Densho Digital Repository - Kathy Nishimoto Masaoka Interview II (Densho ID: ddr-densho-544-7)

<Begin Segment 7>

IM: So some of this stuff changes when you start to go to therapy with Amy Mass. Can you talk about that decision to do that? I think at this time, in the '70s, it's not a super common thing, is it, really to go to therapy? In the same way that it is... all of my friends now, they're like, "I just met with my therapist yesterday." Like everyone is very, it's almost like people talk about today. They talk about their therapist like it's like brushing their teeth or something. Back then it wasn't necessarily like that, so I'm very curious what led you to that and then what you got out of it.

KM: Well, I think I was oriented more that way because I was a psych major, right, and I had been in some groups in college. And then because we were working with Amy Mass in parents' group, and again, doing groups and having those kind of discussions that were fairly, somewhat honest within those groups, and we were working with social workers, and we were doing some training with mental health people in the county like John Hatakeyama and other folks. So it wasn't alien to me at all. And we were also, like Merilynne was working with Asian Sisters, and Amy Mass was seeing some individuals trying to help individual young women. So it was definitely part of what we thought was important to do, some of us. And so I knew Amy and I liked Amy, and so I think I just asked her if I could see her. I think she saw me for free for two years, I think. Maybe we paid her a little bit, and I think the collective actually, come to think of it, may have contributed a bit because they saw it as important, I must have argued my case.

IM: Do you remember... I mean, you can go into as many details as you want, but what did you kind of discuss in these therapy sessions?

KM: I don't really remember. This is like '74 to '76. That one I don't know, I don't really know. It moved from Mo, thought, I know that. That may have started it, it was kind of like, then it moved to other things. She just really helped me build up my self-esteem, I guess.

IM: And so you saw other people... you know, I think a lot of people think, they don't really think historically or they think about, they don't really think historically about Asian American mental health or Asian American women's mental health, but clearly this was an issue among people in your circles at this point. What did other women that you know, or men, too, kind of think about mental health?

KM: I don't think a lot of them were into it. I mean, Merilynne, because both of us kind of went to this training, she saw the value in it. I don't think a lot of people did, though. People were kind of like, not into "touchy-feely," as they called it sometimes. And it kind of goes back to really, other things that I think I was more into. So I did have therapy again later. I always looked at therapy as a way of checking in, so yeah.

IM: So why did you think people weren't super into the touchy-feely thing then?

KM: Part of it, I think, it was the politics. It didn't really allow room for that so much. I mean, we did do some training at Rest Haven and a few of us, again, were into Shinya and a few people, but don't think people liked to go there, they didn't really want to go and look inside, be vulnerable. It's not easy.

IM: Was it more, do you think, more of a problem among the men versus the women, or just equally, people didn't want to, really, examine themselves in that kind of way?

KM: There may have been a couple of men that were kind of into sensitivity training or those kind of thing. But I think it's pretty equal. I think overall people were not, didn't look to it too much, hesitant.