Therapy

Sometimes when I strolled into the student mental health offices I was sure that nothing was wrong with me, that I had come here just out of some weird fluke in the previous weeks, that I was fully capable of dealing with life's hurdles without regularly falling to pieces. My cheery outlook was always evident in the usual preliminary questions, how was your week are you keeping up with schoolwork are you sleeping alright. And then the therapist would ask how my parents were doing.

If you want to see me cry, you just need to ask me sincerely how my parents are doing. Or more specifically, how my father is doing. Ask about what he does with his day-to-day life, inquire about what makes him happy, tell me you hope his health is holding up. Just thinking about him nowadays brings tears to my eyes. I'll probably smile and blandly murmur something about how he's alright, he has a few grandkids now, he gets sick sometimes but that happens when your'e older. Push me a little bit and I'll break down. His days are spent in the two rooms of our apartment, either sitting on the futon staring at the muted television or lying on the bed staring vacantly at the ceiling. Nothing seems to make him happy, but then again, few things ever did. According to him, opening the refridgerator makes him sick, wearing anything less than full Minnesota winter gear on a trip to the grocery store here in sunny Southern California makes him sick, and if I open the front door too quickly, the slight gust of wind will make him sick.

It's not so much the old-man grumbling that gets to me, it's the fear that lies behind it all. He's afraid to leave those two small rooms, afraid to venture outside, afraid to talk to people. I've seen him stumble through ordering a meal at Boston Market and get angry at himself for the rest of the day for not handling it well. He doesn't answer the house phone, ever. I ask my parents why they even have a house phone if they never answer it, but they claim it's for emergencies. It's very evident why he chose to commit himself a few weeks ago, as anyone would go a little crazy from spending all day everyday in a tiny apartment with few distractions for months on end.

I can see two reasonable options here, neither of which will actually occur. One, I stay home from graduate school for an indeterminate amount of time, spending most of my days with Dad and giving him a social vent, hence helping his general mental health. I can also persuade him far better than any other family member to get outside and do things, like visit his grandchild. But I and everyone else in my family knwos that I won't do this. Two, I somehow find a nursing home with a Vietnamese translator that I and Mom approve of. This will also not happen. This is something that everyone deals with, but normally it's when they're in their 40s, not in their 20s. Boo-hoo life is so unfair. Boo-hoo why do these things happen to me, boo-hoo I am so special and alone and significant in my troubles.

This is why I struggled so much in therapy. Because yes, these are legitimate issues. My father is aging and someone needs to take care of him. But I cannot acknowledge the seriousness of this issue in my life, since my little life seems so insignificant to me. All these words, all this sound and fury, for nought. All my plans, options, worries... they disappear when I think about, well, anything at all. I can't take my own life seriously. Because it's just, well, mere existence.