I Think I Found A Good Therapist

[PurpleSurvivor]

I don't have previous experience with a good one, but I think and hope that's changing. I also hope I've figured out how to get capital letters in my thread title.

I went to our first session today. As always I had a plan. I knew she was going to ask me why I was there so my plan was to explain that someone had asked me to take care of myself and then explain the circumstances. Those circumstances are what got me to make the decision to contact her.

This, of course, didn't work.

I got scared and didn't manage to get the words out. She noticed it and backed away from that matter for the time being. Instead she started asking me questions about my family, what I have studied and how I came to move to the city I live in. I gave her the short version of why I chose this city. The long version would simply be to long for a "get to know each other"-session, I will explain that later as it's essential for understanding me.

During our session she managed to get a rough outline of what my life has been until now without me feeling to uncomfortable answering the questions. She could read me very well and picked up on hints that she could ask more about something. Then again, I guess "the official version is..." is quite the obvious question bait in that room... Which reminds me, next time I should probably tell her that I have this little problem with giving information that nobody asked for. Come to think of it, I should make a list of all the things I forgot to explain. I should've done it this time, but I was too nervous.

 

[TimeToHeal]

Hi @PurpleSurvivor! Glad to hear you seem to have found a good therapist, and one you think you'll be able to work well with. That is so essential to effective therapy and healing!

Just try not to dwell too much on things you may have forgotten to mention our bring up - you will have the chance to get to it! Something that has been helpful to me - as I too, think of things afterward that I had meant to say/bring up - is to keep a list in between sessions. I even put it on my phone so I'd always be able to add to it, even when poem and paper weren't handy. So as soon as something pops into my head that I want/need to bring up in session, I just add it to my list. And as I always have my phone with me, I'm sure not to forget to bring the list with me! Maybe a similar strategy will prove helpful for you! :)

 

[desiderata310]

I feel incredibly lucky to have found a great therapist in the first shot. I've heard some tales of really bad first meetings and even worse therapy relationships. I am certain that if my first had been bad I never would have continued to seek help.
Glad you found someone intuitive and sensitive. It does make a difference.

 

[PurpleSurvivor]

Things went better this week. I managed to explain why I chose to live here.

We also entered the topic of my selective memory. Basically, if I do something right I forget about it and if I fail at something I remember it. So she had me telling her about times when things went well. I managed to recall 2 times, both with unique circumstances that made them stand out in my memory, but it was still nice to be able to do that.

I also had plans to do something nice after these sessions. My favorite walk. Well, last week it was to hot so I settled for watching angry birds toons. This week the temperature is great. But of course I have to choose the wrong time to dig through my pockets for my bus ticket (about 100 meters from the bus stop), not watch where I'm going and fall over. So instead of going for a walk I got to go home and clean a scraped knee. Great. Just my luck. I guess I'll watch some movie.