Watch Enthusiast's Marriage Counselor Now Also a Watch Enthusiast, Counseling Sessions Unproductive

The marriage of Douglas and Heather Wainwright, which had been strained by Douglas's $140,000 annual watch purchasing habit, has received no therapeutic benefit after their marriage counselor, Dr. Patricia Ambrose, revealed during their third session that she is also a watch collector. 'We were discussing my spending,' Douglas recalled. 'Dr. Ambrose asked me to describe the most recent purchase. I said it was a Zenith El Primero. She said which reference? I said the A386. She said the reissue or the vintage? And I knew, in that moment, that therapy was not going to work.' The counseling sessions, which were supposed to address what Heather described as 'a compulsive need to acquire mechanical objects that tell time identically to the forty-seven he already owns,' have instead become weekly horological discussions between Douglas and Dr. Ambrose, with Heather sitting between them. 'Last week they spent forty minutes debating whether the Tudor Black Bay is overrated,' Heather said. 'I'm sitting there, waiting to discuss our marriage, and my husband and our therapist are arguing about bezel inserts. She showed him photos of her collection on her phone. Our marriage counselor showed my husband her watches. During our session. I am paying $250 an hour for this.' Dr. Ambrose acknowledged the conflict of interest. 'I should have disclosed my collecting hobby at the intake session,' she said. 'But in my defense, he mentioned the El Primero's column wheel chronograph and I responded involuntarily. The column wheel is a trigger for me.' The Wainwrights have been referred to a new counselor, who Heather vetted by asking a single question: 'Do you own any watches?' The new counselor said she uses her phone. Heather booked immediately. Douglas has kept Dr. Ambrose's number. 'She's not my therapist anymore,' he said. 'But she knows a guy who has a 1969 El Primero and I need that introduction.'