Trauma therapy is exhausting. But I'm doing it because I want.... (fill in the blank)

[Deleted member 47099]

So yeah, trauma therapy is exhausting and distressing and hard work and uncomfortable and overwhelming and just way too much sometimes.

So "why" are we doing it?

What's the positive stuff you can envisage at the end of therapy, that makes all this hard work worthwhile?
What result are you looking for?
How will you know "now I'm done with therapy"?

I'm going to have to give this some thought, myself, but here's a few thoughts off the top of my head:

- inner peace
- not letting fear dictate my life
- fulfilling my potential
- feeling free to choose
- being myself
- liking myself

I thought it might be nice to collect people's goals for what result they want from therapy... as a reminder, for those hard weeks and months, where everything feels like it's too much and is not progressing and everything's just triggery and trauma and yuck...

 

[Friday]

To remember the good times. And I lose those when I lock everything away.

Plus springloaded bear traps piss me off.

 

[MyWillow]

Great thread :)

This is all I know in terms of how I view and feel about life and myself. So much hate. I have no memory of experiencing “trauma”. But my psydoc tells me there’s a lot of room for growth. To put the flashbacks in their rightful place would be nice. To dampen the anxiety and dissociation would be amazing. And for my body not to have to express everything via physical pain would be a blessing. I’d like not to have to fake it. Every f*cking day.

 

[Swift]

Awesome thread :)
I'm doing it because I want to get better.
I want to feel better, and I want to be better for the people in my life.

 

[somerandomguy]

To be the person that I wanted to have rescued me. (Thanks, @Friday.)

 

[MyWillow]

I forgot something. I’d really like to not hate Birthdays and Christmas. I don’t know why I do because I don’t remember any. I try so hard to create new and different traditions but it’s still shitty.

 

[ILoveLife]

...To be okay.
That's all really.

Good idea for a thread @Sophy. Thanks

 

[hopefully optimistic]

I’m doing it because I want my children to grow up with healthy relationships and lives.

But damn, it is exhausting.

 

[Deleted member 47099]

I thought of another reason: I want to feel real.

I grew up having to be fake (pretending to be fine) and I hate feeling like me and my life are fake.

I want real.

Really real. :)

 

[Freida]

Great thread @Sophy !

To
Be able to face January
Forgive myself
Accept the parts of myself I despise

 

[Kubash16]

1. Break the cycle of hell both sides of my family are fluent in.

2. Give any future children the future they deserve.

3. Find out who me is, my entire life has been surviving from one day to the next. I want to find out who I would be if I get to thrive for a little while.

 

[Friday]

Be able to face January

f*ck November.

Wait. What she said. That.

I tried to say that, it came out as f*ck November. February & March aren’t on my Xmas card list, either.