Tales of a Shrink

I had to go to court to testify on behalf of a client today. I'm not going to get into the specifics of the case, because ~~I don't want to get sued for malpractice~~ I want to protect my client's confidentiality.

So I will just say the following: Court isn't a fun place to go. I have been dreading this for a week. I have been reviewing and reviewing my notes. I have been thinking about possible questions and my responses.

Mostly, I was under the impression that the judge would want to crucify me. I had heard horror stories from my colleagues. I was ready to endure insults to my credibility, to have my credentials demeaned, and so on.

In the end, I was on the stand for about 10 minutes, and during most of that time the Judge was yelling at my client's attorney. (I feel bad for the attorney, who looked like she was about to cry.) The Judge did ask me a few questions directly, and a couple of them I did not understand, so I asked him to explain it to me.* He did, and then I answered. In total, I responded to about 5 questions, and then I was done.

So I went home for lunch, and played with my cat.

*-The Client's attorney was AMAZED that I would ask a Judge to explain something. Well, shit... What else would I do? If I'm going to court, I want to make sure I'm telling the truth, so if I don't understand what's being asked, I'm not going to answer. Seems pretty simple to me, but I guess other people just don't do that.