Can't talk vs won't talk

Thank you for your replies. There is an awful lot more than that going on in my head!! I often have to stop because otherwise I feel I could write forever, everything is linked and goes round in circles.

Yeah, I have reasons for being scared to talk, which does certainly contribute to this. It it sad to know that people from the past continue to cause damage for years to come.

Eye contact is something I am not good at. I look at my Ts eyes about once a session for less than a second and only because I think about doing it. I don't in general life either, I can't even tell you what colour Hs eyes are! When I do occasionally, for work mainly, it is as if I am looking but blocking myself from seeing. Mostly, I look away from people but when I feel that would be rude I look at their foreheads or hair. I have been wanting to ask my T to sit and close her eyes so that I can actually look at her and see her, because I do wonder if that would help me.

I know a therapist, a very very good therapist who allows her clients to touch her face. She will close her eyes and invite them to come closer, she will keep her eyes closed for as long as they need to explore her without her looking at them. These clients had trouble with eye contact and also with people looking at them. I thought it was a really great idea. I wonder if you could ask your t to try something like this?

That's interesting because that is the kind of thing I was thinking of. Thanks. Maybe I will ask one day, she may go for it.

i could hardly talk for 3 years in therapy .my T was firm in her dealing with that . i was not allowed at first to write letters unless i read them. she would not read them . no texts or e mails either . she did not push me to talk but was there to help if i wanted it . but again was firm that i needed to talk to her and not avoid it through other means . it felt harsh and it frustrated the heck out of me for the longest time . but i did learn to talk with her .it was a slow frustrating process for the both of us i think .but i also think if she had let me avoid talking and write or e mail and so on i might have staid doing that and choose to not talk .it was easier. over time she allowed me to write in session but i would have to read it out loud .that was hard . as i talked more she did allow me to write without reading it out loud. she would read to me, sit on the floor with me ,draw, play games, and so on .she would even play catch with me in her office to get me moving when fear seemed to freeze me up a lot .at the time i hated what she was doing it didnt feel like she understood how hard it was to even open my mouth for so many reasons. eventually i did take risks and started to talk to her a bit . at times it is still hard and there are still things i cant seem to talk about but my T seems to be very patient with me around this . she is not perfect in any way but she has helped if i look back to how i was not even able to talk at all a few years ago to now she must be helping some

Thanks Granite, that really helps to know that there is hope if I work on it. I kind of knew this but sometimes just need reminding of it. I have been making progress with T to, despite the occasional setbacks. I found it interesting that your T was quite strict but started loosening as she saw you trying and improving. I write in session too and mostly T tries to get me to read it rather than her. Last session she read what I had written and kept hold of the paper, eventually putting it on the floor so I couldn't write any more. I don't know if she was doing this on purpose or not but it sure felt like it at the time, and still does now. In a way I can see that she may have been trying to push me like your T was for you but I definitely relate to the frustration of it and also the feeling of not being understood about all of this.

The fact that she basically said that I choose not to talk was hard for me and so unlike her that I can't help but feel that she was frustrated last session, or annoyed or upset or something. It felt like she let her feelings interfere with our work and that isn't good I don't think.

This resonates with me. I also struggle to talk in therapy. It is certainly not to punish my T in any way. But when Echos said about pre-verbal trauma, that rang true with me. My dad died when I was three weeks old and my mother's grief was all I knew for my first year.
I hear the question or comment that T says and I have words and comments and thoughts, but somehow I struggle to allow them past my lips.

It is so hard because there are so many reason not to talk but not many reasons to talk, in my limited experience of talking!! I am sure that it would help, I just can't get myself past the difficulties sometimes.

i'm sorry it's so hard for you to talk. i went through that too in the beginning. actually with t1 and t2 i never did talk. walked out on t1 during 1st session cuz he was a jerk but t2 tried for 6 months or so and never could talk to her. I'd just sit there and she'd talk and I'd be like "I don't know. I don't know (sigh) I don't know." finally just quit going. t3 (current t) has the patience of a saint as I often tell her and I am finally at a place where I can talk completely freely with her it took a long time to get here. Been seeing her 5 years now. In the beginning, we had quite a few sessions where we just sat together in silence (just "being", she would say.) She never pressured me to talk. In those early days, I did a lot of sand trays (she's certified in sand play) and doing those was helpful, because it was something to focus on when she'd ask me questions after it was done. Does your t do anything like that? I really enjoy doing them, even now 5 years in. Always get good insights from them. What really helped me talk though honestly, was about a year in, she moved out of state and we started doing phone sessions. It was like, as soon as it sunk in (which took awhile itself) that she couldn't see me and more importantly I couldn't see her seeing me, talking became easier. We got through a lot of difficult stuff on those phone sessions during the almost 3 years she lived away. Now she's back in town and I see her in person again, I do still close my eyes sometimes if I'm talking about something difficult, but I don't sit there and say "I don't know" and sigh all the time anymore which I am glad about. It has taken time and that combination of things to get me to where I can talk. And t's patience, of course. She has never once suggested that I am punishing her by not talking, and I think that's not a very good thing for a t to say. I think I would get very upset if she would have. I'm sorry yours seems to have suggested that. I hope you're able to start talking.

Thank you for sharing your story, you seem to have made some real changes in this department with your T and that gives me hope. My T has a lot of patience too, but I think this comes from her feeling like she is not doing her job or helping. We talked about it again because I had done a canvas about 'not talking and brought it to my last session and she said that she had felt helpless to help me that session and that she was not surprised to hear that I had felt pressured by her. Sometimes I like just sitting in silence with her sometimes but it can be understably hard for her to know whether this is good silence or bad silence, whether I need or want help or input or whether I am OK.

Thing is, even though I felt OK, there was this wall between us. I was hiding from her and I wanted her to come and find me and sit with me. T has said before that she sometimes doesn't know how to do this, that she needs my help to do this. I don't know whether it is because I can't or won't help, but I don't really want to help her. I want her to do that on her own. I think I do this when I don't talk. I want her to come and find me.

I am pleased that I am able to talk much more than I ever have been able to do and with time and practice I do think that this will get easier. But then also, I think I am just someone who doesn't talk much in general and you know, a lot of the time that is OK with me. If I could do this without having to talk to another person then I would, but I can't. I have finally admitted that I need another his man bring to help me and this involves talking.

Oh it is just such a loaded topic for me, so many reasons, so much stuff. Round and round in circles until I fly off the merry go round and land flat on my bum.

Thank you for mentioning the sandtray too. My T does have one and uses it with other clients I think, but I am not confident enough to ask and she has never suggested it. Maybe one day I can ask because I think, like you, I find it easier to have something to focus on.

Thanks again.

Mona is correct that I had selective mutism as a child. It used to be called elective, not selective, because it was thought that children with this disorder refused to talk on purpose. That's not true, but one of my past T's told me not talking was powerful.

I disagreed. I just could not talk even though I wanted to. I still don't understand why, but now they say it's a form of anxiety. I was loud and verbal with my immediate family but didn't speak to my close relatives.

I always did better, like you, when I was playing a game or engaged in an activity, so I could look down, and not at the person who wanted to talk to me. My Mom took me to a T when I was around 10 but I wouldn't talk at all. I remember playing with a paper clip the whole time, and she never took me back.

As an adult in therapy, I had trouble talking to my first T. I managed eventually. I had recovered from SM but was still shy. My current T did some art therapy with me, and I fingerpainted once, in session. I found that I could talk much more freely while my hands were busy painting. Have you tried anything like that?

I don't think not talking is a way of punishing your T. When I couldn't talk, it was like I didn't even see the person. Your wanting your T to sit on the wall with you reminds me of the book Murphy's Boy by Torey Hayden. The boy wouldn't talk and hid under a table so Torey climbed under the table with him. I think you have a good T, so maybe telling her about the wall might help.