Call Her Daddy - Couples Therapy (ft. Dr. Orna Guralnik) (REVISIT)

Episode Date: September 21, 2022

Daddy Gang, while CHD is on a quick break, check out this revisit of a past favorite episode. New episodes of CHD will return on 9/28. Father Cooper is joined by clinical psychologist, psychoanalyst and star of the hit docu-series Couples’ Therapy, Dr. Orna Guralnik. This episode has something for everyone, whether you have never attended therapy in your life or you are years into the process. Dr. Guralnik begins with the basics (do I bring a PowerPoint presentation to my first therapy session?!) and addresses more advanced topics such as attachment style, dissociation, and transgenerational trauma in a way that is captivating for all. Not currently in a relationship? Doesn’t matter. Have pen and paper ready because every word out of Dr. Guralnik’s mouth is a piece of wisdom you will want to hold onto. Bonus content…does she analyze Alex in the process?

Hello, Daddy Gang. We need to talk, okay? We're going on a break. Sad. Well, not really. We're going on a break because we are taking two weeks off to reset for season two of Call Her Daddy on Spotify. I've seen you guys in my DMs. Hey, Big Al, what the fuck is a season? You've been doing this podcast for about four plus years. Why is it just season two? The beauty of being your own boss is you get to just make shit up. So season one of Call Her Daddy with Spotify was my first year with Spotify. I have a three year deal. Now we're entering the second year, a.k.a. season two. Things are coming your way. September 28th is the kickoff to season two of Call Her Daddy. But until then, I'm going to re-release an episode because not putting something out

just feels icky and wrong. Like I'm cheating on you. Never unfaithful, disloyal. It doesn't matter. I'm always going to be loyal to you guys. I can't cheat on you guys if I'm on a break. So, Daddy Gang, enjoy yourself. And I will be back September 28th.

Goodbye. What is up, Daddy Gang? It is your single father, Alex Cooper, with Call Her Daddy. All right, all right, all right. What the fuck is up, Daddy Gang? It is your founding father, back on at it for another episode of Call Her Daddy.

Daddy Gang, today is going to be a little different than most episodes. Selfishly, it is one of my favorite episodes. Today, I am speaking with Dr. Orna Goralnik. She's a doctor, a licensed therapist, but more importantly, for anyone paying attention to my social media, she is the couples therapist on the new Showtime series, Couples Therapy. For those of you listening who have never stepped into a therapist's office, courtesy of Call Her Daddy today, this will be your first session. And for those of you who are in therapy, this is about to be your best therapy session that anyone could fucking ask for. This woman is unbelievable. So let's get right into it. Grab your notebook, grab your tissues. And if you have a significant other, have them sit the fuck down and hand them the goddamn tissues because we are opening this

thing the fuck up. And if your significant other is still there at the end of this episode, you know you got a good one, daddy gang. And if they're not, move the fuck on. This will resonate with everyone listening to this episode. It doesn't matter your age, your background. It doesn't discriminate. This episode is relatable. And if you have a hard time absorbing this first go round, that is okay. Listen again and again until you get it. It is not a one and done episode, just like therapy is not a one and done fix. Introducing Dr. Orna is sitting on a couch right now. And I said the roles are reversed today. I love it. Welcome to Call Her Daddy.

Thank you. Thank you, Alex. I'm excited to have a conversation with you today regarding mental health therapy. Obviously, this sparked because you have a recent show that came out on Showtime, Couples Therapy, which you are the therapist and you are conducting couples therapy for multiple different couples. I became obsessed with the show. Everyone on my Instagram was like, Alex, stop forcing us to watch this. Oh, my God, this is amazing. Like, first, like, what is she talking about?

And then all of a sudden it was like obsession. And so I know why you look, you're keeping. I don't get it. Why? And then all of a sudden it was like obsession. And so I know why you look, you're keeping like, why? I don't get it. Why? I mean, I think the show is wonderful, but I'm not sure I understand how your generation got so interested. I mean, it's amazing to me, but I don't get it. I think I was sort of trying to explain it to you that like I mental health was a requirement

in my home growing up. And the conversation about therapy was so fluid. And I know that's not for everyone. But in my personal life, that's what I was raised on. And so I think anything regarding therapy and mental health, especially as my platform has grown, I've become more entrenched in wanting to learn about it. And so when I saw couples therapy, I became addicted and I couldn't stop watching and I was binging, which even the binging don't aren't you like what why why I not not only why there's so many things that are like enigmatic to me and like intriguing about the fact that you

were inviting me for this. Like, first of all, binging on therapy, you know, I'm used to like a very slow pace of working right people you know by the end of the session they're like ah get me out of here I need to think I don't want to see you and they take their time and then people are binging on therapy it's so interesting to me I think because being in therapy I knew that in the show there was either going to be progression or regression like something was going to happen and so i think i became very invested in the interpersonal dynamics of these couples and wanted to see whether they like i think people can find themes within all these couples you can relate a little bit so i think you want to see how it goes yeah um but welcome to the show

i we have so much to talk about i first wanted to say that for me and my journey with therapy i think with regard to the pandemic it's been a year of a lot of i i'm pretty sure you may not know this thing but like kylie jenner everyone was like this is the year of realizing that was my year of you don't yeah we're just like what are you talking about but this was the year of like realizing for me I think I really got into therapy deeper than I've ever gotten and I am so happy I'm able to talk about that on this show you went a step further though because I'm on the show being like guys my therapist told me this You broke down the wall and now you are having a show that is showing therapy and not just the glamorous side of like, oh, my gosh, they're better now. It's like the awkward silences, the hard questions that you're in therapy and the therapist looks at you and asks you a pointed question about your childhood that you haven't thought about because you've repressed it. And we're watching that unfold.

So I commend you. And I'm honestly so honored watching that unfold so i commend you and i'm honestly so honored to be sitting with someone like you that's been able to create such an amazing product thank you alex you have a 21 year old daughter that was so funny to me so did she know about call her daddy yes she knew about it and all her friends know about it and suddenly i'm on their radar i mean till, till this moment, I meant nothing to them, Showtime, whatever, nothing. Now suddenly, oh, your mom's famous. You're like, oh my God, your mom's going on Call Her Daddy? Then we care. That's hilarious. That's very fun for me.

Oh my God. Okay. So can we go, would you mind going a little bit into detail about like who you are, where you're from, and how you got into this background? By training, I'm a psychologist and a psychoanalyst. But in addition to being a psychoanalyst, I also did couples therapy for a long time. I got trained in it and love the combination of working both intensely with individuals and with couples. I also teach and write. I write a lot of theory. And somehow through my psychoanalytic institute, which is NYU Postdoc, the makers of the show, they got to me somehow through my institute. First thought, I'll talk to them because I have a background in film. I did my first degree in film. But then somehow in the long conversations we started having, we really kicked it off.

It was like a real meeting of minds. And they somehow convinced me, why don't you do it? Which seemed completely outrageous and impossible to me. Like, first of all, the whole project was like, how is this ever going to work to document film? Like, is this ever going to feel natural? Is it going to be authentic? But then to put myself in front of cameras seemed like, how is that ever going to feel natural? Is it going to be authentic? But then to put myself in front of cameras seemed like, I don't, how's that ever going to work? And then the other big concern I had is, oh my God, I'm putting all this work in front of these filmmakers. Are they going to be able to stay sort of true to the storyline of a real treatment? Or are they going to feel compelled to tell a different kind of story? I was thinking about that because the thought of my own therapy experience, I know there are some sessions where I don't really say anything profound and nothing really happens. And like

that was kind of a boring therapy session. But you need to keep those in there to show the growth of them when there are sessions that there's a huge breakthrough. And I thought that the filmmakers did an amazing job of keeping that authenticity of there are going to be moments where we don't get much out of them. And then to see the progression of when you do that comparison and that parallel was really apparent for me, which I thought was amazingly well done. Right. And you know, also in those sessions that seemingly nothing's happening, probably a lot is happening. It's just happening on the pre verbal implicit level, right? And something is cooking both in your mind and your unconscious and something is cooking between you and your analyst or your therapist,

that is still hasn't surfaced to the level of insight. But something's happening and you can't get to those, like you're saying, those moments if you skip that process. Everyone thought that the couples were actors. I at first thought they were because I didn't understand how did you find people that were willing to do this? Like, was it hard at first? Do you know that process? I mean, that's a big thing. I mean, luckily, I don't have to do that really difficult work. I mean, there's a whole team that recruits people.

I know what they were looking for were, first of all, people that authentically really wanted treatment. That was their first motivation, not being on a show and people that whose stories were strong compelling they were looking for people that would be like a good diverse representation of like the real world rather than just a particular type of couple and it somehow worked it was interesting because you're revealing slowly through a season so many different themes that are just human themes. Like we all go through them in some way or another. So I think that and knowing it was real and almost having this weird voyeuristic feeling of like, oh, my gosh, I am in my therapy sessions. I know what happens. So to watch others like it was a strange dynamic that I really enjoyed. Now, I don't know if people that aren't in therapy, maybe they're not binging it like me. But I just I just want to say, I really like what you're saying, just in terms of that

was our hope, which is that people will eventually they might start off with some kind of, oh, that's their problem. They're other than me. But when they get to know each of the characters, that viewers will actually realize, oh, my God, we're all so similar. There's so much more in common between us than othering. So much more and also so much empathy. Like I looked at people that at first I would there would be couples. I'm oh I'm annoyed with that that one person and then slowly through the unveiling of their past and what they've gone through and the trauma that they experienced whether it was as a child um or in their adulthood whatever it was it was like oh shit like yet again it's the corny saying but like we don't know what people have gone through and that was very cool to see at first someone being stone cold and hard and not giving much.

And then all of a sudden by like the fourth episode when I'm like, oh, I'm bored with this storyline. Oh, my gosh. Wait. Right. Whoa. That's why that person is the way they are. Yeah. So you for saying that.

Oh, my God. You did an amazing job. I also was fascinated, like not when you're in something, sometimes you're not able to see it. Yeah. And then when you watch it, whether it's in a movie or a show, and then you have your opinion, then it's helpful. Sometimes like, oh, wait, that was me. Oh, interesting. I like to look at things from a third point of view. And like, I like to look above. And sometimes when I'm too into my own head about whether it's a situation with someone I'm dating, etc. I like to be like, okay, hold on. If this was my friend, what would my advice be to her? Take your own advice. Did you feel like the events of the pandemic, was that playing heavily into the dynamic of what was going on with couples? Yes.

It's always very powerful in every treatment that I've done. And I've been doing this for a long time. Whatever is happening in the outside world actually has a huge impact on what goes on between people, both intra psychically and between them and their partner. It made for a very different kind of conversation between couples about differences between them and about privilege between them. Like within a little couple system, there's also all sorts of issues of privilege that have to do, you know, gender, class, race, history. Yeah. It was, I remember. It changed the conversation. It did. And it forced conversations that I think all of us were like,

wow, I can't believe we've never really had these. Right. And then it was all we could talk about for almost the entire year. Right. And then on top of the intensity, then there was the actual just day to day of watching couples be like, we actually wanted time together because he's always traveling. And now I want to kill him because now we're in the same space and we're claustrophobic of each other and now we need space. And so the dynamic of couples that wanted that time and now they're like, oh, God, wait, now I'm seeing who my partner is. And do I not like them because now I'm finally spending enough time to understand who this

person is? Or is it because we're in the confines of our home for X amount of hours a day? Like, I think people were struggling with, am I losing it because of the situation? Or is this an opportunity to show me who my partner is? Absolutely. That was difficult. Yeah, that was very well said. You captured kind of the essence of it. I thought about it a lot in therapy. I have.

I mean, there's so many stressors. And then you've got your partner right there. And how is this not going to play out between the two of you? Right. Either in the form of like, you know, dumping your stress on your partner or assuming that they're the one doing all this bad thing to you, or they just have a different way of responding. And you're like mad about that. and because there's nowhere else to go with whatever is upsetting you. So it became it became like a very like a little mini drama between two people that really had a lot to do with other things in the world. I first wanted to just say, I think debunking some of the myths about therapy. I have people that are in therapy or all the way back to like, is it scary? Do I have to make a PowerPoint presentation and be like, this is my life story. Hi, therapist, like people are terrified,

I think, because I think for so long, it's been intense. And you don't know what how what happened. Someone was like, do I like sit in an electric chair? Like what is going on when you go to therapy? And so I think normalizing that I would say it is the best investment you can make in your entire life. I agree. I agree. I agree. You're investing in your own mind and your own psyche. And ultimately, if you do the work, you will be able to do good for the world. So it's not only a selfish investment, you become like a better friend, a better partner, ultimately a better parent, and ultimately a better member of society. Yeah. I had been saying

to you earlier that I was raised in a home where mental health wasn't an option, it was a requirement. And it was always on the to do list. My mom always messaged to my siblings and I, the only way to enter into a relationship with another person is working on yourself first and including empowerment and sense of self. Because if you have that, then when you're going into a relationship, the codependency and the toxicity won't be as there if you know who you are. I wanted to ask you, Orna, for people who have never engaged in therapy, like we're about to get into it because I want you to maybe if you could clarify the difference between people that have a great support system, you have a great friend, you have a great family member that gives such good advice

versus committing to therapy. I do psychoanalytic work mostly. And that is very different from talking to your best, most supportive, close person, in the sense that the journey you go on in psychoanalytic therapy is you're trying to get to know things about yourself that you don't know, you haven't known before. You're trying to kind of open up a door between your conscious and your unconscious. Interesting. So you're trying to get to know about things that motivate you that you're not necessarily aware of. So when you go and talk to whether it's like, even if you have the best relationship with your mom, or your partner or your girlfriend, you won't know to talk about those things. And you're going on a very deep and

wonderful journey, where you get to know about things that affect who you are, how you're thinking, how you interact with other people, the impact you're having on the world, you get to know a much deeper layer of all of that. I personally feel like everyone has to be somewhat of the way they are because of how they were raised, who their parents are, their childhood. Is the psychoanalytic work always starting back at something in the childhood? Another amazing question. Seriously. There is some basic idea that early experiences shape the mind, whether it's very early attachment paradigms or trauma or just the way you've experienced the world, not to mention like language and culture and all of the things that shape us. And, you know, the younger you are, the more impactful those experiences are, and they will eventually kind of set into certain patterns. And that's part of what you're trying to deconstruct when

you're doing analytic work. Part of what happens to us when we're younger is we, things happen and we, certain patterns get kind of set into us like certain blueprints. And then we come to expect certain things of the world based on what happened to us could you give us an example just in case people don't understand sure let's say you know you're you were born to a mother that had postpartum and you came to expect um little of your mother because your mother was early on wracked by depression and unable to really respond to you. So you came to expect little and to kind of be self-sufficient and operate that way in the world. I mean, I'm really simplifying things.

So what will happen eventually is when you get into analytic work or when you get into an intimate relationship, some of those early patterns will get played out with someone you're very close to. So you might, with a partner, you might, when you're really getting close to someone and it's a moment where you might actually depend on that someone. You pull away. You pull away. Exactly. Because you have that very early experience of a mother who had depression. So you can even work on that without even getting into the early experiences, but simply working on your fear of dependency or your need to be self-sufficient. Someone wrote in, is it necessary to relive

childhood trauma in therapy to heal? Or can I just move on? It depends. It's not necessary. Sometimes it's incredibly helpful. And usually the more people want to stay away from their childhood, the more they need to go there. But you can do the work in different ways. It's not, I mean, some people just really don't want to go there and they're better off not going there. And like you said, it also depends on where you are in your life, what chapter you are in your life.

It might not feel relevant for a very long time and then suddenly something happens in your life and suddenly you feel like, oh my God, I need to go and revisit that thing that I didn't want to touch for all of this time so that's a good point I I always said to I've had certain friends or family members go into therapy at different times and I had had a very close friend lose a parent and it was like 13 years later got into therapy and they just weren't ready and I've always said like you can't force someone to get into therapy and they just weren't ready. And I've always said like, you can't force someone to get into therapy. They need to be ready to do it on their own. Absolutely. And in the therapy itself, you can't force someone to go where they don't want to go.

You stay with a person where they are. And to your saying earlier that some people are fearful of therapy, they're probably mostly fearful of their own mind. Because I mean, in a decent therapy, the therapist is your ally, they're with you to help you through, they're not there to torture you. Really? Some people are not. I think that's another concept that people are writing in, like, what if I don't like my therapist, you can leave your therapist. Like, I'm sure that happens all the time. If there's not a connection, you go and find another one. Absolutely.

I think it's funny because I remember living back in New York and going to – it was – I go on Wednesdays and it was a Wednesday and I was on the phone with my mom. And I'm like, I don't want to go to therapy this week. I have nothing to talk about. My life is great right now. My life is fine i and i was always going in the crisis mode and my mom had said to me alex you know she said alexandra um she said those are going to be the best session that was your best session it was that began the unraveling of what i'm still now working on yes Yes. And I think a lot of people get nervous.

I don't have anything to talk about this week. I love those sessions. I love those sessions when people start declaring that. Because I had a hard time in therapy for a little bit. Having this platform, I have to kind of have everything like buttoned up and know what I'm saying to the world. And when I go into therapy, my therapist was kind of like, can you just try to talk without having everything? But I already know that this is why. And I had all the answers. And my therapist was like, Alex, maybe try to come next week not knowing what you want to talk about.

And not having the answers. Like I want to see you vulnerable. I would like to see some real emotion as opposed to you having everything packaged before you come to therapy. The point of therapy is for me to help you go through the hard times, not you go through them, package it, and then just tell me about it. Right. And similar to what we were saying earlier, like she wants you closer to that boundary between your conscious and unconscious mind. She wants you to get curious about what you don't know. It was maybe for the first few months, almost, like maybe like the first month or two, I remember being like, mom, I'm not learning anything. I know everything. I'm going in here and I'm just speaking.

And then she just stares at me and I leave. And then it was around like maybe three months, all of a sudden I left.'m like whoa and I was watching an interview of yours and you said this 12 week mark was fascinating to you can you talk about that yeah that that that was interesting by the way just a side comment but like that you it sounds to me like you were testing your therapist it took you three months to see basically is this a person i can really talk to that's a really good point because i always feel like yeah it was hard for me to like i would go in and then leave and i would feel like

that would i knew that right because you didn't you didn't bring yourself to your edge right because you needed to see who you're talking to and that's very wise right right right and so I think yeah and I remember then having that breakthrough and then feeling finally like relying on her a little bit to give me the answers as opposed to me leaving and being like wow what am I spending my money on like that was for nothing but it was gaining that rapport and i think a lot of people have written in being like i've gone on and off like i've gone to a couple and then i stop like i just can't and i think if i'm if i can tell anyone as someone that's is in therapy it takes a hot minute to start to really get there because for me it took three months to even trust my therapist.

Yeah, you're not a machine. Right. You're not a machine. Right. You want to see who you're talking to and you should take your time. You do psychoanalytic work with regard to – you only do it in individuals? You don't do couples? Well, my couples work is kind of a combination of – because it's a couple, the work is often different.

So it's influenced by what we call systems, theory of family systems. So we also look at like the kind of patterns that couples create between them. And they might be, of course, they are partially influenced by each of the couple's early histories or previous histories. But there's also certain dynamics that couples create between them. One huge point that I took from every episode was more than half the time that the couples were sitting there and one had an issue with the other. Most of the time, it was like you're actually projecting and the issue that you're describing is within yourself. Exactly. And it's, I mean, when I teach, I like to talk a lot about the concept of projective identification. Excuse the extreme jargon here, but I'll break it down.

So you already talked so naturally. I mean, who would have known that a person in their 20s can know these things already, but about projection, right? That we can have certain experiences that we're not aware of in ourselves and we just project them onto our partner. There's a very interesting thing that happens between couples, which is that you project certain things onto your partner, and your partner, unbeknownst to them, unconsciously takes it on and starts acting the role. And then you get into this very interesting dance, and they do something like that on their end.

Right, because you're both coming from complete different backgrounds. You may both have different traumas, or one has no trauma, one has trauma, different childhoods. And then you're both bringing all that. I hate to use the word baggage, but you're using it. You both have different baggage that you're bringing then into the relationship. And then they're kind of meshing in different projection styles. But then each one of the partners kind of takes on a certain kind of baggage and starts acting the role. And then you get this polarization. So, for example, I mean, the simplest example would be like around the pandemic.

Suddenly one person becomes the one who is like super anxious about the virus. And the other person becomes like laissez-faire, like, ah, we can go anywhere without a mask. I'm not worried. And they get really polarized. Right. But if they were not together, they might be somewhere in the middle. Yeah. And then the person that's not as or the one that is as is intense about it feels at times

they can't be as relaxed because then they're going to fully go to the side that their partner is or vice versa. And so you almost pick polar opposites and you stay in that lane. Oh, that's fascinating. So you accept the projection and you just start acting like that and you ignore other aspects of yourself. You just become that projection. That's why I feel it's if you get into relationships without doing the work on yourself first it's like you can almost become a chameleon in any other relationship you can just become whoever that relationship requires you to be and that gets scary because then it's like well who are you and what do you

bring to the relationship rather than what is the relationship making you become like that gets blurred lines i think um i had two questions from fans that are similar just saying do you think that everyone should go to therapy whether they have mental illness or not and should you go if nothing is wrong with your life okay first of all therapy is not just for mental illness i mean mental illness is upsetting and it's its own thing. But therapy is also for just life, meaning if you want to change something about the way you're living or if you want to get to know yourself in a deeper way, if you want a deeper experience of engagement with your own mind and with the world. Yeah. deeper experience of engagement with your own mind and with the world. So now, if people feel like there's nothing wrong with their life, no, they don't need to be in therapy. But then also that statements like, is that a defensive statement? Or is it like, hold on, nothing's

wrong with your life? Who are you? Are you saying that like with a certain kind of tight fist, like nothing's wrong with my life? Or are you really just in a good place? And no, or even if you're in a good place, do you want to like, is there more you want out of your mind? But no, not everyone should be in therapy. I do think too, from recent therapy sessions I've had when I'm not in my oh my gosh my life is awful and I need my therapist moment I have been in romantic relationships that have failed at times and I am a bit of a perfectionist I don't like when things fail and so I like to look back may I ask you did they fail or did they end well they both or not okay they failed and no some i guess and ended but in my mind it's not always a failure in in my mind some of it was yeah i guess yeah look at me being see therapy here we're in a session my therapist is gonna listen to me like alexandra um but i like to

look back at decisions that I made in my life that maybe I wasn't proud of, or maybe I wish I had done differently. And I use therapy. I can talk about things incessantly all the time. I can go over things and over things. And I like to look back at past decisions that I made. And I want to change myself. I want to be better. So with regard to romantic relationships, specifically, I feel like I'm in the healthiest relationship I've ever been in. And I he's great. Great guy. I would, though, put some of I'm going to give myself a little bit of credit. I feel like a different version of myself right now than who I was in my past relationships. And I needed those relationships to grow and be able to accept the relationship I'm in now. But seeing the work that I've done in therapy has allowed me to look at the person I'm with right now and see them for what they are and accept the love that they're giving me, which I would have never accepted a few years prior. So like, doing that work to look at what you did and

decisions you made, it is helpful just to kind of like have someone to talk to about why you are the way you are, why you make decisions, what you wish you could have changed or what you love about yourself and what you want to continue to grow and work on. So that's kind of a, it's beautiful. What if your partner refuses to go to therapy with you? Right. Um, not unusual. Um, often the men refuse to go. Um, there are two options really. Um, one option is to be honest and talk to your partner about why you think it would be great for them or why you need it for yourself that they go. And you might be able to make a good case. Not if you're saying you're messed up and you need to go fix yourself. But yeah, I think it

will be really helpful for you with this particular issue. It will be really helpful for me, it will unburden me if I knew you're getting help. Like make a good case. But some people just won't do it. And then since you're in a system, a couple is a system, a family is a system, sometimes you can do enough work on yourself that it will vicariously help your partner. So that's also an option. It's a burden. You got to do a lot of work if you're doing work both for yourself and for your partner, but it does sometimes help. Yeah, that's great advice. I mean, I know a lot of people have written in whether they're in an abusive situation, which if you're, I always feel like if your partner

won't go to therapy with you and it's so bad, like I know because you won't be able to say this probably because like you're a doctor, but I can say it on my show. Like I would suggest leave because I feel like if a person's not, if you go to them and you're saying, I need this for us, I think this will help us. Why would a partner not be willing to give it a go? Go to one session, you know? But like why wouldn't you be willing to work it a go go to one session you know but like why wouldn't you be willing to work on something with your partner if you love that person you care about nurturing that relationship what is it that you're so terrified of and i have someone that was in a abusive relationship that i he wouldn't go to therapy with her and i knew it was because he

didn't want things to change yeah he liked the dynamic he didn't want her to get because he didn't want things to change. He liked the dynamic. He didn't want her to get help. He didn't want the help for them because it was working for him, the power dynamic. Because God forbid they go to therapy, all of a sudden it's going to start to get even and that's not what he wanted in that dynamic. So again, I can't speak to everyone's experience, but women that were writing that into me, just look a little bit within yourself of why do you think it's that they don't want to go to therapy yes wise what are usually for couples coming to you like the most prevalent issues usually like top five that you're usually dealing

with that probably is too hard for you to answer. But like, just like, if you could rattle a couple, I could rattle a couple. One main issue is the difficulty we all have with otherness. Oh, interesting. So one of the things that happens when you get attached to someone and you get to know them, and then you start spending a lot of time with them, is they reveal their otherness to you. And when you're in touch, when you come in touch with someone doing things differently from you, it immediately evokes a lot of questions. Wait, who's doing it right? Who's doing it wrong? Who's better? I don't like that right so otherness becomes this kind of incredible irritation yeah just because it's different not because of anything and then

you start developing all these like philosophies to justify why you're irritated right but really one of the main thing that's happening is you're faced with the fact that people are not exactly like you. And you have to ask yourself, so what about me? What about them? They want something slightly different. Yeah. That even – this is like the most low-brow level of thinking about it but like i remember immediately meeting my boyfriend and he he's not like ocd but like he's so like clean and likes things to be organized there you go and

listen orna i i've got a lot of good traits but like i'm not the most organized cleanly person not that i like don't shower and i want that to become a gossip but like i shower but like I don't shower. I don't want that to become a gossip. But I shower. But I don't mind things to be left out, stuff like that. And so immediately I was kind of like, well, who's right? Why do you do it like that? That seems like an awful way to live. Leave the plates in the sink. Why do they have to immediately go in the dishwasher? What are you doing? And so that is obviously a basic level of thinking. But that's exactly it. So that's like the number one issue for couples is just dealing with otherness. relationship between our need for safety and consistency and predictability and our need for newness and adventure wow now we're really getting into a therapy session wow wow oh wow the way that you just articulated that no yeah i I feel I am such an independent and I've worked my whole life to be that way but I definitely love the concept of being with someone that I know is so safe and cares for me and loves me but then I also do I'm 26 you know and at times I like the concept of new and what is out there etc and so that push and pull of the safety but also the thought of what else like that is a constant and I think

with regard to my generation specifically it's been heightened due to social media kind of social tempts you yeah i think social media we have such access to everyone's lives i think back when i talked to my mom about the generation without social media it's like you didn't know what people were doing in abiza or italy like you didn't know unless you are at their home and they're showing you the photo book and so now it's like we have this access to in a pro an amazing amount of information and we're able to connect with people that we're not intimately like right in the moment with which is great but then there's also this it I think it's hurting somewhat of our generation because there's this constant fear I'm sure your daughter has used the word FOMO yes I'm like why oh my god I'm not in Ibiza mom like yes I'm missing

out but when you wouldn't realize you're missing out had there not been that ability of social media to make you see also the life that people are constructing on social media I admit my social media I look like I'm living the best life and i have my bad days but i'm not posting that on social media so there's this it's it's hard i think for our generation to feel happy in their current state and their relationship when they're seeing everything online is all perfect because everyone wants to show that they're perfect but they're not and so it's just like it's really hard yes it's. It's difficult. It's yeah, it's awful. Talk to your daughter, make sure she's also in therapy. It's like, it's never ending. It's, it's hard. It's really hard.

Other common themes are, I mean, this is not exactly a theme, but it's, it's a certain dynamic, which is it's back again to the projection. But people get really entrenched in this like dance of blame. So something is upsetting in one way, causing some level of psychic pain or discomfort. It's very easy for people to kind of morph that into a certain kind of inner language of righteousness and blame. Like, oh, somebody must be doing that to me. If I'm not feeling good, somebody must be doing that to me. It must be her or him. And then you get into blame and defense.

Wow. Rather than, I'm not feeling that great. Can we talk about it? I'm not sure what's happening. It usually comes down to communication. It's crazy. Like I've been really trying to make sure that I usually am introverted in the sense that when I'm dealing with things, I like to deal with them alone. And then slowly it's like I had three things that I didn't mention to him. And now all of a sudden he does a fourth. And then all of a sudden the fourth becomes this huge war. Yes.

Where it's like that it didn't need to get that way. Yes. Communicate fluidly in your everyday life with this person. Then it doesn't build up. Right. Both communicate, but also kind of go back and try to understand, let's say those three things were piling up. Like, what is that about for you? Right.

Like do some self-analysis because it might be that with enough self-analysis, two of those three things actually then you can let them go because they really have nothing to do with him. Yep. Trust is one of the biggest focal points in relationships. I also think, I mean, every generation, again, I think it's heightened right now because of how easily social media can allow you to live a different life and you can be sitting next to your partner and having a complete different conversation

with someone you may be cheating on your partner with etc while you're sitting next to them yes oh my god i've had a ex-boyfriend who would be in bed with me and then i found out that he was like talking to another woman while we lived together and it was the craziest thing it was all via via social media they had never met in person um so they never met never i know um can you explain as a therapist what it's like unpacking trust and how to help build that back up if it's broken in a relationship so that's yeah i won't be able to give you like a satisfying answer there it's that's, yeah, I won't be able to give you like a satisfying answer there. It's just that's deep. A lot, yeah. That's deep. It's deep. There are different components to it.

I mean, one is, you know, when there's like an impasse like that or a breach like that, you have to, first of all, really understand what's going on there. Yeah. Right? It's probably, I mean, just with the few words that you described, I mean, what was going on with this person that they needed to like have a double life? What is that about? And not even a full double life, but like a fantasy pocket. Oh, Orna, I can tell you off screen about that one. It was so messed up. Right.

So your first experience might be that of being betrayed, which you were. But if you really look at what was going on there, I mean, you realize that whoever that person was, was, I mean, needed to do something very complicated with their own mind. Yeah. And you might have been kind of almost, I don't know who you were to him in that. Were you someone that he was, like, why did he need to do that with you? Why did he need to have a secret life with you? Who were you to him in his mind? And when you start thinking like that,

trust is a piece of it, but you also understand that what people do, what looks like a simple betrayal or cheating or whatever, sometimes it's a very complicated story there. And when you understand it, it becomes less an issue of trust yeah that's an interesting concept it's like why did the betrayal happen in the first place yes well who were you to him that he needed to do this why did he need to have like a secret life while with you yeah i've got i've got there in therapy and it's been it's been a journey

how to hold attachment needs and being able to turn towards one another again like can you explain what attachment needs even are etc well we are we are the kind of animal that is born unable to care for ourselves. We need to be tended to very, very closely to keep us alive for a long time. A long time, I can tell you as a mother. A long, long time. So we innately are programmed to attach, to attach to our caregivers, to bring about love and care from our caregivers. We're kind of oriented in that way, to form deep, lasting relationships, attachments. Got it. That's our basic programming. When you see people that are

neurotic about it or battling it, they're going against something that is our basic nature to some degree. So there are all sorts of issues that come about around attachment and often they stem from very early experiences. So for example, if you grew up to, it doesn't have to be a mother, it could be anyone who's like in, has a maternal function, it could be a father or another person in your life that has that. Yeah, your grandma, your aunt, your uncle. A maternal function. If you grew up with a, I'm just going to shorthand it, with a mother who was traumatized herself, then she might be, for example, inconsistent in the way she mothers.

So she might, some of the time, be super attuned. Other times she might be very dissociated. Whatever got triggered up in her. So in that case, you might develop what we call an insecure attachment, an attachment that is not stable, but it goes between shifts between this and that. Yes, no, attached, scared. So there are different modes of attachment. And that gets played out later in the way we attach to other people in our life mostly our romantic partners yeah that is interesting again it goes back to the whole childhood thing it's like the classic line of like oh my gosh i never want to be like my parents and then you grow up it's in every movie and it's like and now you are your mother yeah now you are your parents and it's like it you can't help it And unless you and if you want to adjust that and if you want to be different than what you were raised and like learned and taught that

this is normal this is the norm if you're in an abusive relationship or your parents were and then you are growing up and that's what you saw you never saw a loving relationship how are you gonna know even what a loving relationship looks like right right so it's it's crazy. Can I just ask, like, what were you, when you're asking about attachment, for example, what, I mean, this is going to sound funny to ask it like this, but what does a person in their 20s think about when they think about attachment? It would never even occur to me to think about that when I was your age. I have, it's interesting I have because I have this platform I have a lot of people writing in and so I take in information and if I was just going to not talk about fans writing in and just myself I have had um my mom jokes she's like I don't know why I I maybe I did beat it into a little too hard. Like, she would, she made sure that I had such an independent sense of self, that I, it was,

and I have an amazing father, but it was like, you don't need a man to do anything for you. Like, you are amazing in yourself. And you and I think she taught me that so much that then to get into a relationship the feedback that I always get from a partner is like you do realize we're in a relationship right like lean on me for something like when you just you you're self-sufficient that's's your inclination? Yeah. And I think I have a hard time going away from that independence and allowing it to be a partnership. Yeah. And I think that for me – I don't know if that falls into like the attachment styles but my attachment is not – I don't like to attach. Yeah.

And I like to – Ambivalent attachment yeah yeah I don't I don't want to lose that independence which you don't have to lose once you're in a partnership at all I know that but I think I've at times my partners have have explained to me that they feel sometimes like I have I am a bit I don't know if the word is cold maybe in the past cold because I wasn't as invested in that relationship but now I think my partner sometimes is like just remember like we are in a relationship Alex and you're not not even that I'm oh you're acting single it's just I'm so individually driven and it's not that I'm selfish it's more just like I don't rely on anyone to do anything

for me but myself and was that always true or is it more true now that you have this kind of very intense career it was always always true yeah so that i think for me that is one of the attachment things that i've and and to be honest i think with my show it worked because at the inception of this show i like it's not the healthiest thing orna if you listen to some of the older episodes you'd be like oh my gosh I don't know if that's healthy but I was trying to show um women I guess specifically like you having the attitude that I've had my whole life at times has been a great defense mechanism against dating because I don't need a guy and so I can play the game just as great as the guy can play the game.

And that was great at the inception of the show because I was telling girls like, oh, my God, you can do it. Oh, you're crying over him. He's going to cry over you. I can teach you exactly how to do that. Now, as I've gotten older, Orna's like, oh, God. No, no, I'm intrigued. But I think I always talk about it in therapy. Like at the time in my life back then, like I that I didn't want to get married. I didn't want a real like serious, loving relationship.

It was fun. It was a game. I was in college. I was dating professional athletes and traveling around the world. And it was so fun and glamorous. And it was and then it helped build the show. But now as I'm 26 that I would never take those days back. But now I'm interested in like, okay, that was, now I actually want to use the individual aspect that I have mentally.

And that's worked for me in dating prior as a defense mechanism. I want to now shift that and use that in a different way. I want to be a healthy partner and maintain that sense of independence while also allowing someone in. So that's kind of my journey currently.

Yeah. It's also very interesting to think of it in terms of gender and gender politics and gender dynamics and power. Yes. I think a lot of times the men that I've dated have felt, I'm not going to say emasculated, but it's been I think hard at times because of the way that I am I feel like sometimes it's hard to for them to figure out what their role is in that relationship they want to be able to like take care of me and all and I don't need that even before I had was making money I still had that gave off that energy so I think sometimes they try to figure out like where do I fit in? And I'm trying to get better at letting them feel

like they should be here and be in. I want that. I don't want them to feel like insecure. You know, I don't know. I don't know if this is helpful to think of it this way, but part of what I'm thinking when you're describing it is that you're breaking out of old scripts, right, of how a relationship is, how people take on certain kind of gender roles and who does what and what does it mean to be in a relationship,

but there isn't a new script yet. And you're kind of in a way maybe through this show you're even trying to write it yeah to write a new script of like what does it mean to be in a relationship when a woman doesn't need a man for this that or the other but still wants to be in a deep relationship like what what is the new script for for your generation that is i, very difficult for men to because of the system that they've been raised in. Right. You know, old masculinity. Yeah. And to have a woman making more money than you, if you're not confident in yourself, then that I had a relationship that it was like I wasn't making more money than him yet. But as my career was growing, i saw like this friction of him constantly putting me down and i knew it was just coming from a place of insecurity and i was like i can't be

with someone that doesn't fully isn't like that's my girl she's amazing she's a boss ass bitch she makes so much money i'm so proud of her like she's so talented great instead it was like trying to suppress that what i was doing because of his own issues. Yeah. So I don't know. I just think anyone listening, whether man, woman, whoever you are, like if your partner is not confident enough and secure enough in themselves and they're trying to put you down for your successes, that is a huge red flag.

Yeah. And you know what? It's interesting because when I talk to people about the show and how much it's changed, I look back at the beginning of it. And although it was so salacious and in your face and it's like, cheat or be cheated on, it was more of like a really trying to defy men. Historically speaking, have been the ones that are cheating maybe in the past or on the surface yeah it was wanting to switch the roles of men can have locker room talk so can women yeah and it was absolutely a polarizing moment where it was like people got pissed off what what is she saying what what is coming out of her mouth but it was impactful because i think so many women were like fuck yes like i love what you're saying

like yes teach us how to give a great blow job because that we are powerful and like we have vaginas so we're powerful and we can do whatever we want and we don't need a man so it was like flipping it on its head yeah then once it was two years in and I'm on my third year right now, as I've gotten that loyal audience and we've grown together, the show has shifted a little bit now towards me being like, OK, absolutely. I really do stand by everything I used to say. Some of it was a little crazy, but like the what was really behind it was to be empowering yeah now getting older and having a more sense of self going through therapy going through different relationships learning about the world myself everything is changing ever evolving now the show has shifted and i'm having more intimate conversations like this one right now to educate

myself and hopefully my fan base on like what do we want our generation to become what do we want as women men etc but i think we've just decided what your show is about we have yeah you're writing a new script orna i for relationships so maybe you're right i am trying to write a different script yeah but i didn't know that until i've been in this therapy session for two hours oh my god i'm feeling great or no wow oh my gosh thank you um and you're you're help you're helping do that in the world though on a grander scale you have this show has changed the narrative on i think think, to a lot of people, especially my age group, been like, damn, that's what therapy is like.

Oh, I want to get in on that. That's great. That to me is so cool that you've been able to break down that wall and show the true nature of therapy and how amazing it can change your life. You said something earlier. What did you say? About? You used a term that i

didn't know that that someone is saying that this is a time of oh realizing or not you don't you know who kylie jenner is no no no your daughter doesn't talk about her ever no i don't know who this is like kardashians you know the kardashians i know there is the kardashians i don't know who this is. Kylie, like Kardashians. You know the Kardashians. I know there is the Kardashians. I don't know who they are. I love you. This is amazing. I live in a cave. It's great. I wish I lived in the cave with you.

I would be so healthy. She just said this is the year of realizing things. Right. So I guess it's that. Wow, profound. We're giving her too much credit. No, but I agree. It is really a year of looking at things differently, which I think can be good.

Yes. Orna. Alex, this has been amazing. Have you enjoyed yourself? I've deeply enjoyed myself, deeply enjoyed myself. This has been really amazing for me. Oh, my God. Personally, amazing. Thank you.

Just the depth and breadth of your questions and like all these places that we went, I'm, I'm in awe. I'm in awe of you. And I wish I could do a session with you. And I feel like I just did. You are amazing. Thank you so much.

Thank you. I usually am like, guys, go follow them on Instagram, but I'm assuming you don't want anyone going to Instagram. So Orna, thank you so much for everything. Thank you for the work that you're doing. And thank you for being on Couples Therapy and sharing with the world how amazing therapy can be and can touch people's lives in such a positive aspect.

Thank you. You are amazing. Seriously, Alex, you're amazing. Daddy gang, thank you for listening to this episode with Orna. Orna is now about to describe how to find a therapist near you. Lots of different resources. I mean, I'm talking in general. I mean, there is, first of all, people have insurance panels and they can look on their insurance panels. There are training institutes in most places, especially in cities.

And nowadays you can reach out to training institutes and work remotely. But, for example, psychoanalytic training institutes and other training institutes, people who are training have to see patients and get supervised. So you can often get very inexpensive help through people that are supervised by senior people and are very invested in the work they're doing. So even though they might be relatively young in the field, they can still be terrific therapists. There's group therapy, which is an option for, I mean, it's often less expensive. I'm on the board of a certain kind of initiative now that is trying to offer group therapy at a very, very low cost to people that can't afford it. I mean, there's a lot of very interesting things that are happening now that are making therapy affordable and accessible. Go to Google

and go to a university training center or a psychoanalytic training. Psychoanalytic training centers are really a great place to start. Okay. That's great. Helpful. So there's going to be another season? We're hoping that there will be another season. We're not sure yet. How do we make that happen? How do I ensure that it happens? it happens what like just to you just have to see if they're going to pick up for another season i i actually don't know i'm i don't have to deal with any of that i just want to say showtime if you're listening to alex cooper please pick it up for another season um it's it's been an amazing journey watching it and I would love to binge another season

well I do want to say first of all that if we're going to have another season people should and people want to come on and have real issues not just for the fun of it but have real issues they should reach out I think there's a website called

couplestherapydocumentary.com daddy gang go submit yourselves but don't go with like the fuck I think there's a website called CouplesTherapyDocumentary.com. Daddy gang, go submit yourselves. But don't go with like the fuck boy that you just met last week and you're trying to like figure out if you can date now. Like couples that like really I agree with you want to be in it. That was the best part of the show is that you can tell these people are so dedicated to the process. Everyone had their personal storylines, but you could tell like the genuine nature of the content yeah okay daddy gang i feel i was gonna say i feel better i feel more aware and enlightened and educated and i hope you guys do too i'm about to play for you

essentially almost kind of like a questions of the week with Orna. I'm putting this towards the end because I'm aware that some people may not be as interested in these topics as others. For me, it's fucking fascinating and I wanted this episode to be four hours long, but I also understand some people aren't as into the actual detailed definitions of terminology within psychology. For those of you that are on the same page as me and you're obsessed with couples therapy, Orna is about to basically dissect certain terms that you may have heard or some of the questions that you guys wrote in and I'm about to play that for you. If, however, you enjoyed the episode and you don't need any more

therapy, I understand. Take some time for yourself, whether you're about to like journal or reflect or listen again, or go take a walk or just chill for the rest of the day and maybe listen to some music and relax. But so someone wanted to know, is therapy beneficial if you have an eating disorder or body dysmorphia? Yes. Absolutely. I mean, those are very, I mean, you need to go to someone who really specializes in those areas. But of course, and people that have eating disorders and body dysmorphia, they need help. I mean, they're kind of often kind of locked in their own mind. And it's very important to interrupt

and let someone else in. What is the difference between if I go to therapy alone to work on issues that I'm having with my boyfriend versus if we go to couples therapy together? Yeah, it's a good one. There's no fast rule about that. I think sometimes what happens, for example, I see couples, and let's say they're trying to work on a certain dynamic that they're stuck in, which is often why people get into couples therapy. And whatever work they're doing, at some point it becomes apparent that something about working on the dynamic is not addressing

at least one of the people's issues. And sometimes what happens is the dynamic loosens a little bit and makes it possible for the individual to start getting curious about themselves. Got it. And then they realize, actually, I want to take a pause from this and I want to go get my own treatment and figure out something about myself. People sometimes realize that themselves. I sometimes can tell when I'm working with someone that they think they're having an issue with their partner, but I can tell that they're haunted by something that really is just getting, as we said earlier, projected and projected. But I can tell that they need to go and do a piece of

work on what happened to them. So they stop projecting onto their partner. I could tell in some of the instances you it was great, you would almost focus a little bit more on an individual that you were trying to quickly do the individual psych help to then get them back to the couple's help. And it was interesting to then see like, oh, wow, that's a whole topic that is for that person's self that they should work on individually that has nothing to do with their partner. If their partner disappeared tomorrow, that issue would still be within them. True. And sometimes you can do, I mean, sometimes you can do individual work within the couple. Sometimes people don't want to go do couples work on their own. Sometimes they're too fearful

to get into therapy on their own, and they need their partner there to sort of accompany them. So it's couples work, but it's really individual work with a family member present. Yeah, that's interesting. The transgenerational trauma. Can you talk about that a little bit. That's a big topic. Yeah. Yes. I can talk a little bit about that. You tell me how far you want to go there. But transgenerational trauma has to do with the fact that things that happen to us even before we are born, that happened to our parents or our grandparents or, you know, the collective from which you come can get passed down through the generations. It's almost like a secret errand that gets passed down. So, for example, I wrote a paper about someone, a German patient that I saw, who was my age, born in the 60s. Her grandparents, both sets of grandparents were Nazis. And she herself,

the patient was, I mean, I wrote about it, she gave consent for this to be public information, I wouldn't be talking about it otherwise. But she was plagued by all sorts of irrational symptoms that had no explanation. She was in a very good marriage. She had a relatively decent life. But she was plagued and she could not understand what was plaguing her with like horrific dreams of material that like dead bodies under the ground moving like stuff i mean this is like from two generations ago i mean it took a very long analysis right to really unearth like the the fantasies she was bombarded with that had to do with a Nazi history that was never spoken about in her family. Oh, my God. So things get passed down.

I mean, now in our country, like, you know, the history of slavery or history of like Native Americans. I mean, there's a lot that gets passed down that only now we're starting to look at that. It's not our childhood. Yeah. But it's an errand that we have to deal with because previous generations haven't. And it can lead to a lot of symptoms. That is so intense. And I, cause I had had a less intense, someone had written in saying, I really want to know about trans generational trauma. I've had moments in the last year when I'm in

the healthiest relationship of reacting to things in a way that doesn't match up with anything that I've experienced, but does with my mom. And I have not a clue how to process it, let go of it, because it has nothing to do with my experiences, but I know it's what my mom experienced. Brilliant. Yes, that is a great example of transgenerational trauma that gets passed on. And it doesn't get passed on by stories. It doesn't get passed on in words. It's in these ways of being. Like a mother can handle her baby in a way that just the way she touches her baby is passing in there like a whole history. Right? It's not in words.

It's in, I mean, we transfer so much information between us that is nonverbal and nonconscious. Right. So, yeah. Dissociation and dissociative tendencies. Can we get a little bit into that? Sure. Dissociation is one of the main, one of the main ways that our mind defends itself against being overwhelmed by psychic pain, by pain in general, by being overwhelmed. So it's a way that we can manage our relationship to reality.

Wow. So there are two, you can think of it as two major ways that one can dissociate. I mean, one can dissociate by, let's say something really terrible is happening or overwhelmingly painful or something that your mind cannot bear, you can split in a way, like literally split within yourself and take that experience and sort of put it to the side so that only becomes available to you in very extreme situations. It's almost like a post-traumatic kind of memory that gets tucked away. Or you can, in a way, refuse to fully formulate the fact that it's happening. So you don't acknowledge that it's really happening. You only kind of half, it's like, yeah, it's happening, but it's not happening to me, or I'm not really feeling it,

or you keep a certain kind of avoidance and distance from the experience so it doesn't fully register as happening. So these are two different ways that we can dissociate. Is it concerning when someone has dissociative tendencies? Could it be harmful in a way? We, you know, it's on this kind of spectrum dissociation. I mean, we all use dissociation to some degree to function. Like when we switch from one kind of way of being to another. You know, I'm sitting here and talking to you right now. And then I'm going to go out and be with my friend and I'm going to switch and be somewhat different.

Yeah. That is somewhat of a dissociative capacity to kind of switch. Got it. But, you know, and when let's say you're in the middle of a situation that is very like an emergency situation, you use dissociation in a way to cope with the emergency. You got it. Okay, I need to think very clearly right now. I need to, like, pack up my kid, get out of the house, make sure the door is locked, passports, blah, blah, blah. You need to use a certain way of cutting yourself off from other things to survive. So dissociation can be a very healthy tendency, and the capacity to kind of switch around in a nimble way is a good thing.

When it gets too extreme, then it's of concern. So, for example, you know, the most extreme form of dissociation that one way that we think about it is, for example, what we used to call multiple personality. Or now we call it dissociative identity yeah um and when people are forced when they're in such extreme situations that they're forced to create these like multiple personalities it's certainly of concern it's a very painful it's amazing that the mind can do that but it's a very painful way of being and that requires a lot of help so that is dissociating the beginning of someone that could – is borderline personality disorder the same as multiple? As multiple? Amazing questions.

Seriously. Thank you. We're like covering everything. I know. I'm fascinated. I can't get enough of this. Some people say that borderline personality is really built on an over reliance on dissociation because one of the things that um characterizes borderline being in a borderline personality state

is that you switch between extreme uh emotional states so you can be in a state of wild bliss, it's all good, and then switch into, oh, it's all bad. I don't remember anything good that ever happened to me. Anger, anger, anger. So those kind of switches, you could say, rely on dissociative mechanisms. But being borderline is not the same as having a dissociative disorder. Bipolar and borderline are completely different because bipolar is chemical, right? And borderline is based off of something that, like, mainly I would say something that happened in your childhood. Bipolar, you can take medication. Borderline, you can't.

Right. All of it is, you know, it's these, it's all true in what you're saying, but it's also both and. Okay. In the sense that some people say that people that suffer with borderline conditions also have a certain level of emotional dysregulation that is not only about trauma, but it could be to some degree biological. And some even prescribe mood stabilizers for borderline conditions, and sometimes they help. It's a little bit of it, a little bit of that. It's not one thing. How do you know when you are in love with a person or just codependent? My partner and I have been together for seven

years. We had set eyes on getting married, but I think that we are making excuses on making that happen. I care for this person very much, but I often feel unfulfilled in the relationship. And I think he does too. However, I think we're just staying to be miserable together instead of breaking up. Although we've tried, at what point does it feel unhealthy and codependent? How do we break this up? Like the topic of codependency in relationships. is when you use the relationship or your partner to solve things that really you should be solving on your own or to address things you should be addressing on your own. So it's like the boundary around yourself and your partner has become too loose. And like we were talking about earlier you project too easily you regress too much you ask of your partner to take care of things that you really should be taking care of on your own right um and that could be psychological issues or literal like when you

refuse to work because your partner is working and you could yeah you just sink into this kind of dependent situation that is robbing both of you of a healthier way of living can anyone and should anyone engage in psychoanalytic therapy or is there more of a prototype of a specific person that's looking to engage in that? Amazing questions you're asking. Seriously. Amazing. Thank you. Well, first of all, there is like an endless debate in the field about that question. So it depends who you're asking. Okay. The traditional psychoanalytic view, old school view is that you have to be sort of highly functioning to be able to engage in

psychoanalytic therapy. That if you're not, if you don't have, in a way, the strength of character to endure the intensity of psychoanalytic therapy, you shouldn't go there. You should go for more supportive therapy. Or it's like, let me tell you something. I think we've evolved. And I think many people can benefit from psychoanalytic therapy in the sense that giving yourself the space to take your own mind very seriously is a wonderful thing that no matter where you're at in life, you can benefit from. The truth of the matter is not, most people don't have the conditions that will allow that, right? Because it requires, first of all, time, space, sometimes money, not always. So most people don't have the privilege of being able to engage in that. But it's, it's an amazing journey that would do the world a lot of good if more more people engaged in it daddy gang i really hope you enjoyed this episode and it puts a smile on my

face this is not the last you will be hearing from dr orna goralnik and myself daddy gang you know the motherfucking drill i I will see you fuckers next Wednesday.