Sometimes you just need a listening ear. But what do you do when you can’t find one?
When there is no one left to tell your story to
After experiencing something deeply upsetting, I was shocked to realize that I really couldn’t talk about it with my friends. You can tell your story once, but not much more than that. But after that, the response becomes: “You already told me that,” or people start cutting you off. They stop answering your calls. Even worse: they stop calling you.
Because healing after something like that often requires telling your story more than once, I decided to look for a psychotherapist. That turned out to be a shocking experience as well, for several reasons.
I had no idea there were so many therapists in my area.
An even bigger surprise was discovering that almost all of them had waiting lists of at least six months.
What I found even more troubling was that, from my perspective, some organizations seemed to be making quite a lot of money from people’s psychological distress. They carry out expensive intake assessments, only to turn people down afterward for actual treatment.
And it remains to be seen whether I really needed “treatment” in the psychotherapeutic or psychiatric sense. Because all I needed was simply to be able to tell my story… something that seems completely normal to me after going through something so traumatic.
At least, that used to be considered normal.
There was a time when you could simply turn to your friends for that. They understood. They were willing to listen. Because another time, you would be there for them. That was how it worked.
At least, that was how it felt in my world.
But the biggest surprise was still to come
…the question of whether it is still considered “normal” nowadays to talk to your friends when something devastating has happened to you. Some people even told me they already see a therapist or psychiatrist “just in case” — because they fear that, when they actually need someone, there may be nobody available.
At first, I didn’t understand the long waiting lists. But now I am beginning to understand them a little better. If people feel they need to see a therapist in advance, as an emotional support insurance policy, so to speak, just in case they might someday need someone who will truly listen to them, then perhaps it is not so surprising that mental healthcare is completely overwhelmed.
I started wondering how many people are looking for therapy not because they want treatment, but because they simply have no one who will genuinely listen to them.
And that is how I came up with the idea of offering a listening ear myself.
Because perhaps attention alone can sometimes be a beginning. And perhaps, sometimes, it is enough.
In doing this, I am inspired by Andries Baart’s Theory of Presence.
For me, this means that you feel seen, heard, and acknowledged. I try to be unconditionally present and genuinely attentive to you, without immediately trying to steer toward a solution or a result. I meet you in your own lived reality and listen with attention, without judgment and without rushing.
At the same time, I think it is important to be clear about what I do and do not offer.
I am not a psychotherapist. I do not diagnose. And I am not here to fix you. The only thing I do is listen — with empathy and genuine attention.
Come talk to me
If you would like, you can come to me for this in Amsterdam or Palermo.
A conversation lasts 30 minutes and is free of charge.
You can make an appointment by emailing me at [dianadepodenca@gmail.com].
Why am I doing this?
Not to save the mental healthcare system. 😉
I am doing this because I believe that genuine attention and presence are among the most valuable things people can offer each other. If I can be the listening ear for someone else that I myself needed so badly, then that alone makes it worthwhile for me.
Receiving Is in the Giving. But I would like to write more about that another time.
How I got here
If you would like to know more about what brought me here, I have included links below to earlier posts. In those posts, I describe what happened and how I eventually arrived at this point.
Here you can read the beginning of a five-part series about the traumatic event that set all of this in motion.
This post is about the disappointment I felt when I realized that I could not turn to my friends for support.
Later, I came to understand that some kind of social change may have taken place — a change that means it is no longer considered acceptable in many situations to turn to your friends and cry on their shoulder about something painful that has happened to you.
And here you can read more about how I discovered Andries Baart’s Theory of Presence.
Because I have experienced how difficult it can be to find a listening ear when you truly need one, I would like to offer that to someone else.
A question for you
At the same time, I am curious about how you see this.
I personally have the feeling that something has changed in the way we listen to one another. But perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps your experiences are completely different. That is why I would like to ask you:
Who could you turn to when you were going through a difficult time?
And do you believe that being a listening ear is primarily something friends and family should provide — or is it something that should mainly be left to professionals?
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