I must have had around six courses of talking therapies (mostly cbt). But without exemption after 2 sessions the therapist says it is doing more harm than good and they stop it.
These experiences have kinda left me with a jaded view of psychotherapy. But I wonder - am I just damaged goods?
Sounds like you’ve had some crappy therapists. I’ve had some crappy therapists, too.
That’s weird. Some people don’t get anything out of therapy, maybe you’re one of those people.
Not damaged, special 
Suppose therapists must have to sign a Hippocratic oath - first do no harm.
My therapist told me he couldn’t help me if I’m in a psychotic break, and if it comes to that that we’ll take a break on the therapy. Maybe that was the case?
On each occasion I have got the feeling that they couldn’t wait to sign me off their books. I have some really deep seated, fixed ideas/thoughts that just cause too much pain to explore.
Also I think in the NHS a lot of therapists just want an easy ride.
I haven’t had issues with talking therapies, but I’ve been doing self-guided mindfulness therapy. My therapist is a little guarded about me doing it, she thinks I am overly mindful as it is, that I use it as a tool to judge and beat up on myself. She’s given me the okay to continue, but she’s keeping an eye on it and told me she may tell me to stop.
It’s definitely not easy to treat a person with sz man, we gotta give them that. We have deep sitted beliefs and no amount of therapy can help with those, CBT is for coping mechanisms of every day life, how to look at things, more profound than that even Freud gave up.
Good point. If I had to estimate in the uk 95% of an NHS therapists clients have depression or anxiety. Their training seems to be concentrated on this. Suppose sz seems a bit too much for them.
Maybe try again now that you’re better?
Will have to think about that. Like I say speaking about my problems can be a bit too hard. To be honest I get much better support on this site than I ever did in therapy.
Yeah, but we’re not therapists I get that too sometimes, but honestly some things my therapist says are too precious. As are somethings people say here
The facility I am visiting now provides therapy and psychiatry at the same time. They specialize in anxiety, depression and substance abuse. When I was doing the intake info over the phone, I was able to get in without outright lying. They asked me what I was going to be going there for. I said it was several things. She asked, “Do you have anxiety? Or depression?” I answered, “That’s part of it.”
Then I saw the therapist two times, and the second time she wrote me a referral to the psychiatrist. She also said she wouldn’t be there the next week. I said that was fine. Then she scheduled me three weeks out. When I called to get the psychiatrist appointment set up, the earliest they had available was 2 weeks out. And I realized my therapist set it up so that she wouldn’t see me again until after I’d been to the psychiatrist.
But it’s the best I can do. There are no therapists who list things like “residual schizophrenia” under what they specialize in. I don’t think any therapists (at least not around here) are really trained to handle anything beyond depression, anxiety and mild dysfunctions. You might find the occasional needle in the haystack who is bold enough to take on something like specializing in BPD, but that’s about as far as it goes. And psychiatrists don’t have time to also play therapist here, as there is a shortage of pdocs so they give everyone just 15 minutes and are still overflowing with patients.
I think almost the only way it works is to tackle psychosis like symptoms, and then go to therapy. You also need a therapist who actually has a passion for understanding and helping people, which can be hard to find ironically and sadly. But I think the way it’s usually set up is stupid then because if you only get 15 mins with a pdoc and you have any issues communicating at all, your pdoc is basically just stabbing around in the dark. If your therapist also cooperates with your pdoc, then they can vouch for you and help with communication and everything.
That is why I weaseled my way into this facility for therapy, despite it being focused on anxiety/depression and substance abuse. I want a therapist and pdoc working together.
cognitive behavior therapy with someone who’s actively psychotic would be a mess. maybe you need to stick with a therapist and give him/her a chance to find something that works.
Psychotherapy can be very dangerous, especially to someone who is prone to psychosis. The whole point of it is for you to delve into stuff that really upsets you to help process it. If you can get through it and move at a slow pace it is helpful.
Psychotherapy has been incredibly difficult for me and has thrown me into depressed episodes twice now, as well as increased my rate of flashbacks. BUT I am expressing emotions now for the first time in my life. I am reaching out to people in my life who aren’t online for the first time ever. I feel I have learned so much about myself and that I am finally healing. Purging all the bad stuff is just nasty.
CBT was excellent for me when it came to learning how to manage my anxiety but unless you take psychosis-specified CBT (which is only offered by select specialists in the country), it’s going to do almost jack-squat to help w psychotic disorders and the original form of CBT was not designed to treat them. The psychotherapy doesn’t really work at managing symptoms for the psychosis either but it is helping me process emotions, face trauma, raise self-awareness and see how my past affected who I am. I’ve never taken any other types of therapies so I can’t talk about any others. I think it’s bad to give up on therapy after trying only one type though, because someone may not benefit at all from one type but another may change their life.
My last therapist was the worst, and now I’m without therapy. During one talk, I shared something and this was his response after a few minutes of really awkward silence, “I, uh, wow. In all my years of working with hundreds, maybe thousands, of people, I’ve never heard that before”. Wow, thanks…I feel way better now. I never went back. What a complete dolt. I’m still angry.
My psychiatrist and GP thought it would be a good idea for me to see a psychologist to help with day to day anxiety. So I went along for my first visit and this was straight up about what I needed help with very specifically. He wanted me to write my life story for him. I told him I had led an unremarkable life free from trauma, he still wanted me to do it.
I never wrote it and never went back. That would have been a good way for me to waste a lot of money fast.
It sounds very weird; from my experience, my psychiatrist is my psychotherapist; I have 19 years with him; he is very empathetic, assertive, comprehensive and he has much patience with me, because I have difficult to learn the things that he teach me.
I hope that you find it because, from my experience, he has been very useful.
Tolteca.
The prognosis for psychotherapy is better for some than others. When I was in psychotherapy it didn’t seem to help much. Maybe if you found the right psychotherapist it would work, if you could afford it.