I Grew Up Over-Therapized. It Took Me a Long Time to Find the Kind of Therapy that Worked for Me
As a child I remember my Mother talking on the phone. I would overhear conversations with someone I believed to be one of our neighbours, both psychologists as it happens. They would talk about me and how my being shy and quiet was going to become a problem in my teens or later in life. I felt like I did not exist (“Hello, I can hear you!”). I felt flawed, and worried about my future. Looking back I would speculate nothing good ever came out of it.
Don’t get me wrong I had a good childhood. Not perfect by any means and if anything I was over-protected. I don’t think the intention was to make a perfectionist but that is what happened. The trying-to-set-me-up-for-my-best-life-and-prevent-disaster-attitude killed any spontaneity and just go-for-it attitude if I ever had any.
Even after I moved away from home I kept looking for something that could fix me. At some point long before those phone calls I had started believing that ‘something is wrong with me’.
In my late teens I attended workshops that I would have been embarrassed to tell my friends about, encouraged by my well-intentioned Mother. Through the ensuing decades I tried cognitive-behavioural therpy, art therapy, re-birthing, spiritual healers, ‘success workshops’ of various kinds, couples therapy etc. They all made me feel better while I was in it, more or less depending on the modality and the skill of the practitioner. Then the impact quickly faded.
It wasn’t until after I had kids and living in an already failing marriage that I found what we can call compassion-oriented therapies (humanistic). It follows one of the central tenets of Carl Rogers, one of the big names in psychology. He proposed that the therapist’s genuine compassion for her client is a key component of effective therapy, long term. When we feel diagnosed or judged, our defenses will prevent the kind of trust that can heal that which is broken.
Instead of band-aid solutions, compassion and caring offers the environment that facilitates actual healing of mistaken beliefs about ourselves, as well as trauma wounds. Genuine relationships where we feel we belong and are accepted for who we are, and not who we think we should be, offer beautiful soil for healing.
This is true for family relationships, friendships, romantic partners, and communities. Even pets.
Our beliefs about who we are, are often so deeply entrenched that it takes a skilled professional with outside eyes to discover the mistaken ones and hold sacred who we truly are. It is not how we are used to relating to each other.
We all deserve love and acceptance, even when we have done things that are hard to forgive. From a compassionate stance we can be accountable and make amends in a way that feeling guilty or shamed may prevent.
My own practice of forgiveness has been one of my most healing expeditions to date.
The idea that ‘something is wrong with me’ is one example of such a mistaken belief – it simply is not true. There is absolutely nothing wrong with me. Yet how I had grown up to view myself, despite my parents’ best intentions, it seemed so ‘real’ that I could not see how this thought was in my driver’s seat. It dictated the way I related to most of my reality and the people around me. It prevented me from feeling truly loved.
Mistaken beliefs continue to pop up occasionally, in stressful situations. They never completely go away. Now that I have felt and experienced a different reality I cannot go back to being caught in their grip. When they show up I catch myself and thank them for their dedication, and move on. I consciously choose a more loving way to see myself. If that doesn’t help I know what my work is: To check with someone I trust deeply how they feel about me and my thoughts about me. My closest friends and trusted therapists offer a good reality check, because in my hardest places they see me through loving eyes.
When you look for a therapist you may want to know if they have a humanistic (or person-centered) perspective. Then interview them. You won’t be able to go into any therapeutic processing in the interview, but you can get an idea of how they relate to you.
Do you feel safe, seen for who you are, and accepted?
That is a good start of a relationship where you can heal and grow and dive into the magical mysteries of not only who you are, but also who you are becoming.
Photo by Valeriia Kogan on Unsplash
Footnote I: Different kinds of therapies work for different people depending on your personality and any underlying medical conditions. If you are currently receiving therapy or under the guidance of a medical professional or taking medication, please continue to do so and speak to Your professional if you have any concerns.
Footnote II: There is plenty of information available on Carl Rogers and his theories, such as here on Psychology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/what-doesnt-kill-us/201904/why-is-unconditional-positive-regard-helpful-in-therapy
Footnote III: I have nothing against any of the modalities mentioned above! I may very well expand my therapeutic journey by adding them back in.