Issues with ifs

[ILoveLife]

I don't trust people, there's always a part of me that convices me it's all pointless and they're going to hurt me eventually.

So, I've been having some trouble in trusting my T's approach to IFS. I keep looking online for ways to handle exiles, and just today I noticed it was a bit obsessive of me and that I'm not trusting my T enough, he's doing it right. I know I should talk to him, but I wonder if I will be able to next session.

I was having suicidal ideation last week and I thought he didn't handle it correctly, even though he said all the right things and the session was benefitial for me, I still left with the impression that all of this is going to be the end of me, that I'm not going to be able to handle it. That he trusts my 'healing abilities' too much, that I'm weak, all those cognitive distortions.

A friend of mine got in my head, when she said therapy is a new religion for people, that we put ourselves vulnerable into the hands of another manipulative person, yada yada. I know this are her issues, not mine, but still, I hate being vulnerable and I've been quite a bit lately. I can't shake the feeling that I'm being brainwashed, allowing myself to be vulnerable just to be hurt again.

This probably is pretty normal, given all my other experiences with different Ts that didn't know what the hell they were doing. And the fact that for years nobody believed me when I said I was abused, and the fact that because of psychosis people still doubt me, hence me doubting my own memories. My T believes me, better yet, he believes the symptoms I do have and he was the one to point out that I have a boatload of trauma to heal.

I cycle a lot between "This is the best approach possible for me" to "This is brainwash all over again, like they did to me when I was a kid"... through the IFS lens I know this is a polarization between two parts, trying to protect me to not get hurt again.

On another thread I said I trusted my T around 99%, right now I'm at 30% and don't even know why, he didn't give me any reason not to trust him! I feel dumb, I'm usually pretty good at recognizing these kinds of things and pinpointing the issues.

Maybe I'm just afraid of never getting better.

Thanks for readind and in advance for any input you might have, and sorry for the long post.

 

[Prough]

Trust is the opposite of paranoia. It is the brains mechanism for trying to predict who and what is going to kill it. Your brain makes these decisions based on the information available. If you are more paranoid then those around you it generally means you have reason to believe you are in more danger then your peers. You said you were abused. That'll do it. It sounds like you know this bit already.

The strategy without all the bullshit is this:
You lived an extra dangerous life; your paranoia kept you alive then
You now live with that paranoia
That paranoia has become more dangerous then your environment

The thought is, you won the trauma lottery. The things you went through are rare. Given a new batch of experiences the average will take over, eclipsing the bad. This theory hinges on the fact the world is mostly good. Your t seems to believe this more vigorously then you do at the moment.

So how do we square that without using either trust in your t, or your admittedly confused sense of the whole process. The whole friction arrises from a contradiction: you think the world is scary; they don't. Everyone involved(including you) believe your brain is behaving according to real stimulus in a predictable manner. The answer is simple.

If you are more trustfull then you used to be, your brain is reconciling the real world, your t's safe awesome world, with your past. If you fear people more then you used to, then your new world is scarier then your old world. Unless you are still being abused this would mean your own mind is regarding it's current state as the most threatening issue it has ever encountered.

It would seem to me that your brain has actually worked out the best solution. Trust slowly. Toe in the water so to speak. If you were to wake up tomorrow and want to place your life in the hands of every stranger you met, you would be undone. You cant just stop fearing everyone. You have to learn WHO to trust. Because everybody else learned that while you were trying to stay alive.

 

[ILoveLife]

You lived an extra dangerous life; your paranoia kept you alive then
You now live with that paranoia
That paranoia has become more dangerous then your environment

This makes a lot of sense, Prough, thank you for clarifying your thought too.

I was actually coming to the conclusion that in order to heal I do need to learn how to let go of the mechanism of control I developed so things don't get out of hand again and I "lose it", or end therapy with this great T, or start on a self destructive path again. Need to learn how to measure both trust and the healthy amount of paranoia.

 

[Prough]

That's what me and your t are for. Good luck