Anyone Done Schema Therapy?

[fly away home]

My psychologist had me complete a huge questionnaire which was quite challenging for finding out my schemas. Has anyone d else done this? Was it helpful? What did you manage to take from it/learn from it if anything?

My scepticism often gets in the way so I'm trying to see this as positive but it feels a bit like digging up stuff which isn't really relevant. On the other hand the questions did hit a few raw nerves so perhaps its a necessary journey.

Any info or experiences with this therapy and what's involved would be appreciated.
Thanks!

 

[mamachick]

fly away home-I understand your skepticism. I have not formally done schema therapy but it can be quite helpful and even though the questionaire/tools used are lengthy, my understanding is that it can be time effective in the end.

Often people come to therapy with current problems (relationships, job, legal, school, biological family, etc). We want to talk about what the problem is and how there seems to be no answer. (if we had found it, we wouldnt be there). Often we may talk alot or not much at all about what is going on in our lives. It may be overwhelming or underwhelming in picking out what is relevant to help us. While it seems like things from childhood are not relevant in our treatment, it very much is.

We all have certain themes that are played out through our lives, or schemas. We re-create them in different situations because of the beliefs we have taken on early in life. This can be very unconscious but it still happens. For example, we may take jobs that we can never succeed or chose people who will never treat us well. Once our schema is discovered, we are able to bring it into the light and with cognitive behavioral therapy, address the issues effectively. We then can change our beliefs and behaviors so that we can enhance our lives. We can unlearn what we have learned in our early days.

 

[maddog]

Exactly what Brat said. I have done schema therapy and cannot speak highly enough of it as a very logical, very meaningful means of coming to understand the origins of our current thoughts, feelings and behaviour. I have found this to be one of the most validating therapeutic approaches and it made a painful but very practical sense to me right back in the beginning of my therapy journey when I knew I was messed up, but couldn't put the pieces together as to why.

The questionnaire is definitely long, and it definitely hurts and pulls no punches, but occasionally I still look at mine and shiver at the picture it portrays of my life.

I read a great schema therapy book - the first trauma therapy book I ever read - called "Reinventing Your life". Tacky title, but an excellent, practical, easy-to-read book written by therapists who clearly "get it". I can't believe I've had a mental block this second and forgotten the author's name - Jeffry someone - the key founder of schema therapy. It'll come back to me...

Maddog

 

[mamachick]

I have that book too. Great book

 

[fly away home]

I have found this to be one of the most validating therapeutic approaches and it made a painful but very practical sense to me right back in the beginning of my therapy journey when I knew I was messed up, but couldn't put the pieces together as to why.

Thanks maddog. I am at the very beginning of my therapy journey, only had six sessions so far and its all very foreign to me. I know I have a lot to sort out and the past is something I would rather just ignore, obviously my psychologist thinks otherwise, agggrrr! Yucky! I just don't want to go there but deep down I guess I know its a necessary evil. I am so glad to hear that you found it to be a positive experience. I am scared!

Thanks also Brat17 for explaining it to me. My psychologist did a brief read through of my answers when I returned the questionnaire and mentioned Shame, Defectiveness and Failure as strongly standing out to her, there were other things too but I cant remember and she hasn't properly added it all up. These three certainly sound familiar to me. I have no idea where this leads and how this can change but I am hoping things can be better than where I am at now. She mentioned challenging my thinking, hmmm, I wonder who will be more challenged. Her or me.

 

[maddog]

There is no easy way to begin to deal with the past, but somehow for me, schema therapy really was the ideal place to start, because it allowed us to start exploring concepts, character traits and forms of maladaptive learning without having to directly deal with traumatic events at that point. While obviously trauma was apparent from the nature of the early maladaptive schemas, I didn't actually have to give a lot of detail at a time when I would not have felt even remotely safe or stable enough to do so. But the critical aspects of rapport, validation and trust could be strongly nurtured and developed while we explored each of the relevant early maladaptive schemas.

And while the framework can seem a little confusing at first, and while there are certainly overlaps across the schema domains, even that makes sense once you start to sort through the causal factors and resulting behaviours and personality traits.

Put quite simply, schema therapy helped me to understand that there are good reasons why I am the way that I am, and they aren't because I'm a bad or defective person.

And by the way, it's Jeffry Young - I knew it would come back to me. He is the founder of schema therapy and an excellent clinician (from what I've heard) and a very empathic and intuitive author.

Would love to hear how you go with it.

Maddog

 

[fly away home]

Thanks maddog, I have ordered the book. I was getting so nervous about it that I was contemplating stopping therapy (running away I guess) but I like my therapist and didn't want to hurt her feelings so I just fretted but to know that schema therapy has made a great difference to you and helped with self acceptance I have just booked up with my therapist till the end of the year. Feeling like I have to commit to this because I'm so lost.

 

[maddog]

It takes a lot of courage to make that commitment Fly Away, well done. It's totally ok not to feel great about it, or to feel anything other than scared. It is very daunting and there's no way around that other than to take your time, to try to communicate as openly as possible with your therapist about pace and intensity of therapy, and to concentrate, from the outset, on balancing the tough stuff from the past with the skills of stabilisation, self soothing and self care that are every bit as important as the trauma work.

Just take your time and don't feel you have to get your head around it all at once.

Maddog

 

[fly away home]

So today I went back to see my therapist. It was one really tough session ended up with my whole body shuddering, legs were shaking so much and teeth clattering, it was completely out of control (for me who simply can't cry in front of anyone...ever) and this was just discussing my parents.

She said this was a trauma response. She did help me to calm down after but I was beyond calming. Apparently next time I am to tell her when things get too much but I had no idea until I was in this state. Either way we are looking at the schemas and hopefully can get somewhere with this.

The shaking often happens to me at work so I'm guessing this would be a trigger? Its all so new to me and so very confusing. I always just took these strange things my body did for granted. Now I am beginning to see that its related to my past and its all very scary and confronting.

Sorry, total ramble there, still pulling my thoughts together, finding the loose bits of string.

 

[zaniara]

My therapist works with both CBT, schema therapy and EMDR, so I've done it a little bit. But we are mostly focusing on EMDR though. I think it is very effective though(and I gather it affects how my therapist works with me a little bit all the time anyway). You're so brave! I'm sorry it was so though the last session, but good that your therapist managed to help to ground you. Taking it in in babysteps are really good. (But I tend to not notice when I get overwhelmed until it too late: but I'm getting better at it with time and the help of my therapist.. It's an learning experience really.)

 

[Mayday]

Put quite simply, schema therapy helped me to understand that there are good reasons why I am the way that I am, and they aren't because I'm a bad or defective person

My therapist has done some schema therapy with me too, and how Maddog has described it is perfect. It still feels somewhat surreal, this feeling like I'm not a bad or defective person...I spent my whole life thinking that it was me, I was the problem, there was just something inherently wrong with me.

It's been nothing short of a revolution for me to no longer be bound to that thinking. Like I said, it feels surreal, and not quite real...I still go back to my old comfort blanket thinking that I'm a bad, defective person, but it has lost a great deal of it's power over me. It's slow going, or at least it has been for me, and I still need that reassurance from my therapist that I'm not a bad person, but gradually it gets easier and easier to believe.

 

[fly away home]

Well last session we got half way through reading my schema diary sheets which I had filled out like a good 35 year old school girl and she stopped me, smack bang stop. Only one and a half sheets had been read over.

She said she was sorry, she thinks she has pushed me too fast and will focus on coping strategies and we need to take things much slower. It was quite a shock really because I'm not sure what it was which made her stop so suddenly and I find it painfully difficult to ask questions so I'm still wondering.

I know I was becoming progressively more animated as I spoke, perhaps this is a sign I'm about to loose it completely. I did feel very scattered too she now just wants me to keep track of when I dissociate. So very hard to do when I'm not too sure when its happening. The brain fog which people talk about seems to permeate the majority of my waking hours.

She also mentioned this will be a long haul, the therapy journey.