Therapy and Non-Fiction, my review of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone

Hello friends, and happy Tuesday! I am a little bit late with this review, and that is mostly because I am working on my last university assignment and it is kicking my butt (let's stay classy here).

I think that I am really starting to feel the acedemic burnout this year, and every assignment has been a struggle, but I am finally almost done with it.

Today's review is all about a great piece of non-fiction that I have read recently: Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: a Therapist, her Therapist and our lives explained, by Lori Gottlieb.

Lori Gottlieb is an American therapist based in Los Angeles, and in this book, she talks about her experience as a therapist, giving us an insight into her therapy sessions with a few selected patients - who are inspired by her actual patients but, of course, not real people - but also showing her experience as a therapy patient after a life changing even in her life.

The book is a mix between an autobiographical novel, an introduction to psychology theories and a romanticized version of life.

It starts when Lori Gottlieb get broken up with by her Boyfriend with whom she was supposed to get married. After realizing that she it struggling to come to terms with it by herself, she reaches out to a therapist, Wendell, hoping that he will help her make sense of her break up. At the same time, she works with some of her patients, including a narcissistic TV producer, a cancer patient, a college student with an addictive personality and an 80 year-old depressed woman.

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The line between fiction and non-fiction

“The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.”

I think that what makes this book so compelling is that it navigates around the line between fiction and reality. Lori Gottblieb uses her real life events and concerns throughout the book and a lot of the story feels like a memoir, but it is not a successive list of events and thoughts put together to form a book. There is a structure, a plot, and a story to follow. Skip a chapter, and you will miss part of the story.

Similarly, the patients she describes are fictional versions of real people and it truly transpires onto the page. Each step, each session described on the page is essential to the patient's story, and when it is not telling of their lives, it is telling of ours, of our psychology and behaviours.

This book does a marvelous job at creating a story that is compelling and will make you want to continue reading while also giving insightful advice and knowledge. If I am being completely honest, I have learned more from this book than I have about any self-help or pseudo-psychological book.

Gottlieb does not shy away from harsh truths, and I had a few moment when I had to just put down the book and think about what she had just said - and, admittedly, I did have a few existential crisis along the way.

I think that the real difference between this book and other self-help or non-fiction books is that we get to these truths and advice through someone else's experience, which allows us to both take a step back to see what she means, while also be close enough to take the advice to heart and apply it to our lives.

As someone who does not really enjoy non-fiction books, I was completely mesmerized by this one and could not put it down. I ended up recommending it to all of my friends. I also think that it is time for me to stop saying that I do not enjoy non-fiction, since I have been reading a lot of non-fiction books that I reall yenjoyed and ended up giving five stars to.

A book about therapy that reads like therapy

"The strangest thing about therapy is that it's structured around an ending. It begins with the knowledge that our time together is finite, and the successful outcome is that patients reach their goals and leave."

As I read this book, the one thought that would not leave my mind was "This is very clever because this book reads like therapy." And as I reached the end of the book, I found this quote about therapy having an end, which just made me think that I was right all along.

If therapy is structured around an ending, so is a book. After all, when we start reading, we know that it will end. It is a sort of contract between the reader and the author, that the story, the journey, will come to an end.

The way we learn about Gottlieb and her patients' lives is also very similar to what happens in therapy. Everything is gradual, and sometimes we hit a wall and will not get to see the whole truth until they are sharing it. The beginning of the book is a lot of surface work for Gootlieb's life: her different careers, her journey to motherhood, her breakup.. It is not until she is ready to share and admit what the real issue is that we see it.

Like therapy, everything is gradual and it takes time to share difficult thoughts and experiences. But everything is balanced out by advice and wisdom, given either by Gottlieb or her therapist, that help guide her and her patients, but also us as readers.

As someone with some experience with therapy, I was blown away by the accuracy of the things she described. It was also refreshing to see her in the shoes of a patient, wondering if her therapist likes her, being mad at him for making her question her reasons for therapy, and her discovering things about herself that she did not know were there.

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If you are interested in psychology, therapy, or would like to destigmatize therapy, I really recommend this book. Therapy is such an important thing, and it is often something that is judged. Lori Gottlie talks about a patient who jokignly calls her "his mistress" a secret that nobody knows. Therapy is a taboo subject in society, and this book really shows why it should not be.

If you have read this book, or plan to read it, I would love to know what you think! As usual, if you want to have a chat, you can find me on Instagram. Until then, take care of yourselves, and I will see you very soon! xx