"What did you and Karen talk about today?" I asked before sitting down.
He hesitated. He'd previously answered all my similar questions.
"Is there a problem?" I asked.
"No. Actually, just the opposite. I'm not sure Karen would want you to hear. It would embarrass her." I gave him a look that worked and he relented. "I'd rather you not tell her I told you." He certainly had my attention. I agreed.
"You spent Monday night locked in the den with your husband for a very long time. You were there so late you didn't kiss Karen good night. No one said anything the next morning but when she came home from school, there was a suitcase on your bed and you weren't home as usual. She was convinced you were leaving. She was devastated."
I started to cry. I don't know if it was how sorry I felt for Karen's misunderstanding or out of shear happiness that she'd miss me that much.
"Don't feel so badly," he said, passing me a tissue. "She talked about the incident as if it was a joke on her; poked fun at herself for jumping to the wrong conclusion. When she learned the truth, she was as happy as a lark."
"I'd never leave her. Never. I didn't think she even liked it when I kissed her good night."
"Both of you are learning about each other. Please let her retain her private emotions and don't mention the incident." I agreed but all I wanted to do was hug her and apologize.
He continued, "We also touched on the rules and guidelines your family set up, and punishments attached to misbehavior. That's what I'd like to discuss with you," he added, wasting no time. "We've talked a lot over the past few weeks, mostly about your childhood, which you felt was happy."
"It was happy, Doctor," I corrected him.
"Yes, but there must have been instances similar to the quarry fiasco when you stepped over the line."
"Sure. We had rules and penalties, like the ones we're setting up for our children."
"Did you use those same guidelines your family used when you recently agreed on theirs?"
"Sure. You heard what I said last week. Karen is obsessed with how I was raised."
"Tell me how it was addressed when Sarah Jeanne did bad things in the past. How were those matters handled?"
I hated that line of questioning . . . "the little girl" bit. "The child that dwells in all of us." I looked away and didn't answer.
"What happened when you were young and you were bad?"
"I'd be punished."
"How?"
"There were levels of transgressions. We all agreed to abide by certain rules and if we didn't, we had to answer for it. It was like a family contract, similar to what we just did in our family."