I think acceptance, or lack thereof, is my biggest difficulty in overcoming my problems.
There is an analogy that I have found useful to help me visualize why therapy is very important. It was described to me once, by someone who often encourages me to get the help I need. She said that my problems are like a deep wound on my arm (or wherever you like, I always imagine it on my arm) and that over the years I just placed a bandage over it but the wound never healed. By going to therapy, I am cleaning out the wound and making it heal until it is nothing more than a scar.
I like this analogy very much, and it has helped me to remain motivated to continue therapy even though a lot of the things we discuss I find very difficult.
I know I have made good progress in therapy but, deep down I know I am not doing as well as I could be. I haven't told my therapist much about what happened to me unless I was already at my "breaking point" emotionally due to flashbacks and/or nightmares. When I am at this point, I do believe something happened to me, I believe that I was traumatized.
The problem comes when I calm down, and my rational side takes over. I have another visualization that helps me understand why I "battle" myself over all of these memories: I have two sides to me and they are my emotional side and my rational side. I doubt I am the only one out there who copes through rationalizing their lives. I think rationalizing has helped me cope and protect myself over the years; it also kept me from experiencing many emotions which make the healing process in therapy terribly hard.
I think I would have a much easier time overcoming my symptoms and problems if I could just learn to accept that something DID happen to me, I just don't know how to really start doing that.
Has anyone found a way to begin accepting what has happened to them? I'm hoping to get help with this so maybe I can finally stop battling myself and my memories.
There is an analogy that I have found useful to help me visualize why therapy is very important. It was described to me once, by someone who often encourages me to get the help I need. She said that my problems are like a deep wound on my arm (or wherever you like, I always imagine it on my arm) and that over the years I just placed a bandage over it but the wound never healed. By going to therapy, I am cleaning out the wound and making it heal until it is nothing more than a scar.
I like this analogy very much, and it has helped me to remain motivated to continue therapy even though a lot of the things we discuss I find very difficult.
I know I have made good progress in therapy but, deep down I know I am not doing as well as I could be. I haven't told my therapist much about what happened to me unless I was already at my "breaking point" emotionally due to flashbacks and/or nightmares. When I am at this point, I do believe something happened to me, I believe that I was traumatized.
The problem comes when I calm down, and my rational side takes over. I have another visualization that helps me understand why I "battle" myself over all of these memories: I have two sides to me and they are my emotional side and my rational side. I doubt I am the only one out there who copes through rationalizing their lives. I think rationalizing has helped me cope and protect myself over the years; it also kept me from experiencing many emotions which make the healing process in therapy terribly hard.
I think I would have a much easier time overcoming my symptoms and problems if I could just learn to accept that something DID happen to me, I just don't know how to really start doing that.
Has anyone found a way to begin accepting what has happened to them? I'm hoping to get help with this so maybe I can finally stop battling myself and my memories.