[pachyderm]

In trying to understand what happens with me, and trying to figure out how to avoid the sabotage that always happens, I looked up a thread I posted here in 2008 (!!). I am still in much the same position, though I have no therapist now -- I have been trying to work on this myself. I have not failed completely to learn, but I have not succeeded either. I continually go around and around -- never manage to make a stable breakthrough.

I am surprised at how well I was able to put my thoughts together that long ago. Probably this thread will not interest anyone here now. I don't know what good it will do to post it:

http://forums.psychcentral.com/psych...g-therapy.html

What do you think might help you make a stable breakthrough?

[HazelGirl]

Maybe having a T would help you move past this.

[Leah123]

I commend you for continuing to push for a breakthrough! Am glad you came back and posted.

I can tell you're in your head a lot based on reading that last thread, something I struggled with a lot, and still do to an extent. It also sounds like you deal with some mania as well as anxiety, those uncontrollable racing thoughts, and that a recurring theme is feeling that you are better versed about theory and cross-discipline approaches that might work for you than most or all of the helping professionals you'd been in touch with.

I also got the sense you'd seen multiple helping professionals but was not sure if you had been engaged in long term therapy with any of them, or found any that were a good fit? If I'd read your post originally, I would have recommended you print it all out and give it to prospective therapists as a great, relatively comprehensive introduction to a key issue for you.

I wonder if you've considered Somatic Experiencing, or any other type of therapy where the therapist can help you integrate more mindfulness, more being in the moment, more grounding, more physical attunement into your process.

Also, have you considered medication or are you on any?

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by My kids are cool

What do you think might help you make a stable breakthrough?

Some way (internal or external) to interrupt the thoughts that tend to push me into instability -- to guide me instead back to calm.

Those "thoughts" I have are remembrances of actual things that people tell me, or have told me, ways that actual people react to my expressions of anxiety. I don't know of anyone who can deal with any expressions of my anxiety in a calming (but not suppressing) way.

I feel that my expressions of anxiety tend to make other people anxious, and as a result, they try to stop me expressing it.

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by HazelGirl

Maybe having a T would help you move past this.

A T? There are all kinds -- and the words that are usually used to describe the differences do not tell me anything useful about what they actually do.

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Leah123

I can tell you're in your head a lot...

Yes, thinking does have its disadvantages...

I also got the sense you'd seen multiple helping professionals but was not sure if you had been engaged in long term therapy with any of them, or found any that were a good fit?

Long-term -- yes, the first one. That almost resulted in my deciding that I should kill myself. Others from time to time, but none that helped enough.

I wonder if you've considered Somatic Experiencing, or any other type of therapy where the therapist can help you integrate more mindfulness, more being in the moment, more grounding, more physical attunement into your process.

I have no confidence in any words such as "Somatic Experiencing", CBT, psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, whatever -- I find that they simply do not tell you what these people do in their therapies, what makes the difference between a successful outcome and what does not.

Also, have you considered medication or are you on any?

I have had all kinds of psychoactive medications. None helped more than slightly; some made things worse. I've come to the conclusion that medications are used mostly to suppress symptoms, to avoid dealing with the things that are actually causing the problems. To make the providers feel better short-term, rather than making the patient actually better.

[Leah123]

Originally Posted by pachyderm

I have no confidence in any words such as "Somatic Experiencing", CBT, psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, whatever -- I find that they simply do not tell you what these people do in their therapies, what makes the difference between a successful outcome and what does not.

I appreciate your concern, but suggest you reconsider a bit. Different modalities can make a huge difference to someone with the issues you noted in your original approach, and body-centric therapies where the therapist doesn't just focus on the intellectual interaction seem to me potentially healing for you.

All those terms, but especially SE, are not interchangable and while there is overlap in some types of therapies, looking for practitioners with a focus on things like SE or more broadly the mind-body connection can be worthwhile.

With that said, let me second another point you made: I agree, it's certainly not just the modality that matters. It has been shown through research and my personal experience, that a strong therapeutic alliance is the best predictor/hope of success in therapy and I whole-heartedly believe it.

So the key is to find someone who can do what you need (and I think, based on the limited info in your first post that body-awareness and mindfulness would help) and that the therapist is also someone you respect, like, and can trust, given time. So yes, they must be right for you and know how to do things right for you.

[Leah123]

P.S. I think asking practitioners to talk less about their orientation and more about what they actually do is perfectly legitimate. I think you could say in interviews:

"If I'm dealing with X, what are we going to DO about it? How do you handle these things? Please give me some examples."

You could write out issues like you did in that last post, for example, and get some concrete answers.

[pachyderm]

My sense is that body-centered therapies are not what I need. Maybe I am just afraid of something like that -- it feels far too dangerous. I could easily be exploited.

I am no longer willing to go on a search for therapists. I've had too many bad experiences. And the weekly hour seems foolish to me -- I am not willing to keep going part way up the hill only to fall back again repeatedly. I need something more sustaining. When I get into a bad condition, it can take me days to recover even to the extent I do -- I can calm myself if given enough time and quiet, but no therapy that happens only once a week for 50 minutes does anything other than the endless round of partial recovery and falling down again. I will not do it any more. I can do that by myself, and it is free.

[Leah123]

Originally Posted by pachyderm

the weekly hour seems foolish to me -- I am not willing to keep going part way up the hill only to fall back again repeatedly. I need something more sustaining. When I get into a bad condition, it can take me days to recover even to the extent I do -- I can calm myself if given enough time and quiet, but no therapy that happens only once a week for 50 minutes does anything other than the endless round of partial recovery and falling down again. I will not do it any more. I can do that by myself, and it is free.

I can relate, so I happened to try online therapy and I love it. I can do phone calls or chat online or email, as long as I want, but it's expensive. I do appreciate how 50 minutes a week isn't workable for everyone, it wouldn't work for me.

I don't find somatic awareness has any more potential for exploitation than other modalities: I would explain my experience more if you were interested, but I think that you're not wanting any therapy right now, so... maybe some other posters will be able to help too.

Best,

Leah

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Leah123

P.S. I think asking practitioners to talk less about their orientation and more about what they actually do is perfectly legitimate. I think you could say in interviews:

"If I'm dealing with X, what are we going to DO about it? How do you handle these things? Please give me some examples."

I can lose all ability to communicate what I need in situations like that. I become almost unable to think -- and I don't know anyone who recognizes what is happening and knows how to deal with it. I cannot guarantee what person will show up for an "appointment".

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Leah123

I don't find somatic awareness has any more potential for exploitation than other modalities: I would explain my experience more if you were interested, but I think that you're not wanting any therapy right now, so...

You see? I frustrate you too. Panic is a communicable disease...

[Perna]

If I go it sends the message, I think, that everything is OK

That is part of the problem, for me, my thinking does not get checked out with the other person's thinking and I wander off into the weeds on my own. My T had me "free-associate" once and we were both lost within 30 seconds She quickly back-pedaled and we continued on with my meandering and her following and trying to give a "Don't step there!" warning, if she could. It took a really long time for me to learn from my meandering, so that I stayed on the "path" better and didn't get so muddy or run off to investigate what was behind that bush only to find it was a bear (non-Fuzzy variety :-) etc. It can be painful and difficult wandering in the swamp but one does eventually learn how to wander in the swamp effectively, if one lives through the process.

We grew up. Think about that. It is a success of sorts?

[healingme4me]

Sometimes, when we reach this point, it's a matter of sifting through others experiences, to gain that 'aha' moment.
Now, I haven't been following along well enough, to know which area of experiences to guide you into. But, I've found reading others, during these stuck moments are what i need for personal clarity. Now who, what, where, when and how much...not sure....


Sent from my LG-MS910 using Tapatalk 2

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Perna

It can be painful and difficult wandering in the swamp but one does eventually learn how to wander in the swamp effectively, if one lives through the process.

We grew up. Think about that. It is a success of sorts?

Maybe of sorts. I have found that there are two ways of achieving something of a "success" -- or at least a semi-stable position. One is of a kind of mindlessness -- not really knowing who you are or what you think -- and not knowing that you are missing something. That is the kind of "success" that the world rewards. Or lots of it does. The other is a position of mindfulness (or trying to get there) -- I have not found that the world likes that very much. I (feel I) have to keep my mouth shut about that, so as not to upset people. If they get upset, who knows what they can do to you?

[pachyderm]

Who can intervene in an anxious situation to defuse the anxiety, without getting overwhelmed by it themselves?

This is what I need in therapy, not some fancy words.

[Perna]

I think anxiety is personal; what upsets one person does not necessarily upset another. My husband is rarely upset which helps/calms me enormously (sometimes :-) I have a vague hierarchy of what scares me and work on defusing the lower ones, working my way up. I am pretty good about avoiding the higher up ones until they become my lower ones. Even the lower ones are "scary" but the payoff is greater for mastering them versus failing to master them.

I'm reminded of when I had to take the train from D.C. Union Station to New York City and spend two nights alone. I had never been on a train, never been to New York, never traveled stayed alone, etc. I "cleverly" went to a travel agent to get me an inexpensive, safe hotel in an all right neighborhood, etc.; it ended up being a hotel for transients and I spent a rather scary night with the sound of arguing and bottles breaking in the room next to me, etc. I got a little sleep but woke really early and wanted to get out of there so I'm walking the streets of New York 6:00 a.m., barely light out yet, felt like I was being followed and finally found a diner sort of place to eat breakfast and couldn't figure out what the weird women at the door were there for (was kindly laughed at when I got home and told they were prostitutes, which made sense in hindsight; I was a tad ignorant/naive at 26 still). I went to my convention and it was horrible so I decided to go home early instead of staying both days, etc. When I got back to Union Station, D.C. I was extremely surprised at my euphoria and feeling I could do anything and, instead of getting a cab to take me all the way home because I was afraid of buses, I got a bus AND asked for a transfer (one of the things I was afraid of, asking for a transfer/changing buses correctly, etc.); you could have taken me down to SE and I would have happily gamboled in the streets. . .

The best part of that is that it stayed. Only a couple years earlier I had gotten my job down at Farragut Square (had been working at the Pentagon, driving myself alone in my car) and had had to take a day off work before the interview to get the job in order to take a bus down, find how to "do" that, where it was, scope out the place so it would not be too overwhelming when I went for the interview. The bus was a straight shot down Connecticut Ave., I just lived in Cleveland Park, a mile or two away. But the bus worried me then. Never again after manipulating the train and overnighting alone in New York The lesser of two evils looks pretty tame if you are stuck with the greater one.

[Leah123]

Originally Posted by pachyderm

You see? I frustrate you too. Panic is a communicable disease...

You don't frustrate me and I haven't caught your panic. I think you're projecting.

I suggested a type of therapy and you said no, that you were no longer willing to search for a therapist.

So, I figured that was that, and hoped that other ideas from other posters might appeal more.

The things you write about can definitely be helped. My own therapist for example has done great with me taking on my anxiety in the moment and helping me quell it and feel a world better. But getting the help it does take some faith and too, maybe more trial and error and willingness. I hear that you may be worn down by past efforts and not at a place right now where you're willing to believe you can be helped or to be helped through therapy.

P.S.

Originally Posted by pachyderm

I can lose all ability to communicate what I need in situations like that. I become almost unable to think -- and I don't know anyone who recognizes what is happening and knows how to deal with it. I cannot guarantee what person will show up for an "appointment".

That seems like something excellent to print out and give a therapist, except I think you don't want to see one?

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Leah123

That seems like something excellent to print out and give a therapist, except I think you don't want to see one?

No, I am afraid to see one. That's really what I am expressing here. I don't fit in. I don't succeed when I am supposed to -- when others do.

[Leah123]

Fear of seeing a therapist is super-common, most of us on this board express our fear of being in therapy regularly, so you fit right in on that count.

[Perna]

Originally Posted by pachyderm

I don't succeed when I am supposed to -- when others do.

Your "when" bothers me. It's your life and you're the only one in it? I'm a very slow learner of some things and other things, I don't understand why other people have trouble with them since I don't But I kind of gave up on the lock-step everyone move from grade-to-grade together along with a few other of my family-of-origin barn raising mandates when I got to my 40s I think. It did take me a longish time to "get it", I was 41 before I got studying/school and could succeed there at will.

[pachyderm]

Originally Posted by Perna

Your "when" bothers me. It's your life and you're the only one in it? I'm a very slow learner of some things and other things, I don't understand why other people have trouble with them since I don't But I kind of gave up on the lock-step everyone move from grade-to-grade together along with a few other of my family-of-origin barn raising mandates when I got to my 40s I think. It did take me a longish time to "get it", I was 41 before I got studying/school and could succeed there at will.

I don't succeed ever, though others do. So it seems. That means I am a failure, "wrong", and the others are "right". So I should be like them. Forget what I think, what I am, and try to be like them. Try to be them.

That is a lesson I think I learned early in life. The person I actually am is not acceptable. Not acceptable to my mother, and to numerous others throughout my life (including therapists). And we know acceptance is important to humans.

[blur]

pachy, i remember there was a guy who used to post on this forum who was really struggling and he went to a partial inpatient program and it helped him immensely. i think he went for 4-6 hours a day 5 days a week for a number of weeks in a row. maybe doing a search on that and just looking at the partial inpatient programs in your area is an idea to try. i am sorry things are so tough for you.

[elliemay]

Originally Posted by pachyderm

Some way (internal or external) to interrupt the thoughts that tend to push me into instability -- to guide me instead back to calm.

Those "thoughts" I have are remembrances of actual things that people tell me, or have told me, ways that actual people react to my expressions of anxiety. I don't know of anyone who can deal with any expressions of my anxiety in a calming (but not suppressing) way.

I feel that my expressions of anxiety tend to make other people anxious, and as a result, they try to stop me expressing it.

This can get complicated I think. For me, it would be very easy to think that the guidance to calm would be considered suppressive.