becoming preoccupied with these boards

Anyone else find themselves becoming extremely preoccupied with these forums (Mainly this board and the romantic feelings towards my T)...I find myself checking the boards multiple times a day and it's beginning to distract me from my work and preventing me from doing the things I need to do! Not really sure what it is I'm looking for when I check them other than others in a similar situation!.........aaghhh

Do you find yourself maybe accessing deeper feelings when you look here ? I think I did and we get to find out more about therapy , but I think I can spend too much time here sometimes so try to do other things to balance it , like exercises or going out or something.

I do that, too. But then I also check Facebook and my e-mail very frequently. I work from home, so I think it's my way of looking for human contact during the day. I think I also feel especially understood on here. Like I don't want to go on and on about therapy to a friend or my H (OK, I end up going on to him about it sometimes anyway...), but here is a safe space to talk and read about it.

i did but there was too much negative stories and it scared me about going to therapy, so i had to stop coming here as much

I'm the same...I am constantly looking at the boards lately but finding some of the stories (especially about T's) quite disheartening to read about. It's good to find other people in similar situations and yes it is great to have a safe place to ask questions I couldn't/wouldn't ask others but sometimes I wonder how much it is helping me. Although in saying that it does help reinforce my trust in my T and makes me appreciate having found a good one more than ever.

Yeah, my marriage counselor says he wishes I didn't come here, I think because I've been worried about stuff he'd do (or stop doing) because of stories I've read on here. (Though I think I'd have abandonment fears with or without this board...) I've tried to explain how much support I've gotten, too, but I still think he's anti-PC. Though I guess there have been a few threads involving stuff with him where a few posters have been really critical of me. And I brought some up to MC, fearing he felt the same way. And he said he didn't. So I think he also doesn't like other people proclaiming how he'd feel (like, if I was prying too much into his life, that's up to him to decide if he's upset about, not posters on PC).

I feel like it's helped more than it's hurt though.

It doesn't stop me from doing things but it does distract me from life when I have nothing else to occupy my mind with. Not sure what I'm looking for, I don't like to post much because even here I'm afraid of rejection although I am getting better. Maybe I'm looking for similar stories that could help me figure myself out, don't really know anyone who talks about this kind of stuff in real life

I've lowered my expectations when browsing through the threads on this forum. I think you have to take everything with a grain of salt. These are people's experiences and can be subjective sometimes.

That being said, sometimes I get emotional when reading through other people's stories. It can be a trigger.

Also, I am more wary of the chat rooms too. People say things on the fly, and that can also be a trigger.

I try to post on the positive threads and read those, instead of the other topics. I find this helps me focus on wellness.

I come here (and other websites) purposely, rather than compulsively, when I want a distraction.

It has a way of allowing me to appreciate having a competent T. But I learn alot from here, particularly what it's like to work with different types of therapies, different ways people cope, the attitudes and behaviors outside of therapy that help people be who they want to be, change, overcome obstacles, or progress with life. And I am very interested in psychology and enjoy discussing this material, especially with those who insightful and have similar interests.

It seems this place has different things to offer different people. As in other areas in life, I keep the benefits and leave behind things that aren't helpful. I sought support in my first post and realized this wasn't a place where I will seek a certain type of support, but that doesn't mean it's not good for other things. We are the forum, so it is whatever we decide to make of it, a reflection of us.

My participation in these forums varies from day to day and I visit multiple forums. Some days it's constant and some days not at all when I need a break.

This seems to be one of the reasons I come here. I don't know who I can talk to in real life about this stuff.

I find these boards are very negative and do not represent the majority of therapy experience. I'm thankful I already had therapy experience before coming across PC psychotherapy boards, it would have kept me from getting my needed therapy.

This boards gave me hope that I could ask my therapists for a hug and a transitional object.

My first clinical psych was uncertain if hugs were appropriate so she took it to supervision and eventually allowed hugs though she said not to tell anyone. She also didn't do transitional objects (I asked if she would "charge up" one of my favourite, unique marbles...) because she felt it'd foster dependency. She was quite a strict CBT therapist. She later assessed I needed schema therapy and CBT was not suitable for the extent and chronic nature of my problems.

Later I was transferred to current T who does schema therapy, ACT and DBT. After reading here, I eventually dared to ask about hugs and after a discussion about why I felt I needed hugs (I felt "I'm too disgusting to touch"), I now hug T after each session. I also asked for outside contact after reading these boards and T and I decided I can message within stipulated limits and she won't reply.

I also worked up the courage to ask for a transitional object (a note from T) and have also been given small gifts from T like a humorous paper bag and (because I asked) a card with therapy things written on it by her.

I do go on here a lot since I'm an office worker and am on the Tapatalk app. I also don't have people offline to talk about attachment to therapists, and various therapy things so I find these boards helpful.

This gave me the eebie-jeebies.

It’s certainly great that you had a good experience with therapy.

That’s the only view that is popularized in the media or by the profession. I’ve not tried to file a complaint myself, although I have considered it, but people here have reported their experience with trying to file complaints, which is usually not a positive one, either. This forum does provide us a place to discuss our experiences. I believe the views and experiences expressed here should be taken into account, somehow and somewhere, by a profession that is licensed by our states and professes to have as its goal to “help” people. And I believe that consumers should have access to information about the potential for both the positive and the negative. There is plenty of the positive provided by the profession and by general attitudes in society.

For instance, doing a search on “how does psychotherapy work” I found the following from the American Psychological Association’s official website:

http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/unders...hotherapy.aspx

No mention of any potential negative effects. Yet, from my personal experience and what I have read from others with what seem to be similar experiences, many of us have ended up feeling more powerless, more damaged, more stigmatized, and more ineffective after therapy than before. We ended up with additional problems, while the ones we went to therapy with still remain. I believe that we need a place, somewhere, to try to recover our voices so that, maybe, eventually, we can lobby for the changes to the licensing, complaint, and informed consent practices that are needed to prevent or minimize bad experiences like we have had.

I don't find this board all that negative. I find it rather accurate portrays the challenges that therapists themselves refuse to tell clients about.

What you have said here makes a lot of sense and I agree that we can see from these boards there are a huge amount of negative therapy experiences out there and there are not acknowledged by the profession. It's clear that changes need to be made somewhere and peoples voices need to be heard.

From my own point of view, these boards have opened my eyes to many of the issues surrounding therapy. Yes, It's not always a beneficial or a positive experience for a lot of people which perhaps is what I had originally thought. It would also be nice to hear some positive experiences sometimes too. It would help give me hope, hope that things can get better which is sometimes hard to remember when reading these boards. I guess the fact that many people who have had bad experiences are still going to T shows that they too still want to hold onto this hope.

I think there may be hope for therapy to help many people here. And I think that there "should" be hope -- the profession "should" try to help people, that's what their public, social mandate is. Just like maybe anything, it goes wrong sometimes, they have very limited knowledge, the idea that psychotherapy at this point is "scientific" is, to me, nonsense. Pseudoscience, maybe, but not what I would call science, and calling it that, as the APA did, just misleads people in my view.

My hope is that the critiques and acknowledgement of failures sometimes may help, eventually, in generating improvements.

Anybody who has had a challenging therapy experience and found a way to make it work -- that would be interesting to hear about, too.

agreed...that has been my hope too, that by sharing some of my negative experiences or disappointments of therapy it will help those in the profession recognise that improvements can and do need to be made in this industry.

i also hope that by sharing my negative experiences that it helps others who may be doubting their own experiences of therapy or their therapist's competency. i want them to know that they are not alone and i hope it helps to empower them to either speak up and start having that conversation with their T or that it will help provide the courage to possibly move in a new and beneficial direction that their current therapy may be hindering.