Self-Disclosure Inhibitions

      One of the particularly difficult problems in helping the love-shy
prepubescent child is that of getting him to "open up" about his prob-
lems, hopes, needs, wants, aspirations and desires. Young children who
are shy are almost always afflicted with an inability to self-disclose. And
very often they will not disclose what they really want and need, or
what is really bothering them unless and until they are accorded plenty
of warm, non-threatening encouragement and time. They must be able
to trust the person to whom they self-disclose, and they must feel free
about contacting the teacher, parent, counselor or therapist, at any time
in the future, be it by telephone, letter, or in person.
      Many school districts retain just one or two clinical psychologists.
And these very few persons are expected to successfully trouble-shoot
all of the emotionally disturbed youngsters who surface throughout a
district that services several thousand pupils. Obviously this cannot be
accomplished with any degree of effectiveness without the input of a
great deal more resources for the hiring and retaining of trained people.

     A 37-year old love-shy man shared this poignant story with me
about how he had been too shy to tell a school psychologist what he
really wanted to tell her during his one visit with her.

     "I remember I was in the third grade, and one day I was sent in to
     see the school psychologist because I was regarded as different than
     the other kids. They seemed to think that I needed help. Anyway,
     there were ten different elementary schools in our district, and this
     psychologist only came by our school about once every two weeks
     or so.

     Well, I was given the entire school day with this psychologist. I was
     only about eight years old at the time, and it was really interesting.
     I mean she gave me all these tests. Most of the tests were spoken,
     so I didn't have to write anything. And she seemed to be a very
     nice person.

     Well, at one point she asked me to make a list of the three things I
     most wanted in all the world. I vividly remember this because she
     also said that I was definitely going to receive my number one wish.
     I was just a little kid, and I didn't know how she could be so goddam
     certain. But I remember her calmly saying that I'd better choose my
     number one wish with care because I was going to receive it--
     whatever it was. She said that she had helped all of the kids she
     had seen get the thing that they had listed as number one.
     
     Well, I remember this more vividly than most other things in my
     childhood because the only thing I could think of was a girl friend.
     I knew I wanted a girl friend more strongly than anything else in
     the world. But I just didn't have the nerve to tell her that! There
     was this girl in the other third grade class. Actually, she had been
     in my second grade classroom the year before. But now we had
     different third grade teachers. And what I really wanted was any-
     thing that might enable me to spend all my free time with her and
     make her my best friend.
   
     Well, I remember I was stone silent for what must have been five
     minutes. It seemed like ages. And she was really confused about it.
     I mean I had done a lot of talking up to that point. And I took all
     her oral intelligence tests without any problems like this developing.
     She was really confused.
 
     Well, what finally happened was that I said I'd tell her my second
     and third wishes first, and that I'd have to come back to wish number
     one. Well, I covered wishes number two and three rather fast. And
     then I began stalling again. This time instead of not saying anything
     I started elaborating on as many details as I could think of about my
     second and third wish. The funny thing is I couldn't tell you now
     what my second and third wishes were, even if my life depended
     on it. All I can remember is that I did a lot of talking about my second
     and third wish so that I would not have to talk about my first wish.
     I was really nervous and I wanted to bide myself some time. But I
     really couldn't think very easily because I was talking about some-
     thing entirely different from what I was trying to think about.

     Well, finally I just couldn't think of anything else to say. I couldn't
     stall her anymore, and I had to get to the first wish. Well, dammit,
     I just didn't have the nerve to tell her. So I finally told her that I
     wanted a dog! Actually I did want a dog, but that wasn't what I
     really and truly wanted more than anything else in the world. I
     wanted a girl friend. And I remember that for the rest of the school
     year I went through mental turmoil inside because I didn't have the
     nerve to tell her what I really wanted.

     You know what? Well, I don't think two weeks went by before my
     father came home one night with a standard poodle puppy! I know
     neither of my parents had especially wanted a dog. I think this school
     psychologist must have talked to them. Anyway, this psychologist's
     prophecy was fulfilled at my expense! I was delighted to have the
     dog, but I would have exchanged it in an instant for what I really
     wanted. I didn't get my real number one. To this day I keep won-
     dering what would have happened if I had told her what my real
     number one desire was!"

     To this 37-year old man this incident had long taken on a kind of
occult, mystical significance. However, even if the psychologist had been
unable to get him the specific girl friend whom he so dearly craved, she
should have at least been made aware of what had truly been on his
mind. She should have been made aware of what his strongest desire
actually was. For without this information there was really no chance of
her ever truly helping him in a whole host of other ways--including the
ways which had been of pertinence to the reasons for his having been
sent by his third grade teacher to see a school psychologist in the first
place.
      In cases similar to this one the child needs to be accorded regular
access to a trained psychologist. Moreover, the child needs to be shown
various alternative ways for getting his information across, if he is too
shy to say it all out loud. In the above instance the child had become
able to explain his true feelings and wishes upon actually receiving the
dog. In fact, to listen to him today he may have even been ready on the
very next day of school--if the psychologist had been there the next day
ready to listen to him.
      In sum, troubled youngsters need to have regular access to friendly,
nonthreatening clinical staff. In addition to this regular access, they also
need to be supplied with alternative means for relaying important infor-
mation to therapeutic staff. Again, letter writing is an important alter-
native means of contact. Another might be in-depth hypnosis. Generally
speaking, most children are far more hypnotizable than adults. And this
is a fact that should be constructively capitalized upon.
     Not having the nerve to talk about strong heterosexual love needs
and desires is a condition that often persists among love-shy males well
into adolescence, and sometimes even into adulthood. It is a problem
which can and often does prove quite costly to parents who may be
operating under the illusion that conventional psychiatric treatment will
work to turn a love-shy son into someone who behaves in a "normal"
and socially desirable fashion. The self-disclosure reticence that prevails
among the love-shy often wrecks havoc upon parents and relatives in
addition to the victims themselves. The following case interview well
illustrates this point.

     "I remember hack in 1953 I was a sophomore in high school. And I
     wasn't doing very well. My parents were always being called in
     because I wasn't performing up to what was thought to be my
     intelligence and ability. And I was always acting up. Like, the kids
     would constantly bully and tease me all the time. And the way I
     dealt with that was to play the clown. In fact, I think I was even
     better than Jerry Lewis. Jerry Lewis was my role model at that time.
     And I was even more 'far out' in real life than he was on stage.

     Anyway, the real reason I wasn't doing well academically was that
     I just couldn't stop myself from daydreaming all the time about this
     girl who I was in love with. She didn't even know I existed. But
     from the moment I got up in the morning until I went to bed at
     night all I could do was dream about all kinds of beautiful stories
     involving me and her. I would be in class. But I just couldn't keep
     my mind on anything the teacher would be saying. And when I
     tried to read a textbook I would hold the book open and look at it
     with my physical eyes. But my real eyes were off with my beloved
     girl whom I desperately wished I could have. Sometimes I would
     have the book open to the same page for an hour or more. Sometimes
     I would even get headaches because my physical eyes would get
     tired looking at the print while I personally was not actually reading
     the print.

     Anyway, the principal convinced my father to take me to this psy-
     chiatrist. I remember she charged my father $20 per visit. That was
     a lot of money in those days. And I knew my father wasn't rich.
     Like, he didn't make all that much money. And I began to feel worse
     and worse about it because I began to recognize that psychiatry was
     really bullshit. Like when I first went to see this doctor I thought
     she was going to do something to me. But after I completed the
     initial battery of tests, all there ever was was talk. And during most
     of the sessions there were these prolonged silences. Sometimes we
     would just sit there and stare at each other for twenty whole minutes
     or more before anybody said anything. And it was still $20 a meeting.

     The thing that really upset me the most about all of this was that I
     really wanted to tell her about my daydreams. I mean I really wanted
     to tell her about how I longed to have a real live girlfriend whom I
     could love, and how all I ever thought about was this girl. Well, 1
     went to see this woman every week for almost two whole years.
     And in all that time I never really had the nerve to tell her what I
     was really like--like what was really going on in my mind all the
     time. Of course, she would keep telling me that I would talk when
     I became ready. Well, after two years I still didn't have the nerve.
     And when the principal told my father that all of this didn't seem
     to be doing any good, he finally let me stop seeing this psychiatrist.
     Of course, since then I've had fifteen years of psychotherapy with
     several different psychiatrists who did know about my need for a
     girlfriend. So I guess it probably wouldn't have done any good
     anyway if my first psychiatrist had known about it." (46-year old
     love-shy man.)