It’s OK not to be OK
It’s OK not to be OK
It was Monday, and Max had his first therapy session with Grace at eleven o’clock.
He had been into work, and after meeting with Rhys and Gail from HR, they had agreed to an immediate three-month sabbatical.
Rhys had been lovely about the whole thing, and had told Max it was about time he took some time to really get over losing his parents.
As Max walked out of Broadcasting House for the last time in a while, he felt a relief, a lightness because he was finally taking the time he needed.
After the accident, and the horrible weeks and months that followed, Max had always thought that burying himself in work, and then alcohol, was the answer, but the truth was that he was just kicking the can down the road.
He hadn’t ever properly dealt with the pain, and now was the time to actually do it.
Grace’s office was in an old townhouse in Camberwell.
It was a five-story house which had been turned into a multi-use building, with lots of different offices for a variety of medical practitioners.
There were a number of therapist offices, a sports massage specialist, and a couple of acupuncturists.
After going through the main entrance, Max walked up two flights of stairs to Grace’s office, which was a simple affair of a small reception area, and then her office behind.
The room wasn’t what he had been expecting at all.
There was a simple wooden desk with a chair behind it, and then two chairs in front.
The room was painted in a light grey blue, with some relaxing modern prints on the walls of English countryside scenes.
There was a wooden sideboard against one wall with flowers, and the room had a clean, slightly floral but not overpowering scent.
It was more professional than he had thought it might be.
He was expecting a comfortable lounge where he might lie down, when instead it had the vibe of somewhere relaxing, but also where work was done.
‘Max, hi, I’m Grace,’ said Grace with a Kiwi Accent. Max couldn’t actually distinguish between Hope’s Australian accent and Grace’s Kiwi, but he wouldn’t tell them that. It would probably be like Americans saying that they couldn’t tell the difference between someone from London and Manchester.
‘Hello,’ said a nervous Max, sitting in one of the two chairs in front of the desk.
He fidgeted, getting himself comfortable.
Grace sat in the chair behind the desk, before she looked at Max with a smile.
She had soft, kind eyes, slightly greying hair that was long and tied back in a ponytail.
She was dressed in a combination of browns and beiges, with a silver necklace around her neck that had a locket on the end.
‘So, Max, why are you here today?’
‘Oh, right. Well, my parents died.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. Was it recently?’
‘It will be two years in January. So, about twenty months ago.’
‘OK,’ said Grace, writing something down on her laptop. ‘So, why now?’
‘Why now what?’
‘Why are you here now?’
‘Oh, Hope told me about you. We belonged to the same run club, and she said I should talk to you.’
‘But why are you here?’
Max took a moment to think, and the answer was obvious when he really thought about it.
‘Because I hurt someone I really care about.’
‘Do you want to talk about that?’
Max fidgeted in his chair again, before he started talking to Grace about what had happened at Anita’s Indian feast, and the terrible thing he had done.
The way he had started drinking again after meeting Barry by his parents’ graves, how that had led him to drinking too much at the party, and how that had led him to shoving Charlie, and telling everyone that Bethan’s boyfriend had died.
Max spoke about how well he had been doing since joining Common People, and what it had given him.
He had stopped drinking, started running, and he had been feeling so good about himself until he met Barry Spencer, the man who had killed his parents, and he had fallen apart so quickly.
It reminded him that he wasn’t better, wasn’t even close, and then he had hurt the one person he cared about the most in a moment of stupidity and anger.
Then he explained what had happened since.
‘I have a three-month sabbatical, and I’m going to go travelling in Thailand for a month.’
‘That sounds like a good idea, Max. Although can I ask you something?’
‘Umm, yeah.’
‘How will you deal with temptation while travelling? If you’re going to Thailand, you’ll be around people drinking, partying, and is that something you want to do?’
‘No, I’m not drinking. I can’t.’
‘But while you’re away, the temptation will be there. Have you thought about what you might do if you’re tempted? What if you’re having a bad day, for example?’
‘I need to remember what alcohol has taken from me. It stole so much of my life after the accident, it destroyed my relationship with my ex-girlfriend, Emma, and now my friendship with Bethan. I just can’t do it. I have to stay sober. It’s the one non-negotiable for my recovery.’
‘That’s good, Max, and I’m here to support that. Now, let’s go back, shall we? Let’s talk about what happened right after the accident. How did you deal with losing your parents like that? What were you like before that day, and then after?’
Going back in time to right after the accident, Max could still feel the emotion of that time, running through him like he had turned a tap on.
It was like it was somehow hard-wired into his brain, and just talking about it again, he felt the tears coming.
He had cried a lot then. He would be fine, and then he would break down into floods of tears at the drop of a hat.
The emotion seemed always to be just below the surface waiting for its moment to explode out of him.
It had gradually gone away, sunk deeper inside of him, but it was still there.
He wanted to explore that with Grace, to see if there was a way he could finally get rid of it forever.
He wanted, if possible, to be at peace with his parents' deaths.
‘How long will it take?’ he asked.
‘It will take however long it takes, Max. We are all different, and we all process grief in different ways. I think without even realising it, you have come such a long way. From what you said, it wasn’t that long ago that your life was chaotic, you were out of control, and now you’re here, talking about going travelling, finding solutions to your pain, and that’s all positive.
You also have to remember, it’s OK to feel pain.
It’s OK to feel sad, to understand that you went through something profoundly life-changing, and it has changed you.
To feel is to be alive, and you want to feel alive.
The thing we have to learn is how to control what we do with that pain.
Before you drank, you were self-destructive, and that isn’t healthy.
If you had continued on that road, you would have found yourself in a very dark place.
So, don’t think about the grief, the pain, as something you have to get rid of completely because you won’t, but what we can control is your reaction to it.
If you’re having a bad day, you go for a run, meditate, spend time with friends, or go for a walk.
It’s OK not to be OK. Does that make sense? ’
‘Yeah, it does.’
‘Being at peace with your parents’ death, Max, means being at peace with yourself.’
Max had never felt ready to speak with a therapist about his parents, but now that he finally had, it felt good.
Grace understood exactly what he was going through, and she understood how to deal with it.
A year or six months ago, if he had gone to Grace, he wouldn’t have been ready to hear it, but he finally was.
They spoke for the whole hour, and he really opened up about what he was feeling.
It felt good, but it wasn’t just that. People spoke about therapy as “putting in the work”, and Max hadn’t really understood what that meant.
What was “the work” they spoke about? But as he talked with Grace he began to understand.
The work was what he had to do by himself once he left.
Sitting in that room with Grace, hearing her words, telling her what had happened was one thing, but once he left and was out in the world by himself, it was then he had to take everything they had spoken about and put it into action.
That was the work he needed to start right away.
Later that day, Max was at the flat, drinking tea on the sofa and waiting for Robbie to get home. The shop closed at three o’clock, but it was just after five when Robbie finally walked in the door.
‘How was the shop today?’ asked Max.
‘Good, yeah, pal. Busy.’
‘That’s good.’
‘Aye, but it’s so tiring. I really will have to hire someone soon.’
‘OK, we can talk about that in a minute, but I have something I want to tell you first,’ said Max, and Robbie walked across and sat on the sofa next to him.
‘All right, pal. What’s the scoop?’
‘I just booked a flight to Thailand. I’m going for a month.’
‘Oh, right, cool. That’s good.’
‘Yeah, I’m excited about it. After talking it through with my therapist, I really think I need a break from London. I think it will do me the world of good.’
‘I think so too. The only thing is, I’ll miss youse.’
‘You’ll be fine. Eve practically lives here now anyway.’
‘Aye, but it will no be the same without youse, pal.’
‘Thanks, mate, and talking about me leaving, and the shop, I had an idea about hiring someone.’
‘Oh yeah?’ asked a curious Robbie.
‘I need to run it by them first, see if they’re even interested, but if they are, I think it could be a match made in heaven!’ said Max with a smile.
The idea had come to him earlier, but he wasn’t sure after everything that had happened, if they would still be interested.
He really hoped they would because it would kill two birds with one stone.
Max told Robbie he would speak to them first, and if they were interested, he would bring them by the shop before he left for Thailand.
Robbie begged to know who, but Max said he didn’t want to get his hopes up, if the person he had in mind wasn’t interested.
With his first therapy session under his belt, a flight to Bangkok booked, and now with the idea of hiring someone for the sandwich shop, it had felt like a productive day.
The thing was, at the end of the day, the thing he still thought about and craved was a beer.
He knew it was going to be the hardest part of travelling.
Temptation would be around every corner, but he couldn’t give in to it.
He had to remain sober because it was that small piece of the jigsaw puzzle which was the key to finishing it.
Being sober, saying no to alcohol, despite whatever pain he was feeling, was the only way forward. It was OK not to be OK.
So, instead Max put the kettle on for a cup of tea, and then he would make himself and Robbie something to eat.
He still hadn’t heard from Bethan, and the Clapham Half was in just over a week.
Max hadn’t decided if he was going to run it or not.
He didn’t want to see Bethan and ruin her day, and so if he didn’t hear from her, he probably wasn’t going to attend.
It was the sacrifice he was prepared to make, to make sure that she was OK.
In the meantime, he had a phone call to make, to offer someone a job.