I hope to get some assistance here.
came back from the previous psychotherapy appointment and it was... mixed, the goal of it primarily was to face my feelings and past traumas and memories, bring them to the forfront of my mind and get over them by essentially facing it head on, visual imagery and drawing was available. My therapist noted that this strategy probably wasn't ideal for me, and it's understandable, she and I both agreed I did not feel safe doing this due to the risk of being "re-traumized", although it did seem like she used the word in a less severe sense, as in this itself was part of the process of recovery, whereas that is literally my worst nightmare, and probably the nightmare of many others. She gave me a book called "healing trauma", with a 12 step program, cool, on one page there was the a written interview with Levine and how he unintentionally "shocked" a patient into recovery within one session, I think that's a little extreme, but might be the basis of this form of therapy. I am at the stage now where I am "contained and emotionally safe", but also have 'residual' symptoms and I am shut down emotionally, like the "freezing" type of patient; my case is going to "guidance", so her senior therapist can look at the case and decide if this is the best course of action, I have several sessions.
I got the feeling psychotherapy felt a bit brute forced, I can go through the motions of feeling worse being better but the goal is not "become worse" than my standard baseline, there is from my pov a possibility it could cause some retraumization as my therapist understood. I still felt uncomfortable and honestly I couldn't tell if she was making me uncomfortable on purpose, I doubt it but it felt a bit pushy although she was still nice and all, but it caused a flair up of a fight response with the trembling and then dissociation. I gotta ask, where would you draw the line between "it is what it is" and "too much"? How has your experience been with this and have you found other forms more effective or "safe"?
at the end of the session she asked me in a slightly joking/friendly way, if I would come back or not and continue... ;S
came back from the previous psychotherapy appointment and it was... mixed, the goal of it primarily was to face my feelings and past traumas and memories, bring them to the forfront of my mind and get over them by essentially facing it head on, visual imagery and drawing was available. My therapist noted that this strategy probably wasn't ideal for me, and it's understandable, she and I both agreed I did not feel safe doing this due to the risk of being "re-traumized", although it did seem like she used the word in a less severe sense, as in this itself was part of the process of recovery, whereas that is literally my worst nightmare, and probably the nightmare of many others. She gave me a book called "healing trauma", with a 12 step program, cool, on one page there was the a written interview with Levine and how he unintentionally "shocked" a patient into recovery within one session, I think that's a little extreme, but might be the basis of this form of therapy. I am at the stage now where I am "contained and emotionally safe", but also have 'residual' symptoms and I am shut down emotionally, like the "freezing" type of patient; my case is going to "guidance", so her senior therapist can look at the case and decide if this is the best course of action, I have several sessions.
I got the feeling psychotherapy felt a bit brute forced, I can go through the motions of feeling worse being better but the goal is not "become worse" than my standard baseline, there is from my pov a possibility it could cause some retraumization as my therapist understood. I still felt uncomfortable and honestly I couldn't tell if she was making me uncomfortable on purpose, I doubt it but it felt a bit pushy although she was still nice and all, but it caused a flair up of a fight response with the trembling and then dissociation. I gotta ask, where would you draw the line between "it is what it is" and "too much"? How has your experience been with this and have you found other forms more effective or "safe"?
at the end of the session she asked me in a slightly joking/friendly way, if I would come back or not and continue... ;S