Bernard and Me

Spring, 1988.  I was a graduate counseling student at CBN University (now Regent University), a Christian graduate school in Virginia Beach, VA.  I was taking the entry-level counseling class and our capstone project was to find a person to counsel and video-tape the weekly 50-min counseling sessions.

Most students found friends and family members to “counsel.”  I went down to the an inner-city ministry in the Tidewater housing projects in Norfolk, Virginia and asked if they had anyone in mind. They suggested Bernard, a black man about 15 years my senior who suffered just about every scourge an inner-city man could suffer . . . drug and alcohol addiction, chronic unemployment, estranged family, multiple children by multiple women, abuse, problems with the law. He had the whole enchilada. He wanted help getting his life on track.

Every Tuesday evening, on the campus at CBN, Bernard and I would meet in a little room with 2 chairs, a table, and a video camera mounted in the corner. I would pop a VHS cassette in, press record, and we would talk. That next Thursday, Dr. Jean Orr, our professor, would randomly select a video from among the class members to view and discuss in our counseling lab.

One Tuesday evening, Bernard and I were discussing his responsibility to be a father to his children regardless of the status of the relationship with the mother. I wasn’t getting anywhere with him.Things were getting tense. Bernard was evasive, conjuring up every excuse in the book to justify not staying involved with this children.

“I can’t reach out to my kids! I don’t even know where they live!” he appealed.

I was becoming irritated. “Bernard, have you tried calling their mother and ask to speak to your children?”

“I don’t now her phone number!” countered Bernard.

That was the last straw. I was tired of the excuses. In frustration, I grabbed the telephone off the table between us, stood up, and literally threw the phone at him, striking him in the chest, causing him to stumbling out of his chair and fall to the floor. “Damn it, Bernard,” I screamed, “call 411 for information!!!” Shocked and bewildered, he picked up the phone off the floor, dialed 411 for the operator and was able to get his ex-girlfriend’s phone number. He called his girlfriend right there and was able to set up a time to visit his kids.

That next Thursday, Dr. Orr randomly selected my video. I thought, “Oh man! There goes my grade. I’ll flunk for sure.” The video played without significant comment until the part where I verbally and physically attacked my client in a most unholy manner. Gasps echoed throughout the class. The professor paused the video, closed her eyes for seemed like an eternity, and finally turned to me.

She was somber. “I appreciate that you have verbally and physically illustrated the frustration we all feel from time to time while counseling our clients.” And then she spent the next hour talking about appropriate boundaries, frustration, and professionalism. It was a very long hour.

Suddenly, Dr. Orr glances at her watch. “Ooops! It looks like we’re almost out of time!  Let’s fast-forward the tape to the end of Mr. Sensintaffar’s session and see how he wrapped things up.”

Just so happened, the VHS tape was a used tape I pulled from the TV cabinet. It had been used to tape movies off the TV. Inadvertently, Dr. Orr fast-forwarded the tape past the end of the counseling session and right into a taped version of the new hit movie, Lethal Weapon. She pressed the play button at the precise point Mel Gibson body slams Danny Glover and holds him at gunpoint. The class erupted in laughter. I shrunk down into my seat. I was mortified.

It was legendary, I’m told.

I did get an “A” for the class.