I do, AND I don’t feel comfortable sharing this part of my life with him
Can maybe you seek out another therapist, Maybe a female if you would feel more comfortable? Just thinking out loud here, but I think if I had a PMO addiction I wouldn’t be comfortable disclosing to a therapist of the opposite sex,
In my experience with therapy having a therapist your comfortable with. Is paramount,
I’d volunteer Olivia as a close friend she’s a plethora of info, but I don’t know how well she’d handle it or her schedule
That’s basically what this forum is about.
If you want to share, feel free to do so. We’re listening.
As for triggering others, just add TW in the topic title and all will be aware of your trigger warning.
This might indeed be personal, somehow it was empowering for me to share it with a female therapist. But I totally understand that it can be uncomfortable.
My therapist is…. Um…… unique to say the least lol and it comes with some traumatic things as well which is why i dont feel comfortable sharing with a male therapist
If there’s a therapist and you’re not comfortable sharing what you’re thinking about / what you’re stuck on, it might be time to find a new therapist. It’s nothing personal and it’s not good or bad, it’s just, this project needs to work, and the pieces we have here are not the right pieces to get the project moving.
It’s like filling up your car with orange juice. Cars and orange juice are both useful things on their own, but they don’t belong together; they don’t work together to move forward.
Ive talked to him about changing therapist and he said “get through DBT and then we can change you over.” And i said okay because i only have about 4 or 5 months of DBT left….
Absolutely, you’re right, it really comes down to each person’s preference. It’s not better or worse, it’s just finding a space that works for you
Scroll down to slide 25 in this deck, where it says:
Why DBT? “To learn and refine skills in changing behavioral, emotional, and thinking patterns associated with problems in living that are causing misery and distress.” (Linehan, 1993)
Dialectical: the tension between two opposites, e.g., acceptance and change • Behavior: DBT teaches people skills they need and may not have, to help them live more effectively • Therapy: Treatment is both individual, with a DBT-trained therapist, and group, in a weekly skills class. The ability of both individual and group therapists to combine warmth, nurturing, and validation with absolute insistence upon learning and applying the skills so that the patient’s treatment goals can be met, cannot be overstated
If you can’t share your unfiltered experience in therapy, then DBT is not really happening. There’s no actual truth happening, no actual validation. It’s just a sham, a dramatic production where you (AuraXP) are playing a role - the role of “I am the patient you want to treat” - and the therapist, your audience, oblivious of the sham, is going through the motions of therapy.
If DBT is not actually happening, why bother finishing it? Unless he’s just keeping it going so he can bill your insurance company.
Damn that’s spot on. Have a lot of experience were it didn’t work. Among others in a rehab, my girlfriend suggested to keep going for structure etc. But my intuition told me this is not gonna work. Especially when the therapist read in a book looked up and started talking to the group. Looking back it might me funny, but it isn’t at all. After that I relapsed which nearly ended fatal.
They didn’t acted to my relaps as well, just you can’t come to the aftercare group if you drank. No other action whatsoever, disgusting. Indeed just a production street for billing.
Be VERY careful with advising people to stop a therapy Matt. Or maybe better, don’t do so at all.
@AuraXP finish it, it may not be 100% succesful but stopping it based on a 25 page paper may do more harm than good.
After those few months, go for that change.
What’s nice about having “regular” status is you have the option to share in the “lounge” and not have it exposed to everyone on the internet. I’ve done this recently and knowing my post is only being read by a limited number of people helps me to discuss my life openly. All you have to do is create your topic and choose lounge in the category drop down. The only downfall is that you won’t have access to it if you lose regular status. But it can always be moved to the main forum by contacting the moderators. Or it can just stay in the lounge forever.
Robin explains it here.
I missed a lot during my nap lol its not so much that DBT isnt working for me, i just dont want to share this part of my life in the group, or with my individual therapist because hes a piece of work to say the least
That"s fine. Not all aspects of our lives fit into one single therapy.
4-5 months of suffering? Days seem like years to an addict. Another therapist can help with this, plus the stuff your current therapist is working on…seems to me a clear example of addition through subtraction. But I am me, and you are you. Your mileage may vary.
This does not sound like you trust him at all. You gotta trust your instincts on this and I’m glad you’re doing that.
If the confidential and warm therapist patient relationship is not there, therapeutic benefit and progress are compromised as is.
I hope you find someone better suited to you in the future. You deserve it!
I love this metaphor! I’ll be stealing it
One of my therapists, as I was coming to her nervously about asking how to get a different therapist, told me it was totally normal and natural to look for someone else. “A therapist is like a pair of shoes. If they don’t fit right, you’ll get sore feet or blisters. Find the one or two that fit you and work them in patiently until they’ll take you to the end of your journey.”
I thought that was such a good look - despite that she was losing a client.
Best of luck to you - I had a really hard time getting to the point where I could open up all the way. You’ll find the best way to get your story out there and off your chest.
Best,
Nate