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Old Feb 28, 2012, 03:32 AM
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Perna Perna is offline
Pandita-in-training
 
Member Since: Sep 2006
Location: Maryland
Posts: 27,289
Have you discussed goals with your T recently? I notice some of yours are for symptom relief, which is great but not very inspiring as they're pretty much what anyone wants? Who wants to feel bad? Hardly a goal though, to feel better; not cut, not have an eating disorder, etc.? To "cope"?

What would you be doing if those behaviors weren't there? Who would you like to be, what would you like to feel like? How do the behaviors hold you back or keep you "safe". If other people are doing things like you'd like to be doing, can doing them really be that unsafe that you need those behaviors? I'd be asking myself questions like that.

When I started therapy the last time, I only made one "rule" for myself: I could not curl up in the fetal position, either literally or figuratively :-) I had to keep going, no matter how painful, how scary. I likened myself to an ice breaker or mine sweeping ship and knew I had to keep the "shipping lanes" open between my therapists and me, I had to "get out" of my head and I had to make sure she was allowed "in". I totally ignored all my symptoms, knowing if I got to the root problems, they would take care of themselves, I would not need them anymore (and my main symptom that brought me to therapy in 1970, that I'd had since 1952, did in fact resolve itself!).

I had been fighting symptoms for years and not making much headway but that was because I was fighting myself; I obviously felt I needed the symptoms (or I wouldn't have developed them in the first place) so I accepted them, allowed them, made friends with them (they were obviously helping me cope with something or I wouldn't have had them) and figured out how to be grateful to them and use them to help me further (I had very good defenses so good luck attacking me, I was obviously safer than I felt; I accepted that too :-)
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Thanks for this!
carla.cdt, GoodPoint