I Hate Talking Therapies, Anyone Agree???

[TemporarilyOutOfOrder]

Hi everyone,

I have seen various counselors and one psychologist before, I have a rather negative attitude towards seeing them myself from past results. I feel they just don't get me. I feel so stupid for revealing the ins and outs of my life only to feel like they didn't help me. I have been told to keep trying til I find someone I click with but it is a huge emotional investment for me and I feel like it is hopeless.

I have had anxiety for the past 7 or so years and undiagnosed depression for the past 12 months approx. I have not seen anyone about this suspected depression, have not even spoken to my family or partner about it yet. 

 I dislike the idea of talking therapies and if the GP I will see about my depression suggests a psychologist I hope to try and give it a go again but will be very apprehensive. I have always said in the past that I want to avoid medication and try anything else first but am at the lowest point I have been yet, I have withdrawn from almost everyone and don't even want to make a phone call to sort out my pay issues, I really fear talking with people right now. I am wondering if medication might help me get out of this rut enough to start on the road to recovery.

I want to know if there is anyone out there that is in a similar boat?

What are your thoughts on NOT having talking therapy??

[The_Real_David_Charles]

Dear Temp,

You just gotta find the right guy/girl to be counselled by.  I'd say the "huge emotional invesment" to find a great psychologist would be worth it.  I didn't connect with one properly till I was 40 and I've had Bipolar since I was 28.  We had 8 years of therapy and then he left me for a washing machine.  Lol.

My concern for talking therapy is that telling past problems is so bloody depressing.    Give me a break !  I want to move on not dwell in the past.  But, of course, they need the medical and personal history.   I've been putting off a new psychiatrist for 6 months and finally have an appt for mid June.  If I take my wife in it should be fine but afterwards I will come home and sleep for 4 hours to recover from the stress !  Cos you won't be cured instantly and maybe you'll never be cured.   So, it's more about maintainance and support structures.

Don't do the talking therapy if you don't want to.  It's like anger management.  There are people that get "ordered" by the courts to do such a course.   Do you think these people ever benefit ?  No way.   The whole thing just makes them more angry.  You can only connect when you are ready too.  A bit like sex. (Mills & Boon style).

Adios, David.

[_sagira_]

I'm lucky in that the first psychologist I have been to, I have clicked with.  I've been seeing her for a year and I can say I have made definite progress, as opposed to never having seen her at all.

They basically act as a facilitator and motivator for your life.  Yet it is ultimately up to you to decide and want to change your mindset about how you're feeling.  No one can create that but you. 

Next time you decide to go into therapy you need to do it with mindfulness and a drive and want to change how you have been living your life, because they can't do it for you.  It's the ultimate reality, a therapist can only supply you with the tools, it's up to you to pick them up and use them.

[The_Real_David_Charles]

Dear sagira,

I phoned one new psychologist to check on the Medicare situation and in the course of the conversation she said "don't feel you have to keep coming just because of me".    

So much for supplying "the tools" for therapy, she was actually supplying me with an exit clause.   And we hadn't even started the sessions !    It was a real pathetic attempt to empathise - like my problems were too hard to talk about.  All this after being directed to this counselor after a month in hospital.  Plus, she even worked out of a practise 3 mins walk away.   Should have been a better outcome.

Probably just a reality check.   Even though appointments can be made for counselors, psychologists and psychiatrists you cannot "assume" [that word again Geoff"] that it will be a fruitful relationship or that the counselor won't be a complete waste of time, sadly as most are.   You can't "assume" that they have the right tools or really do want to change a patients life.    You can't assume that all professionals have their own "mindfulness".    It's a bit glib to think otherwise.

The only reality in therapy of any sorts is actually turning up.  And there's nothing "ultimate" about that.  It's just basic contact.   I would never say to a counselor "don't feel you have to keep coming just because of me" so why be so pre-judgemental of a new client and say it to them ? Now I think of it with a bit more brain space I would say that's the sort of thing you say to a family member to sort of make them feel they should go to Grandmas Birthday Party.    Althought I must conceded that visiting Grandmothers in general can be the "ultimate reality".

Adios, David.

PS   I ditched that counselor after 3 sessions.  It was a complete waste of time.

[DP9]

HI

I did a training in the UK in integrative arts psychotherapy. Using the arts, painting, sandtray work, clay, music and drama as a therapeutic tool is very powerful. Talking comes from the mind/ego and that is the problem because depression and anxiety are the soul communicating there is something wrong. Unfortunately in western society there is not much soulful living through imaginaton and creativity and we are therefore living in very externalised emotionally undernourished ways. We need to have a balance and a bridge between our inner and outer worlds this where the arts are amazing. The arts speak the souls language through image and metaphor. Talking is quite limited as a form of emotional expression. Maybe try to find someone in your area who works with the expressive arts therapy. The other issue I have found in Australia is that the practitioners of psychology most often have not done their own therapy and may have not gone into similar processes as their clients and therefore lack empathy. In my training we were required to do weekly therapy for the 3 years of the course. I did 5 years.  In order to be able to be with someone in their pain and issues in my opinion the therapist must have be to those places in themselves. Just doing it from a theoretical place will only help in a limited way. 

Hope this helps

[geoff]

dear Temp, your no different to most of us, although my first psychologist and I clicked and the 'relationship' lasted for 20 years. lol

I had seen a psychiatrist before this, and yuk, pretty well sums it up, and only had one visit.

When we see someone for the first time we look them up and down, just as they do, both trying to figure out will this work or won't it, so we are apprehensive, what do I say to them or how much will I divulge, because we are giving them our past history.

If and when you decide to see another psychologist I would write down just a broad history of what has happened to you, but I would separate your problems in a new form, such as, 1 --------------------

2 --------------- and so on, and if they are proficient they will pin the most important part from the list that you done. It may take them a couple of visits to be able to determine what they believe is causing your depression, so they need these two visits to ascertain your history.

Can you fax a letter to your employer, rather than call them, or maybe email them, because you aren't strong enough at the moment and I don't mean this in a bad way at all, it's only that you have to look after yourself.

Taking antidepressants can do a fabulous job, however with some people they don't work, but if your doctor  suggests that you take them, please have an open mind, and if there are any bad side-effects, then go straight back to your doctor.

I tried about 5 or 6 different types and was ready to throw in the towel, but the last one has done wonders for me.

It's a long process and there is no easy fix, but keep talking to us here on this site, because another idea might be raised by someone else. Geoff.

[lzeukial]

Talking therapy is not the issue. The issue is diagnosis. The talking therapy must be integrated with the right diagnosis. You might need to talk about your issues, but in the right therapeutic framework only.

The movie "A Dangerous Method" is interesting because the patient was able to identify her "issues" - i.e. the right issues. relevant to her problem - using a "word association test." It was a reasonably objective method of finding out what needed to be talked about. Freud used the free association method with the same end in mind, with the patient talking about anything, and the therapist basically just listening, the idea being that something important will come up eventually, perhaps through resistance, slips of the tongue, etc.

[The_Real_David_Charles]

Dear Izeukial,

Maybe the free association is used by all therapists.   On entry there is always a "hello" and various salutations which sometimes lead to what happened on the way to the session, last night at home, where the patient is headed afterwards, whether they came by public transport or car, etc.   This could go on for 20 mins.

In my experience, even the therapists that use free association (or it that "fee association" Lol ?) sometimes say "OK, we'll let's start the session for real now".

But then, it's all real or 'for real'.    If you phone the therapist the relationship is added to.  I think the way a therapist says goodbye says more about the relationship.  Whether they linger at the door with you or simply say "See you next week", turn to their desk and beginning writing stuff considered important.  I had one that would grab his Suduko before I'd even closed the door.  Sometimes I would buy the relevant newspaper before the session, do the Suduko, then shout out "Top right is '6' I believe" as I left.     At the end of the next session he made an effort to say goodbye properly.    To recognise this valiant change in attitude I gave him a Bumper Christmas Crossword book for Christmas.  And a pen.  Ha !

The relationship is probably more important than the method, the diagnosis, the trials and tribulations of life and the fee.  Otherwise, why go ?

Adios, David.

[lzeukial]

Relationships are for your personal life.

The diagnosis is everything.

[The_Real_David_Charles]

Dear Izeukial,

You get a better diagnosis if you have a better relationship with your medical support.  You get better therapy if you have a great relationship with your medical support.  you get a better chance of  recovery if you have an amazing relationship with your medical support.   It's all good - communication/relationship/availability/diagnosis/etc.   A diganosis does not have to just define or limit.

There's no diagnosis unless the medical support get to know you !   Considering most mental illnesses suffer relapses................    It's kind of weird to disregard the human element of treatment.   As far as I'm concerned most medical professionals have a very strong motivation for "helping" people that are suffering and are encouraged to be empathetic.    One of my kids trained as a midwife and she was criticised for being to "by the book" and not enough "people's skills"on one occasion and if she hadn't addressed this issue they would have failed her.   Or are you saying that a diagnosis like 'pregnancy is impersonal ?  Hardly.

Plus, diagnosis is a variable.   Labels vary.  But the way we relate to each other, over the years that mankind has been on this planet, is central to our well being.  Unless you like being treated like a number. Do you really think a diagnosis is the be all and end all of mental illness ?  If anything, in my opinion, it would only be part of the greater picture. And placing too much emphasis on a DSM category negates the very being that is at the centre of any illness.  That is, the very person that then seeks to understand, balance and become whole.

If you can't value a relationship then why bother with a diagnosis ?   This attitude you describe is similar to the old "Don't eat sweet before Dinner" routine.   In one of Deepak Chopra's books he focuses on the fact that the dessert actually works better digestively if eaten before the main course.  This is a bit of a tangent but the thinking's identical.   You need a human situation in the equation to really grasp the possibility of eating in reverse.  It's all about the situation, custom and expectations of the host.   If you want a relationship with medical support then that's totally your choice - but medical decisions involve humans !    As does dessert !

Adios, David.