Looking Ahead

in General  by Paddy Ducklow 0 comments

Hello Friends,

Thank you for trusting us with your life stories, deepest hurts and affections, profound decisions and wild and wonderful questions. We have loved working with you.

Just think of this: Carole and Paddy have each worked in therapy, consulting, teaching, clinical pastoral care, etc. for 40-50 years each, close to a combined 100 years of face-to-face work. We know that is a long time, and we are 75 years of age. (Actually, Paddy is 75 and Carole is 74 and 3/4.)

We are both giving up our registration in our professional associations. So that is clear. Carole will no longer be a Registered Clinical Counsellor and Paddy will no longer be a Registered Psychologist. But we don’t want to give up on people or our professional work entirely. Perhaps we are ready to try something new. We still have energy, plenty of life experience and lots of accumulated wisdom.

Paddy wonders what a “Psychology Coach” would be like (whatever that is) and Carole is wondering about being a “Clinical Counsellor” (without the Registered part). A friend recommended that Paddy be a “Communication Shepherd” and that would be interesting too.

We like the idea of a changeover to something smaller and simpler. We are not entirely sure what form that will take. If you would like to keep in touch with us, send us an email at life@theducklows.ca and we will let you know where we are in our transition.

Best to you.

Paddy and Carole

Battery at 1%

in General / Retirement  by Paddy Ducklow 0 comments

As you can perhaps see from our ball caps, our batteries are down to about 1%. This is ageism as a result of workism. We started this psychology business in 1978 which is a long time ago. I am 75 years old now and Carole is a year following. Our internal batteries tell us that this is enough. Note: we not rechargeable but we are disposable.

Some thoughts from Paddy: 

I never thought that I would retire. I thought I would keep going on like the Eveready bunny and then just fade. Now I have to plan my future, avoid hospitals, tolerate ordinaryness, dig in my garden, that kind of thing. I will still hang around coffee shops talking to strangers. I will invest my life in my grandchildren and stand behind my kids. I will probably holiday in safe places. I will walk my dog, Penny.

Retiring itself is not new for me. I have retired from pastoral ministry (CapChurch) and university teaching (Carey Theological College, Regent College), but this is different. I have made a deep investment in many of you, as you have in me. I will not have the privilege of hearing your story and walking with you to further wholeness. I have learned so much from you and I am deeply indebted to you for sharing your lives and welcoming my involvement.

Carole’s considerations:

This transition is harder for Paddy than for me. I have long accepted contentment. I have made peace with having less to do. I want to be empathic with myself as I have endeavoured to be with you. If any of you wish for a closing conversation, I would be happy to have coffee with you and/or a Seaview walk with my dog.

In conclusion:

We will be ending our collected counselling practice at Christmas time this year. No appointments in 2024. If you would like us to assist you in finding another counsellor or psychologist, please ask. See our list of “recommended counsellors”.  This is a good place to start.

David Ducklow continues as a spiritual director and chaplain. He is great to talk to and well-informed. Please send him a note at david@theducklows.ca and begin a new beginning. And his sister, Christine McLaren, is training to be a Registered Clinical Counsellor. Should be a couple of years before her academic completion. And then more counselling ducks.

Best to you. 

Updates to our Counselling Practice, 2023

in General  by Paddy Ducklow 0 comments

Hello Client-Friends, this is an update (January 2023) about our counselling practice and this may impact your visiting with us. We are reducing our counselling work with the idea of retirement. We will both retire in December 2023. Here are a couple of commitments we are making.

First, Carole and I will not be visiting with new clients (eg intake). We will continue to see individuals, couples, and families that we have worked with before 2023. (If you wish to refer friends or family to us, please see our “Counsellor Referral List” below.)

Second, we will not reopen our at-home office for face-to-face meetings. We will continue online using Doxy.me for our counselling and consulting services.

Third, we can help you make a great counselling match if you ask. For a link for counsellors we work with and trust, go to the Tools section on our website and see the Counsellor Referral List. Also, if you wish for a personal recommendation for another counsellor or psychologist, send us a note with some information about your concerns. You can use the Intake Form for this.

I hope this note finds you well.

Paddy

50 Years Married (and we would do it all again)

in Couples / Love / Marriage  by Paddy Ducklow 0 comments

As of this weekend, Carole and I have been married for 50 years. Some have asked, “what are your secrets?” with the question mostly addressed to Carole, as in, “how did you live with him for so long?” I have been hard to live with I know, but Carole says she would do it again. (We didn’t discuss whether marrying George Clooney with an endless supply of Nespresso was an option.) Anyway, here is my answer to the “what are your secrets question”.

Having an enduring marriage is a good thing but not particularly virtuous. It doesn’t really take faith, hope, or love to outlast others or the expectations of others. Some didn’t think we would make it and, at times I agreed, worrying that I could not be for Carole what she hoped for and needed. But Carole was different. She knew we were good together. She always believed in us and in me.

To have a good marriage, a marriage “to be proud of” is more than endurance and more than counting years. Good fortune is one of many of those intangibles that helped us. It was my good fortune to meet her in high school where she was the secretary of the “future teacher’s club” and I was the president. She never came to one of my basketball games as her church frowned on men sweating in short pants. But we met young and we married young. That was good.

Over our 50 years, we have shared and talked a lot, as well as reading, worrying, studying, and loving God and people. But those vaulted virtues do not minimize our hunger to touch and hold and kiss each other. I read somewhere that good kissing is one of the best predictors of marital success. We continue to be good at that. Researchers say that shared saliva has a biological bling to sustain marriage when life is difficult. Amen.

We have been partners in so many things from church work, people in our home, conferencing, counselling, and most importantly, child-loving. My we love our two kids. It hurts to love this deeply. Parenting is so fraught with hope and love and pain. It seems to me that marriage carves out the capacity to be head-over-heals in love with kids. And now we have grandchildren and we share all their excitement and fear about their lives. It is as deep a pain as love gets.

Carole and I have crafted a common story where prayer and worship and wonder are integral. In the last several years we have become less churchly and more curious. But we are no less desiring of God and responsive to “them”. Our faith journey is less either-or and more hospitable. We like strangers. Me especially.

We enjoy our shared affections. Red wine, “The Chair” on Netflix, travelling to places like Uganda, Uzbekistan, and China to give back what has so generously been given to us. 

Giving back is a shared value. We used to call it tithing but now we think of it as just giving back. Giving is the best gift one can receive. Rather than buying each other another gift for this anniversary we have decided to give to the Children’s Hospital for all they have given to our family over the years.

One more thing that is important to us and what has inspired our marriage: friends. You. And you. And you. Yes, you. You are our family, the people we love. And we are sustained by you. You continue to be faith, hope, and love to us.

Here is a great meditation on marriage. Mediate away!

Paddy and Carole

 

(If you would like to respond to this or anything else on our website, you are invited to write us at life@theducklows.ca.)