Breakdown of Después de hablar con la terapeuta, me puse a estudiar con más calma y mi autoestima mejoró.
Questions & Answers about Después de hablar con la terapeuta, me puse a estudiar con más calma y mi autoestima mejoró.
In Spanish, when you use después de followed by a verb, that verb normally stays in the infinitive:
- Después de hablar – After talking / After having talked
- Después de comer – After eating
- Después de estudiar – After studying
You do not conjugate the verb in that structure. So después de hablé is incorrect.
If you want to use a conjugated verb, you change the structure to después de que + conjugated verb:
- Después de que hablé con la terapeuta, me puse a estudiar…
After I talked with the therapist, I started to study…
Both are correct, but:
- después de + infinitive is more compact and neutral.
- después de que + verb explicitly includes the subject (after I/you/she…).
Terapeuta is a common-gender noun: its form doesn’t change, but the article shows gender.
- la terapeuta – the therapist (female)
- el terapeuta – the therapist (male)
So in the sentence, la terapeuta tells us the therapist is female.
For a male therapist, you’d say:
- Después de hablar con el terapeuta, me puse a estudiar…
Ponerse a + infinitive means to start/begin to do something, often with a nuance of a sudden or decided start.
- Me puse a estudiar ≈ I started studying / I set about studying.
If you say:
- Estudié con más calma – I studied more calmly.
you’re just describing the action of studying in the past.
If you say:
- Me puse a estudiar con más calma – I started to study more calmly.
you highlight the moment you began this new way of studying. It focuses on the beginning or decision to start.
Poner without a reflexive pronoun is usually “to put (something somewhere)”:
- Puse el libro en la mesa. – I put the book on the table.
Ponerse is a reflexive form with several idiomatic meanings, including:
- ponerse + adjective – to become (a state):
Me puse triste. – I became sad. - ponerse a + infinitive – to start doing something:
Me puse a estudiar. – I started studying.
So you must use the reflexive form ponerse in ponerse a + infinitive.
Puse a estudiar (without me) would be wrong here.
Yes, you can say:
- Después de hablar con la terapeuta, empecé a estudiar con más calma…
Both me puse a estudiar and empecé a estudiar translate as I started to study.
Nuance:
- Empezar a + infinitive: the most neutral way to say to begin to do something.
- Ponerse a + infinitive: often feels a bit more informal/colloquial and can suggest a more active or sudden decision: I got down to studying, I set about studying.
In many contexts, they’re interchangeable.
Spanish frequently uses noun phrases instead of adverbs ending in -mente, especially in everyday speech.
- con calma – calmly / in a calm way
- con más calma – more calmly / in a calmer way
You can say más calmadamente or más calmamente, but they sound more formal, heavier, or a bit unnatural in this context.
In Latin American Spanish, expressions like:
- con cuidado – carefully
- con paciencia – patiently
- con calma – calmly
are very common, and often preferred over -mente adverbs in casual speech.
Spanish usually omits subject pronouns because the verb ending already shows the subject.
- me puse clearly indicates yo (I) from the ending -e in the preterite of poner.
So:
- Me puse a estudiar… – perfectly natural and typical.
- Yo me puse a estudiar… – also correct, but yo adds emphasis (e.g., contrast: I started to study, maybe others didn’t).
In normal, non-contrastive storytelling, you usually leave yo out.
Autoestima is a feminine noun in Spanish:
- la autoestima – self-esteem
- mi autoestima – my self-esteem
- tu autoestima – your self-esteem
So you say:
- Mi autoestima mejoró. – My self-esteem improved.
You do not change the ending of autoestima; it always stays autoestima, and it takes feminine articles and adjectives:
- la baja autoestima – low self-esteem
- una autoestima alta – high self-esteem
Mejoró is the preterite of mejorar and presents the improvement as a completed event in the past:
- mi autoestima mejoró – my self-esteem improved (it changed at some point / over some period, and we see that change as a finished fact).
Alternatives:
mi autoestima mejoraba (imperfect)
– my self-esteem was improving / used to improve
Focus on the ongoing process in the past, without a clear sense of “complete result.”mi autoestima ha mejorado (present perfect; more common in Spain than in much of Latin America)
– my self-esteem has improved
Emphasizes a connection to the present (you’re talking about the improvement as relevant to “now”).
In Latin American Spanish storytelling, mejoró (preterite) is very natural for a completed change in a past period.
Grammatically, mi autoestima is the subject of mejoró:
- Mi autoestima (subject) mejoró (verb).
My self-esteem improved.
The sentence does not say “I improved my self-esteem” (which would be more like Mejoré mi autoestima).
The idea is that as a result of your actions (talking to the therapist, studying more calmly), your self-esteem got better. But the structure is:
- subject: mi autoestima
- verb: mejoró
- no direct object
So it’s “my self-esteem improved,” not “I improved it.”
Yes, that’s perfectly correct:
- Me puse a estudiar con más calma después de hablar con la terapeuta.
Spanish word order is fairly flexible. Both versions are fine:
- Después de hablar con la terapeuta, me puse a estudiar…
- Me puse a estudiar… después de hablar con la terapeuta.
Putting Después de hablar con la terapeuta first slightly emphasizes the time condition (“After talking with the therapist…” sets the scene), but there’s no big change in meaning.
In Spanish, when two people talk to each other, you typically use hablar con:
- hablar con alguien – to talk with/to someone
Hablé con la terapeuta. – I talked with the therapist.
Hablar a is possible but much less common and usually suggests one-way speaking “at” someone (for example, someone talking to a crowd or to someone who may not answer):
- Habló a la clase durante una hora. – He spoke to the class for an hour.
So for a normal conversation or session with a therapist, hablar con la terapeuta is the natural choice.
Ponerse has two main patterns:
ponerse a + infinitive – to start doing something
- Me puse a estudiar. – I started studying.
- Se puso a llorar. – She began to cry.
ponerse + adjective – to become / to get (emotionally or physically)
- Me puse triste. – I became sad / I got sad.
- Se puso nervioso. – He got nervous.
In your sentence, because it’s me puse a estudiar, it clearly means I started to study, not I felt like studying or I became studying. The a + infinitive pattern is what marks the “start doing something” meaning.