Oh my...I've been a bad little blogger, haven't I? I think this might be the longest I've ever gone without a new post, and I'm truly sorry for that. But lest you think it is you I've been ignoring, my dear readers, please know that my lack of writing in ANY form has gotten so bad that my therapist and I have devised a plan in which I set my cell phone alarm to go off at 3 p.m. everyday, at which point I set a timer and drop everything, forcing myself to write for thirty minutes. Thirty minutes! I have forty eight sets of those everyday, and I have to literally force myself to use up just ONE of those sets!
In any event, I'm happy that I'm at least able to write once I sit down and super glue my fingers to the keyboard. The words flow, I adore doing it, and some really great prose comes out of this stubborn brain of mine. Slowly but surely, I guess.
As for the aforementioned therapy, which I've written about here and here...well my goodness, it's going so well! I feel as though I'm actually making progress, instead of just sitting in a small room, droning on and on about my childhood to someone who couldn't care less, which is the norm, I've found. Progress towards what, I'm not exactly sure yet...a better outlook on life? an understanding of why I get sad and stressed out, and a better way to cope with those feelings?
My therapist is very analytical, and I enjoy discussing the reasons behind my feelings and actions with her. It's as though a light bulb will go off in my head and I'll laugh out loud at myself at so easily falling into obvious patterns, once she explains them to me. One thing she mentioned that I found quite intriguing, which she brought up after a particularly bad week I had, was how easily we revert back to our childhood emotions when things don't go as planned.
I consider myself a mature person, emotionally reasonable and with an intellectually sound mind, but how did I deal with rejections when I was a child? What were my first thoughts when I couldn't master something (math was a big one) or a plan I had made failed miserably? I beat myself up about it, that's what. I blamed every failed attempt and every misstep on myself, and took it as evidence that I sucked as a person. So when setbacks occur now, although I have become a confident adult, I haven't yet learned a new way of perceiving those setbacks, and regress back to my old negative and self loathing patterns.
I dunno, it may sound a little new agey, but I thought it might be helpful to any of you who have the same thought patterns as myself. It's really a great way to look at therapy, too, for those of you who have never experienced it and are afraid to try it: it's just a means of maturing your reactions to those inevitable ups and downs we experience in our lives. It's learning a new way of interpreting your reactions, and calling yourself out on your own bullshit, self critical explanations for why things go wrong. It's working for me, 100%.
How about you? Have you ever been to a therapist? What was your experience like?
6 comments:
I needed this information--thank you. :)
I went to a therapist once when I was...I guess I'd have been 13? My mom had this boyfriend at the time who, it turned out, was a methhead, and he finally cracked (pun intended?) and locked himself in our house with our dog. He taped up all the windows and like, did not leave the house at all. I don't know all the details of it and who would want to, anyway. Long story short, my grandpa and the police kicked his ass out of the house and he went to jail and my mom got a restraining order and changed our phone number.
It was my stepmom who insisted my younger sister and I see a therapist about it. So I went to see a therapist about it, once, but I didn't really have much to say. To be honest, it didn't really affect me at all. It was around Christmas, so we went to live with my grandparents (who only lived 20 minutes away) for a couple weeks, and we had Christmas morning there.
So yeah, my only experience with therapy is totally neutral. I just didn't need it.
Oh, unfortunately we had to put that dog down, but not because he drove it crazy by locking it in the house with its shit or whatever. She got parvo when she was a couple years old and it resulted in some brain damage which made her really mean and unreliable.
My mom told us she went to "live on a farm."
I went for the better part of four years, and it honestly was one of the better things to happen to me. It's been several years since I last went, and I sometimes think I could go for another round, if only for someone to talk to because there are just some things I don't feel like discussing with my friends, you know?
i've had many bad therapists and exactly one good therapist. but my favorite story is when i moved across the country and my mom and i were hating each other we went to mother daughter therapy. but we quickly began to hate the therapist more and ganged up against. it dramatically helped our relationship :)
Georgia,
I <3 your blog. It's refreshing to know there are other people out there that share the same loves of life as I do (food, cooking, reading, friends), while dealing with very similar personal issues. I recently moved to LA and I felt like a total stranger out here, so it's been really nice reading your writings.
Post a Comment