A Player's Prayer

Twenty- One

One month later...

"Hi Britney, my name is Dr. Avery Thomas thank you for coming in today. Let me start by saying everything we discuss here today is strictly confidential. I legally cannot repeat anything you say to me to anyone without your permission. As your therapist and advisor, I am here to guide you on your journey to being your best self. Is that okay with you?"

B nodded, making it known she understood.

"I'll give a little background about myself just to make things more comfortable. As I said I'm Dr. Avery Thomas I was born and raised in Brooklyn then moved to Atlanta at eighteen to attend Clark Atlanta where I earned both my bachelors and masters. I have a Phd in psychology from Georgia State University. I've been married for thirty years and I have two daughters. Now I'll give you the floor to share anything about yourself you feel comfortable sharing."

"Alright so I'm Britney I was also born and raised in Brooklyn but now I live out here. I don't really have anything else to share beside that."

"That's okay Britney, thank you for sharing. May I ask why you're here today?" Dr. Avery asked.

"Um I've been going through a lot of ups and downs ever since I moved to Atlanta and for a while I thought it would something that would eventually go away on its own but I think I underestimated how much shit is really starting to affect me."

"What is it that affected you to the point of coming to therapy?"

"My brothers birthday is coming up soon." B said, an immediate sadness washing over her.

"Tell me about your brother." Dr Avery said, noticing B's mood change.

"My brother was the oldest out of the three of us -- my sister and myself. He was shot and killed six years ago."

"Go on, tell me about your childhood and what that looked that in regards to your brother." Dr Avery encouraged, wanting the full story knowing there was a lot to unpack.

"Me and my siblings were always close, we didn't have a lot as kids but it always felt like we did cause we had each other and we made shit work. My brother wasn't the type to sit around and wait for things to be handed to him so he did what he had to do to provide. Everyone in the hood always wanted the flashy shit but he wanted to get his family out away from all the noise. Whenever my brother was around I knew I was good."

"Now tell me about your parents, were they present in your life?"

"They were but it was always a weird dynamic." B said, gathering her thoughts since she was revealing things she never spoke aloud to anyone other than her sister and her brother. "Growing up where I'm from was tough but not even cause of the environment but because of home life. My mother was a heavy drinker when I was like seven or eight so she would often take her anger out on me and my sister for the most trivial things just because. And she would only do shit like that when my brother wasn't around cause she knew he would never go for that."

"How do you think that affected you in the long run?" Dr. Avery asked.

"It made me very defensive. I was always in survival mode, always getting in trouble at school cause that was the only place I felt I could retaliate. It took years of dealing with shit at home to physically start defending myself before my mother learned to stop putting her hands on me and my sister. So that's really how I went about everything in life. I wasn't taught to communicate my feelings in a healthy way, I was just taught how to defend myself when I felt disrespected or attacked." Dr. Avery's page was already filled with notes, already flipping to the next page.

"And I always remember being angry with my dad cause he would just let my mother kick me out the house over little arguments and shit like that... cause in my eyes he was supposed to defend me but always left that shit to my brother. But it was a blessing in disguise cause my grandmother became that parental figure in my life at a time where I needed it the most."