The old fart just wanted to sound good and get laid. Why else do men do anything? He couldn’t play baseball and there were no computer games. He had to be good at something, so he invented a fantasy world.
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Hmmm, perhaps he only identified a fantasy world…(chicken vs egg)
Funny how that “fantasy world” yielded real dollars though, huh?
He may not have played baseball but that fucker could shoot on goal from the centerline with 67.327% accuracy, according to unnamed sources….
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I have been told there are 500 witnesses…
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You’ve been told, or you read that some unknown person claims they were told? 
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Isn’t that all of psychology. Invent a problem, lable it, and then invent a cure. The cure should take at least 9 innings and cost about $100 per inning.
I once had a young lady come into my office from CYA, California Youth Authority. They house minors until they are 25. She saw me before her release and then for some time after her release, a court mandated number of sessions that I am not now recalling. The YA clients are brought to the sessions shackled, hands and feet. They are unshackled for the sessions and then locked up again for transport.
So the young lady comes in and sits by my desk. The desk is against the wall, and she is on one side of it facing me. I’ve already read the file.
*First session: She walks into the office
*So, why are you here today.
*I was ordered to come to counseling.
*HA HA HA … like you ever listened to orders from anyone. (She smiles) So why are you here?
*The judge wants me to talk about my problem.
*Honestly, do we give a shit what the judge wants? Why are you here?
*Well, they are making me come.
*Oh, give me a break. No one is making you do anything. There is the door. You can leave any time you like. No one is holding you.
*But if I leave, they won’t let me out of YA.
*So you do have a reason for being here. When I write my report to the judge do you want me to say that you only came to counseling because you wanted to get out of YA?
- No.
*But that is what you’re telling me. Do you have another reason for being here?
*Well, I could talk about my problem?
- You have a problem?
*Yes, I’m a kleptomaniac.
At this point I put my forearm on my desk and swept everything on the desk away from her and onto the floor on the opposite side of the desk. I said nothing and just looked at her.
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Why did you do that?
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You’re a kleptomaniac. I don’t want you stealing my shit.
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I wasn’t going to steal anything.
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You can’t help yourself. You’re a kleptomaniac.
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(Confused look while reality settled in.) But I wasn’t going to take anything.
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So, your not really a kleptomaniac. You have some control over your behavior.
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I guess so.
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Well, either you do or you don’t. Why don’t you tell me why you think you are a kleptomaniac.
*When I go shopping, I take this big bag and I put things in it. Then I try to pay for something small and leave the store with the stuff in the big bag.
*Oh, there’s your problem. You never learned how to go shopping. You see, when people go shopping they take a small purse or wallet and some money. They choose the items they want and pay for them. That’s shopping. You go stealing. When people go stealing, they take a big bag with nothing inside, and they hide stuff in the bag. Your problem is that you don’t know how to go shopping. That’s different from being a kleptomaniac.
(This poor girl walked around with a label over her head for who knows how many years. And I have no idea where she ever came up with the ideas she did. Possibly counselors at the YA. Perhaps she got positive reinforcement during group sessions for being a ‘kleptomaniac.’ We talked a little bit about shopping in some of our other sessions and some issues unrelated to her incarceration.
Upon her release, she reported.
- I stopped taking a big bag with me when I go into the stores. I just take my wallet. I don’t steal things anymore. (She was amazed she did not have the urge without her big bag.) A three-month follow-up, and she stated she had not stolen anything from a store. She no longer took her big bag into stores with her. She didn’t go stealing anymore. She went shopping. She did admit to stealing a pack of cigarettes from a gas station. I asked her if she missed her friends at YA. Certainly she was trying to revisit them. She insisted she wasn’t. ‘If you say so.’ and I left it at that. There was never a report of another theft.
Invent the problem, Kleptomania, and label a person with it. “You are a kleptomaniac.” And then make them struggle their whole life to get over the problem. That’s where the big money is. LOL…
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Great example of changing the narrative and empowering the client.