Struggling with therapy

[Rupes79]

Hi All,

I started therapy a few months ago to work through a fairly traumatic life event. Leading up to the therapy I was functioning quite normally but I wasn’t happy. My psychologist diagnosed me with mild depression.

About six weeks ago I started getting very anxious before each session. I would drink too much alcohol in the days leading up to therapy and it was occupying all my thoughts. I feel like my depression has increased and I’ve had to double the dose of my medication which has horrible side effects.

I cancelled this weeks session because I was simply too worked up and distressed to go ahead with it. My psychologist wants me to continue as she thinks we are making progress but the more I think about it the more anxious and depressed I become. I’ve been thinking suicidal thoughts and I am not really sure of the difference between thinking and acting on suicide. I don’t want to talk to anyone I know about this for fear of alarming them but I am a little worried.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Cheers

Adam

[Sophie_M]

Hi Rupes79,

Thank you for sharing your story with us here. It takes a lot of courage to reach out for support, you also never know who will read this post and feel less alone in their own experiences. We are so sorry to hear that you have been feeling anxious and having suicidal thoughts. We understand that this must be very overwhelming for you, please know that you never have to go through this alone, and support is always here for you.

If you would like to talk to someone we would recommend that you get in contact with the Beyond Blue Support Service. They are available 24/7 by phone on 1300 22 4636 or on Webchat 1pm-12am AEST on our website: www.beyondblue.org.au/getsupport  One of our friendly counsellors will be able to talk through these feelings with you and can offer support, advice and referrals.

We also strongly urge that in overwhelming moments you get in touch with our friends at Lifeline (13 11 14) or the Suicide Call Back Service (1300 659 467).

Please feel free to keep reaching out here on your thread whenever you feel up to it

[Guest9337]

G'day Rupes79,

Welcome to the forums here on bb, it's a good and safe place - hang around whenever you like.

I've been through trauma too, and though our experiences were unique, I have no doubt some of it will be shared.

I see working through trauma like the following metaphor.

Working through trauma is a mathematical optimisation problem. I'm aiming to do just enough work to make progress, but not so much work that I am retraumatised. The work being thinking/feeling/acting/speaking about trauma.

So yeh, we will sometimes be highly motivated to push hard up against the trauma memories, and other times we will be anxious/tired/stressed/(something) and want to avoid memories/thoughts/feelings of the trauma.

All that described, and more or in between too are perfectly valid feelings of our experience.

One role of the sessions is for you to discover where you are to be conscious about it whilst also noticing ones feelings.

Have a time defined, well deserved holiday and then get back on the bike mate.

How long do you want off from "working through it"? Once you've got that number, book an appointment for just after it.

good luck.

[Rupes79]

Hi david ‘n’ goliath

Thanks for your kind words and advice. I like your metaphor around the mathematical equation and doing just enough and not too much. I think what I’ve inadvertently done is push too far ahead, or perhaps my psychologist has pushed me too far.

So the question becomes how do you find that threshold where you’re able to work on it without it making things worse?

Im not sure whether to continue with the existing psychologist or start again with someone new? I feel a bit disappointed with the current one but also not sure I can bear starting again from scratch with a new one.

thanks

[Guest9337]

"how do you find that threshold where you’re able to work on it without it making things worse?"

Gather data through observation of oneself and accepting OR rejecting others stated observations about oneself. Metacognition. Thinking about thinking. Thinking about feelings. Feelings about a feeling.

Here is a metacognitive question, not actually a paradox : Are we comfortable being uncomfortable?

Like for example ur not sure whether to continue with existing psychologist. Well from a mathematical optimisation metaphor - that's like doing part of the problem and throwing the paper away, and starting afresh, might be useful or not. In an exam situation we never throw anything we've done away, might get points for it, but in "real" life, sure we do discard stuff.

We could infer that ones current psychologist has already gathered (x hours) of information about you and is closer than any other psychologist towards optimising the solution of working through trauma. So data wise, he/she is closer than anyone else except yourself to a solution i.e they've got some data no one else has. For now I assume all Psychs are the same, just to simplify this part of the metaphor, but we recognise that there is some truth in the idea that one psych may actually be better suited to you, than any other psych.

Do you want to re-tell those parts of your story to a different person?

or Would you prefer to continue telling your story to the current psych?

The re-telling has a cost as well we note. Fracking hurts just about every time we re-tell the trauma, hurts just to think about it!

So we use our emotions to guide us by examining each of the options presented before us.

To yourself > Which option feels like it will hurt less? 1. Doing nothing. 2. Sticking with current psych. 3. Moving to unknown psych. 4. Alternatives...

So with that question we are using our feelings to guide our thinking. Well we can flip that too...

Which option do you rationally/logically think will hurt you less? 1, 2, 3, 4...

Then you've gathered quite a bit of data about yourself and you'll be closer to your answer and how you feel about that answer.

Then act, book the next appointment, because psychologists are trained in metacognition, it is a field of study for them. OR maybe continue to give yourself a holiday OR ...? But sometime eventually action is needed more than avoiding thought/feeling, you know that already, trauma must be worked through.

im still here mate,good luck. word countgone

[Rupes79]

Thanks mate. Very wise words and very helpful. I’m not sure if your questions were rhetorical or not but my thoughts as per below.

Doing nothing = less hurt but I’ve done nothing for 7 years and been unhappy

Changing therapists seems like too much work

Going back to current therapist is too painful at the moment and creates the most hurt.

I think I need to take your advice about having that break. Pulling back for a moment and building back up my strength. Just need to get myself out of this up and down cycle I am in at the moment. It is quite debilitating.

Thanks again.

[Guest9337]

Yo, I'm still here.

So, I'll give ya a bit more info hey. A projection into the future...

Eventually avoiding the trauma itself causes trauma, the act of repression of the feelings/thoughts associated with trauma pushes our body to respond physiologically. Apparently the longer we avoid thoughts/feelings about trauma, the worse our physical health gets, perhaps even our mental health deteriorates.

We may find ourselves even less able to work through the trauma because we are less healthy. If that happens extremely I would name it a death spiral down down down. Darkness and ruin are likely down that path.

Some people do work trauma through on their own I suppose, spose it's theoretically possible.

So mate, pick a specific duration for your holiday, enjoy it and then get back to working through it. Looks to me you'll have to go through the entire process again to choose how long a holiday you need. Appreciate all this hard work, we are working through trauma by just deciding how long to holiday away from it.

1 hour?

1 day?

1 week?

1 month?

2 months?

quarter?

Which metacognitively feels optimum? Think/feel then feel/think over each one, then make the decision.

[Rupes79]

David is there a definition for trauma? How do I know what I am dealing is trauma?

Do you think having a partner deal with addiction for 7 years and having it directly effect me, without knowing about the addiction for the first 5 years, would create a traumatic experience?

[Guest9337]

Hey Rupes79. Yeh there's a few definitions of trauma. Beyondblue presents a few examples on their "Trauma" webpage and also presents a brief about the topic.

One MedicineNet webpage discussion divides trauma up into physical and psychological, and then sub divides each of those into acute trauma, chronic trauma, complex trauma. So acute is exposure to short term, like one shocking event. Chronic is exposure to prolonged traumatic events. Complex is exposure to multiple varied traumatic incidents.

So yeh, being exposed to partners addiction for years could be traumatic, might not be though. Do you think it was traumatic? Another way to think is... Does your ex-partner feel/think being addicted was traumatic for them? Viewing another persons trauma maybe traumatic for the viewer, it's called vicarious trauma i think.

How do you feel about the addiction?

Where you traumatised by their hiding/lying about the addiction? Did you loose faith in other people, because of what the partner did to you?

Do you feel disgust, remorse, guilt or other unpleasant feelings when considering the relationship and partners addiction?

Because feelings is what psychological trauma is about, one person might find having swear words used against them as traumatic, another person might find it normal, and yet another person find it funny incoherent nonsense.

We all react to events uniquely/differently.

[Rupes79]

Hi david ‘n’ goliath

Thanks again for your reponse. It’s not actually my ex-partner. We are still together. I stuck by him as I loved him and I was all he had. If I’d left him I’m sure he wouldn’t have survived. He tells me so all the time.

I actually think I suffered more from his addiction than he did. He agrees with me on that. He’s a lot stronger than I am but even allowing for that I probably wore more of the pain.

Do I feel traumatised by it? I think the answer is yes. Had the question been asked of me 6 months ago I would have said no but when you start digging through it, having suppressed it for so long, you realise how much you suffered.

Its taken both a physical and mental toll on me. I’ve had very debilitating physical symptoms brought on by stress as well as frequent anxiety attacks and more recently depression. Looking back my mood has been low for some time and I cannot recall being happy in the last 7 years.

There are certain behaviours that have become ingrained and I cannot change them. I’m suffering from a mild form of OCD as well. This is what I am working through with the psychologist (or was until recently).

I have triggers that take me back to the worst times. Even the mention of certain words by people (innocent everyday words) fill me with dread and a desperation to change the topic of conversation. If this addiction is raised in any context I immediately shut down and become fearful my/ his secret will somehow be exposed.

I will look at the definitions on the website but when you are a relatively normal functioning human being and have this part of your life forever hanging over your head you cannot shake or move on from that creates resentment and fear and still drives my behaviour to date then yeah I guess I would say I feel traumatised by it.