the head researcher in theoretical physics at the University of South Florida, so I had high expectations put on me from them, which I also tried to enforce on myself. It's a force of habit by now."
"Well, Josh, you're certainly an interesting person, and you obviously feel like you have a lot of pressures weighing on your mental state. Depression in a case like yours is an understandable reaction. You've been fighting it with a stubborn determination, and you've obviously had enough of doing so alone. It's really crucial that you came to me to seek help, because your mental state would have been so much worse had you not. But, I'm afraid until we have another session, I can't take any action. You have my phone number, so you can call me any time you're struggling. And in the meantime, I'd recommend reaching out to your friends and loved ones, letting them know what you're going through. Shall I re-schedule another session for next week?" Andrea summarises as she looks at the clock on the wall and sees that they've run out of time.
"Ok. I... uh, yeah, please." Josh responds, being taken out of his thoughts suddenly. He's surprised by the sudden way in which their session is cut off, but stands up anyway.
"Thanks, Doc, this really helped." He says, lying slightly.
"It's what I do, Josh. I'll see you the same time next week." Andrea says.
Josh shakes her hand, thanks her for her time and makes his way out. He's not sure what he was expecting, but in truth, he doesn't really feel that much better off, beyond the slight relief of the weight of everything he's bottled up easing ever so slightly from his chest. Perhaps that in itself was miracle enough...
