Dr. Oliver’s initial diagnosis was depression. He said that he didn’t think I was like Travis and had a ‘mood disorder’ (apparently you can just get depressed and have a mood disorder, as opposed to Travis who gets depressed and manic.) Still, he said he wasn’t ruling out that possibility, as it turns out I’m at the age when mood disorders usually get out of control. That wasn’t very comforting.
One day – I think it was my fourth session with Dr. Oliver – I mentioned the sexual harassment problems I had last summer.“Sexual harassment?,” Dr. Oliver asked me.“I didn’t do anything. This woman who worked for the network that produces our show harassed me – I mean shit like looking up my shorts while I was working out and then telling me about it. I turned her down – I have a girlfriend, and, even if I didn’t, the thing I hate most is a woman who pursues me…”“You like to be the pursuer?,” Dr. Oliver asked.“I reckon so,” I said. “That kind of is the man’s job, isn’t it? But I get pursued a lot. You should see some of the things that people write on Instagram. But at least they’re somewhere off in cyberspace. This woman was real as fuck, and wouldn’t go away, even after I made it clear that I wasn’t interested. I even went over to her house to explain that to her once and for all. Then it got seriously bad.”“What happened?”“She said that, if I didn’t do what she wanted that she’d say I harassed her sexually and get me fired from the show.”“Yikes. How did you feel about that?”“Scared, mostly.”“Scared?”“Yeah. Scared shitless. My whole livelihood is tied up with the show. Sexual harassment charges would have ruined that and I’d of been out on the street. That…bitch actually wanted that for me. She wanted to ruin me and have the Sharpmans put me out on the street. All because I wouldn’t fuck her.”“Well…just to play devil’s advocate, you did have something you could have used against her, no? Her advances to you…”“I guess I had plenty of chances to say something, but I didn’t. I was afraid that no one would believe that a man could be sexually harassed. Isn’t there some rule that you’re always supposed to believe the woman?”“I’ll admit that, yes,” said Dr. Oliver.“And they’d probably be all the more ready to side with the woman given how I look.”“You have a point there, too.”“But am I supposed to sleep with anyone who wants to sleep with me?”“Of course not. And I imagine you’d be very busy if you did. I’ve checked out your Instagram.” He smiled.“I don’t write that, you know,” I said to Dr. Oliver. “We have a woman who takes care of the social media for the people on the show. The only social media-y thing I do is the blog…and I haven’t written for it since all this depression shit started. Have you looked at it?”“A little,” Dr. Oliver said, “but I’ll admit not too much. You certainly used to write a lot. Do you think that it’s significant that you’ve stopped writing just now.” “I don’t know. I just haven’t felt like it,” I said. Of course I knew there was a connection. I didn’t need Dr. Oliver for that.“Unfortunately we have to stop,” Dr. Oliver then said. I don’t know why he always says ‘unfortunately’: fortune has nothing to with the clock and my 45 minutes being up lol. “But I want to come back to the sexual harassment thing at our next session.”“Sure,” I said. “You can read the whole story on the blog. I wrote about it a lot. It goes on for like 10 posts.”“I’ll….take a look at it,” he said as he handed me the credit card machine. He didn’t sound very convincing, but he probably doesn’t have the time to read all his clients’ blog posts.I reckon y’all are wondering how I was feeling while this was happening. Maybe a little better, but there still were days when I couldn’t get out of bed, and more and more days when I couldn’t get to sleep, either. This was when I told Josh that I needed a break from the Parrots. That made for a lot of shuffling of positions: Keaton moved over to short, Travis moved from left field to 2nd, and Dylan (who by his own admission isn’t a ball player) took over in left field. I told Chuy that I needed a break from Los Cervezeros too. They just found a temporary shortstop to fill in for me, and made it very clear (in Spanish) that my spot was waiting for me when I felt better. (Neither team captain asked for any details about my condition. They took me at my word that I just wasn’t up to playing.)My depression also ended up changing the plans they had for me on the show. We were discussing sending me to Arizona to do a couple segments with the Dodgers during spring training, but the idea got dropped, partly because of logistics, partly because of the Dodgers, and partly because of my not being myself. I was having a very bad week, and I reckon by this point everyone knew that the migraine excuse was bullshit. This was when I started to be afraid that Maya and Robert thought I was doing drugs and that that’s why I couldn’t function in the morning. On the one hand, I thought of Maya and Robert as friends, but they’re still my bosses, and I didn’t want them to think I couldn’t do my job.Joyce was also less and less fooled by the migraine excuse, although I was spending fewer nights at Joyce’s, which meant fewer mornings, and mornings are the hardest part of the day for me. There was one morning at Joyce’s when I felt as bad as I’ve ever felt, but I somehow pulled myself together enough to get up and get dressed and get out of there without having to explain. The one thing I did tell Joyce about was my worrying that Maya and Robert might think I turned into some lameass Hollywood type who did drugs and passed out and then couldn’t get up until noon when he took more drugs to wake up.“So why don’t you just tell them the truth?,” Joyce asked.“The truth?,” I asked.“Yes. That you’re severely depressed and having trouble functioning at full capacity.”“Wait…what??” I know that the only people I told I was having depression problems were Luke and Travis. I reckon Travis could have told Keaton who could have told Joyce, but I swore Travis to secrecy, and, if anybody knows about confidentiality in mental health issues, it should be Travis.“Hunter, do you think Keaton and I are blind or something? We had it figured out weeks ago.” It was weird thinking that Joyce and Keaton were communicating without my knowing it.“So why didn’t one of y’all say something?”“We were waiting for you to tell us. It took you long enough.”“Dr. Oliver said I was in denial about the depression. It wasn’t until we were up in Santa Barbara that Luke called me on it.”“I guess he really is more than a pretty face. Good for him. And who’s Dr. Oliver?”I reckoned she might as well know the whole thing.“He’s my therapist. I’ve been seeing him for about a month now. Travis found him for me.”“Keaton had a hunch that you and Travis might be up to something like that. But he didn’t pry. If anyone can keep a secret in this world, it’s Keaton.” She looked at me up and down, like to make sure I was still all there. “You do look tired. I first thought you might have had sleep apnea or something and weren’t sleeping right.”“Nope. It’s depression. At least that’s what Dr. Oliver says.”“How’s it going with him?”“Ok, I reckon. But there’s just so much to talk about. I’ve got thirty years of history to catch him up on. Oh…he did his graduate work on sports psychology, mostly with football players, so he’s worked with jocks before. I think he understands what it’s like to have baseball be the driving force in your life.”“You realize that everyone’s probably been in therapy at some point, right?,” Joyce asked me. “Including me, back when I was…before I met you. I was depressed too, and it helped. I saw the therapist for about a year.”“It takes a year?,” I asked. Dr. Oliver was already making a dent in my wallet, and I didn’t like the idea of having to keep going to see him forever. I mean, he’s pretty cool, but I just want to get back to normal as quickly as possible.“I don’t know. A lot of people get used to seeing the therapist and getting to talk to themselves for an hour a week.” Joyce laughed. “Although I can’t see that happening to you.” “It’s just so gay sitting there and talking about my problems.” I had a flash of Keaton sitting in the fancyass reclining chair in Dr. Oliver’s office and laughed. “I should be out playing baseball.”“All in good time,” said Joyce. “The important thing is that you found a therapist you like so quickly. A lot of people have to try a few on for size before they find someone they can trust.”Joyce then told me I should tell Keaton that they were right about me being depressed; she didn’t want to be the one to tell him. So I went over to see him the next night to catch a Dodgers game and tell him that I’d gone totally gayass and was seeing a therapist.“So you’re finally admitting it, bubba?,” he said the minute I was inside the door of his apartment. “It’s about time. Joyce was pretty fuckin worried. Why’d it take you so long to figure it out?”“I didn’t figure it out,” I said, taking the beer he offered me and lowering myself into the beanbag, “Luke did.”“Leave it to the gay guy,” said Keaton.“And that’s why I didn’t want to tell you.”“What’s why?”“Because you would say it was totally gayass of me to be depressed and in therapy.”“Bubba,” Keaton said, sounding rather insulted, “you know I looked out for Vince when he was having all his troubles, and you’ve seen me looking out for Travis. What makes you think that I’d call you gayass for needing help?”“They’re both bipolar. They have serious problems. I’m just…ordinary depressed.”“Fuck that shit. Depressed is depressed. At least you had the good sense to find a therapist. Is he cool?”“I think so,” I said.“Just so’s you can talk to him comfortably,” said Keaton. “You gotta trust that talk therapy will work.”“Were you…?”“Was I what?”“Ever in therapy?”Keaton laughed. “I hope you’re not expecting some long backstory about when I had a secret mood disorder and saw a Dutch psychiatrist, because there ain’t one. Now can we stop talking about your gayass problems and watch the game?”So that’s how Joyce and Keaton found out that I was seeing Dr. Oliver.
Hunter Block's Blog 