Post-FIRE "Support" Group?

[Kris]

Anyway - thanks everyone. This has given me more things to ponder and another book to add to my books to read list. :)

You've read enough books, it's time to stop reading the words of mental health professionals and to go talk to a mental health professional.

You can't get what you get from therapy by reading books.

Yes - but I LOVE reading books and dislike talking to mental health professionals...It seems like yet another to do item to add to my generally hectic life that I don't really have the mental bandwidth to tackle right now.

You had time to read an entire neuroscience textbook that I recommended to you and you talk all the time about how your job isn't demanding.

I'm going to keep harping on this until you do it.

It is significantly easier and less mental effort for me to read an academic textbook or develop software than to talk about my feelings. Me having a crying session is both very needed and also wipes me out mentally for the rest of the day.

But yes - please continue harping.  It is appreciated. One guy spent five years telling me I should start running before I started running. I still thank him for it to this day.

I am just absurdly stubborn about taking the medicine.

You're very invested in being stubborn and unwilling to make needed changes. From your posts it sounds almost as though you are proud of it. That's also something to explore in therapy. Which you desperately need.

Go to therapy.

I think TreeLeaf is about the furthest thing from proud of their issues, but they are an incredibly remarkable case of someone who has been through profoundly extreme trauma and developed adaptations as a result that have produced an incredibly functional life considering. Their issues are so core to their being that they've actually found pretty effective workarounds.

They have no right to be as functional and balanced as they are given their history, it's kind of amazing. But it does mean that every time they speak about themselves, it gives off a very bizarre impression, but when they write about not themselves, sounds well reasoned, balanced, and often quite insightful.

Sadly, with this particular history of trauma, aversion to professional help is one of the common symptoms. But TreeLeaf desperately wants help, and has sought resources from me in particular, so it's not a resistance to help, it's a resistance to the potential and very real risk of retraumatization by medical professionals.

The answer to that is obviously not avoidance, but as I said, that avoidance is an active symptom, so it's hard to overcome without the treatment that the person is avoiding. Kind of a vicious self-perpetuating cycle.

Out of context I may sound like I'm being harsh with TreeLeaf and getting impatient, but I'm not. My responses come from the unseen context of a lot of in depth engagement in PMs and in my journal. Every "go to fucking therapy" from me is said with a lot of love and pages and pages of supported explanation and discussion prefacing them.

Aha. Yes, I can see I am missing a lot of context. Thanks for the clarification. Apologies, @TreeLeaf

[Metalcat]

Aha. Yes, I can see I am missing a lot of context. Thanks for the clarification. Apologies, @TreeLeaf

I knew you would appreciate a bit of explanation. I'm a little protective of TreeLeaf sometimes because they're so easily misunderstood, but such a remarkable example of resilience and growth through trauma.

Once they do finally find the right fit with the right therapist, they will have such rapid, explosive growth, I just wish they could just magically see that and overcome the barrier that they have. It's heartbreaking really.

[Villanelle]

I just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone for the support and kind words. 

I have no real idea what is causing my random episodes of extreme fatigue, depression, bloating and abdominal pain, headaches, etc.

It's hard for me to say if it is some sort of inflammation, IBD, burnout, depression, or the result of severe childhood trauma.

It isn't a constant thing though and I am generally happy and well. I have good days and bad days, but am generally less happy than most people. I'm not going to describe the childhood trauma here. If someone really wants to know they can look at my journal.

My wife and I have always had a good relationship. She just never wanted or wants to work a traditional job and wanted a 1950s style relationship. This is what she wanted since she was 10 years old. She has always been against the idea of her working a traditional job.

Throughout our relationship a surprising number of people have taken issue with this. Everything from she must be using me for my money, to I am abusing her because she does most of the child raising work while I have a career and do the taxes and change the car oil and take out the trash and get groceries and whatnot.

Some people have even said I am holding her back because she did not want to go to college or work a traditional job, and clearly I enabled her to not have to do these things.

It seems almost like - being a housewife and mother aren't even considered valuable or respected roles anymore in our society.

Anyway - thanks everyone. This has given me more things to ponder and another book to add to my books to read list. :)

I don't think there's anything at all wrong with an agreement like that if it works for both both spouses.  You both found something that met your needs and worked for the other person.  Some people are always going to take issues with that set up.  But I'll offer that one reason you might get so much pushback is the way you talk about it.  You say, "my wife has made it clear she will never work".  That doesn't sound at all like a mutual decision, or even one you support.  It sounds like a term she has dictated and you feel you have to accept.  If you'd have said, "my wife and I agreed early on that she would care for the house and family, and I'd be the breadwinner.  So that would be  huge renegotiation of terms and I don't think it would be fair to ask that of her.  Nor would I feel right asking her that,"  you likely would have gotten a very different reaction.  Because that sounds like you are not only on board with the arrangement, but that you were well aware of it going in to things and you support that division of labor.

[Metalcat]

I just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone for the support and kind words. 

I have no real idea what is causing my random episodes of extreme fatigue, depression, bloating and abdominal pain, headaches, etc.

It's hard for me to say if it is some sort of inflammation, IBD, burnout, depression, or the result of severe childhood trauma.

It isn't a constant thing though and I am generally happy and well. I have good days and bad days, but am generally less happy than most people. I'm not going to describe the childhood trauma here. If someone really wants to know they can look at my journal.

My wife and I have always had a good relationship. She just never wanted or wants to work a traditional job and wanted a 1950s style relationship. This is what she wanted since she was 10 years old. She has always been against the idea of her working a traditional job.

Throughout our relationship a surprising number of people have taken issue with this. Everything from she must be using me for my money, to I am abusing her because she does most of the child raising work while I have a career and do the taxes and change the car oil and take out the trash and get groceries and whatnot.

Some people have even said I am holding her back because she did not want to go to college or work a traditional job, and clearly I enabled her to not have to do these things.

It seems almost like - being a housewife and mother aren't even considered valuable or respected roles anymore in our society.

Anyway - thanks everyone. This has given me more things to ponder and another book to add to my books to read list. :)

I don't think there's anything at all wrong with an agreement like that if it works for both both spouses.  You both found something that met your needs and worked for the other person.  Some people are always going to take issues with that set up.  But I'll offer that one reason you might get so much pushback is the way you talk about it.  You say, "my wife has made it clear she will never work".  That doesn't sound at all like a mutual decision, or even one you support.  It sounds like a term she has dictated and you feel you have to accept.  If you'd have said, "my wife and I agreed early on that she would care for the house and family, and I'd be the breadwinner.  So that would be  huge renegotiation of terms and I don't think it would be fair to ask that of her.  Nor would I feel right asking her that,"  you likely would have gotten a very different reaction.  Because that sounds like you are not only on board with the arrangement, but that you were well aware of it going in to things and you support that division of labor.

This is very true, and even more people would take issue with a different set up.

I would be pretty willing to bet that DH and I received more negative comments about me making twice as much as him than TreeLeaf has about his wife being a SAHM.

People say a lot of judgmental shit. They just do.

[curious_george]

Aha. Yes, I can see I am missing a lot of context. Thanks for the clarification. Apologies, @TreeLeaf

I knew you would appreciate a bit of explanation. I'm a little protective of TreeLeaf sometimes because they're so easily misunderstood, but such a remarkable example of resilience and growth through trauma.

Once they do finally find the right fit with the right therapist, they will have such rapid, explosive growth, I just wish they could just magically see that and overcome the barrier that they have. It's heartbreaking really.

Thanks @Metalcat ... I do have trouble trusting anyone in any sort of position of authority, including medical professionals and therapists. When you spend your childhood and teenage years being hurt by authority figures I suppose this is what happens.

I may be hesitant to go to therapy but I feel like I have grown emotionally through the conversations we have had through the forum and through dm's and through some of the books you have recommended. They have helped me to better understand myself and my past.

In my experience my mood is influenced by a lot of things, including how well I sleep, how much stress I am under, what sorts of socialization I have or have not done, how much sugar I have eaten, etc. It isn't simply how I think or perceive things, which I admit are pretty negative, fearful, and depressing at times. It seems to be a combination of a lot of different factors.

I have had some luck in my career and marriage and physical health in life which have certainly helped to decrease the stress levels that I experience. Money may not buy happiness but I can certainly use it to get rid of a ton of negative experiences in life and reduce my stress levels by buying my way out of negative experiences.

I have, in general though, been depressed for most of my life. It feels like I have learned to cope fairly well with a mood disorder, all things considered, but it certainly is not ideal.

I guess it isn't clear to me how therapy helps exactly. Eating salmon and vegetables and taking vitamin d are all pretty obvious. I can run an experiment and add these things to my routine for a few weeks and feel the results.

With therapy it isn't as obvious, at least in my mind, and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me. Which I'm sure a therapist would say is not a healthy way to view the relationship.

I can discuss my feelings, and past, and whatnot in therapy..I can take negative and pessimistic ways of thinking and viewing things and turn them into more positive and healthy perspectives, but will this necessarily increase my baseline happiness levels in my life overtime? Will this change my mood?

Can I actually ... get rid of a lifelong mood disorder with therapy? My experience tells me no. It might help, but I doubt I will ever experience life the way a normal person experiences life unless we really develop a better understanding of the brain and better treatment options.

Which - I am fine with. I've gone through an immense amount of pain and suffering in life and eventually I got to a point where it's like...well, whatever it is, I've already experienced worse.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm painting a picture that is too negative or overly dramatic on these forums. My past was horrible, but I'm not exactly wallowing in misery today, and there are a lot of people in the world who need far more help than I do. People who may not know how to voice how they feel, or who may not even realize they are depressed and not thinking about things correctly.

There is definitely room for improvement though, for sure. It's just not entirely clear to me how much room there is and it's not obvious to me how effective therapy is for mood improvement vs simply talking to a friend about things. Maybe I'm completely missing something.

Thoughts?

[Fru-Gal]

I totally relate to the “paying people to love me” feeling. However after a few tries (this was years ago) I found a good therapist and spent many years talking to them. What I realized was that good therapy fixes much of your self-talk and flawed thinking.

Eventually, you are talking to yourself the way the therapist is, with compassion and curiosity, exploring rather than reacting and going down rabbit holes. I also completely empathize with the fear of authority and what @Metalcat called getting “retraumatized” — and I don’t have PTSD so I can’t even begin to relate to that part of it.

As many have said, finding the right therapist is definitely not quick or easy. But once you do, there’s a lot to be learned from it.

[Financial.Velociraptor]

and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me.

They/them, that was sort of provocative.  I don't believe for a second you consider they's spouse to be your "whore", but rather your equal partner.  So why did they use such language?  Internet interaction is different than meatspace but just DAYUM!  Metalcat can't be your therapist though they are doing a damn fine job within the limitations.   You NEED to see someone.  In the spirit of MMM: *FACEPUNCH*   Get counseling for fucks sake!

[Villanelle]

Aha. Yes, I can see I am missing a lot of context. Thanks for the clarification. Apologies, @TreeLeaf

I knew you would appreciate a bit of explanation. I'm a little protective of TreeLeaf sometimes because they're so easily misunderstood, but such a remarkable example of resilience and growth through trauma.

Once they do finally find the right fit with the right therapist, they will have such rapid, explosive growth, I just wish they could just magically see that and overcome the barrier that they have. It's heartbreaking really.

Thanks @Metalcat ... I do have trouble trusting anyone in any sort of position of authority, including medical professionals and therapists. When you spend your childhood and teenage years being hurt by authority figures I suppose this is what happens.

I may be hesitant to go to therapy but I feel like I have grown emotionally through the conversations we have had through the forum and through dm's and through some of the books you have recommended. They have helped me to better understand myself and my past.

In my experience my mood is influenced by a lot of things, including how well I sleep, how much stress I am under, what sorts of socialization I have or have not done, how much sugar I have eaten, etc. It isn't simply how I think or perceive things, which I admit are pretty negative, fearful, and depressing at times. It seems to be a combination of a lot of different factors.

I have had some luck in my career and marriage and physical health in life which have certainly helped to decrease the stress levels that I experience. Money may not buy happiness but I can certainly use it to get rid of a ton of negative experiences in life and reduce my stress levels by buying my way out of negative experiences.

I have, in general though, been depressed for most of my life. It feels like I have learned to cope fairly well with a mood disorder, all things considered, but it certainly is not ideal.

I guess it isn't clear to me how therapy helps exactly. Eating salmon and vegetables and taking vitamin d are all pretty obvious. I can run an experiment and add these things to my routine for a few weeks and feel the results.

With therapy it isn't as obvious, at least in my mind, and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me. Which I'm sure a therapist would say is not a healthy way to view the relationship.

I can discuss my feelings, and past, and whatnot in therapy..I can take negative and pessimistic ways of thinking and viewing things and turn them into more positive and healthy perspectives, but will this necessarily increase my baseline happiness levels in my life overtime? Will this change my mood?

Can I actually ... get rid of a lifelong mood disorder with therapy? My experience tells me no. It might help, but I doubt I will ever experience life the way a normal person experiences life unless we really develop a better understanding of the brain and better treatment options.

Which - I am fine with. I've gone through an immense amount of pain and suffering in life and eventually I got to a point where it's like...well, whatever it is, I've already experienced worse.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm painting a picture that is too negative or overly dramatic on these forums. My past was horrible, but I'm not exactly wallowing in misery today, and there are a lot of people in the world who need far more help than I do. People who may not know how to voice how they feel, or who may not even realize they are depressed and not thinking about things correctly.

There is definitely room for improvement though, for sure. It's just not entirely clear to me how much room there is and it's not obvious to me how effective therapy is for mood improvement vs simply talking to a friend about things. Maybe I'm completely missing something.

Thoughts?

I have lifelong anxiety, mostly of the social variety. A [wonderful] therapist surprised me when she characterized it as fairly severe, because I move through life okay, and in fact most people would never know I had significant anxiety, even after spending a meaningful amount of time.  But it turns out that's just because I've adapted quite well.  I can fake it, though that takes even more energy than the energy being sucked up by the anxiety. 

I'll never ditch this.  That I know.  But therapy helped me tremendously.  I learned some coping mechanisms, and I also just learned to process and accept things.  And they changed the way I talk to myself about myself.  I just feel less wrong inside my head. And then all of that helped me be somewhat less anxious, which made the coping more effective, which made me less anxious, etc.  Again, they didn't "cure" me.  But they adjusted me so that the malfunctioning parts of my thinking function better.

It did increase my baseline happiness and my mood. 

And also, why not go?  Why not commit to, say... 6 months of weekly appointments, and see what happens?  Do you fear you will come out of it worse off?  It not, then give it a try, and the worst that happens is essentially nothing. If you won't do that, then you probably need to admit to yourself that all this "I don't see how it will help" is probably an excuse to avoid something you don't want to do for other reasons. 

[curious_george]

and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me.

They/them, that was sort of provocative.  I don't believe for a second you consider they's spouse to be your "whore", but rather your equal partner.  So why did they use such language?  Internet interaction is different than meatspace but just DAYUM!  Metalcat can't be your therapist though they are doing a damn fine job within the limitations.   You NEED to see someone.  In the spirit of MMM: *FACEPUNCH*   Get counseling for fucks sake!

I am so confused how this struck a chord, or what my wife has to do with anything. I can assure you that I value my wife more than anyone on the planet and that she is not a whore, considering I'm the only man she has ever slept with.

Metalcat is free to respond or not respond, lol. That's her choice. There are tons of people that she decides to ignore, and for good reason. Eventually I will probably be one of those people - but I doubt it will be because of this post, lol.

Relax.

[Financial.Velociraptor]

and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me.

They/them, that was sort of provocative.  I don't believe for a second you consider they's spouse to be your "whore", but rather your equal partner.  So why did they use such language?  Internet interaction is different than meatspace but just DAYUM!  Metalcat can't be your therapist though they are doing a damn fine job within the limitations.   You NEED to see someone.  In the spirit of MMM: *FACEPUNCH*   Get counseling for fucks sake!

I am so confused how this struck a chord, or what my wife has to do with anything. I can assure you that I value my wife more than anyone on the planet and that she is not a whore, considering I'm the only man she has ever slept with.

Metalcat is free to respond or not respond, lol. That's her choice. There are tons of people that she decides to ignore, and for good reason. Eventually I will probably be one of those people - but I doubt it will be because of this post, lol.

Relax.

Seems I read something into your relationship that isn't there.  Apologies.  Rock on.

[Metalcat]

and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me.

They/them, that was sort of provocative.  I don't believe for a second you consider they's spouse to be your "whore", but rather your equal partner.  So why did they use such language?  Internet interaction is different than meatspace but just DAYUM!  Metalcat can't be your therapist though they are doing a damn fine job within the limitations.   You NEED to see someone.  In the spirit of MMM: *FACEPUNCH*   Get counseling for fucks sake!

I am so confused how this struck a chord, or what my wife has to do with anything. I can assure you that I value my wife more than anyone on the planet and that she is not a whore, considering I'm the only man she has ever slept with.

Metalcat is free to respond or not respond, lol. That's her choice. There are tons of people that she decides to ignore, and for good reason. Eventually I will probably be one of those people - but I doubt it will be because of this post, lol.

Relax.

Seems I read something into your relationship that isn't there.  Apologies.  Rock on.

I'm super fucking confused

[Metalcat]

Aha. Yes, I can see I am missing a lot of context. Thanks for the clarification. Apologies, @TreeLeaf

I knew you would appreciate a bit of explanation. I'm a little protective of TreeLeaf sometimes because they're so easily misunderstood, but such a remarkable example of resilience and growth through trauma.

Once they do finally find the right fit with the right therapist, they will have such rapid, explosive growth, I just wish they could just magically see that and overcome the barrier that they have. It's heartbreaking really.

Thanks @Metalcat ... I do have trouble trusting anyone in any sort of position of authority, including medical professionals and therapists. When you spend your childhood and teenage years being hurt by authority figures I suppose this is what happens.

I may be hesitant to go to therapy but I feel like I have grown emotionally through the conversations we have had through the forum and through dm's and through some of the books you have recommended. They have helped me to better understand myself and my past.

In my experience my mood is influenced by a lot of things, including how well I sleep, how much stress I am under, what sorts of socialization I have or have not done, how much sugar I have eaten, etc. It isn't simply how I think or perceive things, which I admit are pretty negative, fearful, and depressing at times. It seems to be a combination of a lot of different factors.

I have had some luck in my career and marriage and physical health in life which have certainly helped to decrease the stress levels that I experience. Money may not buy happiness but I can certainly use it to get rid of a ton of negative experiences in life and reduce my stress levels by buying my way out of negative experiences.

I have, in general though, been depressed for most of my life. It feels like I have learned to cope fairly well with a mood disorder, all things considered, but it certainly is not ideal.

I guess it isn't clear to me how therapy helps exactly. Eating salmon and vegetables and taking vitamin d are all pretty obvious. I can run an experiment and add these things to my routine for a few weeks and feel the results.

With therapy it isn't as obvious, at least in my mind, and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me. Which I'm sure a therapist would say is not a healthy way to view the relationship.

I can discuss my feelings, and past, and whatnot in therapy..I can take negative and pessimistic ways of thinking and viewing things and turn them into more positive and healthy perspectives, but will this necessarily increase my baseline happiness levels in my life overtime? Will this change my mood?

Can I actually ... get rid of a lifelong mood disorder with therapy? My experience tells me no. It might help, but I doubt I will ever experience life the way a normal person experiences life unless we really develop a better understanding of the brain and better treatment options.

Which - I am fine with. I've gone through an immense amount of pain and suffering in life and eventually I got to a point where it's like...well, whatever it is, I've already experienced worse.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm painting a picture that is too negative or overly dramatic on these forums. My past was horrible, but I'm not exactly wallowing in misery today, and there are a lot of people in the world who need far more help than I do. People who may not know how to voice how they feel, or who may not even realize they are depressed and not thinking about things correctly.

There is definitely room for improvement though, for sure. It's just not entirely clear to me how much room there is and it's not obvious to me how effective therapy is for mood improvement vs simply talking to a friend about things. Maybe I'm completely missing something.

Thoughts?

Ugh...okay

Let me put it this way. I have excellent friends and family who are amazing listeners and I am tremendously good at talking about my feelings.

I still pay a woman I don't like very much $250/hr for regular therapy. My therapist is amazing, but we're not friends and I don't pay her to love me.

Clinical psychologists do about as much training as family doctors. Actually, they do even more specific psych training because they have psych undergrad degrees. Family doctors study an enormous range of topics, between undergrad and their doctorates, clinical psychologists study *JUST* psychology for a decade. A decade.

They're not our friends.

[curious_george]

and many therapists seem almost like people I pay to love me.

They/them, that was sort of provocative.  I don't believe for a second you consider they's spouse to be your "whore", but rather your equal partner.  So why did they use such language?  Internet interaction is different than meatspace but just DAYUM!  Metalcat can't be your therapist though they are doing a damn fine job within the limitations.   You NEED to see someone.  In the spirit of MMM: *FACEPUNCH*   Get counseling for fucks sake!

I am so confused how this struck a chord, or what my wife has to do with anything. I can assure you that I value my wife more than anyone on the planet and that she is not a whore, considering I'm the only man she has ever slept with.

Metalcat is free to respond or not respond, lol. That's her choice. There are tons of people that she decides to ignore, and for good reason. Eventually I will probably be one of those people - but I doubt it will be because of this post, lol.

Relax.

Seems I read something into your relationship that isn't there.  Apologies.  Rock on.

I'm still confused how this struck a chord. Did you think I view my wife, whom I've been married to for 20 years and been with since high school, and who is the mother of my four children, as a whore that I am paying?

Would your viewpoint change if she was working a traditional job and I was doing most of the child rearing?

I am just incredibly confused now.

[GilesMM]

It is significantly easier and less mental effort for me to read an academic textbook or develop software than to talk about my feelings. Me having a crying session is both very needed and also wipes me out mentally for the rest of the day.

But yes - please continue harping.  It is appreciated. One guy spent five years telling me I should start running before I started running. I still thank him for it to this day.

I am just absurdly stubborn about taking the medicine.

How often and how far do you run?  How do you feel during? After?

Last year I was running 1 mile everyday in the morning on the street, then 2-3 miles every other week or so in the woods. I have more energy after running.

I got sick in December though and have not started running again yet this year.

If you are no longer sick, then get after it!  You may feel mentally better as a result.

[Financial.Velociraptor]

I'm still confused how this struck a chord. Did you think I view my wife, whom I've been married to for 20 years and been with since high school, and who is the mother of my four children, as a whore that I am paying?

Would your viewpoint change if she was working a traditional job and I was doing most of the child rearing?

I am just incredibly confused now.

I drew inferences from other posts about your perception as somehow including your spouse.  I was in error.  I'm sort of ... stupid ... on this point.  Please forgive me for reading something that doesn't exist...

[Metalcat]

I'm still confused how this struck a chord. Did you think I view my wife, whom I've been married to for 20 years and been with since high school, and who is the mother of my four children, as a whore that I am paying?

Would your viewpoint change if she was working a traditional job and I was doing most of the child rearing?

I am just incredibly confused now.

I drew inferences from other posts about your perception as somehow including your spouse.  I was in error.  I'm sort of ... stupid ... on this point.  Please forgive me for reading something that doesn't exist...

I'm still confused by your use of pronouns in that post "they/them" and "they's spouse"

And what was "provocative"???

What were you even saying? I literally read it 50 times and thinking "wait...what??"

[Financial.Velociraptor]

@Metalcat


I took some interactions above to mean that @TreeLeaf preferred they/them pronouns.  I'm perhaps...sort of stupid.   I also took discussions of spouse and community judgement vis-a-vis considering 'paying to like me' (therapists) to include spouse.   Again...sort of stupid...   I have always been sort of socially awkward.  It's coming out  now.   

My apologies for making assumptions that are kinda dumb...

[Metalcat]

@Metalcat

I took some interactions above to mean that @TreeLeaf preferred they/them pronouns.  I'm perhaps...sort of stupid.   I also took discussions of spouse and community judgement vis-a-vis considering 'paying to like me' (therapists) to include spouse.   Again...sort of stupid...   I have always been sort of socially awkward.  It's coming out  now.   

My apologies for making assumptions that are kinda dumb...

Lol, yeah, that was a cluster fuck! Oh well, shit happens.

The they/them pronouns was because of me. I default to genderless pronouns on the forums often. I'm cultivating a habit of de-gendering my language unless gender is both clear and salient.

It's also a great way to practice using they/them pronouns properly...which you did not, lol, that was an incompressible mess.  Sorry, I couldn't resist teasing. I'm really not being judgemental, I'm teasing from a place of playful kindness because I totally get it, pronoun stuff trips people up at first. Hence why I practice.

Not stupid, just messy, but messy is often how we learn.

[Financial.Velociraptor]

@Metalcat

*thumbs up*

[curious_george]

@Metalcat


I took some interactions above to mean that @TreeLeaf preferred they/them pronouns.  I'm perhaps...sort of stupid.   I also took discussions of spouse and community judgement vis-a-vis considering 'paying to like me' (therapists) to include spouse.   Again...sort of stupid...   I have always been sort of socially awkward.  It's coming out  now.   

My apologies for making assumptions that are kinda dumb...

Ohhh ok - no worries FV. I understand the post now. I'm socially awkward as well...it was just a confusing post is all.

I changed my name to be gender neutral here after having some eye opening conversations with a female forum member about women getting targeted and harassed on online forums just for having female or gender neutral  user names. You can call me him/his or her/she, or they/their, whatever...it literally doesn't matter to me. Whatever works best for you.

Looking back on my posts I can see how you could come to that sort of assumption. But no, that's, not correct, lol. One should probably never assume another man thinks his wife is a whore...in fact one should probably never assume any woman is a whore, or even see a whore as a negative thing. A woman's value is not derived by how often or how much sex she has with a man or how many men she has had sex with, or even if she was paid for sex.

There are actually a lot of women who enjoy and desire sex just as much as men do, or even more so. So it's actually a pretty mutually beneficial thing in a lot of relationships. It's a great way to emotionally bond with your partner everyday as well. It really is not a transactional sort of thing.

The reason I mention that it feels like I am paying for someone to love me if I visit a therapist, is that it feels like I am paying for someone to have compassionate understanding, which makes me feel like I am not worth having this from someone for free. I also already have several people in my life who offer compassionate understanding if I ever want to talk through a problem.

I have also spent a shit ton of time in my life compassionately listening to other people's problems, and I generally always enjoy it.

So the whole concept of paying for it seems odd, but at the same time it seems like maybe I fundamentally don't understand what a therapist actually does.

My understanding was that their role was to listen to your issues and recontextualize negative experiences, beliefs, and perceptions of things, people and relationships into more positive ways of viewing things in order to let go of maladaptive thought patterns and the associated emotions, so that one can make way for more positive beliefs and emotions and experiences in life. But it sounds like I am horribly off base here.

[Metalcat]

So the whole concept of paying for it seems odd, but at the same time it seems like maybe I fundamentally don't understand what a therapist actually does.

My understanding was that their role was to listen to your issues and recontextualize negative experiences, beliefs, and perceptions of things, people and relationships into more positive ways of viewing things in order to let go of maladaptive thought patterns and the associated emotions, so that one can make way for more positive beliefs and emotions and experiences in life. But it sounds like I am horribly off base here.

Nope, you do not understand how therapy works.

Granted, even most people who go to therapy don't understand how it actually works, so that's not a you thing, that's more an everyone thing.

I thought I knew how therapy worked when I decided to be a therapist. Then I started learning it and went "wait...what the fuck is this? I hate this!" and dropped out of my program because it wasn't what I wanted to do. Turns out I wanted, at the time, to do something more like coaching, which was more similar to the work I had been doing before, because I was extremely good at giving people advice, telling them what to do, and getting them to actually do it.

But then I had a few years of retirement behind me, did a lot of therapy to move on from my old career, and gradually doing actual therapy started appealing to me.

You can only talk about your experiences and feelings in ways that you consciously understand them. What therapy does is systematically, with very particular skills, get past all of your decades of beliefs and rationalizations and dig into the very basis of how and why you think and behave the way you do.

I've had beliefs about myself and ways of behaving that felt like core, fundamental parts of who I am, unchangeable, factual truths that were utterly demolished in one session of therapy where I realized that core chunks of my identity were founded on reactions to trauma and then reinforced throughout my entire life.

You talk over and over again about wanting to understand why you are the way you are, well therapy does exactly that. You're avoiding the one thing that can actually help you get the answers you want.

You've read the biopsych textbook, so you understand that the brain creates shorthands for everything, interpretations of what reality is based on limited information. Well, you do that about yourself too.

You *think* you know yourself, but what you really know is the series of shorthands that your mind has created to represent *you* and a bunch of that programming is faulty. "This happened to me, so I'm like this," "I've always been this way, it's who I am," "This is important to me, and here's why," ect, etc.

Therapy digs into the base coding of that programming and figures out the basis of all of those things. It also allows you to recode things.

I am fundamentally not the same person I was before I walked into the office of my first really effective therapist.

Nothing about the experience was positive, he was a fucking asshole, and I left the session, promptly went home, got shit faced drunk, and sat staring catatonic at the wall for hours until my spouse came home.

I explained, through snotty, messy tears what had been talked about in therapy and my spouse said "he's a fucking genius." It's not that that therapist knew more than others, it's that he was the exact right fit for me at the time and it felt like being so profoundly understood far better than I could have ever understood myself on my own.

It was like having someone peel away my own skin and muscles for me to see the organs underneath with my own eyes and go "oh, exactly that, right there is what creates this physical state that I've always felt and thought was normal."

Literally nothing was reframed positively, actually many things that I said about myself that I used to see positively, he reframed just fucking horribly. Understanding *why* I prioritized the things I did, and how a lot of that was driven by trauma...it was actually horrifying, hence the drunken catatonia and sobbing.

Let me compare therapy to a medical issue.

So self help, as you've described: self reflection, reading books, talking to friends. That's like me growing up with knee and back pain. I know I had a ski injury at 11 that hurt both knees and I know I had a spinal injury at 13 that hurt my back. Those were very logical explanations.

I then fell skating and hurt my knees again, further reason for having knee pain. I did a lot of body building when I was young and my spine got further injured. Further explanation of why my lower back always hurt.

I exquisitely understood my knee and back pain. I knew exactly what set them off, I knew how to make them feel better, I felt I understood them.

I also sought the care of a lot of doctors. This was like when I was seeing therapists who were a bad fit. They were definitely well trained experts, and when they looked at my knees and lower back, they couldn't find anything majorly wrong, so chalked it up to oversize issues, minor soft tissue damage. I was prescribed PT and advil.

Everyone involved felt like they understood the issue and handled it in ways that we all thought were appropriate. We all felt we understood the etiology of the feelings my body had.

Seeing my first really good fit therapist was like when a spinal expert MD diagnosed me with a rare genetic condition that makes me extremely prone to injuries. Suddenly my whole lifetime experience of pain and injuries made more sense. It was like my entire life got reframed through this lens of "oh. This is why my body feels this way and reacts this way, and no, it's not normal."

My whole identity as it related to my body changed.

Seeing my second amazing fit therapist after the first one died was like when I met my surgeon who was like "dude...your femurs are rotated in the wrong direction, that's why your knees and spine hurt so much. Combine that with the genetic predisposition for injury and it's a miracle you've ever walked as much as you did."

Again. The whole history of what I believed about myself and my body radically changed and was entirely reframed. One of the hallmark signs of my bone deformity is that you get easily fatigued while running. I could never run as a kid and always framed myself as just not an athletic kid, out of shape and weak compared to my peers.

N'ah. Just all the muscles involved in running were twisted so they fatigue super quickly because running for me was incredibly inefficient and took enormous amounts of energy, like someone else trying to run backwards full tilt for a long distance wearing two different high heeled shoes.

Talking to these two doctors completely rewrote my entire life history and my entire perspective of myself. Like I'm transported back to when I was an embarrassed child unable to keep up with my classmates in gym class and totally seeing that experience differently. Or my early 20s talking to one of the previous doctors basically telling me that I just have a low pain threshold with my knees and need to learn to toughen up because my knee injury is so minor.

Having this incredible self knowledge of why my body has *actually* felt this way for my entire life was like watching the all of the puzzle pieces of my life history change shape and fit together differently.

Therapy does the exact same thing.

[curious_george]

Oh - I see. Thank you for the explanation.

It intellectually makes sense - and I can understand the value a good therapist could provide. Keyword here being good.

It usually takes me a while between intellectually understanding the value of something and emotionally processing it and then actually doing it.

With my background growing up therapy was sort or viewed as a luxury for rich people...In fact in some areas of America basic medical care is seen as an expensive privilege.

My wife never even saw a dentist her entire life until we moved in together, for example. She never saw a doctor between the ages of 5 and 18 when we moved in together. She did not even have a computer or internet access until we moved in together. She literally only had the clothes on her back and a small box of books when we moved in together because she was running away from her physically abusive step father.

Sometimes it seems like low income people, and high income people, live in completely different worlds and have completely different expectations out of life.

I remember talking to a sheriff years ago about an incident that occurred. I will always remember what he said. He said he will get called to a trailer park because someone shot someone else, and the shooter will say "well he had it coming he was running his mouth" and the victim would even agree and refuse to press charges.

In their mental frame of reference getting shot by someone is not only normal but it is even expected at times. This was just a normal part of our reality.

Meanwhile he will get a call from a rich neighborhood where a house got TP'd and the owner is very upset and wants finger prints pulled and so on. Getting TP'd is completely outside their frame of reality and is not considered to be normal or ok. It isn't just about being poor or rich. A lot of rich people have a completely different frame of reference as well. I can usually tell if someone grew up in a professional class or the working class just by having a brief conversation with them.

In my experience therapy is simply outside the frame of reference of most poor people. It isn't something anyone really did or talked about even...and if it was talked about it was always in a negative context "Oh poor TreeLeaf has to go to therapy because his mother never loved him". That sort of thing.

When talking with a lot of more professional class people it's almost expected that everyone is either in therapy currently or was in therapy in the past. It almost seems like it is celebrated on some level - kind of like going to college.

Thank you for helping me understand and bring this into my frame of reference.

It sounds like my wife could also use therapy, as well as virtually all my foster brothers and sisters...and most of my biological family.

Actually they should probably send a therapist to one of the trailer parks I grew up in and talk with everyone, honestly.

That place was fuuucked up.

[Metalcat]

Actually they should probably send a therapist to one of the trailer parks I grew up in and talk with everyone, honestly.

That place was fuuucked up.

Yes, they should. Therapy should be a universal thing, so should dental care. The poor do live in a totally different reality and it is one that causes enormous foundational damage. This is well studied.

Just because people grow up with this being their normal doesn't mean it's healthy. A lot of people, rich and poor, grow up with norms that aren't healthy.

Very few people are optimally healthy. Normal doesn't mean healthy.

If you want to be healthy and happy in this world, you have to be abnormal. This is a key thing to grasp. You can't compare yourself to the world when talking about the value of mental healthcare because the norm is to be a fucking mess.

Mental health is a lot like personal finance. The norm is a fucking disaster. We don't embrace frugality and FIRE here because it's the normal thing to do, we do it because it's optimal, but it makes us fucking weird.

Mental health is the same way. It's not typical to do what it takes to achieve optimal mental health. And you have to embrace being a bit weird to do it.

Resistance to therapy is like resistance to budgeting. It might be normal, but normal is a fucking mess.

[Wolfpack Mustachian]

Actually they should probably send a therapist to one of the trailer parks I grew up in and talk with everyone, honestly.

That place was fuuucked up.

Yes, they should. Therapy should be a universal thing, so should dental care. The poor do live in a totally different reality and it is one that causes enormous foundational damage. This is well studied.

Just because people grow up with this being their normal doesn't mean it's healthy. A lot of people, rich and poor, grow up with norms that aren't healthy.

Very few people are optimally healthy. Normal doesn't mean healthy.

If you want to be healthy and happy in this world, you have to be abnormal. This is a key thing to grasp. You can't compare yourself to the world when talking about the value of mental healthcare because the norm is to be a fucking mess.

Mental health is a lot like personal finance. The norm is a fucking disaster. We don't embrace frugality and FIRE here because it's the normal thing to do, we do it because it's optimal, but it makes us fucking weird.

Mental health is the same way. It's not typical to do what it takes to achieve optimal mental health. And you have to embrace being a bit weird to do it.

Resistance to therapy is like resistance to budgeting. It might be normal, but normal is a fucking mess.

As you mentioned therapy as universal, how do you view therapy in situations without significant trauma or really much trauma at all? What would the focus be on? Would there be a need?

[Metalcat]

As you mentioned therapy as universal, how do you view therapy in situations without significant trauma or really much trauma at all? What would the focus be on? Would there be a need?

Therapy is most definitely not just for people with severe trauma. That's kind of like asking if only people who have been hit in the face and had severe dental trauma should see a dentist.

I would say that there are a few things that virtually everyone would benefit from:

-regular PT
-regular massage
-regular dental care
-regular therapy
-OT at least once for a workplace assessment
-periodic career coaching

Optimal mental health is a lot of work, very few people are walking around functioning psychologically optimally.

Life is hard and takes an emotional toll. No one gets through it without building up maladaptive patterns. In fact, some of the most fucked up people I know have absolutely no history of trauma or difficulty at all.

DH's BFF is a fucking disaster and he grew up with two upper middle class, educated, loving parents who are still together and still great parents. Nothing bad has ever really happened to him, but he's self destructive to the point that he actively seeks out abusive women and systematically fails to manage his diabetes and has been told that he is virtually guaranteed to have his foot amputated by 50 because of his compulsively poor self care habits.

Dude.Needs.Therapy.

Sometimes having a relatively easy life leaves people totally ill-equipped for the challenges of normal life and with very little resiliency.

Just look around. The world is packed with obese, unhealthy people who are in debt up to their eyeballs, in bad marriages, and this is the norm. The norm is unhealthy. The vast majority of them don't have any significant trauma.

Even take seemingly perfectly happy, functional people and you will always find something that isn't working properly.

Our society just doesn't generate healthy people.

It's the same way that even if you take a lean, fit, active person who looks totally healthy, if you send them to PT, the PT is going to find all sorts of muscular imbalances and suboptimal mechanics. Why? Not because they've suffered a major injury or anything, but because day-to-day function is hard on bodies, even strong, fit ones.

Does everyone "need" therapy. Depends on your definition of "need." If we're taking about ability to be a functional, productive member of society, then TreeLeaf needs therapy less than most people. They're well adapted to function more than most people. Educated, good job, good marriage, fit, financially secure. They don't "need" therapy to function, but they absolutely need therapy to function optimally, and the benefit would be breathtakingly impressive.

But if we're talking about who could benefit from good therapy? Well yeah. Everyone.

I personally think everyone should have at least 6-8 sessions with the right therapist for them at some point in their lives and not just when they're in crisis. Crisis therapy isn't transformative, it's emergency management. Which is why so many people don't get a lot out of therapy and don't really understand what it can do.

Like people who only go to marriage counselling when things are so eroded that it's beyond repair. Almost no one actually knows how incredibly effective marriage counselling is for strengthening marriages because no one goes when it works best for actually helping the marriage.

In a perfect world, all couples wild benefit from some marriage counselling before even getting married, before and after having kids, any time a major life change happens.

I sent my DH back to therapy because of my surgeries. He needs to responsibly manage the toll of having a hobbled wife for over a year.

Frankly, not having therapist support through this would be downright reckless and irresponsible, IMO, and that's for someone who's actually great at this kind of thing. He's a former certified nurse's aide. But still, he needs therapy to get through this optimally, and so do I.

The challenge is finding good therapy, which has little to do with the skill level of the therapist and more to do with specific fit. People who "tried therapy" and it "didn't work" are people who didn't have a good fit with their therapist.

It's literally impossible for someone not to benefit from therapy with someone who is a good fit. It's the same way that everyone would benefit from the right PT for their body.

The process is exactly the same, it's a process of looking at how your system works, finding the parts that aren't working optimally, and resolving the structural factors that cause that issue.

By definition, no one is every perfectly healthy, so seeing a professional who can always help you work on the issues that aren't optimal will ALWAYS be beneficial.

Whether it's worth the cost is a whole other question.

I could benefit from massage every 4 days, the benefit of getting it more frequently than every 3-4 weeks though diminishes relative to the cost, so even though it would be optimal, it would be worthwhile.

Just because something is beneficial to everyone doesn't mean it's worth the cost for everyone. But let's look at that cost.

The economic toll of obesity alone astronomical, add to that the economic cost of chronic pain conditions, and the cost of workplace burnout.

All of these issues are best managed with effective counselling and it's a hell of a lot cheaper than burdening the traditional medical system and using doctor and hospital time.

I just wrote a paper on the current research and the economic arguments of using therapy as a first line treatment for chronic pain, and even a preventive treatment. There's an argument to be made that all major surgery patients should have a series of therapy sessions before therapy as it is shown to lower the probability of even developing chronic pain after surgery.

So yeah. I think that therapy should be a readily available, publicly funded service for everyone.

[Villanelle]

As you mentioned therapy as universal, how do you view therapy in situations without significant trauma or really much trauma at all? What would the focus be on? Would there be a need?

Therapy is most definitely not just for people with severe trauma. That's kind of like asking if only people who have been hit in the face and had severe dental trauma should see a dentist.

I would say that there are a few things that virtually everyone would benefit from:

-regular PT
-regular massage
-regular dental care
-regular therapy
-OT at least once for a workplace assessment
-periodic career coaching

Optimal mental health is a lot of work, very few people are walking around functioning psychologically optimally.

Life is hard and takes an emotional toll. No one gets through it without building up maladaptive patterns. In fact, some of the most fucked up people I know have absolutely no history of trauma or difficulty at all.

DH's BFF is a fucking disaster and he grew up with two upper middle class, educated, loving parents who are still together and still great parents. Nothing bad has ever really happened to him, but he's self destructive to the point that he actively seeks out abusive women and systematically fails to manage his diabetes and has been told that he is virtually guaranteed to have his foot amputated by 50 because of his compulsively poor self care habits.

Dude.Needs.Therapy.

Sometimes having a relatively easy life leaves people totally ill-equipped for the challenges of normal life and with very little resiliency.

Just look around. The world is packed with obese, unhealthy people who are in debt up to their eyeballs, in bad marriages, and this is the norm. The norm is unhealthy. The vast majority of them don't have any significant trauma.

Even take seemingly perfectly happy, functional people and you will always find something that isn't working properly.

Our society just doesn't generate healthy people.

It's the same way that even if you take a lean, fit, active person who looks totally healthy, if you send them to PT, the PT is going to find all sorts of muscular imbalances and suboptimal mechanics. Why? Not because they've suffered a major injury or anything, but because day-to-day function is hard on bodies, even strong, fit ones.

Does everyone "need" therapy. Depends on your definition of "need." If we're taking about ability to be a functional, productive member of society, then TreeLeaf needs therapy less than most people. They're well adapted to function more than most people. Educated, good job, good marriage, fit, financially secure. They don't "need" therapy to function, but they absolutely need therapy to function optimally, and the benefit would be breathtakingly impressive.

But if we're talking about who could benefit from good therapy? Well yeah. Everyone.

I personally think everyone should have at least 6-8 sessions with the right therapist for them at some point in their lives and not just when they're in crisis. Crisis therapy isn't transformative, it's emergency management. Which is why so many people don't get a lot out of therapy and don't really understand what it can do.

Like people who only go to marriage counselling when things are so eroded that it's beyond repair. Almost no one actually knows how incredibly effective marriage counselling is for strengthening marriages because no one goes when it works best for actually helping the marriage.

In a perfect world, all couples wild benefit from some marriage counselling before even getting married, before and after having kids, any time a major life change happens.

I sent my DH back to therapy because of my surgeries. He needs to responsibly manage the toll of having a hobbled wife for over a year.

Frankly, not having therapist support through this would be downright reckless and irresponsible, IMO, and that's for someone who's actually great at this kind of thing. He's a former certified nurse's aide. But still, he needs therapy to get through this optimally, and so do I.

The challenge is finding good therapy, which has little to do with the skill level of the therapist and more to do with specific fit. People who "tried therapy" and it "didn't work" are people who didn't have a good fit with their therapist.

It's literally impossible for someone not to benefit from therapy with someone who is a good fit. It's the same way that everyone would benefit from the right PT for their body.

The process is exactly the same, it's a process of looking at how your system works, finding the parts that aren't working optimally, and resolving the structural factors that cause that issue.

By definition, no one is every perfectly healthy, so seeing a professional who can always help you work on the issues that aren't optimal will ALWAYS be beneficial.

Whether it's worth the cost is a whole other question.

I could benefit from massage every 4 days, the benefit of getting it more frequently than every 3-4 weeks though diminishes relative to the cost, so even though it would be optimal, it would be worthwhile.

Just because something is beneficial to everyone doesn't mean it's worth the cost for everyone. But let's look at that cost.

The economic toll of obesity alone astronomical, add to that the economic cost of chronic pain conditions, and the cost of workplace burnout.

All of these issues are best managed with effective counselling and it's a hell of a lot cheaper than burdening the traditional medical system and using doctor and hospital time.

I just wrote a paper on the current research and the economic arguments of using therapy as a first line treatment for chronic pain, and even a preventive treatment. There's an argument to be made that all major surgery patients should have a series of therapy sessions before therapy as it is shown to lower the probability of even developing chronic pain after surgery.

So yeah. I think that therapy should be a readily available, publicly funded service for everyone.

Just to reiterate this point, if someone asks if I "needed" therapy, that would be tough to answer.  I would so I do Life better than most people.  I have stable, healhty relationships.  I'm pretty self-aware.  I move through the world quite successfully.  So, did I need therapy?  Maybe not.   But also, I had insane social anxiety.  Asking the make-up counter worker at a department store where the bathrooms were wold leave me with sweaty palms, a 'wooshing' sound in my ears, and a need to practice in my head a few times so I could settle on whether it was better to say 'bathroom' or 'restroom'.  Basically every experience in life, outside of my very small, very close circle was like that.  It was bad.  So, did I need therapy?  Yeah. 

Whether I needed it or not didn't really matter.  Because it was really fucking good for me.  I lucked out in that I found an amazing therapist on the first try.  Since just going--even just calling to make the appointment--was immensely triggering for my anxiety, it's unlikely I would have managed to do that multiple times.  But since then, I've also had a bad therapist.  I found her to be friendly, enthusiatic, patronizing, condescending, and frankly, not smart enough.  She was talking about me needing to be more mindful, and how I should focus when drinking my morning coffee on how it smells, how the warm mug feels in my hands, etc.  First, I don't drink coffee.  That in and of itself wasn't a deal-breaker, but it was indicative of the fact that this woman clearly didn't know me or my issues, and almost seemed to be defaulting to a plug and play script, based on what she assumed were my issues after 10 minutes of talking with me.  Second, being more mindful (in that way, at least) is actually not at all what I need.  To be fair, I was having trouble articulating my issue clearly because I didn't fully understand it, but instead if digging around until we both got there, she made an assumption.  I was polite--I didn't tell her she was way off base.  I just thanked her at the end of the session, and never went back.  So, some of that failure was on me, but it was a failure none the less.  I need someone tough and who gets straight to it and who doesn't try to go slowly and gently.  I figured that out later, and next time, I'll tell someone that up front.

The more you know about what works, the better.  Say it up front.  Don't hesitate to tell them it's not working, and why.  And don't be afraid to break up and find someone new.