Wednesday, February 13, 2008

In Treatment: Episode 13....Sophie

ClinkShrink has asked me to reiterate that this is a "Painfully Silly" show.

Sophie kicks her backpack towards Paul. She has brought him a model boat, he is delighted.

"It must really suck having to listen to other people's problems all day." Oh, I hear some version of that a lot. I remind people that I chose to be a shrink, I actually kind of like it.

Sophie and Paul change seats and she plays Shrink for a while. He treats Sophie with a gentleness and fondness that he doesn't have for his adult patients. It's as though this is the one patient we meet who isn't laden with noise for Paul, he looks younger while he sees Sophie. They talk about "what if I'm a therapy patient" and Paul does a nice role induction. Sophie tells Paul angrily about her parents and how they split and how they told her.

Sophie talks about her relationship with her Coach, Cy, and we aren't surprised to hear they've had a sexual relationship while Sophie was staying there, caring for their daughter, while his wife was away for months. It's all a pretty sad story and Sophie feels responsible for Cy's marital problems. She left their house and had her near-fatal accident.

Sophie goes to the bathroom. We will she kill herself in there? Something shatters. She broke some picture frames, she's worried she'll hurt their relationship. She demands that he determine if her accident was a suicide attempt. She screams and curses at Paul.

These people are worried about the insurance company and whether something that happened weeks ago was a suicide attempt....they don't even mention that she was sleeping with her adult coach-- ummm....she calls him a 'gentleman,' a really good guy. Paul never counters this. Sophie talks about how she messes everything up. They say good bye at the door. He calls Sophie's mother and asks to meet with her. Shouldn't someone be more concerned about this kid's imminent safety and arresting the coach?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Inspired by your posts, I watched the first episode, Laura, today on HBO On-Demand. It was painful but seemed so real. And now I'm hooked. Can't wait to catch up.

Anonymous said...

FD-- I was worried about you, heard you were having problems with the writer's strike and a lack of junk TV. Hope this helps.

Rach said...

I'm (viewing)living vicariously through your blog! Don't stop posting please, Dinah! There's no HBO here - although Sara invited me to watch the original In Treatment in Hebrew.
Does anyone know if they are leaving the episodes up on iTunes, or if they are pulling them down after a certain period of time???

Anonymous said...

I too am a vicarious viewer of In Treatment through Dinah’s blog. Alas no HBO in the land of Oz nor are those living overseas able to download episodes from the HBO site (this can only be done within the US). Luddite that I am, I have yet to master iTunes so all that’s left is the Shrink Rap recap and analysis. Dinah: I understand if you need to cut back but don’t give up on it totally.

Anonymous said...

It's a good fall back. if you do ever sick of being a shrink, you can write for TV Guide

Anonymous said...

I don't know about iTunes, but I know on HBO.com they only leave each week's episodes for that week. So far, though, they've left all of them on iTunes.

Anonymous said...

Still no comment about her sleeping with her coach? I find this interesting. What were people expecting/hoping Paul would say or do with the information? Should he blindly believe her, should he become detective and suss out the actual truth? Does it matter, the essence of the truth of the event other than how it affects Sophie? How do therapist deal with actual truth, percieved truth when it comes to sexual abuse or suspicion of sexual abuse in unequal realtionships?

April said...

My husband and I argued about this last night---what should Paul do with the information Sophie gave him. He said Paul should be telling the parents and even the cops. I said that would break Sophie's trust and Paul will be able to help her more if the maintains their relationship. As long as he is treating her he can help her to be strong and probably keep her from feeling like she needs Cy's love. ??

Anonymous said...

Age of consent varies from region to region but it seems as though Sophie had this sexual relationship, if indeed she did have this relationship, when she was no older than 16 and possibly younger. The other factor is that the coach is an adult in a position of trust, ha ha aren't they all...So Paul could be liable for failure to report a child abuser and Sophie may not be the only victim if one chooses to believe that she did have sex with the guy. She is pretty inconsistent in what she says and who knows if it happened or not (and if she was abused, it could have been the coach or it could have been the dad who loves her as much as Cy but who is missing in action)but once reported to the doc it has to be taken further especially since the guy has a little girl of his own at home. Gotta wonder about the parents in all this. I bet Paul is wondering who is going to pay him. Haven't noticed Sophie hand him a cheque, just a boat. Paul is in over his head because this is where children's aid societies come in. Too much crazy stuff for this guy to handle and he knows zero about this kid.

Shawn Anderson said...

Sophie is on a balance beam right now... shift too far in any direction, and she could fall. Until Paul gets a better grip on the situation, I think he's going to try to reach out to the mother first.

We see in the previews for next week that even speaking to her mother breaks her trust in Paul. Imagine what would happen if he went to the police straightaway?

Anonymous said...

The guy would be classified as a mandated reporter as far as i know. further, knowing and not reporting ---how does that help develop trust in the long term?