v
My repeated inquiries at the Boston Psychoanalytic Institute finally bore fruit. I met first with Dr. Jacobson, the executive director of the Institute, soon after my return from San Antonio.
“The Board has come around to your view of our field, Dr. Stein,” Dr. Jacobson announced. His stark Nordic features contrasted with his warm mid-south accent. “We’ve been looking for the right candidates to ‘break the barrier’, so to speak, and expand our analytic training programs outside of the stranglehold my medical colleagues have enforced since, well, since the time of Freud. Someone with your background, Harvard, your work in their psychiatric training programs, as well as your background in research…well, let’s just say both you and we can’t afford to have you fail, and what I hear from all your references is, that’s never an option for you.”
I smiled. Even though this is what I’d heard all my life, it had never reassured me. At least he was frank about telling me what the stakes were. “I honestly don’t know if I’m completely ready for total immersion, for being the guinea pig.”
“Glad to hear you say that. After talking it over with Dr. Rosenthal, our Dean of admissions, you could start out as a fellow. Spend a year in our Thursday evening seminars, keep on with your own therapist – is he an analyst? – and if things go well, if both you and we feel the case has been made, then you could transfer in to the the second year, hopefully finishing by – let’s see, if you start in September, then it would be June of 1985 you’d graduate. How does that sound?”
Relieved, I answered, “Yes…no, my therapist calls himself an analyst, he’s very Freudian, but I don’t believe he’s had a formal certification.” I leaned forward, and went on, “I’m ready, this is what I want. Truthfully, I can’t wait to start.”
That September, I quickly got into the Thursday night rhythm at the Institute. 5:30- 7, Basic Concepts, then dinner in the atrium, followed by Introduction to Analytic Technique from 8-9:30. As I arranged my purse and notes before the start of the first seminar, I was startled by a tap on my shoulder.
“I thought that was you, sitting here in the corner, trying to hide!” Jeanne Heldman stood, one hand on a hip, head cocked to the side, a full grin creasing her face. “Janie Stein – what are you doing here?”
During her fours years at med school, followed by a psychiatric residency, we’d drifted apart. I’d last seen her in St. Louis sometime in the mid-‘70s, exchanging letters once or twice after. I leapt up, gave her a quick embrace, and said, “I haven’t seen you in…what…five years now? How was Philadelphia?”
She stood back, shook her head, and, as if in disbelief, said, “I got married!”
“Really? That’s …good, I hope?”
“Couldn’t be better. Found someone I actually want to have children with. He’s English, we’re going to London next year. I’ve already got a transfer arranged into the London Analytic Institute, they agreed to let me take the first two trimesters here, then…but wait, you’re not an MD, how…why did they…?
“Persistence. I guess. I wouldn’t let them go till they said, ‘Yes’.”
“That’s the Sarah Jane Stein I remember oh, so well,” she said with a bemused shake of her head. She went on, “After this, at the dinner break, we can catch up. I’ll tell you all about Roger…”
We spent the next eight Thursday evenings together, once again a little enclave of two, sharing doubts and dreams, renewing the subtle competition we’d used to encourage each other in college.
The second trimester featured Ethics, followed by Infant and Early Childhood Development. I’d raced through the syllabi the night before, and saw Petyr Cohen, MD, listed as the Ethics instructor. I called up Marcia, and asked, “What was the name of that guy you told me about, the one who had to hide during the war, ‘Peter-something’?”
“Petyr,” she said, with a light emphasis on the second syllable, “Petyr Cohen.”
“Right. I think he’s one of the instructors at the Institute.”
“Well, make sure you tell him I said, ‘Hello’.”
Dr. Cohen wore a rumpled dark brown herringbone sport coat with a blue tie, filled with small indecipherable red letters in groups of three or four. While he explained how confidentiality serves as the basis of the therapeutic contract, I studied his face, his voice, his mannerisms. Exceedingly self-assured, he alternated between sitting at the head of the table, and walking around behind us as he spoke, sometimes pausing to lay a hand on one of us to emphasize a point, or ask a leading question, making sure to address each of us formally, as ‘Dr. —.” Proud as I was of the work that had led to my title, I still felt uncomfortable with it, as if I were wearing a coat several sizes too large. When it came my turn to be anointed, I noticed an unfamiliar tightening deep in my chest up through the back of my neck. I turned quickly, and found him standing several feet away.
“Dr. Stein, you are a psychologist. Unusual to see one of your profession here. I assume you follow the same standards of professional ethics and confidentiality as those of the Hippocratic persuasion?”
At a loss, all I could manage was a brief, formal smile and quick nod of my head. He smiled, said, “Right,” and moved on.
By the time we broke for dinner, with Jeanne in tow, I’d regained my composure, and found the courage to approach him. “Dr. Cohen, may we sit with you?”
He stood up, napkin in one hand, and, with the slightest of bows tempered by an equally slight impish smile, swept his hand broadly across the table. “Certainly, ladies. I’d be honored.”
I explained how we knew Marcia, gave him her regards, and asked, “You grew up in Switzerland?”
He ran his hand across the top of his head, softly ruffling his short-cropped hair, the slightest hint of grey at the temples. After an almost soundless chuckle, he said, “I was deposited in Switzerland by my parents when I was only 16 months old, in 1940, before their country – Hungary – sealed its fate by declaring war against the Soviet Union, July of 1941. My parents were prescient, I suppose, they knew what was coming, that Hitler would never let the Carpathian Mountains stand between him and an opportunity to expand his wretched Reich. And, of course, being Jewish, we never did find out what happened to them. Some camp in Poland perhaps? Who knows.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry…” I started.’
He brushed my concern away. “I was too young to even know them. I do have a picture or two, but to me, they have always been unfamiliar members of our star-crossed tribe. I mourn for them collectively, of course, but not as individuals. But thank you.” He quickly collected himself. “As I was saying, my real parents were an American doctor and his wife, a minor diplomat, both on the staff of the American embassy in Geneva, whom my birth parents knew from their previous assignment in Pest. By the time I was eight, I arrived with them in Philadelphia, a full-fledged citizen, with little memory of that tragic time.”
As he stopped to take a breath, and stab a morsel of lasagna on his plate, I asked, “But your name…?”
“Yes, that was from my birth parents. I asked my mother if she had a birth certificate. On it, the spelling is difficult to equate in English, of course, but she said the most common rendering would be with the ‘y’ instead of ‘e’. I am proud of it, every time I see or write my name, I can remember them, and how they sacrificed themselves for me.”
He folded his napkin neatly after patting his mouth three times, then arranged his plate and utensils together in the middle of his tray. Looking deeply at me, he pronounced, “Well, Dr. Stein,” then, with a curt nod to Jeanne, “Dr, Heldman,” then back to me, “it’s been a pleasure talking with you. I hope we will share diner again next Thursday?”
“Please, call me Sarah,” I said, “I’d enjoy that very much.” As I rose, the jangle of keys falling from my purse startled us. He reached down, picked them up to hand to me, then halted as he noticed the small red toy jeep I’d attached to the crowded ring, nearly a decade ago, and forgotten as it faded into the background of my life.
Bemused, he asked with raised eyebrows, “Your car, Sarah?”
Frowning slightly, I tried to blink away the memories floating back. “My boyfriend gave that to me, when I was in college,” I found myself explaining.
“Oh?”
“He was a boy. Just a boy.”
vi
During December, Petyr Cohen walked us step-by-step through increasingly fraught scenarios of ethical dilemmas which commonly emerge during analysis. We easily dispensed with the risks of treating other family members of a patient, and receiving, or proffering gifts. Next, we covered non-sexual boundary violations.
After the seminar, Jeanne and I found our usual table along with Petyr. I asked him, “Can you give a real-life example of a violation, something I might actually encounter?”
He cleared his throat, sat up straighter, and pronounced, “Say your client has season tickets for the Bruins, box seats, front row. You are a big fan of Bobby Orr, and you wish to…”
“Wait a minute,” Jeanne interjected. “He retired a couple of years ago, didn’t he? I mean, I’m no hockey fan, but even I’ve heard of Bobby Orr.”
“Thank you, Dr. Heldman, I suppose you’re right. I’m not a fan either. I’ve never quite grasped the American obsession with team sports, especially the more violent ones like football and ice hockey. I believe it may have some connection with the deep strain of anti-intellectualism in our culture. The know-nothings who frequent these gladiatorial competitions – it’s as if their brains only have room for either sports, or useful thought. I was merely responding to Sarah’s request for a relevant example. Indulge me if you will?”
He paused, allowing me to interrupt. “I have that sports gene either. And you’re right, the amount of time and money we spend on all that play is inordinate, when it could be going to improve our society, to education, or…mental health.” Our dinner discussions had become the focus of my week, as I learned to banter with him and challenge his rigorous views. “But you said, ‘team sports’. Are there physical activities which do have a value, which can improve someone’s life, expand, not stifle our thinking?”
He turned directly towards me, and said, “I do love skiing. Growing up in Geneve, plying the piste was de rigueur. I have continued my love of the sport here in New England. Once my divorce is final, I hope the condominium we purchased in Killington will suffice in the settlement for me, while she is satisfied with the place in New York. As I was saying…”
I barged in, asking “What’s going on inside your mind, when you’re skiing? I knew someone, in college, who was obsessed with skiing. His senior, year in college he spent the winter in Aspen, then after his residency, another year in Salt Lake, skiing every day. He said those were the only times he felt free from…let’s see, how did he put it?…’the tyranny of thought’. He was one of the smartest people I’ve ever known, yet he seemed expanded, not diminished, by his time away from academics.” I reflected, “He had the same passion for swimming, another individual sport.”
Petyr’s eyes fell out of focus as he leaned back in his chair. “I agree, wholeheartedly, with that outlook. While I’m not obsessed, like your friend seems to have been, abandoning school, and then a medical practice, nonetheless, I relish the times I am able to test my prowess on the slopes.” Looking back at me, he narrowed his eyes and asked, “This is the same boy who gave you that Jeep on your key ring?”
I nodded briefly.
He smiled, and said dreamily, “I wish I’d had the courage of your boy friend. What was his name?”
“Mike. Michael Harrison.”
“Michael,” he said softly. “He had the right idea. Once in this country, my parents encouraged me to ski race. Ach! Every weekend! The gates, restricting where I could turn – all the beauty washed away from the sport. I complained, they never took me back, and we started going to Nantucket in the summer for vacations. Finally, when I returned to a conference in St. Moritz, meeting up again with old school chums, I remembered the beauty of the sport, the freedom of turning wherever one will, always seeking the least crowded line, following the sun across the hill. I came back, told my wife we would find a place in Vermont, somewhere the boys could escape the city…” He drifted off into his memories.
“Would it be a boundary violation, Dr. Cohen, if I asked you about your wife?”
“Certainly not. We’re all friends here, correct? Not analyst and analysand. What is it you’d like to know?”
“You have two children, right?”
“Yes, two boys, 9 and 7.”
“You must have loved each other, once. Why…how does that end, two people falling out of love? How can that be?”
He paused for thought, then said, “Love seems simple. And the younger we are, the earlier we are in a relationship, it is indeed simple. Think of your earliest loves , your mother, your father…”
I quickly said, “No words, we speak to them without words, saying a lot about very little – ‘I’m hungry’, ‘I’m wet’, ‘I’m tired’.”
“And yet, the love is unconditional, no? When love re-appears again, for the first time with someone outside the family, it pushes aside everything else in the world, all-defining, all encompassing, the same as when we were babes.”
Jeanne added, “Right. We learn how to grow with someone else. And sometimes, we grow in ways that run counter to being with that other person, is that where you’re going?”
Petyr nodded, “Correct. In my case – in our case – I discovered that my wife began to love our children, to the exclusion of all else. Not an unusual circumstance” – he glanced knowingly at me – “but one which a couple must work through in order to become fuller companions, to actually build a family. And that, I believe, was our failing.”
I challenged him. “But wouldn’t you expect her to have that unconditional love for her children, for your children? Wouldn’t that be a strong foundation for a family?”
He sighed, for once speechless. Then, “We tried to work that through. Lots of talk between us. Lots of words…”
“But no feelings? No longer any feelings?” I asked, remembering my years with Howard.
“What is the saying, ‘It takes two to tango?’ For us, love died in tandem. I felt none for her, and none from her, for me at least. I tried to learn what I missed, what I did wrong. She insisted it was not me, it was her. But I believe it was us, together, as a pair, from whom love evaporated, as mysteriously as it seemed to come. It was not an argument, no specific behaviors she found lacking. Our foundation, the hidden core of any relationship, simply was no more.”
I wondered, “But couldn’t you have spent more time with all of them, tried seeing where that would lead? You might have created with her a different kind of love, larger, fuller, with a family.”
“Ah, Dr. Stein, you do indeed have the makings of an analyst, don’t you?”
vii
The following Thursday, Petyr led us through “Sexual Boundaries: How feelings of guilt, shame, and anxiety surround erotic feelings and erotic counter-transference.”
“Sexual feelings between analyst and analysand often present pitfalls in the therapeutic process,” he began. “Analysts classically find it difficult to openly discuss their own feelings about the client, being unable to admit them to themselves, much less share with their colleagues, and especially with the patient.” As he spoke, he remained seated, hesitant to walk amongst us. His hooded eyes clung to his lecture notes while his hands rigidly held the paper. Afterwards, wrapping a shawl around his neck, he hurriedly grabbed his long wool coat and aimed for the door.
Once in the atrium, he turned to find me, saying, “I’m sorry, Sarah. I will not be able to share dinner with you this evening, you and Jeanne. I must get to the train station, I’m picking up the boys, who are traveling with their mother. They are spending the Christmas holidays with me, while she gets to use the Vermont condo.” He sighed with resignation, then brightened a bit in ironic amusement. “It’s funny. They spent Chanukah with their mother, who is …not Jewish, and yet, due to the peculiar custom of shutting schools for two weeks during a holiday many of us do not recognize, they will live with me during that difficult fortnight.” With a slight bow, he slapped his Kangol cap over his bristly hair, turned, and strode out into the night.
Jeanne and I gathered dinner from the carts, skeptically eyeing the attempt to mimic holiday fare: dried-out turkey breast, soggy peas, pale orange sweet potatoes ladled with runny faux-maple syrup.
“You’d think, given the history of psychoanalysis, and” – I glanced around the room – “the persuasion of the majority here, that we could dispense with this ritual?”
Jeanne laughed, crinkling her eyes into narrow slits. “Petyr’s not here, so you’re going to talk like him?”
I ignored the jab. “This sexual boundary stuff…Love seems simple. Isn’t that what we were saying last week? But you took years to find Roger, and I’ve…” I trailed off, vainly searching the plate for some latkes or gefilte fish.
Jeanne continued smiling. “Still looking for love in all the wrong places, Janie?”
“One thing I did learn is that true love – lasting love – comes from someone who cares about who you are, who you really are, not some imagined ideal, not what you mean or seem to them.”
“And you haven’t found that yet?”
“I don’t know,” I tried. “I want – I need – someone to whom I can give my heart, fully, but still retain my soul, for me. And be loved for being that person, who doesn’t swoon, who wants to create a couple, a family, a new creation, bigger, deeper, fuller, beyond either of us as individuals.”
Jeanne turned serious. “I’ve watched you, Ja…Sarah, this last month, here with Dr. Cohen. You don’t have that look of swooning – I’ve seen that in you before, you know – you seem fully yourself with him…”
“I know, I know. This love I’m talking about grows, grows slowly, doesn’t explode like it did when our bodies were bursting with fresh new ideas about the world. But Petyr – I don’t know. He’s still in…transition, still with one foot in New York, wondering why he can’t stay with his family, the other, here in Boston, looking for something new.”
“It doesn’t feel like time yet, you mean?”
I gently laid my knife and fork across the still-full plate, and slowly pushed it towards the center of the table.
After New Year’s, we returned to discuss “Erotic Countertransference and Self-Disclosure.” Two weeks with his sons had refreshed Petyr Cohen. He filled the room with knowing laughs as he described the advantages of using erotic feelings in the analytic process, while warning us of the pitfalls.
“You do not want to be the Doctor who wakes up one morning to see his – or her – name and professional reputation besmirched in headlines in the Boston Globe. We must be even more careful, in these changing times, when the slightest raised eyebrow, wink, or half-smile could not only be misinterpreted, but even used against us as evidence of nefarious intentions and action.” He paused for emphasis, then said, “In this modern era, the dictum goes far beyond, ‘Keep your hands to yourself’.”
As we sat down to dinner, I asked Petyr, “How are your sons?”
He breathed in deeply, smiled, and spread his arms wide. “They are both growing, so much, so fast. Stuart, the older, has begun to read the books I’ve been sending, a new one every month. The latest is a history of the Lewis and Clark expedition. He told me he wished he had the chance to go off, explore, and discover someplace untouched by man. Peter, he’s all involved with his new roller skates, the fancy kind with urethane wheels, what to they call them?”
“Inline?” Jeanne prompted.
‘ “Inline. Yes, that’s it. Perfect for rolling along through the park while his mother jogs beside him…” He caught himself short, frowned, and grew pensive.
I put in, “That’s Petyr, Junior?”
“No, with an ‘e’, not my ‘y’. Too much of a burden to pass that on.”
“Last time, Jeanne and I talked about your seminar, and got into a discussion of love again. Made me want to ask you, why do people pair up? What is the driver of love?”
He seemed to relax with the opportunity to delve into a favorite topic of his. “Of course, in all creatures, the iron tyranny of DNA, of sexual reproduction, demands a mate. It may be the most powerful force on the planet, the insistence of those four nucleic acids to replicate their double helical structure.”
“Oh?” I countered skeptically.
“Yes. Think of how much the surface of our sphere, our Gaia, has been changed by evolution, how the very oxygen in our atmosphere was created by plants, how long-dead creatures have returned from their buried depths, to be burned, filling our air with their nitrogen and carbon oxides.”
I scoffed, “I think you’re getting far afield from what I asked!”
“No, listen. Even though intellectually, scientifically, we can see that human reproduction is a primary basis for people pairing up, the magic, the beauty, the miracle of it all is that we feel this urge not as a pure primal desire, but has something hallowed and fulfilling, as love. Forming couples, forming families, is at our very core, what makes us alive, what keeps us alive.” He placed his napkin down for emphasis.
I heard an echo in my head, and shared it with Petyr and Jeanne. “Life, life itself, is reason enough to be living, I like that, I like that very much.”