hi everyone.
i am going through a period where i am intensely questioning the value of long term therapy.
i have spent over 10 years in therapy and quite honestly, still have all the same problems I had before I started. I even had a period where I took a break from therapy and during that time, I felt better than I have the entire time I was in therapy.
I am quite conflicted. I even changed careers to train to become a therapist. So I feel giving up on therapy for myself would have to mean giving up on the idea that I want to be a therapist.

Does anyone else feel that therapy has helped them but not nearly as much as the effort and time you put in?

Overall, it feels like its not worth it and is not going to lead to a place where it feels its been worth it.

Is there anyone here who does feel its worth it? Most people I know in therapy feel much like I do.

Im also curious, if anyone has thoughts about what I wrote about changing careers to become a therapist. It seems like I bad idea if I come to conclude that therapy hasnt helped me.

Im really angry about this because I have been in this same spot, questioning and wanting to quit, several times. I hate that this is happenign to me again.

Thanks for reading this.

Hey...good to hear from you!

Ten years is a long time. I'm wondering what your benchmark is for being *done* with therapy? In some ways, we're never done. But, sometimes, it's enough therapy for now.

Personally, I can't usually track my progress very well in the thick of therapy, but when I step away and take a break, I see it clearly. It all comes together. Therapy creates enough of a disequilibrium that I need to step away to see my own progress (for the most part).

Maybe it's time for a break? Or an ending? I don't think this means you're not cut out to be a therapist, and I don't think it means you're done with therapy forever.

I've recently gone back to therapy after taking a six month break...in part, to deal with a pressing family crisis and simply cope through the holidays. I don't expect to be there forever...just for awhile.

But I do expect to need therapy at different times throughout my life. I've accepted that this keeps me sane and functional. And that's a good thing.

I think you're asking good questions.

And to answer your question -- therapy has helped me more than I can say. i've probably spent ten grand on therapy, and it's been worth every penny and then some.

Hey
Just quickly - I started therapy 4 years a go adn would say without a shadow of doubt that it was the best decision I ever made. I didn't even know how much pain I was in and now things feel so much better inside - I'm certainly not 'done' but I can finally see a time when i maybe ok to leave my therapist.
Good luck with your decisions.
Serenity x

Hi DaRock, I have *only* been in therapy for 2.5 years, so I can't say where I may or may not be in 10. I agree with BG that its hard to see progress when you are in the thick of things. When I step back and think harder about how I was 3 years ago compared to now, I can see that I am coping better. But my progress is still gradual and modest so far, and I am not near the place I want to eventually be. I would be discouraged if I honestly could not see any improvement at all after 10 years. Can you go back in your mind and vividly remember what it was like for you when you first started? Maybe it has been so gradual for you that you haven't noticed the overall difference? Or possibly, you really haven't been getting your money's worth, but it doesn't necessarily mean you need to give up on the idea of therapy as a profession. Maybe its just your particular therapist who hasn't been effective with you, and this could actually inspire you to be a better therapist than that to others someday. I don't know your situation, so I have no way of knowing. I'm just throwing ideas out there for you to consider.

However, I do identify with the part about training to be a therapist and how success as a client/patient seems vital to validating that choice. On days when I feel like quitting or like I've failed at therapy, then typically I also strongly question my choice of future career. Admittedly, that could cloud my judgment as to whether my current therapy is truly working for me or not, because I have a vested interest in believing that it really is effective and that everything I am working towards isn't a waste of my time and life.

Hello Da Rock. Can I ask if you've been with the same therapist for those ten years, or have you switched in that time?

If you've been with the same therapist and feeling like you've made no progress, chances are that you haven't! And that that could be down to the limitations of your T and the fact that you might have gotten into a kind of rut and neither of you can see the way forward.

Have you talked to your T about how you feel there's been no progress?

I take it from what you said that you periodically find yourself in this place, questioning the whole process and wondering whether you've made progress or not. Can you remember how it feels in the times when you're not questioning it all? Do you feel like you've made progress in those periods? I ask because I'm very familiar with finding myself in phases where it all seems like I've wasted endless hours and countless dollars only to be right back where I started, but when I move past the frustration that creates I can see that I have changed.

I should add that I haven't made progress or changed because of therapy, but DESPITE it lol. I have a history of quitting therapy because it doesn't help me, but I do find change and progress comes out of all the agonizing I do about why different therapists are no good for me. I call it negative therapy, but without having done the therapy, I doubt if I would have learnt as much or understood as much or changed as much as I have.

I can't really say much to your questions about switching careers. I think it would be very difficult to maintain faith in being a therapist if you feel that therapy itself hasn't helped you. It does sound as if you are reappraising everything at the moment, but there's no need to jump into any decisions immediately.

Best wishes to you Da Rock.

LL

hi LL. what does your quote mean about david bowie?
i have had a number of therapists. i often find myself in this situation. this is not new.
this therapist is the one i landed with after leaving one who i worked with for 5 years. this one ive been w. for a few months.

im like you. i also think i make progress despite my therapists. i just hate all of them. i even hate my supervisor, at my internship, who is a therapist. and i find that for my clients, what the heck do i offer them. its up to them, not me not the therapy.

i have made progress. i just dont know if therapy is accountable for that.

thanks again lamp.

Hi DaRock. Oh the Bowie quote is a line from his song ‘Five Years’ and I picked it because my head is such a mess most of the time that my brain hurts trying to sort it out, sort of tongue in cheek but true nevertheless.

Thanks for explaining about your therapists. If you’ve only been with this latest one a few months then there’s hope yet. You don’t say whether you hate him too (though maybe you do because you’ve said you hate all of them?) I can very much relate to that global feeling of hating the lot of them, some of mine I barely remember, some of them I am still raging furious at, but all of them excepting my latest T rank very low down on my scale of worthwhile human beings. And despite having an overwhelming tendency to automatically blame myself for anything that goes wrong in my relationships, well in my life generally, I am holding to that view of them, for now anyway .

I have a single refrain that I chant at each therapist, ‘I don’t feel heard, I don’t feel understood’. I’ve spent an awful lot of time and energy in seeking to be understood and not succeeding (I’m not even sure my latest T understands me very well, if at all, but he’s doing a lot better than any other T before him.) I wonder if that isn’t how you feel and isn’t what’s contributing to your feeling so angry at everyone? It can be murderously frustrating feeling like you’re explaining things REALLY CLEARLY only to be met with incomprehension every time.

Am I right in understanding that you are actually practising as a therapist? Because you mention your clients, or are you talking about future clients? If you have current clients, how do you cope in the sessions when you’re feeling so hopeless? That must be really difficult for you.

I really hope you can talk to your T a lot more about how you’re feeling, before you decide to give up. I do believe it IS worth persevering.


LL

Hi LL.
You crack me up. I love the reference to blaming yourself yet still finding room to hate therapists. I mean, of course its meaningful and grist for the mill so to speak in terms of growth in therapy...but boy can I relate to really hating therapists and fighting for my right to hate them and having thoughts like oh no, this is real hate, you are aweful, this aint no transference.

my single refrain is you cant help me, you dont know how, and you misrepresent yourself as someone who can. over and over.

You are right. I am practicing as a therapist, in training. I am in my final year. It can be hard, especially when patients are hopeless. I have a hard time dealing with it. it is not easy but being a therapist is way easier than being in therapy. its not as hard as living my life.

I did talk to my T today about my anger. He listened to it all, offered some interpretations and I walked away feeling pretty ok.

We'll see what happens tomorrow when I see him.

Thanks for your input.

quote:

my single refrain is you cant help me, you dont know how, and you misrepresent yourself as someone who can. over and over.

Wow, that sounds so heavy! Do you have any idea where all of those feelings might be coming from?

alpaca, yeah. my parents acted like they knew what was best for me and told me what to do and i always felt they had no idea what they were talking about but acted like authorities anyways.
if someone you mistrust is giving you orders as a child and you listen because you have no other choice and then when you need something for that person they dont come through...it makes sense why i would conclude i cant trust anyone and not only that but that they will act like they can help when in fact they cant.

I think that makes sense, DR. I'm sorry you had to deal with that :-( I hope you get to experience something different in the future!