gooblax
MVP
Looks like I made it a week before reminding myself that I don't really deserve help.
- Thread starter gooblax
- Start date
Great that it was a whole week.
I suspect part of you feels one way and another part of the "committee of the mind" feels another way -- often at the same time. That is what happens with me. In general, most people can't easily handle the discomfort of such cognitive dissonance, which is a "super power" you are getting better at:
I suspect part of you feels one way and another part of the "committee of the mind" feels another way -- often at the same time. That is what happens with me. In general, most people can't easily handle the discomfort of such cognitive dissonance, which is a "super power" you are getting better at:
Coping with the nuances of contradictory ideas or experiences is mentally stressful. It requires energy and effort to sit with those seemingly opposite things that all seem true. Festinger argued that some people would inevitably resolve dissonance by blindly believing whatever they wanted to believe.
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gooblax
MVP
Yeah that's probably true. Eg. wanting to be perceived as strong/tough, while also wanting things that are the opposite of being strong/tough, when the reality is that I can't have either.
"These mountains that you are carrying, you were only supposed to climb." – Najwa Zebian
"Not everything that weighs you down is yours to carry." ~ Anonymous
David Baxter PhD
Late Founder
^^^ what @Daniel said.
gooblax
MVP
I'm not really sure that I understand.
For me, it's often hard to let go of things due to hyper-responsibility rather than just anxiety per se. In any case, if one doesn't have enough boundaries, limits, self-acceptance, etc, it's a recipe for chronic unhappiness.
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A reminder:
9 Signs of Childhood Emotional Neglect
Childhood emotional neglect may not leave scars, but it does real harm to children and to the adults they become.www.psychologytoday.com
You deserve to have your needs met just like anyone else does...A good therapist can help you identify your emotions, ask for what you need, learn to trust others, build self-esteem, handle rejection, build self-love, and more.
But...if your feeling that you "don't really deserve help" is more like OCD, then no amount of reassurance may help. In any case, sometimes a less direct approach, e.g. metacognitive, may be more helpful:
And to circle back to hyper-responsibility:
Being too harsh on yourself could lead to OCD and anxiety
A new study has found that people who reported intense feelings of responsibility were susceptible to developing Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) or Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD).www.sciencedaily.com
"[A] very quick or easy way is to realize that responsibility is working behind your worry. I ask [patients] "Why are you worried so much?" so they will answer "I can't help but worry" but they will not spontaneously think "Because I feel responsibility" ... just realizing it will make some space between responsibility thinking and your behavior."
gooblax
MVP
Yeah I don't think it's an OCD-like thought. I'd basically temporarily forgotten about it until reading it again quoted in the post, and then was quite easily able to put it out of mind again once I'd stopped re-upsetting myself about it. So IMO the thought has 'recurringness' but not the 'stickiness' that is my understanding of OCD.
The thing that is most upsetting is when I allow myself to believe that it's ok to think that maybe how I actually feel is important, but then it gets proven otherwise. So I don't know that I want to test that theory again.
I've been thinking about talking to my psych about something emotional related to the 'learning to drive' topic but dunno what outcome I'd like out of the discussion, so I think I'll just put that statement to him and see what happens from there.
Also if he sends the receipt today it will have been 3 weeks. Luckily I don't need the receipt other than for my own records, but I'm sure it would be annoying for others.
The thing that is most upsetting is when I allow myself to believe that it's ok to think that maybe how I actually feel is important, but then it gets proven otherwise. So I don't know that I want to test that theory again.
I've been thinking about talking to my psych about something emotional related to the 'learning to drive' topic but dunno what outcome I'd like out of the discussion, so I think I'll just put that statement to him and see what happens from there.
Also if he sends the receipt today it will have been 3 weeks. Luckily I don't need the receipt other than for my own records, but I'm sure it would be annoying for others.
Can you give an example of what triggers such disappointment/disillusionment? In other words, how does your (temporary) belief ("how I actually feel is important") become proven otherwise?
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gooblax
MVP
The most obvious example is:
- psych said that if I was upset about something from a session, he'd prefer me to ask for a phone call so we could resolve it rather than me just trying to handle it for the 3 weeks til the next session
- I confirmed with him that he really meant I could do that
- the 2nd time I did it (asking for either a call or an earlier session), he had his own issue which resulted in ignoring my email for 2 weeks until I finally lost it and texted to find out wtf was going on.
(Result to avoid having this occur again - no emails/contact unless it's 100% necessary for logistics.)
Or alternatively something like:
- I emailed some homework but said I wasn't sure if I was comfortable to discuss it.
- He decided to discuss it without finding anything out about why I was uncomfortable, I went along with it but got upset about it.
(Result to avoid recurrence - not emailing homework. Which is aligns with #1 anyway.)
Also anything that stays on surface level and functional topics can do it because it's like no one cares how I'm feeling as long as I provide the outputs required of a generic person like work output, taxes, and enough social pretence to avoid undue attention.
Most of the time the triggers are just anything that reminds me of stuff like that. Or of how other clients might not be treated like that, either by their own therapists or especially by my psych.
That reminded me of this:
How to Find Your Bliss: Joseph Campbell on What It Takes to Have a Fulfilling Life
“You have to learn to recognize your own depth.”
www.brainpickings.org
"This is an absolute necessity for anybody today. You must have a room, or a certain hour or so a day, where you don’t know what was in the newspapers that morning, you don’t know who your friends are, you don’t know what you owe anybody, you don’t know what anybody owes to you. This is a place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are and what you might be. This is the place of creative incubation. At first you may find that nothing happens there. But if you have a sacred place and use it, something eventually will happen."
"Our life has become so economic and practical in its orientation that, as you get older, the claims of the moment upon you are so great, you hardly know where the hell you are, or what it is you intended. You are always doing something that is required of you. Where is your bliss station? You have to try to find it."
-- Joseph Campbell
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gooblax
MVP
Tricky to put a duration to it. On a good day I have what's more like positive ruminations, where I think about my psych as a comfort/security mechanism (yes, creepy and gross but not going to focus on that)... And that's pretty much any time my thoughts are unoccupied, but only a couple of minutes each time, eg. while riding to work I might think about it 3 times over the 30mins, but for like 1 minute each time before I think about other stuff. Then occasionally I might intentionally allow it for longer. So maybe 2 hours or just under if all that is added up.
On a bad day, all of those occasional thoughts are tinged with the upsetting thought. On about 75% of those times it will affect my mood, which will keep the rumination going for longer. If those 75% are double duration and add about an hour after work where I stay miserable about it... That calculates out at 3.9 hours, assuming that I haven't spent an extra hour at work trying to write things down or posting here to try and stop feeling miserable... So make that 4.9 hours.
On a bad day, all of those occasional thoughts are tinged with the upsetting thought. On about 75% of those times it will affect my mood, which will keep the rumination going for longer. If those 75% are double duration and add about an hour after work where I stay miserable about it... That calculates out at 3.9 hours, assuming that I haven't spent an extra hour at work trying to write things down or posting here to try and stop feeling miserable... So make that 4.9 hours.
Yes, it is difficult. I'm sure in the eventual future someone will invent a brain interface to measure it (or, more positively, to measure how mindful one is):
Rescuing the ruminating brain: Identifying biomarkers of rumination and mindfulness through concurrent EEG and fMRI studies of schizophrenia and depression
Is ?the idle mind the devil?s playground?? It depends on where the wandering mind goes. If it is busy reflecting on recent activity, consolidating recent material into long term memories, and envision...
gooblax
MVP
Well psych hasn't sent the receipt yet, nor the link that he normally sends out for the telehealth meeting. Still plenty of time to do that so I'm not concerned. Although I also figure this is what would happen if he ever got into an accident or whatever - the automated reminder would get sent before the session but then no further comms and he just wouldn't show up for the session and I'd never know why. I suppose in one way it's fair, because the same would happen if I unexpectedly died. But it's also not ideal because it's not a mutual relationship.
Have you thought about becoming a therapist? Because it seems you would be very sensitive to the needs of clients. Personally, I would rather develop a mental health app than deal with rejection by clients, etc 
gooblax
MVP
I don't think social anxiety would be a very good therapist trait I'd probably commit my own "failure to reply" sins due to anxiety, although I'd make myself do it because I know how bad it feels when it's not done. But it's more the in-session stuff that I'd struggle with. And for real, I don't think I have the necessary curiosity about people to make a good therapist.
I haven't had any good app ideas either so it looks like I'm stuck with my current career
Anyway, he sent the link now so he's still alive. But still hasn't billed for last session as far as I can see on my bank transactions.
I'd probably commit my own "failure to reply" sins due to anxiety, although I'd make myself do it because I know how bad it feels when it's not done. But it's more the in-session stuff that I'd struggle with. And for real, I don't think I have the necessary curiosity about people to make a good therapist.I haven't had any good app ideas either so it looks like I'm stuck with my current career
Anyway, he sent the link now so he's still alive. But still hasn't billed for last session as far as I can see on my bank transactions.
You create a billing app for therapists that generates an invoice when the client walks in the door and triggers the sensorsI haven't had any good app ideas either so it looks like I'm stuck with my current career
gooblax
MVP
Haha It would also do things like alert of any things that the therapist needed to remember to tell the client, like "hey BTW my fee will be increasing next month" or "I'm going to be away for 6 weeks, here's the backup contact therapist I've prepared in case you need it over that time" etc.
He finally billed me for the previous session, about 4 hours after this week's one. I didn't bother mentioning it during the session.
It was a reasonably good session because:
- I asked him to avoid mentioning other clients and explained why it was unhelpful, and he agreed to try to stop.
- We sort of came to a bit of an understanding about how he thinks he can help with the driving lesson stuff (although maybe only after I got emotional about it, because before then I don't really think he was understanding where I was coming from. Maybe he still doesn't but at least I made an attempt.).
- He helped me to avoid staying in a shutdown, self-punishing mindset at the end of the session. I know it's not easy for him either when I end up staring into space and not really responding or finding it hard to get words out, but he did really well this time and I felt like he cared and didn't just want me to be stuck there. Because of this I drafted a thank you email to him at 2am, saved it til 7am in case I changed my mind, but decided to send it.
It would also do things like alert of any things that the therapist needed to remember to tell the client, like "hey BTW my fee will be increasing next month" or "I'm going to be away for 6 weeks, here's the backup contact therapist I've prepared in case you need it over that time" etc. He finally billed me for the previous session, about 4 hours after this week's one. I didn't bother mentioning it during the session.
It was a reasonably good session because:
- I asked him to avoid mentioning other clients and explained why it was unhelpful, and he agreed to try to stop.
- We sort of came to a bit of an understanding about how he thinks he can help with the driving lesson stuff (although maybe only after I got emotional about it, because before then I don't really think he was understanding where I was coming from. Maybe he still doesn't but at least I made an attempt.).
- He helped me to avoid staying in a shutdown, self-punishing mindset at the end of the session. I know it's not easy for him either when I end up staring into space and not really responding or finding it hard to get words out, but he did really well this time and I felt like he cared and didn't just want me to be stuck there. Because of this I drafted a thank you email to him at 2am, saved it til 7am in case I changed my mind, but decided to send it.
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