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| Bill Reiner and John Rudersdorf, Barnes and Nobles by SLCH |
I am congratulating a friend who looks so happy since he's had a baby. He comments that the baby cured him of any "existential angst".
It is true that passion for your baby, diaper changes and sleep deprivation have a way of curing many from that...unless, like many, you get post-partum depression but that's another thread for another day.
Let's return to existential angst, which I don't think is a disorder.
Three nights ago, I'm saying good night to my oldest son. "Isn't it incredible mom, that I was born in THIS family? that we exist at all? That we live on this earth? That another person in another family has a completely different existence? That it all depends on so little and so much?" I smile at him: "You think about this all the time, don't you? Sorry sweetie, you're my son". He smiles back: "Yes...always in the back of my mind...and it makes life interesting".
Two days ago, I pick up my wonderful friend William Reiner from the airport. He is coming for his annual visit to lecture on sexual development (also see http://captrainingdirectorblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/gender-identity-identity.html). Great to see him as usual and, over the course of his visit, we start many conversations about: parenting, doctoring, science, humanity, how things change and stay the same -we open up random books from my office, issues of "Medicine de France" from 1952 that I found in Lima, Peru and the gems of wisdom from the seventh dalai lama: http://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Seventh-Tibetan-Buddhist-Philosophy/dp/1559391324, that I found in Beijing, which quickly support that-. We discuss that science is now suggesting something we experience at a deep level both personally and as child and adolescent psychiatrists: being sensitive and vulnerable to environmental factors can go both ways. The vulnerability that can harm you faster than it might hurt others with less intense vulnerability, can also make you more likely to thrive/throw/recover/benefit from a particularly good environment.
I listen to Bill and I joke that he's got as much existential angst as my oldest son. We both nod knowingly: we both have it and we've stopped trying to strip it out of our beings...You see, it's so intertwined with empathy, at least for us.
Then Bill laughs when I tell him the conversation I had with my new dad friend: that's right, those were the days where the existential angst just did not have any room to be experienced. Living in the moment and being almost only focused on your baby and its well-being.
But, like my son says, so far, it has not really gone away...still in the back of my mind and yes, it makes life interesting.
Till Later,
Anne
I agree that existential angst itself is not a disorder, especially when it can be acknowledged and reflected upon, when one takes the perspective that it makes life interesting. However, it seems that people's desires to avoid existential angst drives many aspects of our consumer culture, from plastic surgery to recreational drug use to buying crap no one needs. I wouldn't be surprised if this is partially driving the huge rise in suicide amongst baby boomers...
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me a little bit of a cartoon by Claire Bretecher: "Agripine". Agripine is a dramatic and somewhat prototypical French Parisian teenager (hence the snobby Antiquity name) and the cartoon books (several volumes spanning the late 80s to the early 2000s) are about her mis-adventures and those of her generation. In one snapshot, Agripine is slouched on a bed, clearly dysphoric. Her mom comes in and initially tries to cheer her up with rosy platitudes a la "you're cute, you're gonna have boyfriends etc...", to which Agripine remains stone cold. So...mom drops the mask and gives her the "poop" about life including certain truths like beauty fading, irreducible loneliness, frustrating aspects of love and parenting etc....Until Agripine perks up, thanks her mom who is now slouched dysphorically on the bed; "Thanks mom, what you said made me feel a lot better!"
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