The ER Doctor
We complain about relationships coming to us for therapy when there’s barely a heartbeat left. We wish they would have come sooner. Maybe we could have helped. I say “we,” assuming you’ve had this thought. I admit that I’ve had that thought plenty of times. And then an ER doctor helped to change my perspective.
He was a client, and during a session this particular superhero in scrubs told me a heartbreaking story. He talked about a time that he was doing CPR on a child. The grandma was standing to the side, holding her breath as he was trying to breathe life into her grandchild’s tiny body lying on the hospital bed.
A big team of nurses were around him - they had immediately responded to the code blue (cardiac arrest). But, then - after seeing the signs of death that only a medical professional would know, he gave them another code. This was an unspoken code - something to indicate that although he knew the child was dead, he was going to continue to administer CPR.
They understood immediately and stayed in position. They had done this with him before. My client, the ER doctor, knew that if he took his hands off and stepped away, it would be too quick for the grandma to process. In the days after, she would question if CPR was done long enough. What could someone have done differently to bring her baby back? Maybe he learned this the hard way. I don’t know - I just know that for 5 more minutes, he gave CPR to a corpse.
And, yes - when my client finally called the time of death, the grandma wept. I’m sure her grief was heard in the hallway immediately, and to her loved ones for years to come.
This compassionate act of pretending by my client moved me. It inspired me too
No, we don’t need to fake saving a marriage, but could we do a few more reps of CPR? Let the couple know, I’ll be with you until the bitter end, and I won’t rush it.
Ambivalence is one of the hardest presentations to work with - you’re given a burnt-out pursuer, so close to being done, and a withdrawer that is desperate to save what’s left.
Your challenge is to keep both partners in mind as you track the cycle, validate pain and give space for grief. You have to find the balance of letting the pursuer do what they need to do (even if that means leaving) and letting the withdrawer feel their desperate hope.
I fear it’s insensitive to make this analogy. The death of a child can’t be compared to anything.
It’s more the position of the ER doctor that I’m thinking of. That level of compassion, patience and wisdom - that’s what I aspire to. I think therapists are also superheroes. We don’t wear scrubs, but we definitely meet people in their darkest hours.