Dear Mom and Dad,

Thank you, thank you so much. And I'm sorry, so very sorry.

You know that I am grateful for the big things- feeding me, clothing me, taking care of me, raising me. You know I am eternally thankful for the years and years you spent supporting me. At least I hope you know that. But there are other things I am grateful for. Thank you for sharing your margaritas with me at dinner, for not being too mad when I told you that I never went to ACT practice. Thanks for letting too many teenagers sleep in our basement. Mom, thanks for breaking the Easter chocolate out of its hiding place early because I had a craving. Dad, thanks for letting me go to that protest and for understanding my aversion to social situations. Thanks for sitting on folding chairs with me watching drunk white people on fourth of July, thanks for listening to WGCI. Mom, thanks for remembering what its like to be a teenager and knowing how to navigate. Thanks for adjusting when the MS makes things difficult.

But also I am sorry. Really, very sorry. You are the first people I have seriously wronged, I think. I have been trying to be better lately, more honest. I am sorry for the lies I told. I am sorry for being rude and standoffish. I am sorry for every time I cursed you under my breath. I am forever sorry and ashamed of my "summer excursion" as mom calls it. I didn't know. I wish I could have kept you two safe from all the things going on with my head last year, but I think by attempting that I made it worse on everyone. I am sorry that I tried to protect you, because now I realize that it is your job to protect me. I am sorry for the future worry I am going to cause you. The next few years will be full of worry. But it will be okay, I will get through it and one day I will have a stable job and you can stop worrying a bit.

Thank you for giving me a reason to stay when I didn't want to.

Your Daughter.

Speaking Fankl-y

Logotherapy is an interested and different concept. I have never heard of it before, which I find a bit odd. I do appreciate its challenging of traditional Freudian psychotherapy, but I do not think logotherapy is the end all be all that Frankl seems to regard it as in his book. He admits that logotherapy can work in conjunction with other treatments but Frankl's writings assert very broad generalizations and seem to me to oversimplify psychological issues.

I do not think that every person has to have a meaning, or find a meaning. If a person comes to the conclusion that life is meaningless, who is Frankl to push his opinion on them? Accepting that life is meaningless does not equal giving up on life or suicide. Like the absurdists, one can believe there is no meaning without wanting to escape life. For some people no meaning is the answer, and that should be okay.

I also do not think that once a person finds their meaning that is necessarily enough. I am not a logotherapist and I do not understand the intricacies of Frankl's methods, but he seems to see finding meaning as the answer to many issues causing a person to seek therapy, including depression. I completely understand why that may be useful for some. But part of what makes Depression such an awful, debilitating disease is that a sufferer can logically understand and see the meaning in life, all the beauty and all the joy, but still be Depressed. One's outlook on life is not always in harmony with their mental state. Frankl seems to be ignoring the biological influences of mental illness.

I really do appreciate and see the merit in logotherapy and Man's Search for Meaning but I feel like we didn't challenge Frankl enough in class so I wanted to take the time to do it here.