[Under*Over]

The last 6 months of my therapy has seemed like a total waste of time. The current office I am dealing with is super frustrating, overrun with problems, and the only reason I am staying there is because I have a psychiatrist there that I like.

I have been seeing a therapist there and while she is nice and all I just dont feel that it is working out.

First of all, she is always late. Like every time. And not a little late, like 10 minutes plus late each time.

Thats just one small annoying thing. The other bigger thing is that I feel like therapy is going no where. All we ever do is talk about basically nothing. Shell ask me about my week and Ill tell her about my week. And then thats it. The sessions feel so one sided that I feel like I could get more out of just using a journal. She offers little to no insight. She just sort of agrees with whatever I say. “Sympathizes” I guess. IDK even how to describe it beyond I feel like I am spending 100s of dollars to talk to the wall most of the time. When she does offer an insight it is usually either totally obvious or completely wrong. Like Ill talk about say... trying to think of an example not specific to me... say I said I was having stomach pains lately. Shed say something like “sounds like your stomach pain has been bothering you lately”. And its like... well. No DUH. I just said that. Or on the other hand shell say something like- “have you considered that maybe your stomach pain is because you have been not eating enough carrots”. IDK. I cant even come up with equivalent examples for how off the wall wrong some of her (super rare in the six months since Ive seen her) insights shes given me.

So I have an appointment scheduled at the place with a new therapist for next week. Its the last one I am going to schedule there for a while if this one doesnt work out because their therapists so far have been pretty bad.

So I just thought Id ask you guys. Have you ever had something like this... like... therapy where you felt it was going nowhere?

[stopdog]

Yes - that sounds quite familiar. I even asked the one I hired what was supposed to be happening and she said she did not know, or nothing, or trust process. It was useless and frustrating.

[Lemoncake]

Originally Posted by Under*Over

The last 6 months of my therapy has seemed like a total waste of time. The current office I am dealing with is super frustrating, overrun with problems, and the only reason I am staying there is because I have a psychiatrist there that I like.

I have been seeing a therapist there and while she is nice and all I just dont feel that it is working out.

First of all, she is always late. Like every time. And not a little late, like 10 minutes plus late each time.

Thats just one small annoying thing. The other bigger thing is that I feel like therapy is going no where. All we ever do is talk about basically nothing. Shell ask me about my week and Ill tell her about my week. And then thats it. The sessions feel so one sided that I feel like I could get more out of just using a journal. She offers little to no insight. She just sort of agrees with whatever I say. “Sympathizes” I guess. IDK even how to describe it beyond I feel like I am spending 100s of dollars to talk to the wall most of the time. When she does offer an insight it is usually either totally obvious or completely wrong. Like Ill talk about say... trying to think of an example not specific to me... say I said I was having stomach pains lately. Shed say something like “sounds like your stomach pain has been bothering you lately”. And its like... well. No DUH. I just said that. Or on the other hand shell say something like- “have you considered that maybe your stomach pain is because you have been not eating enough carrots”. IDK. I cant even come up with equivalent examples for how off the wall wrong some of her (super rare in the six months since Ive seen her) insights shes given me.

So I have an appointment scheduled at the place with a new therapist for next week. Its the last one I am going to schedule there for a while if this one doesnt work out because their therapists so far have been pretty bad.

So I just thought Id ask you guys. Have you ever had something like this... like... therapy where you felt it was going nowhere?

I would trust your gut feeling. If you feel like it's a dead end you're allowed to leave and find someone better.One T I only lasted one intro session with.

[ElectricManatee]

I think "How was your week?" is one of the worst therapist opening lines. Sometimes my week -- good or bad -- has nothing to do with what I want to talk about in therapy. I don't pay for small talk; I can get it in the supermarket check-out line for free. I have had one or two initial sessions that felt like this, and I didn't go back. I am okay with some chatting or rapport-building occasionally, especially if I initiate it, but in general, I'm there to get to work.

[nottrustin]

Have you talked to your therapist about it? I am really learning that unless we tell our Ts what we need from them they don't always know.

Long term T always started my appointment with how are you or how was your week. Sometimes it lead to small talk, other times the small talk led to much more. and other times I just dove in and said X is really bothering me. That's when we skipped small talk.

[Salmon77]

I think it's a good thing you're trying a different therapist--this one may not be a good fit for you. Her being constantly late would really bother me, it would feel like she's unprofessional and unreliable and not respecting the client's time. I'd start every session angry with her and it wouldn't go well.

That said, it sounds like maybe you could take a bit more control over the conversation than you're doing, maybe? When she asks you about your week, you don't have to go over everything that happened if you don't want, you can just pick the one thing that seems most important to you. When she reflects back at you with something you just said, tell her it's not helpful to you. Maybe something to think about when you meet the new one.

[Omers]

Yes. 1st T was 4 years of nowhere. 3rd T was a waste of air. I would talk about trauma and her reply would be “but you are happy now because you’re away at college!”. 6th T was that way too and I saw her for 3 years. I wish someone had told me what it should have looked like and not to settle.