Still Struggling With Therapy After 6 Months

[LilyOfTheValley]

I've been seeing a psychologist weekly (never missing a week) since I was diagnosed with C-PTSD over 6 months ago. Even before I knew what was "wrong" with me, I knew that a big problem for me is that I could never talk to anyone. I have lots of friends, but found myself to be a great listener without ever really sharing anything personal about me. I've always been like this so I have no experience with really talking with someone.

After over six months of therapy, I'm still struggling. My primary method of communication is still my journal, which I bring in to him every week. After he is finished reading, I immediately tense up with dread waiting to see what he is going to pick out to discuss with me. He has told me multiple times that it's my therapy and he wants me to tell him what I want to discuss, but I can't. To me, it's like choosing my own torture.

Sometimes he'll pick something and we'll have a good session (usually something in the present). Most times, if he touches on something painful I completely dissociate and don't remember the session at all, or we spend a large portion of the session sitting in silence because I can't get myself to talk. After all this time, we still haven't really gotten near the traumas.

In between sessions, I find myself wanting to talk to him, tell him things, so that I can finally start getting a grasp on all of this. But, when I get there, it's like all my confidence goes away and all that remains is the anxiety of what this week's session will bring for discussion - regardless of whether I wanted to discuss that particular topic or not prior to actually walking into his office.

I've tried talking to him about this, but he reassures me that I do usually talk to him. He has excellent credentials and I know he has treated his share of PTSD patients before so he knows what he's doing. In the beginning, I was patient with myself since I knew it would probably take quite some time to open up to someone this much. He already knows more about me than anyone, but it barely scratches the surface since I still hide so much of what I am thinking and feeling. These last few weeks I am losing patience with myself. I didn't think that after so long, I would still be so scared of letting someone have access to what's really going on inside.

I'm not sure what I'm seeking from you all by posting this. I know I want to hear from anyone else that has been in therapy for quite a while and finally got past that fear (how?). But, even more basic, I think I need to understand what I'm really afraid of. I trust his experience, I respect him, I never feel judged, and he's shown me many times that he can be spot on when I actually can share something I'm really thinking/feeling. But yet, almost every week, there is this wall that I throw up and I don't know why.

 

[kers]

I've been in therapy for, well, years, and I think it's been very productive and life-altering, but it's also been slower than molasses on a cold day. It helps a lot for me to discuss my reticence on any given day--talking about what I'm afraid of makes it easier to see that it's safe to talk. Talking about not talking is often a huge part of what's valuable for me in therapy. Just yesterday I spent an hour talking about not wanting to talk--and then felt brave enough to spit out one important sentence on the feared topic. It's as much as I could handle, and that's okay.

At the risk of sounding like a therapist, I think it's worth thinking about why you are getting impatient with yourself, why it is hard to let yourself go at your own pace, slow though it may be?

 

[LilyOfTheValley]

I'm sure a lot of the reason I lose patience is that I want to feel better and know that I am standing in my own way. Progress is so incredibly slow that it's difficult to see, although I am finally seeing some.

It's also upsetting to realize how much of my life I have lost now that I am finally seeing it. I know I add pressure to myself by thinking that every week that goes by is another week lost by not "living". Every time I avoid something because of my fears and anxiety, especially something I want to do, it's another reminder of what I'm missing out on because of all of this.

I guess what it boils down to is I didn't think it would take this long. When I first started therapy, some of the articles I read stated that PTSD could be treated in X amount of sessions. I don't remember the number, but I do know I am already well beyond it and nowhere near where I hope to end up. I just went and read Steps to Recovery and that seems like a much more realistic perspective compared to thinking I should be at certain point after a certain number of sessions.

Thanks, Kers, it looks like your question helped me to answer my own. :smile:

 

[anni]

I'm just replying also because sometimes it can be really frustrating to read statistics about how long it takes to treat things. Everyone is so different that I almost wish the professionals wouldn't put that sort of information out there or at least not state it so definitively, you know? Information one finds on the web varies also, I see when I'm tooling around there which confuses me even more. I don't have C-PTSD, but have read that the dynamics are different there also than with the PTSD sufferer. It just might make patients to be too hard on themselves to think there's some parameter, I think. You're doing the best you can, and maybe will surprise yourself with some realization that the healing has progressed further than you perhaps are aware of at the moment.

Kers answer was really to the point, wasn't it? I liked it a LOT!

I hope you're feeling a little more optimistic with things today,

Anni

 

[Tinyflame]

I guess if you are doing the best you can it would be a helpful thing to start to learn to like yourself in the now (as you are now). Seems others find that easier to see about "us" sometimes than we do.

Reminds me of that saying "My boss is really critical and I'm self-employed". :( !