Metacognitive therapy

Good deal. Hopefully it works for wolfsong too.

I thought I'd try to find some free web conferencing software we could use. If not we can just go through the slides together and discuss them.

Okee...Costello 8am Sat is good.My only concern is my stupid brain damage.I will be ashamed,and disappointed if I forget.

I think it's a wonderful idea to create a group among yourselves. If Skype won't work for you, I wonder if an online discussion format would?

Any suggestions? I think skype would be fine, except it would be nice if one person clicked through the slides while we all discussed them. If I can't find any web conferencing software, we can each look at the slides on our own computers and just move through them together and use skype to discuss.

I think the slide were meant to be used with groups of 6 or 8 people. It just seems like it would be more interesting and memorable if several people contribute to the discussion.

From your original link...

I love reading stuff like that.

costello: Any suggestions? I think skype would be fine, except it would be nice if one person clicked through the slides while we all discussed them. If I can't find any web conferencing software, we can each look at the slides on our own computers and just move through them together and use skype to discuss.

I think the best approach is to try what you have set up already -- using Skype to work through the material. For you, the critical thing is that you want your son to be able to take advantage of the opportunity so what he's most open to should be the guide.

Skype is not something I'm personally comfortable with but I'd certainly be interested to hear more about this approach and would likely contribute to some degree if there was an online discussion related to it. Perhaps you could do a bit of both -- Skype with a small group but also post a "lesson" or "focus" here so others could familiarize themselves with the process, contribute if they wanted to and perhaps learn some new approaches and coping skills for themselves. In turn, that input might help flesh out your Skype group's explorations.

I'm going to go read more about the approach. Thank you for sharing the information.

~ Namaste

That's a good idea. I think the key with this kind of thing - which is really more of a training than a therapy, I think - is to practice with it in daily life. To do that you have to remember it when you need it.

One thing that draws me to this approach is that I recognize my son in most of these cognitive errors. The research paper included at the website mentions that the faulty thinking persists even after the psychosis has passed. I can tell you that in my son's case the faulty thinking started long, long before he ever had any psychosis. I recognize some of this - jumping to conclusions, for example - from the when he was very young, 5 or 6 years old maybe. He would get one tiny fact about a situation, then he'd say, "Oh, I understand." And he'd build up a whole scenario around that one fact. I used to dread it when he'd start with "oh, I understand" because he'd be off on a tangent and I couldn't convince him to wait for more information.

Anyway we'll try it and see how it works.

I'm really sorry, but I'm going to be away most of this Saturday coming...

Should we wait until the next Saturday. wolfsong and I didn't do the first lesson last Saturday. We can wait to start later.

One thing I found out last Saturday is that my son was not up at 8 am. He didn't get up until 9:30. Maybe a different time? If we do 1 pm Saturday that would be 7 pm your time. (He's still sleeping like 11 to 12 hours a day. He's really being overdosed at his current dosage level. He's pretty eager to lower it again, but I want to go slow.)

The following Saturday would be better, and seven pm my time would be good, because the business of the day would be out of the way then.

Great. July 2 at 1 our time, 7 your time.

Okay... I've recorded that in my mobile phone, so it will ring me the day before to remind me, and an hour before to remind me. Which means I will be at my computer! Looking forward to meeting you then.

i hope it's good for wolfsong too.

Sounds good....if my brain damage allows me to remember...lol

I'd like to start this today with module 1A at 1 pm central standard time/7 pm London time. I have a skype account - costello.at.psychcentral.

My son and I just worked through the first lesson - on attributional style. When something good happens to you, do you tend to blame yourself, others, or circumstances? When something bad happens to you, do you tend to blame yourself, others, or circumstances?

According to the module, people in psychosis tend to blame other people for negative events. They also tend to come up with very simplistic reasons for complex events and to feel that they have little control over these events.

The exercises have you work through a number of positive and negative events and try to think of explanations for those events that attribute blame/credit to yourself, to others, and to circumstances or chance. Often one event has numerous causes. For example, if you win an award for playing the piano you would attribute it to yourself for your hard work, to others (parents and teachers) for supporting and helping you, and to circumstances (your natural talent).

There were a few slides about hearing voices and thought insertion. They gave factual information about these experiences and helped challenge the idea that voices and thoughts are coming from outside oneself.

I thought the module was useful. My son thought the answers were obvious.

This was one of the shorter modules, I think, and it took about 40 minutes for just my son and me to work through.

Could you send a link to the module? I know i missed it this Saturday past, but I'll try and catch up to you guys. I know I need some kind of help other than what the medical community is offering. According to the pnurse I've been showing "negative signs of schizophrenia..." I thought I was normal, but my normal is pretty abnormal right now. I want to work through this, not just suffer through the cycle again.

All those problems seem to me very familiar.

This is the module we worked through: http://www.uke.de/kliniken/psychiatr...e)_english.pdf

Ultimately its success will depend on using it in daily life.

Yesterday my son was at my office. We bought a need cell phone for him on my lunch break. On the way home he realized he'd forgotten the charger in my office. He was getting increasingly distressed. Finally he said mournfully, "I have no one to blame but myself." I pointed out to him that this keyed into the module on attributional style. In the past he would have blamed me. He would have found a way to make it my fault. He would have said I should have reminded him to grab his charger, or I rushed him and caused him to forget it. So that was a good application.

Then yesterday evening he was upset because his friend hadn't texted him back. He texted his friend with his new phone. The friend didn't recognize the number so he texted back to ask who it was. My son said who it was and explained he had a new number. His friend never responded. That, of course, hurt my son's feelings. It seems that last time he saw this friend he told him that he hears voices. Now he's wishing he hadn't. So when the friend didn't text him back, he decided it was because he'd told him about the voices. So my son starts listing other reasons why his friend might have ignored him. Finally he announced, "I don't feel any better."

I think he missed the point of the module.

This NAC my son is taking is said to be particularly helpful with negative symptoms.

I hope you don't have to suffer through the cycle again.

Thank you... I'm working through the module, will share my feelings here if I may?

It is technically feasable that thoughts are being inserted, either as a result of government or psychopharmacological intervention, or as a result of some sort of demonic input. I'm not saying it's likely... just that it's possible.

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It's a very helpful module, apart from that one page which I printed out above, sorry if the typeset was a bit odd. I do recognise a tendency to be suspicious of other people's motives, though less so now than of late. I do still think that there are powers that be who are behind a lot of the processes we observe, governments, political movements, etc. For example, if voting worked, they'd not allow us to vote. Newspapers don't relate the actual news, they simply report on what "they" allow us to know. And I really do believe that people are being snooped on and bugged far more than they're aware. I thought this long before the news of the world debacle... and I know that I've been bugged in the past. I don't think I'm being bugged now, since I'm no longer interesting... but as to why they'd go to the effort, yes, I know it's expensive etc... but they're not exactly poor. And if they're going to be testing on subjects, why not test on a human population? there's only so much that testing on rats and donkeys and spiders can tell you.

Thanks for your feedback. It's very useful to me. My son also tends to be suspicious.

I'm sure that powerful people do what they can to sway things in their favor. I guess I can't see it as being any kind of major plot. And I don't think I'm interesting enough for anyone to want to watch me.

I ask my son why he thinks people are watching him. He says it's because he's so great everyone wants to be like him. In reality I can't imagine anyone wanting to imitate him or trade places with him.

People are sometimes snooped on and bugged. I doubt if it happens a lot or often. I doubt that I've ever been bugged. If anyone has snooped on me, it's someone who knows me who's curious or whatever. I doubt any serious bad intent.

I guess it just comes down to what you believe. It must be very difficult to believe that people are monitoring you or experimenting on you.

My son and I will be working through the second module tomorrow at 1 pm our time - 7 pm London.

I don't think that people are snooping on me because I'm so marvellous... though I might have thought that when I was younger, I thought I was far more important back then. But I do think that innocuous people are snooped on, and never get to know it. I may not be one of those innocuous people, I might well have hallucinated the whole thing. I could be so much duller than dull that nobody gives a monkey's what I talk about, etc. I accept that as a possibility (and I'd far sooner believe that than the other.)
Having said which, I really do think snooping is far more common than people realise. At one point every single conversation between Ireland and Mainland Britain was being monitored by the British government, which meant I couldn't talk to my Grandmother without the conversation being recorded, transcripted, and shoved in a file somewhere. This was in the era of Margaret Thatcher, before computers were anything like as sophisticated as they are now. Who knows how far they are now?
Not only that, but I know that software easily available to private citizens is being used in various ways... I could go out and buy a comprehensive system to bug my neighbours (if I wanted to) for less than four hundred pounds.
And now I have to add that this is bothering me far more than a month ago. Which does coincide with my med changes. So I accept that is a potential problem.

Sounds like it could be helpful, but I usually stick with CBT, just because that's what my doctor does.

If hackers can hack into your mobile phone, to listen to your calls and use the camera to see things, the government will be doing this all the time, to the people they are watching. I should probably be more careful about that.

I think MCT is a form of CBT. At least they're in the same family. The idea is to look at your habitual ways of thinking and see how they contribute your problems. Then try to change the thinking. I like CBT. I also like DBT which is a form of CBT.

Some people hate CBT, though. They just don't find it helpful. I'm all about exposing my son (and myself) to a variety of therapies. He's going to have to decide for himself what's useful and what's not.