Corporate’s come up with a new way to cut costs and look like a humanitarian company: new health insurance with required psychiatric visits, physicals, etc. for the entire family. Gene is two years away from retirement age, and his company’s managers have zeroed in on him as a potential opportunity for cost cutting at their location. Gene has avoided the psychiatrist visit till now, and is already having some misgivings about what the new company policies are intended for, and the side effects for his family. Today, Gene sees the psychiatrist. Part One. (Written in 2006.)
Gene was a proud sort, the kind of man that if something bad happened to him, he wouldn’t tell anyone unless he could make himself appear to be at top. Nothing got to him, and if it did, it was not around for long, except as the punch line to a lunch time joke or a slow day tale. Life was meant to be lived, so Gene lived and let live. As long as nobody encroached on his rights and wants.
Everyone in his family had seen the workplace psychiatrist this year, everyone but Gene. They’d each come home with some new disorder, medication or referral to group therapy. His wife, Donna ate sleeping pills nightly, and faitfully attended a monthly women’s empowerment group meeting. Had her own bedroom now as well, complete with frilly new decor that had been paid for by yours truly, Gene.
His son, Anthony swallowed pills with every Poptart to stay alert in class, and met with a counselor to work through his test performance anxiety whenever test time came around. Test performance anxiety? Whatever happened to study, be literate, do well. Ah well. Ever since this newfound anxiety crippled Anthony, Gene noticed his son was always crying about one thing or another, whining about this or that, and had taken up wearing pink polos on test day.
“For good luck. The counselor says if I choose something I’m afraid to do, and do it on test day, I will feel braver, and do even better on the test.”
Piddle.
Gene’s daughter, Julia went to anger management courses twice weekly, and took some kind of medication that dulled her mind too much for her to write in that old infernal journal about confusion and repression, much less bare her heart publicly at liberal poetry readings. This was the only good thing to come from all this workplace interference into family life. Julia was no longer a sullen teen manhater. She completed chores with a smile, and stopped asking so many darned questions about every little thing.
Gene liked this one change—but hated being forced into psychiatric visits to satisfy corporate’s new policies regarding happy workers and healthy homes. He thought his home was healthy enough before the trips to Dr. Weiss, that the family just needed to stop whining all the time, get up and do something, face things. Be more like him.
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