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SecretGarden said:
Sunny... sigh.... With your CBT therapist were you able to emote or were you (or your T) constantly correcting your emotions?

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Yes, I was able to emote. I went to her at the depths of my most depressed, crying a dozen times a day, not able to sleep, trudging around all day or being unable to get up and go to work, etc. Some days I would try to drive to work and couldn't get more than halfway there due to general crying, sobbing, being a basket case. This is the sunny she saw. I went to see her and cried every time. She provided a safe place to cry. No, she never tried to correct my sorrow. How can you "correct" someone who is grieving? I have never associated CBT with the practice of rejecting the client's feelings. I know many CBT therapists focus a lot on correcting faulty thinking patterns. We didn't have to do a lot of that because I am a really good thinker. I'm a trained scientist and know how to think clearly and logically about everything, including, for the most part, my life.

My therapy with this counselor did not include working with my unconscious. Honestly, that never came up. It was more practical-oriented, such as here are some things to do to help your depression symptoms. The big ones she recommended to me that helped were getting more sleep (we worked on this a lot!) and sharing my problems with other people, creating outside resources of support for myself. She was, however, focused on alleviating symptoms of depression, rather than getting at the cause of my depression and helping with that once and for all (that's what my current T did). So I felt somewhat better after seeing her, but my depression was not gone, just the symptoms less severe.

Anyway, that was my experience. She was helpful in her surface way, and never rejected my feelings and emotions.