My head says you are right about finding a good therapist, my psyche can't seem to get past the distrust. My experiences with the psychiatric world have all been disaterous.

Following my first suicide attempt, three decades ago, I went to my first psychiatrist. In his office, he told me that anything I said would stay between him and myself. I spilled my guts. When my parents came to pick me up, he brought them in with us and proceeded to tell them everything I had just told him.

The second one was the husband of one of my mother's friends. I was extemely depressed and would go in and just sit, unable to say anything. After five or so sessions, he said that if I didn't start talking, he couldn't treat me without consulting my parents as they were paying for it. It never got to that point, because the following week, when I was parking my car in his parking lot, I dinged another car and was really nervous and afraid I was going to get into trouble. I couldn't stop pacing during the session, but still wasn't talking. He diagnosed me as bipolar and sent me to a psychiatrist. (He was a psychologist).

Shrink number three put me on lithium, never checked the blood levels and it didn't help. Over the next several weeks he put me on MAO inhibitors, antipsychotics and tricyclic antidepressants. Many of them made me so ill I couldn't get up without throwing up. The last one he had me on, (pretty sure it was melaril), caused hallucinations as well as nausea. I can remember seeing the front of a car going by the house, and the back end following several seconds later. I heard birds that were not in the house. When I would get up, my blood pressure would bottom out and I'd go down. I called him and told him what was going on, then told him I was not going to take the drug anymore. He said that if I refused, he would call the police and have them come take me away. At the time, I had recently moved into the house of a friend, renting one of her spare rooms. My parents had to take me back home as I was too sick to function on the medication. I stopped seeing shrink number three, but it took weeks to get over the effects of the meds I'd been on. The color orange would make me vomit and the hallucinations continued for a while. That psychiatrist had his license yanked a couple years later for malpractice, not keeping records and failing to monitor patients on medications.

The fourth one, a psychologist, diagnosed me with PTSD and major depressive. He may not have been bad, but I could no longer trust psychologists/psychiatrists, and just couldn't bring myself to talk to him. I quit after a few sessions.

Even though it was a long time ago, and I've known people who really like thier therapists, I can't seem to break through the lack of trust. By now, were I to go to one, even if I could talk to them, I'm afraid to open those doors i've locked things away in. The risk of a complete breakdown or suicide would be significant.

Sam2