Facing Theraphy And Finding A Therapist

[Aduren]

So at 26 I decided to finally treat my PTSD caused by an abusive childhood. The fact that my career is in research/science has allowed me to sort of pass the PTSD as another social tendency of being a geek. I have problems on 2 fronts. (1) an almost innate inability to form a relationship with the therapist. (2) A feeling of being lost as to what is my therapy, how will it work, and been trust worthy about it.

(1) My first therapist was ok. She had me focused on the fact that statistically speaking I was the oddity in numbers, I am functional and good (no automedicating etc). However I never found this to be a relief as I never truly felt like the man she said I was. I revisited too much too soon and I relapsed.

(2) The second therapist said he was a former preacher and continued talking as if god would somehow help me. This aggravated some of my symptoms and left.

(3)I saw a third therapist last Friday. I find myself in survival mode when I feel corner, and as soon as he showed me in he said "a intern will be joining us," to what I said "that implies I have no option," he shook his head (surprised) and ask if that would be ok to what I said no.

I felt he was not even taking my feelings into consideration, if it took me 26 years to talk to someone (educated and prepared) where would I get the strength to do so with someone that is not prepared. He then began to tell me that his neuro feedback is a success and he won't treat me without first trying 10 sessions of it, but no to worry because it will only add 35$ to my copay.

Any suggestions?

 

[Deleted member 1860]

The oddity in numbers thing is crap. I got the same thing as a teenager. "Oh, you just need to stop cutting because you're a straight-A student and involved in a lot of activities. My other patients have drug problems, don't do well in school, and come from bad homes." As in, you have no reason to do what you do. Talk about invalidation. (In other words, you're not alone. Inexperienced therapists in this area don't get it!).

I "believe" but can't see pastoral counselors. I can't have God pushed on me in any way. My abuse was at the hands of someone in the church, so religion can be a trigger.

The intern thing...a definite no-no without advance permission on your part! I've said no to this myself. It's hard enough to open up to one person, let alone a "student".

I'm on my second neurofeedback therapist. I don't think it's cool for him to tell you that you need 10 sessions of neurofeedback before he will treat you. Neurofeedback is not without its side effects (ranging from mild agitation to full on episodes of high anxiety & panic for me), so forcing it on a patient isn't cool. (Dont believe claims that it is side-effect free. Think about it....nothing in this world is side effect free for everyone!) Both of my therapists were open to no neurofeedback if that was my desire. I'm currently not doing neurofeedback with my therapist as I'm not sure if it is helping me all that much at this point. But....at first it was like a miracle treatment for me. It (along with a sleep doctor) allowed me to sleep normally again (some nights I was lucky to get an hour of twilight sleep). It helped with my obsessive thoughts (hands down my worst symptom, and no, I'm not OCD). I think it can be very helpful for symptom management, but I urge you to do some research first.

 

[Pencil]

Sounds as if you'll have to kiss a few more frogs. Last frog sounds very froggy.

 

[Aduren]

Thank you Solara, feel as if they have a metered stick and depending on how much you have screwed your life you get a validation to trauma, as if trauma is dependent on life screw ups. I have not "screw up" because the trauma done to me was based on that. Perfection was expected and celebrated and anything less was condoned and punished. This is why my tendencies are just as self destructive, except instead of alcohol and cocaine I use aderall, phentermine, and testosterone. Instead of drowning in depression and losing everything, I work drowned in self depression desperately to achieve recognition. Then I get even more depressed because there is always room for self improvement and I throw away the award because I still feel worthless.

And I felt the third person was trying to sell me, forcefully, "his" treatment and I had I taken his advise blindly and have bad side effects--it could have affected horribly my work. He failed to fully explain side effects and talked about its side effects (that I found while reading this site) and that to me was unethical

I am sort of desperate to find a therapist. I feel I am going a thousand miles an hour and my brain wants some time out from constantly over working. This past weekend I emailed 12 new therapist, it's 1 in the morning and I am in the laboratory, because I need something to do. I will keep listening to my gut in therapists, but if anyone has any recommendations for someone in Houston Texas, let me know.

I understand the obsessive tendencies. The abuse was done by my mother a Phd, MD, LCSW, and like I mentioned in another post she made my childhood a clinical thesis in which she tested that early childhood structure would yield the optimal or desired result in a child. I often find myself following a list robotically (or neurotically), non stop to make sure everything is up to standard. My notes, work...it drives me insane, yet it is weirdly reaffirming and calming, and you say neurofeedback helped with this? I just don't think I am ready right now to face its possible side effects, especially after my relapse.

 

[Aduren]

Sounds as if you'll have to kiss a few more frogs. Last frog sounds very froggy.

I want frogs to have a website like Vitals where therapists are actually reviewed like doctors... not because I want the work cut down for me, but because I hate the taste of frogs.

 

[Pencil]

I hate the taste of frogs

:roflmao: Especially after a few.

But you should remember that therapist could get raving reviews from peers (and it sounds like the one with the intern could be one of those) or by patients and yet not be okay for you (erm, like your three frogs). I guess you'll have to get a good mouthwash.

 

[Aduren]

:roflmao: Especially after a few.

But you should remember that therapist could get raving reviews from peers (and it sounds like the one with the intern could be one of those) or by patients and yet not be okay for you (erm, like your three frogs). I guess you'll have to get a good mouthwash.

Point taken. I'll buy it by the gallon then.

 

[Hashi]

I've had some bad, bad therapy experiences and I think all we can do is learn from them. Learn from them we must. I'm definitely on the side of going with your gut, and I think I'd also be happy to bring brain and heart into the process of choosing. When I've found a good match in a therapist, it has been based on four things, in the following order. I had to write these out for myself in advance and stick to them.

- No deal breakers. These are very individual to each of us. My deal breakers wouldn't be an issue for some other people, They were things like the therapist had to be sensitive to the kind of words I used and then use the same words to talk to me (if I said survivor and then they said victim... bye bye), Another was giving me plenty of time on the phone, free, to make initial enquiries. If instead of answering questions they kept suggesting an initial (paid) session to talk about things... bye bye. And so on...

- Essential questions. For example it was very important to me to know what the therapist did to keep things safe. They didn't have to come up with a "correct" answer, but they needed to say things that showed they understood the risks of retraumatisation, they took it seriously, and they had strategies to work with their clients on staying safe. Another personal example is that - unlike many people - I'm not a fan of cognitive behavioual therapy (CBT), so I always asked about their willingness to work without it.

- Magic words. As with everything, very individual to each cient. My personal magic words are things like safety, intuition, dreams and art therapy. Someone else's might be things like treatment plan, skills, strategies, coping, parenting or anything else that's their approach and priorities. They're things that would be on my list of questions anyway, but if a therapist talks about any of them before the point of being asked, then that's a lot of bonus points in my assessment of them.

- Gut feeling. For me, this comes after the other three. To be honest, the other three have usually separated the wheat from the chaff enough. But the gut feeling needs to be right too.

I'm sorry you've had bad experiences, but in my view these can at least help you identify your deal breakers, magic words and essential questions when looking for someone better. Good luck.

 

[Pencil]

Hashi, I love your post.

 

[Aduren]

I have not formulated any set form of a qualified provider. I expect them to be intellectually adept, not because my education, but because my mother's. In a way I do look for structure and someone who tells me where to go next because obviously I have no idea how to do any healing on my own, I do admit I need direction.

I have this long list of providers from my insurance and is it ok of me to automatically rule out therapists with no Phd? This is worse than hiring an assistant at lab.....

 

[Abstract]

I hate the taste of frogs

:roflmao: Hopefully only princes from now on!

I agree with others have said here. Well put Hashi! Thanks for sharing.

I guess I see there being three different groups of problems:
1. The T is unprofessional - ranging from not doing things that they should do such as managing counter transference (longer term - shorter term is inevitable in my mind) or safety levels, to lack of appropriote boundaries, right through to abuse.
2. The T's way of working doesn't fit well with what I need. That can be to do with the approach they use like Hashi mentioned or it can be a range of other things such as how directive they are, how much reassurance they give, how much they understand me, their qualification doesn't quite fit with what I need etc etc.
3. The relationship just does not work or many difficulties arise. Because I don't feel comfortable, they remind me too much of someone else or I can't trust them. The trouble of course is that there is an element of this one no matter who it is or what they do! Did I say, "an element"?! :p It is something I have to manage in order to be able to have therapy. Darn annoying.

About the Phd - you can rule out whoever you feel won't work for you. I have felt like that too - just because I was trying to do anything I could to try to be sure of good treatment - I changed my mind about this afterwards though once I weighed up what was the most important for treatment to work for me.

It might be a good idea to continue talking through what you think you need and what hasn't worked in the past before taking the next step. Do you have an idea of the different psychology approaches and what they entail?

 

[rainy_daze]

I have this long list of providers from my insurance and is it ok of me to automatically rule out therapists with no Phd? This is worse than hiring an assistant at lab.....

I think it is OK to rule out therapists that you think aren't qualified. Absolutely. I think you're very lucky to have a list to choose from. Where I am in the world, there was no choice, and the wait for therapy to start was awful.

A suggestion that popped into my brain was when you've narrowed down who you are choosing to help you, find out what pace your therapy will go at. My therapy feels incredibly slow, and the gaps between sessions are very long. Just a thought; I guess it's about working at a pace which feels right for you. Good luck in finding a suitable therapist Aduren.