{"id":133083,"date":"2020-11-05T12:10:55","date_gmt":"2020-11-05T01:10:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/?p=133083"},"modified":"2020-11-05T12:10:57","modified_gmt":"2020-11-05T01:10:57","slug":"no-group-no-i-do-author-christie-tate-on-the-life-changing-power-of-group-therapy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/2020\/11\/05\/no-group-no-i-do-author-christie-tate-on-the-life-changing-power-of-group-therapy\/","title":{"rendered":"No group, no \u201cI do\u201d: Author Christie Tate on the life-changing power of group therapy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Christie<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Christie Tate is a Chicago-based writer and essayist. She has been published in\u00a0The New York Times\u00a0(Modern Love),\u00a0The Washington Post,\u00a0Chicago Tribune,\u00a0McSweeney\u2019s Internet Tendency, and elsewhere. Christie has just published her memoir, Group: How One Therapist and a Circle of Strangers Saved My Life<\/a><\/strong>, a book which has just become the latest pick for Reese Witherspoon’s Book Club<\/a><\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, Christie’s on the blog to tell us a little bit about her journey with group therapy helped her to find love. Read on …<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n
\"Christie<\/a>

Christie Tate (Photo by Mary Rafferty Photography).<\/p><\/div>\n

There were two flights to Buenos Aires, and I wanted the later one. Yes, we could use extra time to pack after our wedding weekend, but I also wanted to go to my group therapy session on Monday morning.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll take the seven o\u2019clock,\u201d John said, and several clicks later everything was set. It was one of many things I loved about the man I was going to marry: He didn\u2019t flinch when I asked to plan our first 48 hours as a married couple around my group therapy schedule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Years before I met John, I was a high-achieving law student sinking into a deep depression when a guy I\u2019d gone on five dates with stopped calling. He was just the latest in a lifetime of romantic misses. Before five-date guy ghosted me, there\u2019d been a smattering of blind dates that went nowhere, and a distressing pattern of falling for charismatic alcoholics whose capacity for intimacy topped out at two hours. There had also been sober, stable men who wanted to open the car door for me and hold my hand at the movies, but those steady men made my skin crawl. And I wasn\u2019t faring well in friendships either. \u201cCome visit us in Houston,\u201d girlfriends from college said into my voice mail, and I never returned the calls. Law school classmates invited me to get dim sum or blow off studying to catch a Cubs game or watch the St. Patrick\u2019s Day Parade in downtown Chicago, but I declined. \u201cYes\u201d wouldn\u2019t come out of my mouth no matter how lonely I was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When my isolation and depression led me to fantasies about ending my life, I knew I needed help. When a friend recommended her therapist, a doctor who ran groups and was allegedly an \u201cexpert\u201d at relationship issues, I was sceptical. How would sharing a therapy session with strangers help me? When I met with the doctor he promised me that group was a route out of isolation. What did I have to lose?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTop or bottom?\u201d This was the opening salvo lobbed at me by a group mate in my first session. Hazing. Six strangers stared at me, waiting to see how I\u2019d respond. I feigned bravado and offered a mostly theoretical answer to the question about my positional preferences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTop,\u201d I said, to sound sexually bold and comfortable with the topic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fake answers, I assumed, were frowned upon in therapy, but I was so defensive about my paltry sexual explorations that I couldn\u2019t imagine telling the truth, which would have sounded like, \u201cI wish I knew, buddy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAhem,\u201d the therapist said, interrupting the exchange. \u201cWhat are you feeling?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Feelings? What did they have to do with anything? No way was I telling these people that I felt defensive, annoyed, and slightly violated. I stared at him long and hard, as it slowly dawned on me that I would not reap the promises of group therapy\u2014connection, intimacy, a greater understanding of my dysfunctional relationship patterns\u2014if I lied about who I was. But how could I tell the truth when I didn\u2019t trust any of them? Certainly not the guy in wire-rimmed glasses who initiated my hazing like a frat boy holding court at a kegger. Not the woman sitting to my right in sensible navy shoes who helpfully pointed out that my hands were shaking as I presented my bogus sexual insouciance. I definitely didn\u2019t trust the therapist sitting next to my left who promised transformation if I agreed to bring my whole self to group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After extensive coaching from the therapist, I reluctantly admitted the truth: \u201c I feel shame.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Riding the train to law school after that first session, I felt a mixture of hope and despair. Group might be the perfect place to work on my relationship issues, but could I do it? Would I have to cry in front of those strangers? Would we have arguments? Would I have to tell them all of my secrets, like how I gorged on apples at night and how badly I wanted a boyfriend with good hygiene and a healthy sex drive? In the second session, I asked these questions. Every head around me nodded. \u201cYes, you will cry. Yes, we will argue. Yes, all of your secrets will come out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLet\u2019s start now,\u201d the guy who asked me about my sex life said. \u201cWhat\u2019s the thing you least want to tell us?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My neck muscles tensed as I looked around the circle. How badly did I want to change?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI just want y\u2019all to like me,\u201d I said, and then burst into tears. The group laughed as if they understood the ache inside me. That act of radical honesty was a road map to how to get well in therapy. Say the hard thing, let the armour crack and fall away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More cracks followed. Eight months into treatment, the therapist announced a two-week hiatus. Anxiety roiled through me as I pictured him gallivanting around Mexico on vacation, while my group mates and I waited for sessions to resume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDon\u2019t go,\u201d I wailed. \u201cI need you! I need these sessions.\u201d Two weeks without group felt like two weeks of solitary confinement in the dank, unlit confines of my psyche. When my therapist asked me the inevitable question\u2014\u201cwhat are you feeling?\u201d\u2014I was ready with an answer: \u201cSad to miss group and afraid you won\u2019t come back.\u201d And just like that, I got the opportunity to work on my deep abandonment issues in real time with six group mates as my witnesses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By my second year, I embarked on dating, and group sessions became a forum to dissect each potential suitor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow\u2019d your date go?\u201d a group member would ask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe ordered a bottle of wine after I mentioned I was sober,\u201d I\u2019d say, hoping for a thumbs\u2019 up because I was tired of being single.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRed flag, move on,\u201d they\u2019d say. They repeated that refrain about the guy who spent our date discussing his fondness for cocaine, the guy who asked me to pay his rent, and the married guy. I didn\u2019t always follow their guidance at the outset, but they were always right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I fell in love, but it didn\u2019t work out, I took my heartache straight to the circle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cY\u2019all, he\u2019s gone. He said I\u2019m not \u2018the one,\u2019\u201d I reported through tears after my second dumping in eight months. By then, I\u2019d been in treatment over three years and felt devastated the group sessions hadn\u2019t resulted in a healthy relationship. One group mate passed me the tissues, and another offered her me her hand to hold. \u201cGroup therapy doesn\u2019t work!\u201d I wailed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt works,\u201d they said, \u201cyou\u2019ll see.\u201d After the session, the guys in the group insisted I join them for breakfast. \u201cWe\u2019ll treat you to scrambled eggs and hot tea.\u201d At the diner around the corner, they gamely let me rehash my broken relationship all over again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Five years into treatment, it was a group mate who first pronounced John as \u201cthe one.\u201d \u201cI\u2019m calling it. It\u2019s him,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy?\u201d I asked. John and I had gone on two above-average dates\u2014one to the opera and one to an Italian place on Grand Avenue. John didn\u2019t seem like a raging alcoholic or commitment phobic, but it was too early to monogram towels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou\u2019re different with him. Less crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As with every other relationship, I kept my group apprised of data I collected about John. He didn\u2019t drink, wasn\u2019t obsessive about working out, and hadn\u2019t asked to borrow money. I could see a future with him, a real future with joint tenancy, kids, and retirement plans. My group mates could see it too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m in group therapy,\u201d I told John after our fourth date. \u201cI tell my group everything so if you don\u2019t like that, we should stop right now.\u201d John understood. When we designed my engagement ring a year later, we chose a setting that reflected my path to him: one large stone, representing us, flanked on either side by three smaller stones, representing group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At my wedding reception, my group mates congratulated me and John. One by one, they hugged me and whispered, \u201cI knew you\u2019d end up here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Monday after our wedding snow fell from a gray Chicago sky. In the evening, John and I would board a plane to the southern hemisphere. But first\u2014just as I had every Monday morning for seven years\u2014I stepped onto the El train and headed downtown to take my seat in the circle. I wanted to be there, to express with my presence that I was grateful for all the gifts they\u2019d given me, including a space to sort myself out, to practice vulnerability, and to learn to connect with others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Something I could never do by myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

—<\/strong>Group: How One Therapist and a Circle of Strangers Saved My Life<\/a><\/strong><\/em> <\/em>by Christie Tate (Simon & Schuster Australia) is out now.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

This book is part of our 2020 Christmas Gift Guide<\/a>! You could win 1 Million Qantas Points when you order any product featured in our Christmas Gift Guide between 2 November and 14 December, 2020.*<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Christmas<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

*T&Cs apply<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hear from the author of Reese Witherspoon’s latest book club pick!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":133123,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[6677],"tags":[12084,12074,12085,2303,3639,7172,10136,12086],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/ChristieTate-Social.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133083"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133083"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133083\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133146,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133083\/revisions\/133146"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}