Ugh.

Another miserable experience in group therapy tonight. I've figured out that any stresses in my life amplify existing fears. Like flying for example. I had to fly over Labor Day weekend, and I was miserably nervous, much more so than usual. Because of the other factors stressing me out (my lost job, etc.), I had less control over my fear of flying than I usually do (so I sat there and sweat bullets). But about group: suddenly I'm far more uncomfortable at the thought of an audience than usual. I felt nervous and child-like and couldn't think of anything to say. Luckily the early part of the group was dominated by a couple of the other members having a discussion. But later on they tried to involve me again (fruitless effort as usual). This time one guy said that he was feeling connected to everyone in the group except for me (which figures since I feel like an outsider). And I know they wanted me to talk and discuss why it's hard for me to connect etc. Only I couldn't think of anything to say. So I said a few empty sentences (I rarely give more than the skeleton of what I'm thinking) and dropped it. With everyone still staring at me. Then T tried to get me to talk more. He asked me what I thought of the guy asking the question (I noticed later that he said "thought" rather than "felt" so he was really trying to intellectualize it and make it easier for me). I said I didn't know, he said "yes you do" and tried to help me by interpreting a couple of things that I had said. Only I couldn't think of anything to add and so I felt like an idiot. So I just said "I don't want to talk" and gave up (my reaction to feeling cornered). Dude in group had pointed out that I'd been there 8 months without ever connecting. Like I don't know that. Anyway, it was miserable.

In retrospect, there are a whole slew of things going on in my life that I might have spoken about to them (and they would have liked that), only none came into my head when I was there. Well, none except when I said I no longer wanted to talk about work (hate going in there every week and saying "no I haven't found anything yet"). So I guess the one thing I did say could be translated as "butt out."

I think that until my life has improved a lot, I'm going to be horribly anxious about having an audience. So I don't anticipate that this can even get better any time soon. So I'm back to the should-I-quit-group-now question again. I hate spending the money on going and not getting anything out of it. But I can't even try. I say almost nothing and barely even respond to the others there though I do listen to their stories. I don't know why I'm like this. I think I just tried group because T wanted me to without my ever being able to drum up a real desire of my own to participate.

Blah. I wasn't even doing that well at it when my life was in better shape. Though occasionally I looked forward to it.

Okay that's my venting for tonight. Any thoughts on whether I should just quit and have done with it?

Sidony