With this issue, one of America's best-known psychiatrists becomes
aregular contributor to PSYCHOLOGY TODAY. Frank Pittman, M.D., a
practicing family therapist in Atlanta, is the widely quoted author of
Man Enough: Fathers, Sons, and the Search for Masculinity (Putnam), and
Private Lies (Norton). In this space, Dr. Frank will answer real
questions from real people with his unusual mix of subversive wit and
heart-stopping widsdom. Send your questions to Dr. Frank by mail to
PSYCHOLOGY TODAY, 24 E. 23 St., New York, NY 10010, or by fax to
212-260-7445.
DEAR DR. FRANK: MY LIFE IS GOING OKAY. I DON'T FEEL THAT THERE'S
ANYTHING REALLY WRONG WITH ME, MY JOB, OR MY MARRIAGE, BUT NOTHING ABOUT
MY LIFE SEEMS VERY SPECIAL. I'M JUST NOT HAPPY. WOULD THERAPY
HELP?
Dear Not Happy: You are suffering from "dysthymia," which just
means you're not happy. It may be that happiness was not a skill taught
in your family or that your childhood was unstable. People whose parents
neglect them, abuse them, or get divorced don't dare trust happiness.
Unhappiness becomes a habit, a way of life. Your brain chemistry is not
making it possible for you to anticipate pleasure.
Dysthymia leads to infidelity, divorce, and job instability--
desperate efforts to shake life up enough to make us feel things.
Dysthymic people blame their lives for not being juicy enough when they
are just suffering from dry brains.
Happiness comes from pumping the right juices into your brain. The
juices flow when you experience exercise, sex, joy, and triumph. But they
flow most juicily when the exercise is free of anger, the sex free of
guilt, the joy free of shame, and the triumph free of fear.
Happiness requires freedom to play and playmates to play with,
people who like you and value your joy. Children are ideal playmates, so
hang out with them. Happiness also requires setting achievable goals so
you can have moments of triumph when you experience life's little
victories. Think small. Rather than staking your happiness on becoming
master of the universe, clean out your sock drawer instead.
And above all, even if you can't arrange the other things easily,
you can get exercise. An hour of exercise every day would work a lot
better for most dysthymic people than an hour of psychotherapy.
A good therapist can coach you into a life of active happiness and
can train you in the skill of happiness. But be sure to hire a happy
therapist. Dysthymic therapists look for someone to blame for people's
unhappiness, for ways to escape pain rather than helping dysthymic people
find things to make them emotionally alive.
A therapist should not wring your hankie while you whine, but
should be your trainer and coach, inspiring you into life. Whining about
your inability to achieve a constant state of ecstatic wonder not only
runs off your prospective playmates, it makes you even more
unhappy.
Of course, if you do your little projects while dancing around the
house to your favorite music, if you exercise and screw yourself into
exhaustion, and you still feel dysthymic, try Prozac. A squirt of
serotonin into your dry synapses may prime the driest of pumps.
Dear Dr. Frank: I used to be subject to depression. My wife was
wonderful in helping me through it. Probably as a result of therapy, I'm
happier than I've ever been before. But I realize that my wife is not
much fun, and she isn't comfortable with my new spirit. I don't want to
go back to my old unhappiness. Should I give up my wife instead?
Dear Happier: You have trained your wife to center her life around
your unhappiness. Depressed people may or may not be enjoying their
misery, but they're not much fun to the people around them. The hovering
caretakers get drained, tired, and angry. When we're unhappy, we are
motivated by pain avoidance rather than the pursuit of happiness, so our
partner gradually gives up on seducing us into pleasure and ends up
pushing us through life with an emotional cattle prod. Spouses may have
to be retaught how to make the formerly depressed feel good. They may
even have to relearn how to play themselves. Your pain and/or pleasure
has been the center of the universe for a while; now it's her
turn.
Dear Dr. Frank: I've had a lot of therapy and read a lot of
self-help books. I've learned to really love myself. I always pamper my
inner child. I have overcome any tendency to feel guilt for anything I
do. I'm real good at asserting myself and expressing my anger, and I
don't let anyone abuse me in any way. I've worked particularly hard on my
codependency. I've cut off all my dysfunctional relationships. I'm now
ready for a perfect relationship but no one I meet matches my level of
mental health. What can I do to get the love I deserve?
Dear Deserving: You have learned, to your sorrow, that we
therapists can get so obsessed with protecting people that we may damage
their ability to conduct relationships with real people. Do you remember
the manners mom taught you? In therapy, good manners can seem like
pathological codependency, and the parent who taught you to subordinate
your own infantile needs to the requirements of relationships can seem
abusive. But the real world is different from therapy.
Once outside the therapist's office, your feelings are not the
still point of the turning world. Out among normal people, you will find
those manners more helpful to you than all the stuff you got from therapy
or from self-help books.
Tags:
achievable goals,
advice,
brain chemistry,
desperate efforts,
dr frank,
family therapist,
frank pittman,
happiness comes from,
issue one,
juices flow,
mail,
playmates,
practicing family,
putnam,
real people
