Interesting Times

It's incredible the ways in which countertransference can rear its head. At placement the other day, one of the consumers looked at my sweater and said, "That's a girl's sweater. What are you doing wearing a girl's sweater?"

Immediately I was sucked back to seventh grade math class. I had worn my usual hooded sweatshirt to school, kept it on through health class and science class, and took it off for the start of math. Underneath I was wearing a white shirt with purple dolphins. I liked this shirt a lot because I liked dolphins a lot. I enjoyed watching Flipper, and I had visited the New England Aquarium recently. But I also really liked purple, and I still do. Second best color in the world as far as I'm concerned. So this purple dolphin shirt really was a fantastic shirt and I finally got the chance to wear it for the first time.

When my mother bought me the shirt, I was with her, in JC Penny's I think. I asked her, "Is that a girl's shirt?" not because I was concerned about wearing a girl's shirt, but because I was concerned about the attention others might give it. She assured me it was unisex and explained what that meant.

In class, as I took off my sweatshirt, my friend Ashley looked at me and said, "Dan, that's a girl's shirt." This irritated me because 1) my name isn't Dan and 2) the shirt is unisex. So I replied, "no it's not, it's unisex". I'm not sure how many people in the class knew the meaning of the word unisex, but it didn't seem to matter as everyone broke into laughter exclaiming, "HE SAID SEX!" and "HE'S WEARING A GIRL'S SHIRT!". I was mortified. Trying to explain to a room full of seventh graders what unisex means while wearing a shirt with purple dolphins on it did not go well. Fortunately I learned the following from the situation: what I wear isn't the problem, gender typing is the problem.

This was a pretty negative experience, and I actually still get upset talking about. So when it came back at me full force at placement, it didn't put me into a very good emotional space. I responded to the consumer by shrugging my shoulders and saying, "I'm not sure if it matters if this is a girl's sweater", trying to mask the pain brought up by the memory, and then I walked into the internship office and had a good, long think.

Without anyone to go to for supervision, and without the computer available to write up a process recording, I was left to find a different way of dealing with my experience. After displacing my anger about the situation I was able to sublimate: reaffirming with myself that when I go for a PhD, I'll study gender and work to end gender typing and gender role oppression. Thinking on this positive note, I went out and lead a mighty fine psychodrama group.

Ah sublimation, how would I handle negative reactions to countertransference without you? Ideally, I would have written up a process recording and been able to meet with my supervisor around this issue. More ideally, I would have been able to talk to the consumer about this in an open and safe space, exploring with him his thoughts about staff wearing clothes that don't necessarily fit with his view of their gender roles. This however, could only have happened if I immediately understood my reaction as countertransference. With more supervision and more process recordings, I hope to be able to do that.