A Real Catch

As Lizzie passed the library, she saw Jenny sitting on the steps, crying.

"Jenny! What's wrong?" Lizzie could not believe that a grown woman was crying in public.

"I just went to a job advancement workshop and took a test, and they told me I have a low self-concept!" Jenny said.

Lizzie asked Dr. Singh for something for her chronic itching.

"But why do you itch?" Dr. Singh asked. Lizzie did not know.

"I think you itch because you're very tense."

A red flag popped up in Lizzie's mind. Men always told her that to get her to have sex with them.

"Why don't I prescribe something for you?" Dr. Singh said.

"You want to put me on tranquilizers for the rest of my life just because I itch?" Lizzie never went back to Dr. Singh.

Jerod asked her if she wanted to go for a walk. Jerod, a football star with a deep tan, the dream of every girl at the picnic!

"OK," she said, trying hard to be cool about it.

As they walked toward the woods, Jerod took her hand.

Once they were out of sight of the picnickers, Jerod put his arm around Lizzie and kissed her in such a sincere way that she knew he cared for her.

"I like you," he said. He was more honest than the other guys, who had said, "I love you," or, "I want you."

Jerod wanted to lie down. For a second, Lizzy wondered if she should go that far. But he had a great job and a high IQ, and his feelings for her were genuine. What were the chances of a woman like her getting another man this good?

The weeds scratched her arms and legs, but she did not care.

As they walked back to the picnic, Jerod dropped her hand. "I'm a high-profile person," he explained. "So act like we weren't together, or they'll figure it out right away."

Lizzie did as she was told, afraid to make him angry.

As soon as Lizzie was out of earshot, Jerod gave his best friend a big grin.

"You got her?" his friend asked.

"Are you kidding me? Look at her!" The friend looked at Lizzie's scratched body, and handed Jerod twenty dollars.

Not happy with the type of man she was attracting, Lizzie decided to go to a lecture on how to find a good man. Her friend, Shirley, would not come with her.

"I've been perfectly happy without a man in my life for five or six years now," Shirley said.

"You're just saying that!" Lizzie said. "Any healthy, mature woman needs sex, at least once in a while."

But Shirley insisted that it was true.

"If you improve your approach, you'll attract better, more marriageable men," the lecturer said.

A woman in the back said: "This is ridiculous!"

"You can speak up. Go ahead."

"My name is Nora. I came for advice on how to find a good man, and I'm getting a sermon on how I'm not doing things right. You don't see the men blaming themselves when they don't get women."

"You don't see men reading self-help books, either," another woman said. "Why is that?"

"Because they weren't taught to blame themselves for other people's problems," Nora said.

"So you don't think there are any women whose approach to looking for a potential husband could be improved?" the lecturer asked Nora.

"Well, of course there are," Nora said. "The women here just seem so -- so desperate. As if there were all sorts of perfectly marriageable men in their lives who are treating them badly because the women aren't using the right approach. Is that really the case?"

Several women shook their heads "no".

Nora said, "What's actually the case is that women tend to grab whatever men -- some who are real losers -- come along. And then we come to these lectures to find out how to make these losers marriageable and willing to marry us. It seems desperate to me. Aren't we worth more than that? Aren't we good enough that we deserve men who'll beg us to marry them and treat us right so we will?"

"Wait a minute! You're calling us desperate!" Lizzie said.

"I'm calling us beautiful, intelligent women who don't know our own worth," Nora said.

Lizzie went to a class led by a counselor, an expert at helping people advance in their jobs.

"Probably the most important job skill is a good self-concept," the counselor said. "If you don't recognize your own skills, who else will? So the test you're about to take is a test of self-concept."

Lizzie raised her hand and asked what the cure was for a low self-concept.

"Therapy. The therapist encourages you, motivates you to develop your confidence, and helps you develop rewards for trying."

"I hope my self-concept tests out low!" Lizzie said.

Lizzie asked Dr. Nasser for something for her constant itching.

"But why do you itch?" Dr. Nasser asked. Lizzie still did not know, after all those years.

"I think you itch because you're tense."

Red flag! "I'm not going on tranq --"

"Wait, please," Dr. Nasser said. "I don't think you're some nervous, hung-up person who needs to be tranquilized. I think you have a physiological disorder. You may be missing some important chemicals in your brain. That can cause tension."

The red flag disappeared. Dr. Nasser referred Lizzie to a psychiatrist. "She'll give you medication -- a salt, actually -- that will remedy the chemical deficiency."

"You have bipolar disorder, formerly known as manic depression," said the psychiatrist, taking out her prescription pad. "I'm going to put you on lithium."

Red flag!

"Is this a trick?" Lizzie said. "Dr. Nasser said all I have is a chemical deficiency, and I just need some kind of salt to correct it."

"He's right," the psychiatrist said. "Bipolar disorder is a chemical deficiency. And lithium is the salt that corrects the deficiency, at least for 80% of bipolars."

The red flag disappeared. Lizzie started taking lithium.

Slowly, a change took place in Lizzie's personality: she was not desperate for a man any more.

She still had sexual desires. But she no longer took walks in the woods with men she did not know. Her self-concept had improved.

Shirley and Nora had been right.