Sara’s Pick: Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb

This is a really interesting and well-written look at therapy from both sides of the couch. Dr. Lori Gottlieb opens up about treating her patients and being treated by her own therapist. After a heartbreaking split with her Boyfriend of two years, Dr. Gottlieb decides that she needs help in recovering from the trauma. As she recounts her own therapy hurdles, she realizes that she’s seeing the same struggles in her own patients. Some of them are jerks, some are not really ready to work on their issues, and some face staggering blows that they confront with grace and humor. She has a television producer who is angry and defensive, an alcoholic who thinks she can still have a drink or two and be ok, and a young newlywed woman who discovers she has cancer. Her therapist has to point out her blind spots even as she has to gently coax her patients to open their eyes to issues they can’t or don’t want to articulate.  This is a thoughtful and compassionate look at the human condition and the help therapy can bring.