DO I NEED THERAPY?

fwiw at least in me its not too hard to find someone who will mix talk therapy w/ cbt techniques

i think the two biggest determining factors in the success of treatment are the patients willings to 'put the work in' & their compatibility w/ their therapist. i know this seems to be p obv but it is easy to get focused on a specific methods of treatment or ideas abt 'whats wrong with me' & ignore the fundamental relationship @ the core of therapy

good thing i didnt start this thread, jesus

My job offered therapy services as a benefit, but only if you went to the provider they contracted with. My wife and I attempted to use this service, but the therapist we were assigned was about as competant as someone who'd read a bunch of self-help best sellers. iow she was well-meaning, tenetive, able to regurgitate a few aphorisms and mostly worse than useless.

My wife set out to find a better therapist, asking around for leads relentlessly, calling ahead to speak to the prospective therapist to ask questions. After a few months of tracking down leads, she located an excellent therapist who was extremely helpful, smart, who always asked good questions, and who developed an understanding of the situation fairly rapidly. Once we established a trustful relationship, we used her many times over a period of about a decade, and we passed her name on to many friends.

lamp otm

the clinic I was going to wanted me to have an annual appointment with their psychiatrist. The psychiatrist was a middle-aged dude and he was listening to Michael Savage in his office during our meeting, which I thought was maybe not appropriate. Anyway, I said, "My dad listens to Michael Savage," prompting him to ask if my dad knew X trivia item about Michael Savage. I had no idea. He said, "Call your dad." I said, "It's long distance, are you sure?" He said, yes, so we put my dad on speakerphone. He grilled my dad about minor points of Michael Savage trivia, and my dad knew none of them. "Looks like you don't really appreciate Michael Savage," the psychiatrist said to my dad before we ended the call.

― breaking that little dog's heart chakra (Abbott)

after reading this just seconds after the goiter post on the salt/food thread it's clear that abbott, you are the #1 ilx poster for making me explode laughing at the maddest shit

also yeah, what was the FIRST least professional therapy experience you ever had? or was that just a thing

The first worst therapy experience I had was at the same community clinic – I started out seeing one therapist who was terrible, who I am going to call Bessie. 1. I was spending 1/3rd of my time talking breaking down what I was saying to her into simpler concepts (snobby complaint maybe but it was draining). 2. She decided I was an alcoholic/drug addict and just wasn't telling her (I hadn't drank in 4 mos at this point!!) and she spent a lot of time trying to get it out of me. 3. Bessie decided she wanted to spend all of the time talking about this made-up problem & not the actual problems I came to see her about. I spent three sessions w/her and it was painfully not working*, so I asked to see another therapist. I left Bessie a message saying I did this.

The second therapist I liked a lot. During our first session, Bessie opened the door, unannounced, and demanded I explain to her why I chose to quit seeing her as a therapist. So, I told her. But it was really fucking awkward and weird! And I would rank this more unprofessional than the Savage phone call, which is at least funny.

*tough I got some dried figs out of it (not explaining how this happened (the figs were later eaten by a cascade of ants))

oh my god that savage story

"Looks like you don't really appreciate Michael Savage,"

amazing

crazy in the coconut

Abbott yr story reminds me of that bit in the Bell Jar where Esther has the arrogant useless shrink who asks her where she went to college and rambles on about how the WACS were stationed there and how pretty they were and then says "well we're done now".

got my first day today...

cbt was so much more helpful to me than any other therapy i've tried. we used chapters from this book; i keep staring at it in bookstores and forgetting to remind myself to order it cheap from amazon:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51Y2yCG78ZL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg

link:

http://www.amazon.com/Anxiety-Phobia-Workbook-Fourth/dp/1572244135

xxpost, all the best with it ronan

ta for the book link jbr, I might look into that myself.

it was pretty good today, he mostly let me speak, felt like i was jumping from topic to topic but i guess he needs the groundwork. only drawback is i just got six weeks work which starts on 13th and if i change timeslot i have to change counsellor, in the system i'm in, so not sure whether to try and negotiate to have friday afternoons off (and lose half a day's pay) or to just change counselling time straight away and avoid upheaval after it's gotten into more depth...

funny I just recorded a song this morning called "everyone needs therapy"- hivemind?

by the way - I used this and it worked for me

http://www.amazon.com/Feeling-Good-Handbook-David-Burns/dp/0452281326

The Anxiety and Phobia workbook is really good.

I ordered this:

http://www.amazon.com/Disease-Please-Curing-People-Pleasing-Syndrome/dp/0071385649/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1307128451&sr=1-2

Pretty sure that I have a problem with people pleasing :/

ah yes - the "approval addiction"

http://books.google.com/books?id=UaEg_ujTKEcC&lpg=PA290&ots=C-KRIbtebl&dq=the%20%22approval%20addiction%22%20burns&pg=PA290#v=onepage&q&f=false

kinda mixed results so far...i guess overall positive. counsellor mostly just lets me yammer on but i asked him to try and provide advice, not really like specific to situations but at least to act as some kind of barometer. he does say some weird sorta hard to grasp stuff, eg i talked about indecision for ages on friday and he said "i want you to hold onto that feeling of not knowing what to do in this sort of situation" and sort of didn't elaborate or stressed the "hold on to it" element. v hard to know what he meant there but i feel largely positive about him so i sort of gave benefit of the doubt.

i want you to hold on to the benefit of that doubt

Was sent for a 'wee chat' with my mum's pyschologist once, i talked about how i couldnt get a girlfriend, i was hopin for some mindtricks or something, but nada. She musta told them i was normal cos i didnt have to go again, i got some girlfriends after that but it was unrelated imo

i was talking w/a psychologist once who began quoting something from a poem by Jewel, which led me to think that maybe i was not getting my money's worth

finally found a way to do this outside of work hours affordably. v strange experience, it really is like on tv. genuinely a few "let's talk about your mother" or whatever.

overall it's good i guess, slightly scary experience in that i have found myself get very upset really suddenly few times, which was like a type of emotional catharsis i've never experienced before, but i guess that's why i'm going.

glad for you- hadn't you tried it before?

heh like five posts ago

yeah i had to stop cos i got a job and that slot was in the daytime. took until now to get a post-work time... i thought the guy was shit the first two weeks cos he literally said nothing, but now he is started dropping these questions that make you realise or see connections between things, without any heavy handedness about it.

i would heartily resent that, i think

i found the silence worse, made me think he was all "why the fuck is this guy even here?"

though as i said, it is a bit scary thinking you're okay then seeing sort of unhappiness come out in an uncontrolled way, it's like puking, it does make you think "oh shit" in that way as if you'd noticed some medical prob you never knew you had via a weird physical reaction.

Do you feel like it's helping you at all? Everyone who's recommended therapy to me haven't changed much at all, even after years of it, so I'm a little skeptical. Feels like I've already made the parents/early life connections to behaviors, world view, etc., but also won't discount checking it out.

^

had three sessions now, so it's too early to say. but i guess it is helping in the sense that i am getting rid of some bad stuff from my past mostly related to being sick. i mean, if it's true that talking about things is good then yes it's definitely helping.

as in, i'm constantly aware of having a majorly fucked upbringing, but at the same time i'm pretty level and cool with who i am, but the odd time i think 'jeez imagine how awesome i COULD be tho'

(xp)

Yeah, I imagine there's this extra level you can unlock by going to therapy. I've gotten the most out of just thinking about things and figuring shit out on long walks along rivers and through vast, empty fields, and there doesn't seem like there's much territory left to be mined out of that. Maybe the talking thing's valuable in itself, feels weird to ever mention any early life stuff to people when they ask... mostly because it's just odd in itself, and gets uncomfortable responses. Telling it to someone in a corduroy jacket and wire-frame glasses probably eliminates that.

Lol otm xp to d

i'm not lolling tho i'm ;_;

i wish ppl would realise that when they read my posts.

i'm ;_; goddamit

I took the plunge about a 6 weeks ago, 3 free sessions through employee assistance program.

Had been having weird emotional outbursts, ie crying jags, etc all kind of resulting from conflicts and/or fear of them.

Just talking out where my fears maybe came from, and having her give me some simple tools to adjust my reactions, has already made a huge difference for me.

Right now my plan is to see how I go once I visit home in April, and if shit comes up after that I can go see her again.

I felt v guilty at first, and very awkward about talking about my family to a stranger, but omg just lightening the load was the best feeling, and figuring out more parts of the jigsaw puzzle...I am not much of a personal-problem-talker at all, but I cant recommend it enough, even if it's just a few sessions.

I'm kind of viewing it as taking the car to the mechanic - no shame in getting a tuneup, right? And good to know I have someone to call if/when shit gets real now, instead of shoving it all away all repressed-like

why did you (all) select a therapist of the gender you did?

EAP programs are there for a reason. Glad you took advantage, Veg. I think it might be time for me. I have beat my last round of anxiety attacks, and now I just feel pretty bored overall :/. dunno which is worse really.

well...tbh i don't feel bored when I leave teh house and socialize (which I did a lot this weekend), but it'd be nice to be able to enjoy a relaxing night to myself without feeling flat emotions.

I'd think itw as the meds except I was like this before them. this is just how my brain works. it shuts off and I fake emotions until they come back.

i chose a female therapist with the assumption that i would be more comfortable divulging things with a woman. but not sure if this is actually the case.

my therapist doesn't remember half of what we talk about. she recommended me a book yesterday as though she had never recommended it -- but she had, twice! but this time she asked me, "if i recommend you a book, are you going to read it"? so i was like, well why don't you tell me what it is first! (and then i wondered in my head if that's the only book she ever recommends to her patients, and what, does she know the author or something? i told her i was waiting for it in the library queue and she said i should totally buy it)

i think i need a therapist who is less FRIENDLY and trying to be FRIENDLY because it makes her therapeutic pronouncements seem passive aggressive though this could be just me projecting...

or maybe it just maybe makes me not trust her because i feel like she's being fake to me?

is this things other people feel w/their therapists or just me?

I just went with the first therapist they assigned to me, I told them I didnt have a m/f preference.

My therapist turned out to be a woman around my age, a little older...she's been a good fit. I felt like she understood my issues pretty quickly, and always seemed to get to the nut of a problem with just a few questions. I told her way more than I ever expected to

Still thinking about checking out some therapy, but these two books helped me out a lot:

www.amzn.com/0553381407
www.amzn.com/0671708635

I went from perpetually anxious, angry, and emotionally dead ... to the degree where I couldn't stand leaving my apartment or I'd shuck off relationships, to almost never anxious, cool with things, and fairly level headed with some help from those texts. Most of the work comes from introspection and the sheer will to get better no matter how much work or pain's involved. Not being anxious anymore and feeling emotions is the greatest thing in the world after dealing with it from my teens through 20s.

Was going to fire my therapist today and she therapied me into making another appt.

tricky bastards

they're good when they want to be

about 10 weeks in now, it's a fucking incredibly hard thing to do i have to say. for 2/3 weeks i felt it was having this huge improvement and probably invested too much in a bounce that could have been to do with anything, then for the last week just been back to feeling fairly bad, with the added sense of questioning more of my perspectives than ever, and the realisation or worry that you know, maybe you can never really be happy. i think so far therapy has made me accept some things that i didn't before, but in the process made me then think "well if i am wrong about this then who knows what else in me could be totally skewed and messed up"