A theme I have noticed.

It seems like I read a lot of statements here that show people falling into similar categories:

Category 1: I am too messed up for therapy. T's time would be better spent fixing someone who can actually be repaired.

Category 2: I am fine. I should be able to do this on my own & free up T's time to help someone who actually needs help from another person.

Do you relate to either of these two? Are there additional categories? Obviously some people are secure in their therapy relationships, that would be category 3.

I am definitely in Category 2. I constantly feel like I should handle all of this on my own & let T use his time to assist those who need help.

I tend to go from one to the other, all over the place right now but definitely think someone else deserves T's time either cos I can't be fixed or because T should help someone else. I always ask my T to give my appointments away to someone more deserving

I'm a mix of both

I tend to go between the both, depending on my mood and how I feel

I'm in a different category - I'm not fine, exactly, but I don't think I'm too messed up for therapy. Right now, I wouldn't want to go it alone, but I probably could if I really needed to. As far as my T goes, I think he and I are both pretty secure that he can help me with my "not fineness".

number one, but slowly making progress to number two...

........

Ditto

I'm totally in category 2.

On one ocassion I was mad by the fact that something from the past was bring out current anger. I actually told my T that I should be able to handle it and it shouldn't be effecting me. Her exact response was "I have no idea who told you that". I guess this probably came from the we don't talk about bad stuff mentality of my family growing up.

I think some of being in category 2 comes from the fact that what happened in our childhood seemed normal to us because we didn't know any different. Thus we don't actually feel what we went through was that bad. Therefore there shouldn't be a current day effect. We survived that crap so we should be able to deal with anything. That's just my two cents.

I agree. In some ways I think I was stronger BACK THEN. I didn't freak out likeI do now. Now I get set off by little stupid crap. Drives me nuts.

I'm with you there

What an interesting question. "you don't have to help me, go help someone else" is still the message in both category 1 and 2.

For me, that would imply, you can help me but not if you're going to rush me. Because the mother was always rushing me, so I was like, okay, I give up, you go ahead and peel the potatoes, mom, I can learn some other time. So now it IS totally scary to have to backtrack and learn all those old lessons. Plus I'm mad - I should have learned these skills long ago, and now it's just too late. But then I see people on here complaining about how old they are - and they're half or a third my age, and then i'm like I don't know what to think. all anyone has is NOW.

I know I have a very rough past, but so has my T. I do believe my T can help me find my way to a healthy place. And I do believe my T's time spent with me is worth it to both of us. I know I have many skills and am not as hurting as some others, but that doesn't mean I don't deserve or need help.

I'm in therapy and I know I need it but I can't wait for the day I can deal without it.

I so get this. I told my T last session that therapy was making me go "soft". She didn't take too well to this and pointed out that stuff was going crappy and that why I came there not the other way around.

definitely go back and forth between both♥

At first I thought I go back and forth between the two, but if I really deep down thought those things wouldn't I quit? Am I just a big phoney who really thinks I deserve therapy? Why do I keep going?

I'm a different category. I've made progress and am more and more able to deal with things on my own, but the support from T on a less frequent schedule is still vital to keeping myself going the right direction.

Both. Not going back and forth between them - both at the same time, except for the first sentence of #2.

I should be able to do it without a therapist. I am not sure a therapist is going to matter one way or the other and I have seen no evidence of it helping but I do keep going back. I am not worried about the therapist at all nor do I think I am wasting the therapist's time in any fashion, nor any thought that someone else might be more deserving of the therapist than I am. I pay the therapist, she has slots open for others = other screwed up people don't enter into my therapy thoughts - that is for them and the therapist to work out. So I don't think either category quite fits for me.

Good point stopdog. Maybe the categories are better defined as:

1) I don't deserve a therapist/I am beyond repair.
2) I shouldn't need a therapist/I should be able to do this on my own.

before therapy, i may have thought i should be able to do it on my own ... but it became clear that i couldn't.

so... in this regard, no more shoulds. i accept that i need the help and i gladly accept the help and support. i feel fortunate to have the time i do with my therapist. i'm as deserving as any of her other clients. i'm not taking time away from anyone else.

Right now I am new to therapy; I've only had a few sessions. I don't know that I feel like I fit into either category, though before I went I was a bit afraid that no one would be able to help me. Now that I have had the chance to work with T just a bit, I have a fair bit of optimism that my T is going to be able to help me with my problems. After I went through one of his tests with a zillion questions, he said the results indicated that I was able to admit I had problems that I needed help with / couldn't deal with on my own. He said my answers also reflected that I seem to have a readiness to engage in the process and be compliant with the things I need to work on to improve. He said both of those bode well for a therapeutic relationship. I guess I'm starting out with category 3, which seems like a good place to start. But I'm smart enough to recognize that just because I feel this way today doesn't mean I won't feel differently at another time. I can certainly understand how/why someone might feel what was expressed in the two perspectives originally mentioned. <3

I am neither one.

I'm afraid I still identify with both.

and yet we GO THERE, once a week or every two weeks, to say it again.