So today I saw my T for the first time in a month; we had a double session. I told her I had been feeling depressed, hopeless, couldn't get out of bed for a couple days this week b/c of my job situation. I also eventually told her I had been having suicidial thoughts and she kept asking me to elaborate but I didn't want to.
She specializes in CBT, and we started talking about my thoughts regarding how I feel about myself, ie worthless, stupid, hopeless, etc. She said they were cognitive distortions and pulled out her list of cognitive distortions and started saying what type of cognitive distortion I had. Then (and she ALWAYS does this) she asked, "Well, if one of your friends was unemployed, would you tell them they were stupid and useless?" and of course I said no. She is always asking me this question: "Well, if someone else were jobless/didn't have a PhD/received a bad grade would you think they were stupid, etc?" And the answer is always no, I wouldn't,and then she always asks why I think this way about myself if I don't hold other people to the same standard. I understand where she is coming from, but it doesn't change my belief about myself. I feel like she is trying to logically talk me out of how I feel about myself, but it's not working, and I told her that her "technique" wasn't helping. Then she started asking me what qualifications I had regarding employment, and I grudgingly named my academic MA degree and the two years of experience I have working with kids. Even though she knows this about me, I know she was trying to get me to see that I'm not useless. So finally I said "OK, so I'm not completely useless, I'm just 90% useless." And she said "OK, so you're 90% useless, that's better than completely useless." So basically we spent more than an hour with her trying to use logic or CBT or whatever to reverse my thoughts, but it wasn't working.
Maybe I'm just stubborn, but I felt like she wasn't getting that I feel this way. Even if maybe logically I'm not as useless/stupid/a failure as I think I am, I feel like I am, and I felt like she was trying to use to tough love/logic to reverse my thoughts, but it wasn't working. I guess I just wanted her to listen to me instead of pulling out her CBT stuff.
Finally she asked why my previous boss had written me a recomendation for a job, and I said because he's a nice guy and he's from the same hometown as me (I also think by this point I was just being stubborn) and she said, "So there's no reason other than that as to why he would write you a recomendation?" and I said no. So then she said "OK, so why don't you just call him up and tell him you're completely useless and a failure and he shouldn't write you a recomendation?" I told her that obviously I wasn't going to sabotage myself.
I was getting SO frustrated by this point, and it was not how I had imagined my first session back going at all. Then I was saying that I didn't want to get out of bed for a couple of days and I didn't want to go grocery shopping, etc. because I didn't deserve to eat, I didn't deserve to do anything, etc. And she asked me what good this kind of thinking was doing, and I said that I just didn't feel like I deserved anything. And she said "Well, OK, why don't you just lie in bed and feel ****** about yourself for the rest of the day if you feel like that?" and by this time I just said "OK, fine then, I will lie in bed for the rest of the day." I just felt so frustrated and pissed that I was spending my first double session back arguing with her. I just genuinely wanted to talk to her. So finally she was like "Well, OK, I see that cognitive behavioral therapy isn't working." and asked me what I would want to talk about, but by that point I didn't want to talk about anything.
Anyways, for the last 20 mins. I did eventually end up talking to her about my trip, and I gave her the magnet I had bought from the Freud museum that said "Analyse me," and she loved it. But when I gave it to her she was also like "I don't know if I deserve this since I haven't been doing a very good job of analysing you," or something like that.
I know that she wants to help me, but I was just really frustrated today because I understand that yes, maybe I am not thinking logically. But arguing with me about it and telling me to go to tell the guy who is writing me a recommendation that I am stupid and worhtless (even tho I know she was being sarcastic) isn't helping. And the thing is, is that my situation really is not good. Like being unemployed, in debt, and finishing a useless MA program is enough to put anyone into a negative mind frame.
I did tell her I was frustated, and I even told her I wanted to throw something b/c I felt so frustrated. I do think she got it, that her technique wasn't working, but I was curious to see what others thought on here about CBT as a remedy for depression, or about my T's comments, or about what your T has said if you were in a similar situation.