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PF,
I think there is absolutely a difference between needing therapy and being ready for therapy. The distinction, in my mind, is that not only is there a need for the therapy, but there is a desire for the change.
Take a person with an eating disorder, for example. That person can desperately need to get help. They could be wildly spinning out of control and even be on the brink of death, but until they are ready to change, until they are truly ready to give up their eating disorder in exchange for a better way of life, they are not truly ready for therapy. They must be ready to do the work, to actually change their behavior in order for the therapy to work.
So, I ask you what your T has asked you....are you readyfor therapy? Not do you need to change, but are you ready to change? Are you willing to change?
I think there is absolutely a difference between needing therapy and being ready for therapy. The distinction, in my mind, is that not only is there a need for the therapy, but there is a desire for the change.
Take a person with an eating disorder, for example. That person can desperately need to get help. They could be wildly spinning out of control and even be on the brink of death, but until they are ready to change, until they are truly ready to give up their eating disorder in exchange for a better way of life, they are not truly ready for therapy. They must be ready to do the work, to actually change their behavior in order for the therapy to work.
So, I ask you what your T has asked you....are you readyfor therapy? Not do you need to change, but are you ready to change? Are you willing to change?
Hi PF,
I do think there's such a thing as not being ready for therapy. I know because I experienced it. I was going to therapy and was dealing with what I consciously remembered of my family, which was the fact that my dad was a violent alchoholic. While working with my first T, she asked me to join a group she was co-facilitating. It was 15 weeks long and met once a week. At that time, whenever I spoke about my past, I could acknowledge being hurt and the pain of it, but never the anger. There was one week where the other facilitor actually confronted me about it. That he saw my pain and that it was very real, but where was my anger? There was also another woman in the group who was constantly angry but could never admit to any hurt. It was like having this weird mirror across from me. It hit me that although it was obvious that she was very hurt, she would only express anger. So maybe I was really angry, but would only express hurt. By the end of group, I came face to face with my anger.
My dad was a very violent man, and I grew up terrified of his raging, so much so that my anger terrified me. On a very deep level, I was convinced that if I got angry, something or someone would get hurt. My dad's behavior left me unable to distinguish between anger and violence. I was so scared of my anger, that when I realized it was there, I fled therapy. Group ended, I left and was supposed to call and make an individual appt with my therapist and I up and disappeared. Didn't call, didn't explain, just didn't show up again.
Finally a few years later, it felt like the anger was starting to get out of control and I became worried about my kids, so I called my therapist and told her, "Ok, I've found my anger, now what do I do with it?" She was very gracious about taking me back and I apologized and told her I wouldn't do that again (and I stuck to that) and we started working together again. It was then I recovered memories of the sexual abuse and starting really facing what happened to me as a child.
But I will tell you when I left, it was because I wasn't ready to face it yet. Maybe I just wasn't ready to change, but I also think I didn't feel safe enough or strong enough yet to deal with what I needed to. Over the years of my therapy, I've come to respect my own sense of timing. I couldn't set the pace of the abuse, but I could control at what pace I faced the abuse. My present T has talked about the fact that it can be so very difficult and painful to heal, that he understands some people deciding not to go there and who is he to tell them they have to. It's there life and they should be able to decide what to do about it. That he believes in the process of facing it so that you can heal from it, but he wouldn't tell anyone that they have to put themselves through it. They may not believe that the improvement in their life would be worth what they'd go through to obtain it.
Last but not least, I do believe that the question "are you ready for therapy?" can be a legitimate challenging question from a therapist. But it can also be an easy way to blame the patient for lack of progress.
AG
I do think there's such a thing as not being ready for therapy. I know because I experienced it. I was going to therapy and was dealing with what I consciously remembered of my family, which was the fact that my dad was a violent alchoholic. While working with my first T, she asked me to join a group she was co-facilitating. It was 15 weeks long and met once a week. At that time, whenever I spoke about my past, I could acknowledge being hurt and the pain of it, but never the anger. There was one week where the other facilitor actually confronted me about it. That he saw my pain and that it was very real, but where was my anger? There was also another woman in the group who was constantly angry but could never admit to any hurt. It was like having this weird mirror across from me. It hit me that although it was obvious that she was very hurt, she would only express anger. So maybe I was really angry, but would only express hurt. By the end of group, I came face to face with my anger.
My dad was a very violent man, and I grew up terrified of his raging, so much so that my anger terrified me. On a very deep level, I was convinced that if I got angry, something or someone would get hurt. My dad's behavior left me unable to distinguish between anger and violence. I was so scared of my anger, that when I realized it was there, I fled therapy. Group ended, I left and was supposed to call and make an individual appt with my therapist and I up and disappeared. Didn't call, didn't explain, just didn't show up again.
Finally a few years later, it felt like the anger was starting to get out of control and I became worried about my kids, so I called my therapist and told her, "Ok, I've found my anger, now what do I do with it?" She was very gracious about taking me back and I apologized and told her I wouldn't do that again (and I stuck to that) and we started working together again. It was then I recovered memories of the sexual abuse and starting really facing what happened to me as a child.
But I will tell you when I left, it was because I wasn't ready to face it yet. Maybe I just wasn't ready to change, but I also think I didn't feel safe enough or strong enough yet to deal with what I needed to. Over the years of my therapy, I've come to respect my own sense of timing. I couldn't set the pace of the abuse, but I could control at what pace I faced the abuse. My present T has talked about the fact that it can be so very difficult and painful to heal, that he understands some people deciding not to go there and who is he to tell them they have to. It's there life and they should be able to decide what to do about it. That he believes in the process of facing it so that you can heal from it, but he wouldn't tell anyone that they have to put themselves through it. They may not believe that the improvement in their life would be worth what they'd go through to obtain it.
Last but not least, I do believe that the question "are you ready for therapy?" can be a legitimate challenging question from a therapist. But it can also be an easy way to blame the patient for lack of progress.
AG
hi permafrost!
i've been in therapy for a while and in some ways i could say that when i first went (6 years ago) i wasnt really ready for therapy, i didn't really know what therapy was. but i learned, slowly and maybe slowly i became more ready.
sometimes, i think even now maybe i'm not quite or i'm just getting there now...
i think it's ok to start off feeling like you 'need' therapy, which means you feel the 'need' for change even though you don't yet know how you'll do that.
don't be discouraged, you'll be ok at your own pace.
puppet
(p.s. just having read what i wrote, i realised i always seem to give advice / say nice things that i wouldn't say to myself - so maybe this advice is for me too)
i've been in therapy for a while and in some ways i could say that when i first went (6 years ago) i wasnt really ready for therapy, i didn't really know what therapy was. but i learned, slowly and maybe slowly i became more ready.
sometimes, i think even now maybe i'm not quite or i'm just getting there now...
i think it's ok to start off feeling like you 'need' therapy, which means you feel the 'need' for change even though you don't yet know how you'll do that.
don't be discouraged, you'll be ok at your own pace.
puppet
(p.s. just having read what i wrote, i realised i always seem to give advice / say nice things that i wouldn't say to myself - so maybe this advice is for me too)