told to forget

My new T suggested i should forget 14 years of severe abuse. I tried to explain if that's the cure, i'm halfway there. I only remember in flashbacks and nightmares. In bits and pieces. My sister should be super healthy. She doesnt remember a decade. But i think the counselor doesnt know what she is doing. She is a student, and videotaped. Her supervisor reviews the tapes. I have seen her three
times. I cant afford to go anywhere else. I dont know how to request a different T without hurting her feelings or getting her in trouble.

Wow! What the H are they teaching these new therapists?

Hugs toy you

Change your therapist, we cannot forget our past, the goal is to address the things that we experienced and work on ways to identify how these experiences effect us and then how to work on ways to overcome them and gain empowerment over them.
Open Eyes

Thanks you two. :-)

Ive tried this forget thing.
I seem to feel better if I block it all and stay busy.
Unfortunately its only a temporary solution..
The thoughts and memories seem to come back right away
every time Im alone and not super busy.

Yeah. Actually my T asked me if i thought it would be possible to forget the trauma and she meant forget traumatic feelings eventually. English isnt her first language. That's what i want to be able to remember like i remember anything else.
Of course, trying to forget doesnt work in long run. Wish it did. With me it's like i built a huge wall to block memories, but the older i get, the harder it is to maintain the wall and it's crumbling.

likewater
it is not a matter of getting her in trouble or hurting her feelings. it would be a dis-service to her to not bring this up to her supervisor. the purpose of students seeing clients is so that they can learn, train to do therapy on their own. the chances that her supervisor really watches all her taped sessions is unlikely. she may choose one here or there to get a sampling of the students work. or they are on hand for when there is a complaint. her supervisor needs to know that this is the advice that was given, which was bad advice. this student maybe missed that day in DSM class on how to treat trauma. if you let it slide by, she will be treating all future patients the same way. you let her supervisor know, she will not get in trouble, she will simply be corrected with the knowledge on the appropriate way to treat trauma patients. she is there to learn,but she wont learn if it is not known that she made a mistake. stand up for yourself. just because you are getting free service doesnt mean you have to accept poor service.

Forget the therapist?

All we have in therapy is words and conversation with this other person, our T. English was not my T's first language either. It is easy to misunderstand or just plain miss meanings.

How do you know the T meant the feelings instead of the actual events?

One cannot wall off feelings as you have tried, as you see, your wall is crumbling. The feelings must be looked at and processed, the event has to be approached from a different viewpoint; its pastness is very important to that viewpoint. There has to be a disconnect between the past event and how it made you feel and the present.

My car was rear-ended and totaled. Fortunately I was not in it; a car hit it when it was dead/stopped at a red light and forced it through the intersection and beyond. The emergency people did not know I was not in it were searching the side of the road for me! I had gone to the gas station down the road to call for help for it being dead, before it was hit. The people in the car that hit it were taken to the hospital in ambulances.

It happened as I was driving home from seeing my therapist and the session and evening were already stressful. The battery was dead when I came out of the session and I had to force myself to go back into the clinic and ask to use their phone to call for someone to jump the battery! That was very very difficult for me to do, go back and talk to people when I wasn't "supposed" to be there, to ask for help too!

Then there was the fact I was also late from having to stop and get the battery jumped and it was the night I was supposed to get home right away, my husband's office Christmas party was that night and I had to change into more formal clothes to go to a hotel downtown. Now the car had been hit and totaled and there was the mess of getting it towed, dealing with police and calling my husband and getting him to come way over where I was to pick me up. No time to go home to change, we'd have to go straight to the party, and even then, be late. Luckily, I was in my work clothes, had not gone home between work and the therapist and changed into jeans as I often did, and the work outfit was "okay" for the party, it would do. But you can imagine the stress going on?

I was unprepared for the next weeks though; driving to/from therapy by the site of the accident, seeing parts of my car (tail lights, grille, etc.) still by the side of the road. I got a new (used) car right away but there was also the terror, when I'd stop at that light, that the car would stall. Or, coming out of therapy, that the car wouldn't start and I'd have to ask for help, to use someone else's phone (I was afraid to talk on the phone, too).

I was amazed at how much worse I felt after the accident than I did while it was happening! My therapist clued me in that that was how we are hard wired; we take care of the situation, the emergency while it is happening and then can "collapse" afterwards, when it is "safe" to.

It is a good thing that your wall is breaking now! It would not break if it were not safe for it to yet! Your Self will only give you what you can deal with; the wall will not wholly crumble in one-fell-swoop, it will maintain its integrity as long as you "need" it. Not want it, need it.

If you do not feel able to change therapists, I would figure out how to explore your world for yourself in her presence, with her comments. Imagine what it would be like to forget the feelings or forget the events. Which would you prefer? Neither will happen; the feelings will be worked through in the sense that you will realize that you are safe now and that feeling afraid something bad will happen is no more "real" than the nightmares your mind/unconscious is using to work through its difficulties with your experience. If you embrace the nightmares, write them down, pay attention to them, "care" about them, they will reward you, your mind will know you are working with it instead of against it and won't have to try so hard to get your attention, to get you to really look at the situation instead of trying to "forget" it.

Remember the old adage about turning to face and confront the monster in your dreams being the only way to get it to go away? It works with the actual monsters in our lives from the past, also. Dream monsters are figurative of the real ones. Face the dream ones, either while dreaming or while conscious, or face the conscious ones, and both will reward you by becoming less of a scary monster. I have a cartoon I love, that makes me smile and reminds me that I can deal with my issues:

what about womens horizon or a church that has a free program in abuse.
look in the internet if there is any free counseling in your area.

I didnt explain this very well, but we had a long talk. She will refer me if i want, but once we talked, T and i agree on goals. I think she worded it badly when she said forget the trauma. I told her i'll always remember, and i was insulted she suggested i could or should forget. I hope to be able to remember someday without freaking out and nightmares, etc. She said that was what she meant. It's difficult because we have only met 4 times and we don' t know each other. After our last meeting, i really believe we can be ok and
work together. (((Perna))) i'm so glad you weren't in your car! That was the universe keeping you in one piece. Thank you everyone for all your kind words too. You'll never be able to fathom how much you all mean to me.

im so glad you talked to your t about this - that is always the first thing to do in my opinion

i really hope you can work through thses things and help them go back int the mists ofthe past where they beloing

It's impossible to 'forget' the past. What you can do is learn to cope and understand what happened to you is not your fault. You can stand up to the abuse and be a strong person once again. Personally, when I remember the abuse, I remember that I'm going to stand up against the SOB and not let him have power over me anymore. That gives me self confidence and lets me 'own' the abuse. It sounds easy but it's a hard step to take.

When she says you should forget about your abuse, you should tell her she should forget about her dreams of being a therapist!

Please find another therapist soon if you can, this does not sound like a well trained individual

Just read your above comment likewater... I'm glad you two straightened things out, but I do think the way she worded it was completely wrong and deserved an apology so I hope she did that much at least. As a therapist, everything they say in that room has much much much more meaning than anything anyone else says out of the room. I'm glad you two have a better understanding and you're feeling more hopeful in the future, perhaps when this happens again have it cleared up with her while in session the same day she says it so you don't feel upset and offended if it happens again. Sorry for the above post... I was rather off on it ;p

Like forgetting is an option. I'd be ten kinds of sideways! Heck, if I could forget, I'd be mentally healthy.

Obviously, what ever you have endured has cause pain, unresolved justice (so to speak) and why's, what if's and shoulda, would of and could of's don't give you, or anyone else here rest!

How brave though! To face your issue with the T straight on and direct!

(((((likewater)))))

It helps that my T is super nice. I fired her. Lol. She knew i was P. O. ed so now we have agreement like Purpleflyingmonkeys said. If something bothers me, i bring it up right away. I'm the biggest chicken you ever met. I got so scared , at work one time i peed my
pants, but thanks for calling me brave.

Oh and , Penny, forgetting won't make you healthy. Dealing with your issues little by little and in a safe way at your own pace will. (((Penny))) (((Purpleflyingmonkeys)))