General Has Anyone Done Work On Schemas In Therapy?

[Wastinglight]

Recently my T asked me to complete a questionnaire on schemas, so we could start working on addressing my main maladaptive belief systems. This is based on the work of Jeffrey Young, who postulates that there are 18 maladaptive schemas that cause problems in people's lives and relationships. You can find a summary of these schemas here: http://www.schematherapy.com/id73.htm.

My main schemas are grouped around disconnection & rejection - mistrust/abuse and emotional deprivation, and also around subjugation and self-sacrifice. This came as no surprise to me. From previous therapy work I've been able to identify a number of reasons why I have come to subscribe to these schemas - prime among them was an emotionally distant dad and being bullied by my so-called friends at school (instead of telling them to go f**k themselves, I instead tried harder to be friends with them). It's little wonder then, that an absence of attention, affection, warmth and companionship in personal relationships, and engaging in behaviour that subjugates my own needs, wants and desires, feels "normal" to me.

I thought I'd post a thread about this, because it seems to me that many of us who are (or in my case, have been) in relationships with sufferers of PTSD (and other similar conditions), are often willing to focus more on meeting the needs of others, than our own needs.

Just wondering if anyone else has undertaken the schema questionnaire - and whether there are identifiable trends/similarities in the schemas that we embrace, as carers/supporters.

 

[Friday]

Scripts & Schemas... Absolutely. :) One of the foundations of psych.

Via Jeffery Young & his work? Nope. That's new to me.

 

[Sighs]

Never seen this before, but aware that you don't have to be Freud to figure out that the daughter of a combat vet with PTSD is going to have some childhood issues which impact her relationship with a combat vet with PTSD. Sigh!

 

[Wastinglight]

Never seen this before, but aware that you don't have to be Freud to figure out that the daughter of a com...

Of course, and the results of the questionnaire didn't come as a surprise to me.... BUT, for me, when it's staring me in the face in black and white, it's harder for me to take the usual route of "Yeah, but" as a way to keep making choices that cause me pain.

I didn't mean to offend. I am just finding that, for the past few years, I've been aware of many of my issues on some level, but haven't really done the hard work on actually changing my behaviour in a way that benefits myself and leads to healthy interactions with people. The more "evidence" I gather, the less excuses I have for engaging in the same behaviour as before (and then complaining about it!).

 

[Wastinglight]

Another reason I've been pondering this is because someone posted a thread on this forum a while ago asking people if they'd ever done a Myers-Briggs personality test. An astonishing number of people posted saying that they have an INFJ personality type (or something similar). I too have an INFJ personality and so does another member of my family. We both have suffered from anxiety/depression throughout our lives. Does having this personality type pre-dispose us towards developing anxiety/depression/PTSD/whatever? Maybe, maybe not, but it's food for thought. Following on from that, I wondered what similarities might exist in the belief systems of people who typically take up supporter/carer roles.

 

[Rumors]

I read the page and it frightened me.... Lol. I think I need to go to bed.. I never knew such a thing existed but I can parallel far too many of these.

 

[Wastinglight]

I read the page and it frightened me.... Lol. I think I need to go to bed.. I never knew such a thing exi...

Yeah, I totally get that. When I finally started to come to the realisation that my beliefs about myself and about relationships were a bit messed up, I started wishing I hadn't pulled at that thread - things you don't want to know about yourself! Now it's a case of "Okay, I know this stuff, but what do I do with this information?"

 

[Friday]

Now it's a case of "Okay, I know this stuff, but what do I do with this information?"

<grin> Work on replacing unhealthy scripts & schemas with healthy ones :D

CBT is one of the most useful tools in altering scripts & schemas.

Schemas & scripts aren't unhealthy inherently. (Although the absence of them is usually a sign of a severe mental illness or neurological damage). They're in the "coping mechanism" column of psych precepts... Where they can be beneficial, neutral, or unhealthy... Along a spectrum scale :)

 

[Sighs]

I must admit I avoid looking at it too closely. I'm not sure I can change at my age. I'm not sure I want to.

 

[Ronin]

"Okay, I know this stuff, but what do I do with this information?"

You can always just lay it off, till more pieces come along and you've got an idea how to put it to use. ;)

 

[Wastinglight]

<grin> Work on replacing unhealthy scripts & schemas with healthy ones :D

CBT is one of the most useful tools in altering scripts & schemas.

Indeed, and that's what I've been trying to do. I figure "practice makes perfect".

But I've come to the realisation that it's much much harder than I thought to force a change in a deeply entrenched belief system. Especially when it's something like "I don't deserve to be treated well." Because I can look at that and say "Well, of course I deserve to be treated with love, care, trust and respect", but really, the belief that I don't deserve better, is located much much deeper in my psyche - perhaps at the subconscious level. I only know that I hold beliefs like this because all my behaviours within relationships (romantic and otherwise) point to that being the case. Ya know? How do you change a belief that you don't truly acknowledge as being true, at a conscious level?

 

[Wastinglight]

I must admit I avoid looking at it too closely. I'm not sure I can change at my age. I'm not sure I want...

I can understand that - a few years ago, I pretty much decided the same thing, but reasoned that I should swear off relationships altogether, because I couldn't trust myself to make good choices. Then I fell for C, and realised that I really did want to be in a relationship. At the same time, I thought "Oh shit, I don't know if I'm healthy enough to be in a relationship - but I really really want to be with this guy!" So I started doing the work on myself. I think I've come a long way in the last year or two, but I still have a long way to go. This is one of the reasons why I'm so gutted that he ended up breaking up with me. He has no idea just how goddamn hard I tried for him, no idea at all. And it still wasn't good enough.

So I'm working on schemas now, cos I figure that, if I don't address them, then I am destined never be happy - whether I'm in a relationship or not.