The Drama Triangle & Just Drama

Some background. I was in therapy for 26 yrs which included meds etc. I walked away from it all 4 yrs ago.
My SO & I are back in T. This is our 4th time trying & we feel comfortable with this T.

Last wk T brought up the drama triangle bec of a conversation we were trying to have. I was playing victim. Now I do remember using & learning about this triangle when I was in an all women’s support group discussing abuse. So I was a bit rusty in its application.

But looking at the conversation SO & I were having, I was playing victim, hoping he’d see how I felt. ((So to me I was voicing my opinion using “I” statements to explain how I felt, not accusing))
T asked us if we do this a lot & I said no. I feel that for the past 10 yrs I’ve grown out of the “victim” role & stopped looking for SO to rescue me so I feel more independent.

Sidenote: one T taught us how to speak to each other using I statements & saying how we feel.

Last wk in T I was trying to articulate that my SO uses a form of gaslighting with me bec his answer to most discussions we have is “I didn’t say that....I don’t remember saying that....you heard wrong.” This wasn’t really discussed.
(How to discuss gaslighting with a SO was a theory I’d discussed with a former T on my own)

I told T I use IFS therapy daily! It’s my go to way of comprehending my life, feelings, emotions, everything. Apparently it’s difficult (?) to do in T with couples.
(The mention of IFS therapy led to a short discussion of dissociation which I didn’t wanto discuss or found relevant)

Then T told me to look over the book The Dance of Anger, which I probably did 12-15 yrs ago bec I have very bad anger issues!!!


So what I’m trying to say here is...I’ve been in T for a hell of a long time. I’ve read books & studied theories & every T has their own go to methods & it seems the longer in therapy the more I’m asked to construct the “Ultimate Soup!”
You just throw something else on top of the base of your soup, add another theory, try this, apply this, look at this, now add that & that & that etc
So my job is to sieve the dam soup & make my own “flavor” of it, but add their “twist” to it bec it’s what’s missing. There’s always something missing. Obviously. That’s why there’s therapy.

Well guess what?? The next T will say...but you forgot to add this! And that’s when they add another dam ingredient to the mix for you to stir, simmer & sieve.
(I love analogies obviously)

Does anyone else feel like this has become one ginormous game of catch 22 that you’re NEVER going to win?
And in my opinion the current that runs underneath it all? Money! Bec I know as a person with MH issues I’d spend the money trying/dying to feel better.

Example: our T will bank more billable hrs if we decide to “really work” on our marriage & our issues. If I call it quits we might have a couple more sessions & there’s not much more the T can do.

I think this is why Melania Trump never says anything, but avoids holding trumps hand. Its HIS way or the highway. I get the feeling your h is (and many many others are) the same way. Society and religion and government etc support it.

Eta - the way out is kinda like in the old movies - you step out of your old role and place in society. Its a huge step.

Eta - at least, this is the way it feels with me and my family. Im the outcast, everybody else is married with children.

I don't know if the reason they always find some other thing that you could do better is because of money. I think it's more likely they want to feel like they are helping/contributing to your self-improvement / feeling better / stronger marriage or whatever. After all they'd probably make more money if you stayed sick and in therapy forever.

Mostly though there is a real limitation to what therapy can do. A therapist can teach you new communication techniques, but if one or both people in couple's therapy don't want to improve their communication then there isn't much more that a therapist can do.

I really liked the Dance of Anger by the way. It gave me a new way of looking at my anger and I have decreased it quite a bit simply by understanding the feelings underneath the anger.

Yes. I got out about a year and a half ago.

I had been looking for the current that ran underneath all of my "issues" -- feeling bad, split, "possessed", depressed whatever have you.

And maybe with all my experiences with therapy, some really horrible, I have found much of that undercurrent -- some "victim" mentality for sure in there, lots of other stuff, too, but what I'm left with is a life I still don't know how to live well, and not much time left.

I'm not sure if this would be useful at all or if what I'm thinking even matches what you're really going through, but I hear your frustration. In life I kind of am the person who wants to get everything right and do everything by the textbook, and I tend to really overthink things, or I worry too much about trying to apply everything I've learned perfectly when really the best way to do it is to let events happen and then try some of the different skills and see which one fits best and kind of more learn through life experience. However if you're dealing with someone who's gaslighting you even the best Experts of relationship struggle with that one because it's so toxic and it's just incredibly difficult to have a decent relationship with someone who's doing that.

I was thinking about the money vs caring aspect of t the other day when I recalled something a "case manager" said to me years ago. Basically, they are going to get paid regardless of who they work with. If it is not you, it will be someone else. You (and me and everyone else) can choose how far you want to go on this path. For the t, they probably have a cancellation list of folks who would take an appt if one opened up.

Maybe learning about ourselves and managing our MH is like learning about any other subject. If algebra is all the mathematics I ever wanted to learn I could stop at high school math. If I want to learn about calculus, real analysis and abstract algebra, I'd be an undergraduate math majors. If I want to specialize in statistics, I'd go on to get my doctorate degree.

(hope i am making sense and not making things worse)

Outwardly I would not point to money as the goal. But it does lie underneath it all if one really looks.
We’ve told this T he’s our 4th T we’ve worked with. We’ve also been to a few other T like an initial appt to get a feel for them.
So we’re not brand new to T & our marriage is 24 yo.
Each T gave us something to focus on. One said using “I” statements, then repeating back what we just heard to our SO so words don’t get twisted & we actively listen.
One T used the Gotham?? method.....
It just seems like each T sees something we haven’t tried & that maybe this new thing will help.
I know there’s no magic answer.....bec they all have their own answers.

I can understand your first part of the post & in the beginning of my marriage I worked hard to do things right & things had to be just so which is a hard habit to get out of. But I can’t just let events happen anymore bec of my age. I’m missing out on my life to make sure everyone else’s life is running smoothly. I’m tired of holding my breath.

Afa gaslighting I’ve used this word at least a half dozen times with my SO to explain how I feel & what it does. His responses to me r always the same as I stated above. He won’t even google the term to figure out the definition! He thinks it’s a made up word.

Exactly. Brilliant. Yes. Not due, in my case, to therapy — much bigger fish &etc., — the remnant of malfunctions and I’m stuck between stupid and sick, again. I once had ‘hope’ (most insidious!) a long, long time back, an active participant in maintaining a status quo, but I lost it (hope, participation) when I realized that my larger problems were organic and that it was this (be here now!) or a bit of brain slice-n-dice and I wasn’t up for that.

Dr. A---- -------- — a jewel — told me that I might not find solace in the daily output of my hypergraphia if I insisted on having written well. I find that I cannot, after all, write, or live, well: I’m too fragile for that and time is much, much too fleeting.

So, I’m like you; no one to save me, no one to love me, unable to live well as my time here grows shorter. Maybe it’s an either/or conundrum? I’m too tired to think it through.

By the force of will I’ve avoided victimhood, preferring to be thought mad rather than mean. And so I have been. Has it mattered? I don’t know.

Oh, the things that I don’t know!


***redefine happiness***

Organic. Yes. I can understand that well.

Can you? Do you know of any specific organic realities that cause your mental disorders? I do. I think that those interested in psychiatry now should move to M.D./Neuroscience/Neurosurgery research and clinical meds as well. I’m re-reading one of my famous doctor’s books (odd but her name was removed — but she’s famous; to me, she’s famous... her book is called The Midnight Disease. It tries to shape hypergraphia/writing well/editing/writer’s block, &etc).

But organic is the whole ‘us’/we/I/ego and I read of Saudi Arabian’s travelling to Texas to have a stent and ICD implant and I think ‘golly, you mean those are serious procedures?’ I go through the Drive-a-Stent for my cardiac stents and I was completely awake when my ICD was upgraded.

But brain organic! In the midst of the gray and white matter are different regions of the brain that satisfy and — oh, not so much as punished — keeps us in check.

I am making a commitment: neurology will have replaced psychiatric treatment in 100 years.

Because it is all organic, I think.


****************

Organic to me, in my own life, means that my MH issues will not be solved by meds. After 26yrs of med combinations & concoctions I’ve realized meds are not the answer.
Organic to me, means my current environment. What I’ve surrounded myself with all my life. Now I see large portions of it as toxic. So I’ve cleaned myself of meds so I can focus on the present & actually “see” things better. Not thru a haze.