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In Treatment: Alex – Week Five

By fred | February 27, 2008

(S01E22) This is Tuesday’s session, the one with Alex. And before going in that one, I have to admit that things weren’t looking so good. Last week I already stated that I didn’t really care for Alex and his stories, his life, his problems… While at first his whole “I was dead for 2 days” bit could have grabbed my interest, I’ll admit it, soon it all vanished and the only reason that kept me interested was Laura.

Alex got involved with Laura, who’s not really involved with Paul but without a doubt she wishes she could be, and so does Paul even though he won’t admit it as he even recently recognized. But yesterday, Laura told the big news to Paul : she ended things with Alex, there’s not seeing each other anymore. So of course, learning that, I started to fear for my interest in the Tuesday’s sessions…

Well, I shouldn’t have ! This was one of the best ones ever, I loved it. And yeah, I loved Alex. It’s nothing new that I don’t value Paul that much as a therapist, far from it. So when this session began and Alex started to remark that it wasn’t him, but Paul, who always found ways to bring the discussion to Laura, I liked it.

And I liked it even more when he started to go after Paul, to point out that he never ever gave any answers, but always replied with new questions, that he never gave any advice, he always questions and listens – and again, I can’t believe people that him so much for only that, but it’s their money after all. One thing Paul also tends to do a lot, which I find annoying but, is that when his patient is venturing in territories Paul doesn’t feel comfortable going to, when it gets personal and Paul doesn’t want to deal with such topics, he’ll always throw a new question or remark with a highly therapist signature to it.

For instance this time, he brought up the old man in Baghdad in order to put things center things back to Alex and his therapy, and move the focus away from him. But even though Alex looked like he agreed to talk about his father, he wasn’t ready to let go that easily, and he went back on the same topic. So much that Paul, once again, broke under pressure and started to attack Alex.

He started to talk, to express himself, for once, but he wasn’t just answering a question or giving out advices, nor was he stating facts, no he was actually attacking Alex, trying to pass it as some behavior analysis and giving himself the good role, of course, but he went after him. So Alex had to react, and he just went back to its original plan, to tell Paul the truth : that Paul isn’t perfect, as he likes to pretend.

He told Paul how he was no God, and how him acting like he knew everything and was above his patient was indeed messing up the equation, because Paul simply is not, far (so far) from it. And then Alex revealed that he had actually prepared for this, that he asked around about Paul. It could sound scary, to have a patient of yours starting to analyze your life that way, but I’m with Alex on this one : Paul is asking him to speak the entire the truth with him, to fully trust him, but Alex can’t know anything about Paul, he’s even refusing any answer, not even willing to share his opinions or give advices.

That is asking a lot, and why should he trust Paul, only because he’s paying him ? You could tell Paul was annoyed with Alex and his saying, that he thought Alex was condescending and obnoxious, and he was also completely right : right about Paul thinking that anything Alex, or Laura, even did had to be about him, right about his inability to see anything that went wrong in his own life, in his marriage. And this is when things went to another level, when Alex talked about Paul’s wife and her affair, about Paul’s kids and her sexual life.

But that’s not what triggered Paul, no, what was the trigger was of course when Alex did the unforgivable, when he dared to insult Laura. Don’t mess with Paul’s little protégée, cause that is out of line. And we know that Paul knew this was coming, it was obvious after what they talked about before that Alex was going to mention Laura again, and he was pushing Paul, he really was, so you knew he wasn’t going to be nice.

Paul knew that, and he wanted to go after Alex, he wanted to throw something in his face and go crazy. This is why he even took the cup of coffee in the first place ! Paul doesn’t drink coffee, he told us so in the past. Of course, Alex made him a up this time, but Paul didn’t touch it. And when he took the cup from the table, as Alex was talking and talking, there’s only one reason, one explanation, one motive for Paul to do that : it’s because he wanted to be able to throw it in his face !

Sure, Alex may be out of line. But Paul is the therapist here, he knew Alex was pushing him, and he knew he was going to mention Laura. Yet, he did not stay calm, he did not tried to stop Alex from going where he was heading, no Paul let him go there, and prepared himself, he took his weapon and started to get ready to fight. And I have to say, this scene made me laugh so much, I loved it!

Now of course, after this incident Alex just took off. He left, and this time he did not pay, of course. And much like Laura, there’s no real suspense since we all know he’ll be back next week.

Then we had the wife coming in and blah blah blah, boring, don’t care. The only thing that I didn’t get is, who exactly did Paul call, to cancel their session ? Because I thought that he felt he couldn’t just go on with another patient, not after this, I though he wanted to take time to breathe a little, and that he was calling the next patient. But he was not, and I’m not really sure who’s Richard or when he’s supposed to come in, do you ?

I sure loved this episode, and of course I’ll be there next week, because I need to see what happens from this point on.

Posted in Reviews
Shows: In Treatment