A Therapist's Unseen World

“Six-Seven”

The first question is always the same:

“How have you been?”

People rarely answer it.

Instead they circle it,

like aircraft waiting for permission to land.

A construction worker once told me,

“I’m fine,”

then cried so hard

he apologised to the furniture.

A woman with three academic degrees

said she felt “a bit tired,”

which turned out to mean

she had not wanted to wake up

for most of the year.

A teenage boy shrugged when I asked how he was.

“Six… seven,” he said.

As if life were a test

he hadn’t studied for

but hoped he might still pass.

I have learned that numbers

are often safer than words.

Ten means performing.

Eight means coping.

Five means something is quietly collapsing.

Six or seven usually means,

“I am not okay,

but I am still here.”

Outside the office

traffic moves,

coffee machines hiss,

people complain about the weather

as though it were a personal betrayal.

Inside,

someone is deciding

whether tomorrow

is worth attending.

My role is not to push them forward.

Not to drag them back.

Only to sit steady enough

that, if they choose to remain,

there is a place

where remaining

makes sense.

“Same time next week?” I ask.

Most of them nod.

That small movement of the head

has saved more lives

than anyone will ever record.