Maybe You Should Talk to Someone - Book Summary

by Lori Gottlieb

"Absorbing and fascinating" – The Guardian
"In prose that's conversational and funny yet deeply insightful, psychologist Lori Gottlieb is here to remind us that our therapists are people, too." – Refinery29

The book describes the everyday life of psychologist Lori Gottlieb, interactions with patience and also with her own therapist.

The book shows a few of her patients and their development, one of my favourites is John, the one who called everyone "idiots", he is an asshole but by the end of the book he does manage to open up, and the main issues were that his kid was killed in a car accident.

Lori starts therapy after a breakup, the guy figures out after two years that we don't want a kid in the house, after reading more about him, it seems she dodged a bullet. In therapy, she keeps talking about her ex-boyfriend but after some sessions, she discovers that he wasn't the issue and that something about herself needs changing which also helps her to be a better therapist.

Other extracts from the book I found useful:

The famous line by Sartre "Hell is other people."...
We all know people who are just impossible to get with or "as John would have it, "idiots"), but sometimes we can be the ones who push us into hell.

Most common reasons people end up in therapy:
panic attacks, job loss, death, birth, relations difficulties etc...

People can treat you differently if they find out you are a psychologist,  some will ask you how to fix certain problems and some will avoid you because their afraid you will see their insecurities.
Some of the patients when they meet their therapist outside of the session and see their feelings and vulnerabilities will stop the therapy, eg: one day a woman was at a coffee inline for coffee when she got a call with bad news and ends up crying after the patient spotter her he chooses to change therapist.

Note: Some pieces of information are left out of the book.
Get the full experience by reading it!