Having Problems Being Vulnerable With Psycholgoist

[blackandwhite2017]

Hello world,

I have been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (though I am a bit suspicious about this diagnosis), PTSD, Depression, and Attachment Disorder. I have known my current psychologist who specializes in treating people with both developmental disabilities and mental illnesses for 3 months now. We have done 1hr of consultation, 6 hours of interview for psychological assessment, 3 hours of completed questionnaire for psychological assessments, 1 hour of planning sessions, and 4 hours of treatment sessions so far.

However I still have problems being honest about how bad things really are for me right now. I didn't let her know that I have frequent suicidal ideations, that I am seriously going to fail school if I continue like now, that most of the times my room is a complete mess, that I seriously have problems dragging myself out of the house every day despite needing to walk my dog, that I barely speak with other humans anymore. I have serious problems letting her know how weak and vulnerable I currently am, and I think this is preventing me from getting the full effect of CBT.

When she asked me those kinds of questions, I always lied and I think she bought those lies because of the way she responded. I can't really blame her, despite my supposed autism I have been trained to be a very good compulsive liar due to my unhealthy upbringing. I had to lie about how I really felt and what I really thought in order to not get into troubles with my family. I realize that this is not applicable to my psychologist and I need her to know about my real problems for her to be able to help me. But I can't do this, anytime she asks I instinctively lie and I feel too anxious to tell her straight up how bad things are going for me on my own.

Any suggestions about this? And btw I really believe my psychologist is a really good person so there are no issues regarding that. I just have problems allowing people to know my vulnerabilities, none of my "friends" from work or school even know about my mental illnesses.

Thanks,
HelloWorld314

 

[cat-lady]

Back when I was in therapy I would write down bullet points of stuff I wanted to talk about and take it with me to therapy. This helped me share stuff I was reluctant to. Partly, it helped me remember stuff and partly it was a way to keep from struggling to find the right words in the moment. It also maybe helped create some emotional distance to be reading it instead of just saying it like in a normal conversation. Sometimes I would only be able to get through part of it but not all of it. I didn't let myself get discouraged about this. I just kept it as a reminder for next time. Sometimes it would take a few sessions to work up to something on the list but I would eventually. Not sure if that helps but I hope it does.

 

[Deleted member 37085]

Hello @HelloWorld314 copied what you posted above:
I still have problems being honest about how bad things really are for me right now. I didn't let her know that I have frequent suicidal ideations, that I am seriously going to fail school if I continue like now, that most of the times my room is a complete mess, that I seriously have problems dragging myself out of the house every day despite needing to walk my dog, that I barely speak with other humans anymore. I have serious problems letting her know how weak and vulnerable I currently am, and I think this is preventing me from getting the full effect of CBT.

Your above thoughts and feelings have me questioning some things you've just shared and yet, I do relate to most all of what you've posted @HelloWorld314. If you question the Autism diagnosis I would most definitely share this during your next session for your thoughts and feelings are very important in this mutual relationship with therapist and she is there for you to listen to you. How will she be able to fully determine diagnosis when you hold back information that is tantamount for therapist to make important diagnosis and help you?

I was so misdiagnosed (not saying you are yet you are questioning the Autism diagnosis and please try and share your thoughts about this diagnosis with your therapist) from the mid 80's until 3/12 with incorrect diagnosis and put on crazy-making Rx drugs for decades and I wish that I had spoken up about my concerns regarding misdiagnosis for I lost a lot of years with incorrect diagnosis and was not receiving help I needed for the corrected 3/12 diagnoses. Lost so much time, so much of my life because of wrong dx. Grateful to have correct dx now. If you can, please try and speak to therapist about this, okay.

As you know, therapists are human and they make mistakes just saying and they are not mind readers and please please don't waste precious time and your life by trying to shove down truth and lie to her, for you are only lying to self and postponing the inevitable, which is having to eventually come face to face with your truth.

It has been very hard for me in therapy getting honest and being honest and for years I languished and was in so much pain because I had no clue what was lying beneath and I could not begin to tell my truth in therapy until a catalystic event brought painful nightmares and memories into my awareness of same. Prior, I had no clue what truth was lying beneath surface that was causing me to also have suicidal ideation. I know now. I have been able to only try and try again to tell therapist in bits and pieces and you are worth it and I am worth it.

Being honest with yourself and speaking up and out about anything and everything will help you so much in dealing with life right now. It will hurt to talk about your truth and it will also set you on recovery course. I know it is easier said than done, I know, I know. You need for yourself to start somewhere or else down the road all that you are not telling therapist will all (as it did with me) catch up with you. Old saying - pay me now, or pay me later; another old saying - wherever you go there you are. Another one: the truth shall set us free. It is obvious I care for I have not been in forums lately posting to sites. I care. And I am NOT telling you what to do - just sharing my experience and thoughts with you because you were brave and posted here.

You say you have serious problems taking off your masks and showing vulnerability and weaknesses to anyone even your current therapist and you say this is preventing you from getting full effect of therapy. When initiating therapy and trying to find your voice and tell your secrets (if applicable) well, this is normal. I noticed that you spoke nothing about the reasons why you are experiencing suicidal ideation. And this is the place to remain anonymous and tell your truth and get your much needed feedback and understanding from others here for all that lies beneath that you are afraid to look at and allow your therapist to help you with. Your being suicidal says to me that you must be hurting awful badly and in an awful lot of pain and this is very important to hear you admit and this is your time in therapy and it's all about you now. You are WORTH IT. When you're able try and post more h

Your time in therapy is about you and getting to root of the cause of why you feel you need to leave. I know you want the pain to stop and you may not really want to go. I know how you feel, and I understand being in so much pain that you feel you want to leave. I will tell you now that you are worth it! You are worth telling your secrets and receiving help. Yes, opening up a little at a time, and trying just trying a little harder to tell your truth for today about how you've been feeling and that you've been lying about stuff to your therapist. I know that you know you are hurting yourself so much by lying (you said you and you are the one that will pay down the road if you continue to pass in therapy and not tell the truth. This again is your important time in your life to now try and get honest with yourself and tell your truth and receive the help you evidently believe you need. She will never be able to help you unless you try to start taking off your masks one mask at a time. Baby steps.

Also this you posted above as well:
I had to lie about how I really felt and what I really thought in order to not get into troubles with my family. I realize that this is not applicable to my psychologist and I need her to know about my real problems for her to be able to help me. But I can't do this, anytime she asks I instinctively lie and I feel too anxious to tell her straight up how bad things are going for me on my own.

Suicidal ideation @HelloWorld314 is emotionally and mentally very serious state of being and I understand that you are struggling to tell her what's really going on inside of you and you are wanting to tell therapist your truth. How about you try telling her that you are having serious problems (as you've admitted here) and try being vulnerable about your real problems just in little pieces and try also sharing with T that you feel you cannot tell her because you feel so anxious and please try telling her that you have been having suicidal thoughts. I believe you want help right or you wouldn't be in her office and struggling to try and receive full effects of therapy. And you wouldn't be on-line here being honest about not being truthful with T. Your feeling so weak and so vulnerable is so very understandable and I am there to in therapy. I am currently in Emdr Therapy and I must allow myself to try and be weak and vulnerable or I will remain suicidal and continue to isolate, and drop more and more out of life and living. If I do not allow myself now this opportunity to again take baby steps and try only try and look at what lies beneath,

I will NEVER get to the root of why I prefer dogs to people, and why the pain is so great that it caused me to leave college and never return, and to explain my isolation from mankind, and I am beginning because I am getting honest (baby steps) to understand why I was so confused about father and mother and now I know why I was trying so hard to leave here. I could not deal then with unknown and underlying emotional trauma events and the truth of what lies beneath and my brain protected me for a long time, until I now am ready and am facing truth. I understand that you have nearly convinced yourself that you are unable to deal with what you went into her (therapist's) office in the first place to deal with @HelloWorld314. I believe you want the help and I want you to know that you deserve to be heard and helped and you deserve to tell your story, your truth and you deserve to be in recovery. It's all up to you now. I dreaded therapy and it has been the most difficult thing I've ever dealt with (still am) in my life, and I continue to try and seek truth weekly through therapy, and I can only hope and pray that you will to. JJ

 

[Fayne Jane]

Hello world,

I have been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (though I am a bit suspicious a...

You can't get help if you are lying. I have been in therapy off and for years and not for PTSD. I also work with folks on the Autism Spectrum. Let me know how I can help?

 

[blackandwhite2017]

Hi thanks for the replies.

Dear @cat-lady, yes! Bringing a list of all the issues I want to talk about is what I have been doing from the very beginning. I am glad we are like-minded! However, I find myself twisting the list as I go. My psychologist asks me to record my disturbing thoughts/emotions/behaviours and their triggers and asks me to talk about them in our sessions, but I find myself lying while reading my entries... I don't really change the content, but I sometimes leave out some stuff or change the magnitude of the problem. Most often times, I don't talk about the entries that disturb me the most. I am sure though with time I can force more truth out of myself, but boy that is hard. My compulsive lying is to the point that I lie to random strangers about my name, and age and my dog's name and breed when strangers talk to me about my dog on the bus.

Dear @JadesJewel, thanks for the time you have taken to write this reply!

Firstly, I have told my psychologist that I don't think I have ASD ever since the day the diagnosis broke out to me, but she told me she is very sure that I am on the spectrum. I am still arguing with her regarding this, my theory is that before I moved from China to Canada, I had no problems making friends in elementary school and first year of Chinese middle school and people commented me to be cool, rational but friendly, so I can't really have a social disability. But my psychologist told me women with Asperger's don't fit the traditional male Asperger's image and I used my intelligence to mask my disability. I am not really sure who is right, but I don't deny I have many ASD traits now. I am still waiting for my official psychological assessment report, and my psychologist told me she would explain how my traits exactly score into ASD in the report. So I guess I will wait for the report...and that does not convince me I will definitely discuss this with her!

Secondly regarding my suicidal ideation, I have made a post about that in a rant yesterday which happened to be my first post on this forum and the need to rant it out was what got me registered yesterday. Haha, I am glad I did, this place seems to be full of helpful people! I don't want to talk about suicides in therapy for now because 1) I am worried that therapist is going to report me because that is one of the exceptions of our confidential agreement 2) I don't really think I will commit suicide now because I have so much responsibilities to others...to the world. Whether I like it or not, I am a part of the world and my suicide means leaving my pain and messes for others to deal with. I feel too proud for that!

Lastly, thanks so much for sharing your experience, it was really inspirational! I know how hard being truthful is, and you should be really proud that you are slowly allowing yourself to be truthful and vulnerable in therapy --- baby steps are better than nothing! My thought process is quite likes yours, I understand the full rationale behind needing to be truthful in therapy, yet I can't really bring myself to do this, at least not most of the time. I think I will try baby steps as well. I don't think I am able to tell her about what problems I am really having as that is just way too much and unrealistic given my compulsive lying behaviour. So I guess my goal for the next session is to tell her that I lie sometimes and she needs to adjust the severity of the issues I describe at least one magnitude upwards. Luckily for me, even though the topics are not comfortable, my psychologist is very good and I enjoy my time with her despite feeling very uncomfortable/anxious. Looking back, I seem to have already gained lots of understanding and seen some emotional improvements with the assessment and the past several sessions alone so I am hopeful therapy may eventually solve my problems or at least teach me to manage them in a non self destructive way.

I really hope the best of luck to you @JadesJewel, you are doing a good job. With baby steps, I believe you will be able to eventually break the wall you have built between yourself and others. I will try to do the same with myself as well.

All the best,
HelloWorld314

 

[joeylittle]

@HelloWorld314 - a tried and true solution would be: Print your OP (or the thread if you like) and bring it to therapy, and hand it over. You've already written what you need her to know. Now, you only need to give it to her.

 

[blackandwhite2017]

@HelloWorld314 - a tried and true solution would be: Print your OP (or the thre...

Lol this is really good advice and this option invalidates my many excuses, but the only problem with this method is that after the day I give her my writing, I will continue to lie. This pattern won't change just because I give her the truth one time. Yes she will be able to spot those lies after I give her the list of problems in writings, but I might get defensive and I honestly don't know how I will react in those situations. Will I quit therapy? Will I say something very rude that result in her rejecting me as a client? Or maybe I will lie to pretend my problems get better when they get worse?

This is not a permanent solution, and I think one big thing about this therapy is that I need to learn to not to lie for my own sake, I need to learn to trust my psychologist who I logically know is trustworthy. I think I will try baby steps for now and if by the time we reach our 10th treatment session, I still can't talk more about my real problems, I will use this method instead. I hope by that time I will feel comfortable enough with my therapist that if she were to spot my lies, I would not go into full defence.

Anyway, thanks for the tip joeylittle haha, I have sugar gliders if your joey is from joeys of sugar gliders:)

 

[joeylittle]

the only problem with this method is that after the day I give her my writing, I will continue to lie. This pattern won't change just because I give her the truth one time. Yes she will be able to spot those lies after I give her the list of problems in writings, but I might get defensive and I honestly don't know how I will react in those situations.

See, this is part of what's great about therapy. You're right - you may not break the habit right away, and you may get defensive...on the other hand, you can't know how that first conversation is going to go, after you share this with her - you may feel very differently. You might be surprised by her reaction. Lots of things can happen, and you are not responsible for predicting how it's going to go.

It sounds like you developed the ability to predict how your family would react to things as a self-protective mechanism. Your therapist isn't them.

I need to learn to trust my psychologist who I logically know is trustworthy.

Trust is fastest learnt through application - that is to say, you will learn to trust when you entrust someone and they do not break your trust. When it comes to a therapist, they are bound in many ways to not break your trust. So - there's no reason to wait, really.

(I am a pot taking to a kettle here, by the way. I am often afraid to do things, and think that I can just wait 'until the time is right'. Truth is, nothing changes between now and 'the right time' - it's just a way to practice bracing myself for negative consequences that generally never show up at all.)

 

[kilted]

I am interested in you saying that you didn't have a problem in China when you were young.

I wonder if part of the "autism" thing is that you were well-adjusted to Chinese culture, then moved to a new culture with totally different language, body language, way of being, subliminal messages and also a more individualistic "way of being".

This would be very confusing and mean you would have to re-learn how to communicate and integrate from scratch.

This process of consciously working out what the social language is..... is very similar to what people with AS have to do.... so I wouldn't be surprised that you might come across as AS.

 

[blackandwhite2017]

It sounds like you developed the ability to predict how your family would react to things as a self-protective mechanism. Your therapist isn't them.

Well I would like to rather plan things ahead than just go with the flow. I guess I just feel more comfortable forcing myself to spill little stuff out every session instead of spilling everything out at once and can't predict what is going to happen next. I guess there is a need for control there.

This process of consciously working out what the social language is..... is very similar to what people with AS have to do.... so I wouldn't be surprised that you might come across as AS.

Though I suspect the ASD diagnosis, I really doubt this. When I first came to Canada, I spent most of my time with ESL (english second language) students who were mostly Chinese, yet I got bullied by them. I had problems even merging within the Chinese student population in Canada. I still don't understand exactly why, but I think it is because social scene starts getting very very different from elementary school roughly around 13 years old, and I wasn't aware of that until roughly 15 years old.

 

[Keen]

I haven't read the above responses, so this may be a repeat, but one idea you could try is just share a tiny little truth next time. And then a little less tiny but still really small truth the time after that. Little by little, you'll feel more comfortable sharing as you see he or she is safe and trustworthy. Good luck!

 

[blackandwhite2017]

I haven't read the above responses, so this may be a repeat, but one idea you could try is just share a...

Hi thanks!

Lol that is exactly what I am doing right now --- I just told my psychologist that I lied about the severity of my problems but I hoped she would not push for the details and I would make myself gradually spill out truth instead. And she replied "I will respect your wishes and appreciate that you have developed defences for very good reasons and that therapeutic work must proceed at a pace with which you are comfortable".

Yeah I feel really lucky that I met a psychologist who really knows what she is doing on my first official try with a mental health worker.

All the best,
HelloWorld314