Anne asked Lori Gottlieb:

Hi Lori! First - thanks for the lovely, heartbreaking, hilarious book. I finished it and immediately sent a copy to my mother in law and warned her she would SOB. My question is: to what extent does your clients' pain come home with you? Obviously you thought about 'Julie' a lot in particular, but do you find that to be the norm with your clients, or are you pretty adept at separating job empathy from real life?

Lori Gottlieb Hi Anne, thanks for the kind words about Maybe You Should Talk to Someone. I'm so glad you enjoyed it! As to your question: Therapists care about their clients and do think about them, but we don't carry their struggles with us outside the office. Sometimes something a client said in the last session will be closely related to something I see/hear/read during the week, and then the client will pop into my head and I'll make a note to share the insight/thought I had when I see the client back in session. With Julie, of course, I thought about her more and more as her condition deteriorated, and I think all of our clients live inside of us in certain ways. Something that they say or experience might touch us and stay with us during the week. But that's different from carrying their pain for them.

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