Hi Tas,

2 years and 7 months in counselling. My brother died after a long spell in hospital and it really affected me. My friend knew this guy and suggested I see him, I have not looked back since. So I started because of grief and then a whole load of other stuff!!!! Now my mother has passed I am sure I will be here for who knows how much longer

Great question TAS (and nice to meet you!)
I am always interested in these two questions when meeting new people here.
I've been going in psychoanalysis for almost 4 years now, and started because i was depressed and struggled with the following anxiety. I was 20 years old when this terrible state started escalating and i found myself lost in this deep existential crises.
Thank God i found T!

Hi TAS... well let's see. I was with oldT for 2 years and 9 months when he abruptly abandoned me. I had started therapy with him because my mother was seriously ill and she died a few weeks after I began therapy. I was also struggling with a special needs child. One thing led to another and when the attachment kicked in (almost immediately with him) I just kept going back.

I just hit the 2 year mark with my current T. I began to see him to recover from the trauma inflicted on me by oldT when he abandoned me and then banished me from his existence. I am also hoping we can finish the work I started with oldT at some point once I am able to completely process my oldT trauma and feel safe enough with T.

TN

Great question, TAS! I've been in therapy about 18 months. I started because I was having a lot of problems. I had suicidal ideations (didn't actually want to "do it," but the thoughts would recur with troubling frequency) struggled with mild SI, and also had a phobia about driving in the new city I was living in. On a deeper level, I had what felt like a very fragmented sense of self. There was just this sense of being a poorly integrated personality that was barely keeping together and might fly to pieces at any moment. Most uncomfortable.

So, I dragged myself to T's office one day and pretty much instantly felt that she could help. I poured out a lot of stuff those first few sessions. Once I had vented quite a bit we started on the long process of figuring out the function of all my symptoms and how and why they evolved. I haven't always liked that so much because it's challenged some of the way I've preferred to view my childhood and family, but it's been good for me. Most of my symptoms cleared up fairly quickly, though I still struggle at times. I'm sticking around, apparently for the long haul, partly because attachment set in and partly because I value T's support as I try to create a more coherent, confident, and stable self.

I started seeing me T almost a year ago. Reason for me to start seeing T were full-blown PTSD symptoms that acted up again back then (caused by past csa) and it wasn't pretty.

It felt like this was the only chance I had left.

As scary as the therapy process was and still is, I am not regretting it at all. Things take much, much longer than I had anticipated and I really hope that T can help me through the worst of it. Our time together will be limited as T is not working privately but via a crisis center, so I don't know yet how long it will be.

T is great though. Very supportive, caring, kind and so far she seems to believe that those things happened to me. Not having been believed when I tried to reach out for help back in those days, this is huge (and still feels unreal.)

I've been in therapy on and off for over thirty years - I go through phases of falling over myself, trying to sort myself out, get nowhere, go running around looking for a therapist to help, they don't help, I shut up shop and get on with my life until I fall over myself and start the whole process again .

I've been in therapy pretty consistently for the last three and a bit years, but not with the same T. In fact of the 35 plus Ts I've seen in the course of my therapy career, 24 of them have been during these last three years.

Hard to say what keeps bringing me to therapy, as in, what my issues are - but the new P I've seen four times now has given me some labels to play around with and they sort of fit so I'll use them as shorthand - severe anxiety disorder, secondary depression, avoidant and obsessive aspects and some borderline traits. LOL and none of those actually describe or address what my actual issue is. Oh well

Good thread TAS, it's always interesting to find out stuff about members that doesn't always come up in general threads.

LL

Good question Tas! I've appreciated everyone's responses.

For me, I have been in and out of therapy since I was suicidal at 16. 20 years and 5 therapist's later (worked with T1 - T6 for between 4 months and 18 months over the years, mostly on depression and anxiety)

Current T is my T for life, and I've been with her for nearly 2 years. Started therapy after a nearly 3 year hiatus cause I was desperate for help after sinking into a deep depression, so my doctor sent me to my T. Never expected it to go long term, but still plugging along in dealing with ongoing major depression along with OCD, anxiety, and PTSD. Essentially my inner world is complete chaos, and I was struggling to keep it all inside. Now I don't have to cause I've got my awesome T!

Five years. My husband suggested I go because I was depressed and suicidal after major emergency surgery. ~D.

I guess I should answer my own question

I was going through life...coasting along...a betrayal occurred and let's just say, I couldn't handle it. It took me 4 years to finally seek out help...I wanted to solve the problem on my own. I realized I was in over my head.

Everything from my childhood that I had pushed away and hidden...all the emotions came to the front...knocking me on my hiney.

I have been with Therapist for a year. I have a lot to work through.

There are some amazing, courageous people on this forum

To Better Days,
T.

i started therapy in January 2011. it took me 4 months from the time my primary doc referred me to the time i contacted my T. it was a very difficult thing to do. i was at the end of my rope with my marriage but couldn't seem to make a move. well, i've been divorced for a year and a half now, but other things have come to the front, mostly tied with low self-esteem, not knowing who i am at 50, which believe me is a tough enough realization. anyway, i think i'm in it for the long haul cuz i don't know if i can ever say good bye.

Hi TAS

Good Thread. I don't know much about most members here. I started therapy due to severe depression. I had Suicidal Thoughts and some SI problems. After T taught me that what I thought was "normal" growing up in an alcoholic home, actually wasn't normal at all, we started working on the issues revolving around that. I have been seeing T on and off for almost 10 years. I moved away for 5 of those years in which I didn't see her at all. I am just now, starting to fully and completely trust her and we are working on processing the traumas I went through as a child that I have kept in all this time as well as a load of other issues that come from growing up in the type of environment that I did. It's hard, sometimes I want to give up. It's painful. But in the end, I know I am better off now than I was then, so I am in it for the long haul as well!

Hey Tas

I've been in psychoanalysis for 6 years now, mainly for depression, best thing I've ever done is go to T

Luci

I've been going for 17 months, except for two while my T was hospitalized....
Started going bc of self-destructive behaviors mainly evident in binge-eating, but some other things as well. Also have what T described as PTSD that is manifest in arachniphobia. (being "surprised" by a spider, esp a dark one, triggers anxiety and brings back certain memories.)

Have learned and am still learning about those things and so much more...

Hugs to all,
Starry