Anastasia, Ask Your Analyst Read Online Free PDF

symptoms."
    "Difficulty sleeping?"
    "Nope."
    "Loss of appetite?"
    Anastasia shook her head. "Nope. I said at dinner that I'd lost my appetite, but it was only because of Sam. Actually, after I took my plate to the kitchen, I ate the rest out there."
    "Inability to concentrate? That's another symptom."
    Anastasia brightened. "I may have that last one. I have a lot of trouble paying attention in Math class."
    "That doesn't count," said her father. "I mean
real
inability to concentrate, like if you couldn't even follow this conversation."
    Mrs. Krupnik yawned. "I can hardly follow this conversation, I'm so sleepy. I'm going to bed in about five minutes."
    "Sexual problems," Dr. Krupnik continued. "Are you having sexual problems, Anastasia?"
    "DAD. Quit being gross."
    He chuckled. "Let's see. Delusions. Do you ever think you might be, oh, the Queen of England?"
    Anastasia brightened. She made her Queen of England face, raising her eyebrows as high as she could, and drawing her mouth into a teeny, pinched position. "I am sometimes teddibly distressed by the conditions in this rawther lower-class home," she said, looking down her nose at her father.
    Her mother yawned again. "Me too," she said.
"Nobody ever did the dishes tonight. They're still in the sink. It was your turn, Myron; it's Thursday."
    He made a face. "I'll do them in the morning," he said. "Anastasia, I'm running out of symptoms. How about: Do you ever think someone is trying to poison you?"
    "That's
it!
" said Anastasia. "That's the one I have! Just today, Mom said she was going to make oatmeal for dinner! Talk about poison!"
    "Come on, sport. Oatmeal for dinner is disgusting, I'll agree with you there. But did you seriously think that she was going to sneak some ground glass into it?"
    "No," admitted Anastasia, grudgingly.
    "Well, then. One last symptom. Do you ever hear voices?"
    "Sure. I hear yours right now."
    "No, I mean phantom voices, inside your head. Voices that aren't really there, but you hear them anyway."
    That was an interesting thought. Anastasia never had. But then she had never really tried to. "Shhh," she said, "let me listen a minute."
    Mrs. Krupnik yawned again, as silently as possible. The three of them sat there without speaking, each with their heads cocked to the side, listening.
    "Myron," whispered Mrs. Krupnik, "I think I hear a voice!"
    "Me too, Dad!" Anastasia said aloud. "I really did hear a voice! I couldn't tell what it was saying, though. It sounded far away."
    Her father stood up and put his finger to his mouth. "Shhh," he said, "listen. What
is
that?"
    The distant voice had stopped, but now they heard footsteps upstairs. Small footsteps.
    "It's Sam," said Mrs. Krupnik. "What's he doing up at this hour?"
    The footsteps came to the head of the stairs, and now they could hear the voice loud and clear.
    "I threw up!" Sam called cheerfully. "All over my bed!"
    "YUCK," said Anastasia.
    "It's mostly ketchup!" called the voice. Mrs. Krupnik yawned, stretched, and leaned back in her chair. "Maybe I'll read for a while," she said, and picked up a magazine. "Myron, it's Thursday, remember?"
    Dr. Krupnik sighed. "I know," he said. "My turn for clean-up."
    "Here," he said, as he got up from his chair. He reached toward the bookcase, took out a book, and handed it to Anastasia. "Read Freud if you want to know about psychiatry."
    After her father had gone upstairs to tend to Sam, Anastasia turned to her mother, who was absorbed in a magazine article.
    "Dad forgot something important," Anastasia said.
    "What's that?"
    "Remember that movie we saw on TV?
Sybil?
And Sally Field was this girl who had all these different personalities?"
    "Sure," said her mother, "Joanne Woodward was the
psychiatrist who cured her. That was a good movie. I wonder why I let you watch it, though. You were much too young. You were only about eight."
    "I was
not
too young," said Anastasia. "I loved that movie. I never forgot it. But it's only just now that I realized I'm