Lovely idea this . I'll put my thinking
cap on. It's always good to have some goals to aim
for.

Hi Poppet,

I was just thinking yesterday that I wanted to ask my T exactly how they meassure progress in therapy. Do you know how?

I'd like to transition to once a month therapy sometime in 2013.

Like HIC, I'm going to attempt tapering off. Not sure how far I will get, yet....

i think our goals will be learning a bit more about us, there's still a lot of blocks..so thats on-going i guess ? t and we have a little fill in arrangement so we know whos been around and talking. one of t's goals and ours is to feel a bit more in body (if that makes any sense..our brain and the body arent really joined up so to speak)..so t says there is work we can do which involves no touch and a very slow introduction to re-introduce us to the body...umm not sure on this one but t said we can do a lot of talking before we even attempt it later in the year and she will help us stay safe...might have to come back to that one methinks...

Poppet, there's a little more work that I want to do, but it's mainly going back and doing some exercises with eye contact and different stuff that T asked to do months and months ago and I refused to at the time. Mostly I've achieved what I wanted to and I'm more happy with the way my life is going. I'm on day 11 of a two-week break right now, and I don't seem to be suffering aside from being bored out of my mind over the holiday since most of my normal activities have been cancelled. Last year I had only a 9-day break from oldT and it felt like an eternity. So I'm thinking I may be ready to go to every other week starting now, and maybe by the end of the year I will just schedule as needed. Don't know. Anyway, good luck to everyone else on their goals!

quote:

..so basically you are both looking to end at some point and think you've done enough work ?

Nah, I wouldn't go that far. But I feel more functional and peaceful (er, most days, anyway) and like I'm ready for therapy to be less of a major focus in my life. I still want to see my T and do therapy-- just less of it. I very recently switched to an every two weeks schedule, and that's been going mostly okay so far. I'm thinking if I can manage with that for the next several months, I will try switching to once a month sometime in 2013. My ideas after that are somewhat hazy. . . maybe I will just do once a month forever, lol! I can't quite fathom life without T, so definitively ending isn't in my thoughts yet.

P.S. Someone else please talk! I feel like I'm always the last one to post on threads these days and it's making me paranoid.

sure it's nothing personal, HiC!
It sounds great to be comfortable with where you are in terms of contact and support in therapy... Occasionally I think I'm ok with it all, but it only takes a tiny thing to completely disrupt that feeling.
Perhaps occasionally will become once in a while,then every now and again and perhaps even sometimes, often and more often than not? In about 5 years? I asked my T how long she thought I'd be at this therapy lark - she declined to be precise... But that's just a T thing, eh?!

I've long given up asking when therapy is going to end - T won't say and I haven't a clue But there will be a time I know; all T says is that I will know when the time is right and I have to believe her on that one

For me whether in therapy or not, just getting through 2013 will be an event.

I just want to say that all of you on this forum are an encouragement!

I spent the entirety of 2012 in varying degrees of crisis. I was in the midst of divorce, major upheavals and stress at work, financial difficulties were the top three. Oh, and I had been terminated by my T at the end of 2011 and was starting out with a new T a year ago.

And new T gets huge credit for getting me through. I needed to check in with him nearly every day. It wasn't extensive, but he never wavered in his consistency with me.

So, as 2013 begins, I am happy to say I've emerged from crisis mode. I'm not sure what that means for therapy. I acknowledge that I still have a LOT of work ahead of me, but I'm not sure how to proceed. So my goal is stepping into the next phase. It seems amorphous, but it's big for me.

I also want to engage more in the boards here. I have learned so much from so many of you, and I just haven't had the energy to consistently participate. I hope that changes in 2013.

Courage and grace to all of you!

quote:

Originally posted by Iris:
I asked my T how long she thought I'd be at this therapy lark - she declined to be precise... But that's just a T thing, eh?!

What's a therapy lark?

Hi CtL,
A "lark" is a colloquial term meaning a sort of joke... So I was being a bit flippant...
Not feeling at all flippant about the experience at the moment!

I am now envisaging a lovely singing bird in my T's office... that I could talk to instead of avoiding eye contact!

Iris,

Are you from the UK?

what on earth makes you think that?!?
Indeed.

Your use of words!!