[Sarmas]

I was wondering how people respond to their T hen you think T is either minimizing or misinterpreting a situation. Today I saw my T and I was explaining to her that my coping skills are horrible and that I'm overwhelmed. I have reasons to believe that my ex is getting ready for court again and so now it's an expense again. I have to dig into my 401k which I don't want to. I already have a busy schedule. One of my kids has been sick for a few weeks and we are still running to appointments and get labs done. My job is stressful and I'm
Having issues coping there and I don't feel appreciated. I get stepped on because I'm the nicest one.
I tell this to my T except for the financial part and the getting stepped on at work. She told me that I'm catastrophic and that she's not trying to minimize things but that it's life and I just have to deal with it. She said that going to court is not a big deal. I told her that I'm mentally exhausted and that I need a break. She said that she has issues in her life as well that she has to deal with. I didn't tell her but I'm like you don't have financial issues and you don't have to go to court. You have a husband that's supportive at all times. I have no one. It's just me .i have no family other than my boys and no real friends. At the end of the day I'm not sure what to do with myself. Now I have a group of kids vandalizing the front of my house when I'm asleep. I just can't. I sat there and said nothing. I figured that she wouldn't understand and what's the purpose of explaining plus my time was up. I know she has missing information so I take that into account. I hate discussing finances with her because she's so financially set and so organized. I don't want to be judged by her. I came out feeling horrible and more depressed. I can't email or text because we had issues with that in the past. Now until next Wednesday. When I explain controversies with people she will sigh or make a negative remark as if I'm wrong so I skip it.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? How would you handle it?

[lucozader]

Woah... She sounds like a really terrible therapist to be honest. How horrible to have your pain minimised and dismissed like that - and how dare she bring up her issues, it's not about her! Are you in a position to find another one? That's honestly the only advice I feel I can offer here!

It doesn't sound so much that she is minimizing your situation as it is that she is trying to get you to realize you have to problem solve rather than get frozen in catastrophizing. I can remember times when I felt and probably sounded very much like you do right now (probably about two days ago): overwhelmed and flustered and exhausted and just done with it all. I would go into my session and start venting about everything that was going wrong for me, and my therapist's response was often, "Okay, how are you going to deal with this long list of problems." He was basically reminding me that he could sit and commiserate with me, but I'd leave in exactly the same place I came in, or, he could help me make a plan for getting all of my ducks in a row so I could regain some semblance of a sense of control over my life (and I could remember to let go of things that I really couldn't control).

Yes, I really just wanted to vent and have him agree with me about how bad my life was, but it really wouldn't have helped improve how I was feeling because when I walked out the door, I'd still be in the same boat. It was frustrating when he wouldn't just let me vent, but it was usually really helpful if I would allow him to help me find a way to slow down my thinking and work the problems.

I've learned, much in part to my therapist's modeling, that I can only control so much. Sometimes I just have to do what I can and accept that. I'm great at enumerating everything that's going wrong at a given time and getting anxious and stuck there, but I've learned to handle one thing at a time the best I know how and be okay with maybe not getting everything done just so. I've learned to set my priorities and put some things on the back burner or delegate them to someone else if possible.

The other thing I want to comment on is your description of your therapist. Has your therapist actually shared her financials with you so you are certain she has no financial problems? Has your therapist actually shared all of her personal/family problems with you so you are certain her life is as perfect as you make it out to be? My experience is that most people don't share those kinds of struggles even with people closest to them, much less their therapy clients. It might be you are assuming things about her that just aren't her reality.

I hope things calm down in your life. It sucks when life seems to throw so much crisis at us all at once. It is overwhelming and exhausting and anxiety-making. I hope you can take a deep breath, pick up one thing that you can do something about and work on it. The things you can't do anything about, just allow yourself to say they suck and focus on the things that you can work with.

[Salmon77]

She doesn't sound helpful at all. It sounds like you're dealing with a ton of stuff all on your own and that's very stressful. Is it possible that this T isn't a very good fit for you? Maybe you should look for another.

I would say just that, "Are you minimizing my situation?"

I tend to agree with lolagrace. The way you describe your therapist's responses, they do sound a bit dismissive but at the same time you say yourself that you only tell her about a few select issues. How would she than know the extent of your problems? I also agree that it's easy to make assumptions about other people's lives when we don't know and imagine things.

I personally often found my therapists' challenging me to deal with my problems in practical ways the most useful, because avoiding tackling practical issues head-on and in a timely fashion is what tends to cause most of my anxiety. Venting about it and an empathetic response can provide some relief but it never really solves the problems and so the effect does not last long. Also, perhaps rather than dismissing, your T is trying to make you see that some of those things can be resolved more easily than you might think when very anxious.

[thesnowqueen]

Seems to me that she needs to see where you are - anxious and overwhelmed - before working to get you to see things in a different light. If that makes sense...

I think validating feelings is an important part of my therapy. I think you need to tell your T that you feel like she is minimizing your feelings. Unfortunately, her stance is not working for you. What I have learned to do when I feel like everything is falling down on me is to take things day by day or hour by hour. I try not to get bogged down in worrying about what's going to happen, but that takes a lot of conscious effort. It works sometimes, sometimes, not. Let T know how you feel, that's what she's there for. Take care.

[SummerTime12]

That's sounds really invalidating, I'm sorry! She could be trying to get you to problem solve, as some posters have suggested, but without acknowledging the difficulty of what you're going through and the effect it's having on you, I don't her methods will be very effective..

[ruh roh]

Unless you weren't reporting things very clearly about your therapist in past posts, I don't think the problem is how to respond to an invalidating therapist. The problem is going back to see an invalidating therapist.

I tell her "stop minimizing this. its important to me!"

[AllHeart]

Sounds like your t doesn't understand and was lacking empathy. You may be catastrophic, I don't know, and yes, you do have to deal with this stuff but what your t apparently forgot is that it is her job to support you and help you find relief so that you can deal with it better. To turn around and tell you she has issues in her life (well, duh, doesn't everyone?) is not helpful. It's dismissive, insensitive, and non-supportive.

My old t sometimes did this. I found that asking her something like, "ok then, do you have any suggestions on ways for me to cope better?" usually helped. And, "Are you serious right now?!" followed by a brief rant is a good back-up if need be! A t is there to help you with your needs. That's what they get paid for. Perhaps your t needs a reminder of that.

[Sarmas]

Originally Posted by lolagrace

It doesn't sound so much that she is minimizing your situation as it is that she is trying to get you to realize you have to problem solve rather than get frozen in catastrophizing. I can remember times when I felt and probably sounded very much like you do right now (probably about two days ago): overwhelmed and flustered and exhausted and just done with it all. I would go into my session and start venting about everything that was going wrong for me, and my therapist's response was often, "Okay, how are you going to deal with this long list of problems." He was basically reminding me that he could sit and commiserate with me, but I'd leave in exactly the same place I came in, or, he could help me make a plan for getting all of my ducks in a row so I could regain some semblance of a sense of control over my life (and I could remember to let go of things that I really couldn't control).

Yes, I really just wanted to vent and have him agree with me about how bad my life was, but it really wouldn't have helped improve how I was feeling because when I walked out the door, I'd still be in the same boat. It was frustrating when he wouldn't just let me vent, but it was usually really helpful if I would allow him to help me find a way to slow down my thinking and work the problems.

I've learned, much in part to my therapist's modeling, that I can only control so much. Sometimes I just have to do what I can and accept that. I'm great at enumerating everything that's going wrong at a given time and getting anxious and stuck there, but I've learned to handle one thing at a time the best I know how and be okay with maybe not getting everything done just so. I've learned to set my priorities and put some things on the back burner or delegate them to someone else if possible.

The other thing I want to comment on is your description of your therapist. Has your therapist actually shared her financials with you so you are certain she has no financial problems? Has your therapist actually shared all of her personal/family problems with you so you are certain her life is as perfect as you make it out to be? My experience is that most people don't share those kinds of struggles even with people closest to them, much less their therapy clients. It might be you are assuming things about her that just aren't her reality.

I hope things calm down in your life. It sucks when life seems to throw so much crisis at us all at once. It is overwhelming and exhausting and anxiety-making. I hope you can take a deep breath, pick up one thing that you can do something about and work on it. The things you can't do anything about, just allow yourself to say they suck and focus on the things that you can work with.

Thanks. I see where you're coming from. I know that she's trying to be helpful. She doesn't mean to be invalidating and I don't think she knows that I ely like she was minimizing my situation. I did tell her that I was stuck and that my coping really sucks. She asked me how I could cope differently and I told her that I have no idea. Her solution was to take a vacation which isn't ideal is so many ways. I gues for the normal person yes but not in my world right now.

Yeah you're right sometimes you just want someone to agree with you. I guess I felt that by her telling me tshe it's not a catastrophic situation that she was minimizing my situation and feelings.

She is open about her life and what she does. That's how I also know about some of her struggles. I enjoy hearing it because it makes her more real. I think she's a great person. I know I'm there for me But I'm okay with it.

I guess she was trying to see that everyone has issues including herself and I get that. It's not foreign to me. I was trying to explain that I've dealt with issues but that I'm at my max and sometimes I'm not sure how to do it. I guess I needed to know how to cope from here until next week and not until the vacation that I can't take.

[Sarmas]

Originally Posted by justafriend306

I would say just that, "Are you minimizing my situation?"

I should've commented on it. I have a tendency to hear things I don't like or disagree with and just sit there. I tried explaining a few times in order for her to get a better picture. I then gave up.

[Sarmas]

Originally Posted by AllHeart

Sounds like your t doesn't understand and was lacking empathy. You may be catastrophic, I don't know, and yes, you do have to deal with this stuff but what your t apparently forgot is that it is her job to support you and help you find relief so that you can deal with it better. To turn around and tell you she has issues in her life (well, duh, doesn't everyone?) is not helpful. It's dismissive, insensitive, and non-supportive.

My old t sometimes did this. I found that asking her something like, "ok then, do you have any suggestions on ways for me to cope better?" usually helped. And, "Are you serious right now?!" followed by a brief rant is a good back-up if need be! A t is there to help you with your needs. That's what they get paid for. Perhaps your t needs a reminder of that.

You're right I should've asked her for better coping skills. She suggested a vacation but that's not a day to day coping skill and not a realistic one to me at this time. Perhaps if I was someone else in a different situation then yes but in my life that option isn't even real. I sat there and said well a vacation would be ideal.

[Sarmas]

Originally Posted by thesnowqueen

Seems to me that she needs to see where you are - anxious and overwhelmed - before working to get you to see things in a different light. If that makes sense...

That's what I was trying to show her. All I wanted her to see was my situation for what it is. Even though I know that not explaining everything detail isn't helpful. I wanted her toad knowledge that I have an issue and how would she address things in my case. I can handle quite a bit but when things accumulate and I feel Like things are out of my reach then it becomes much. Its the big picture. I felt as if she was saying that these are just daily ordeals that I'm having issues with which it isn't. I've been through working two jobs and getting little sleep to get through and give my child what he needed. I've dealt with not even having milk to feed my infant when I was younger and having to
Leave my house at 10pm and walk 5 miles in the cold with a stroller to "shop" at my parents. I did that often while going through a bad relationship as well. That's easy compared to my life now. That's just trivial things compared to what I've gone through and my life now. I just don't discuss it and put a smile on my face and continue. It eats me up inside. When I try to begin verbalize my thoughts and they start getting shot down its a little frustrating but I understand where she stands. Sometimes I think if my diagnoses stands in the way. She diagnosed me 5 years ago. I don't think that she's a bad therapist at all. I think that she needs to listen a little more and not be so quick to answer.