[laxer12]

Does anyone here not tell your T about good stuff that happens to you, for whatever reason? I'm not talking about stuff that is related to the work you are doing with him/her but other random life stuff like winning an award, getting good grades, or getting a good review at work.

I want to be able to tell my T these things because I don't want her to think my life is all negative or that I'm not successful. We just talked about why it is hard for me to talk about these kinds of things in my daily life but I want to be able to tell her too.

I guess I just care too much about what she thinks of me...

[Soccer mom]

I did in the beginning but I think mainly to keep the session light avoiding the actual issues. I think you can tell your T. anything you want! And, you could even start by saying something like "I seem like we always talk about negative things in my life so I want to tell you about the positive too". I think she would welcome that!

I find this really hard too. One time I did tell her something, I didn't feel good after, I think it relates to some feeling from childhood, a childhood wish to be valued that never came to fruition?

[ruh roh]

I tell my therapist when something good happens, because she's the only one I have in my life who knows how much it means and is genuinely happy for me during those rare times. It doesn't take away from the deeper, difficult issues, but sharing the good things has been important to me.

[ScarletPimpernel]

I find this difficult to do with my new T. I want to tell people so they will be proud of me, but new T is too new. How can she feel proud of me when she doesn't really know me?

[WrkNPrgress]

Originally Posted by laxer12

I want to be able to tell my T these things because I don't want her to think my life is all negative or that I'm not successful. We just talked about why it is hard for me to talk about these kinds of things in my daily life but I want to be able to tell her too.

I guess I just care too much about what she thinks of me...

I wonder if the reason it's hard is because that's a 'new path' for your mind? I know for me it's much easier to fall into depressive modes and thoughts and quite hard for me to see the lighter side of things even if they're right there in front of me. This is because my mind has bad habits. I have to re-train it.

Anytime we repeat a motion or a thought, we're using neural pathways in our brain. We need to process bad stuff to get it out and into the open and not let it 'drive the bus' but we also very much need to talk about accomplishments and good feelings in order to reaffirm those feelings and those pathways too!

I always consider it good practice to talk about the good stuff, not because of what A T thinks but because talking about it helps to verify in our minds that good stuff happens too.

It's self-positive reaffirmation.

[stopdog]

I do not. I tried once or twice and it did not go well. So now I do not do it. I tell real people in my life and I can be quite not unhappy about things, but telling the therapist is not something that was a good plan.

[Leah123]

Actually, learning to share and revel in the positive has been part of the work of therapy for me. My therapist has observed, probably correctly, that sometimes I have the glass half empty perspective. I do mention the positives, but they easily get overshadowed by the negatives, so... I'm making an effort to spend more time on them. It's nice! (Aka, what WrkNPrgress said!)

[brillskep]

I tell my therapist about the good stuff as much as time permits. I don't find any of the good things to be unrelated with our work, as they are about me and my life. It's nice to share my good moments like that. i think one of the reasons this is so important is that life really is not all about the issues and only paying attention to the difficult stuff can actually make life seem more difficult. It's very important for me to acknowledge both good and bad as parts of my journey and to share both.

"did not go well." Now I'm imagining a brawl with the police called.

[laxer12]

Originally Posted by Soccer mom

I think you can tell your T. anything you want! And, you could even start by saying something like "I seem like we always talk about negative things in my life so I want to tell you about the positive too". I think she would welcome that!

I actually did start our session the other day almost just like that! The problem was that I struggled so hard to say what I wanted to and I felt so awkward that the conversation quickly changed course. We ended up talking about why it's so hard for me to talk about my success but not really the original stuff that I wanted to tell her. It was a really helpful conversation though.

I enjoy sharing the good stuff with my t. There's multiple layers to it. One, just because it's nice to share good stuff as opposed to only talking about the hard stuff. Two, the whole projection thing - my mother never said she was proud of me, still doesn't, but t always does when I share the good stuff - nurturing my younger self who never got to hear that, and teaching me how to nurture myself in the process.

I always tell my T the good stuff. I try to keep my life in perspective and balance, and those good bits are so important to maintaining that balance for me.

[Ad Intra]

I never did due to time. Often I would come in with one topic on mind and stay there. In retrospect I wish I would have shared the good moments with her. While under her care I received a raise, had fun with friends and enjoyed school (but if I remember correctly I might have shared once or twice the later two).

[divine1966]

I do, if time permits.

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[Coco3]

I did share the positive things with T. First, I thought it was because I just liked to share because he was important to me, but I have to be honest with myself and say that it was a transference thing. I wanted to hear him say he was proud of me. A lot.

Also, sharing was a learning process for me. After I learned to open up to my T and I'd get supportive responses, I dared opening up to others.

Sometimes I just shared to keep a session light.

[phaset]

I have a hard time sharing anything, but after my baby was born we spent the whole session talking about it and she smiled at me the whole time. At the end she gave me a few compliments and I felt icky though.

[PinkFlamingo99]

I have lost 60 lbs since December and I showed her my pics next to each other last week. It felt good because she was genuinely happy for not only the weight loss but the fact that I look much healthier (my nutrition was awful and I was badly anemic before so I had huge eye bags and was really pale).

I do tell T about good stuff because I have no offline friends to share things with at all. T is pretty much the only person.

[junkDNA]

i always tell my T good things. i text him abt it a lot. he always says yay! or that hes proud of me, stuff like that. it makes me feel good because i dont really get that from others and it has helped me to be able to feel proud of myself