It was a relatively warm Friday night in early spring. Dana Fairbanks, a mediocre tennis player in her late twenties, was driving back home from a gathering in an old friend’s house. She used to like those nights with her trusted friends. They would usually stay at home watching movies, eating pop corn and laughing uncontrollably about stupid things.

She cared about her friends; she loved them; and even if they couldn’t meet as often as they used to anymore, they still had the connection that good friends have. They had the same values, the same beliefs, they shared the same sense of humor and most of the times they could sense if something was wrong by looking at each others eyes. That last thing was the only thing Dana herself didn’t have with the rest of them. That was the reason why she sometimes felt the odd man out in this group of friends and that was the reason why she didn’t see herself fit with these people anymore, even though she loved them so much. It wasn’t that they didn’t try to connect with her in the past. She didn’t let them. She had her secrets. She had her embarrassing and unusual thoughts and feelings. And of course she had her guilt. Nobody should ever learn about her thoughts. Nobody should learn about her secrets. Eventually her friends stopped trying to connect to such a deep level with her. They all loved her and support her in her career and personal life but they had learnt long ago that when Dana chose to shut them out they should really back off.

Dana was not sure how they felt about this unspoken arrangement between them but lately she felt that she was getting tired of this lack of self exposure. The older she got the more pressing the matter of self exposure became. It touched her sensitive existential chords and it became an obsession almost. The last two years it was constantly on her mind in one way or another. She wanted to expose her inner self but she didn’t know how. Nobody really knew her. Even she didn’t understand herself. Confused as she was and embarrassed, how could she possibly explain to others, how could she stand up for herself. Maybe a therapist would help but would that mean she was a sick person needing help. Her ego could not bare this.
Her upbringing was based on the belief that feelings should not be discussed especially unusual and unconventional ones. These should be ignored if possible. People should appear as strong, decisive, self confident and normal as possible. Anything out of the ordinary simply does not exist in the real world and thus should be ignored or stay hidden deep inside as an embarrassing anomaly that nobody should learn about. People should not expose their weaknesses so that other people take advantage of them. Personal matters were not really discussed inside her family whereas career and money matters were considered important and were discussed frequently and thoroughly. So allowing herself to get help from a therapist was like admitting to herself that she could not handle it, that she was not as normal and perfect as most people thought. That would shake her reality even more since she was used to see herself through other people’s eyes. A vicious cycle.