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Chapter Six – Part of a Session – Page 188
Transcript Commentary
Heidi laughs
Bill
Are you feeling bad?
Heidi
In class I am, not the rest of the time, no.
Judi
Wow! Well, we don’t want that on your
feedback form! (Bill laughs).
Heidi
I don’t think it’s (inaudible).
Judi
Well, maybe you want to talk about that,
actually.
Heidi
I don’t know what to say.
Paula
(interjects) It was like that last week.
Heidi
(Rapidly) It was exactly the same last
week.
This seems incongruous to Bill,
particularly in the light of Heidi having
said that she feels dead, but obviously
more than that, leading to his response. On
reflection, this is a shocking experience as
a tutor, perhaps particularly given that this
semester is part of training to work with
personal disturbance.
This seems direct, occasioned perhaps by
the intensity of Heidi’s expression.
Heidi brings the issue right here and now.
Judi responds to the impact of that, with
clear acknowledgement. However, this is
also wrapped in a joke, clearly shared by
Bill. Much as the student’s communication
has involved an apparent joke, well known
(e.g. Freud 1900/1953) as a conveyor of
layered meaning, perhaps Judi’s response
in the same apparent form is an
acknowledgement of this.
Heidi probably made a remark dismissing
concern with her expression.
Here, Judi is trying to challenge Heidi’s
move to dismiss the attention of the staff
and the group that she has just engaged,
and also perhaps the possibility that the
group or the task (of learning
psychoanalytic psychotherapy) may have
had an impact on her experience.
The sequence of these three statements (by
Heidi, Paula, and then Heidi again) shows