It shows me talking to other people at the Hope for Tomorrow course, and the fact that that it helping the black cloud (depression),
turn into a blue sky with white clouds (up and down, but good on the whole). On
the subject of my HFT course, this week was about different talking therapies.
The main ones we covered were CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy), psychodynamic (teaching you you be aware of your inner child/ adult/ critical parent dialogue), and humanistic (being listened to and finding solutions on your own, guided by your counselor).
Personally I’ve done a few different types: when my parents divorced I had counselling sessions with a service espcially for families, then when I became depressed in sixth-form I had counselling which they arranged for me, then at uni I started out by seeing a counsellor, but now see a psychologist for CBT. Also, when I was in France I had some counseling. I have found all of these useful in different ways; for advice on difficult situations, for a way to express myself confidentially, and as a way to help me think more positively.
However, CBT is not easy. I think that what I wanted was for someone to wave a magic wand and make it all go away, but no-one can do that. A counselor/ psychotherapist/ psychologist (arguably all very similar) can give you to tools to help you, but they can’t do the work. They can tell you to challenge your negative thoughts, and to replace them by more positive ones, but they won’t be there in your head doing it for you, and so you have to do your homework between sessions. The problem is, when I’m feeling fine, I don’t bother challenging the occasional negative thought, which means that it’s really hard to do so when I’m down. I’m also so used to thinking negatively about myself that often I don’t flag it up as negative thinking, as it just seems normal. “Oh my goodness, so-and-so hasn’t texted me back, I must have offended them” is completely automatic for me; it’s much harder for me to think “So-and-so is probably busy or has run out of battery” I even manage to think negatively about my depression- sometimes I convince myself that I’m just weaker than other people, and that I’m not really depressed. That the fact that I can’t get out of the house, or even bed sometimes is because I’m lazy or not trying hard enough. That it’s normal to beat myself up about what I said or didn’t say to someone, or to find it hard to believe that I deserve being loved. It turns out that loving myself is one of the hardest things; I am my own worst critic. This has been proved by the fact that my fiancĂ© has got me to start writing down, alongside positive things that I’ve done on a particular day, and things that I should have done but didn’t, negative comments made by others. There’s hardly ever anything in that column! And yet I often imagine other people to be thinking negatively about me, after all, I do, so why wouldn’t they? Hopefully, CBT will carry on being my second stone in my armoury, and perhaps Sozo will add another.
P.S. Apologies for the change in fonts, blogger is being a pain and not applying my changes.
Personally I’ve done a few different types: when my parents divorced I had counselling sessions with a service espcially for families, then when I became depressed in sixth-form I had counselling which they arranged for me, then at uni I started out by seeing a counsellor, but now see a psychologist for CBT. Also, when I was in France I had some counseling. I have found all of these useful in different ways; for advice on difficult situations, for a way to express myself confidentially, and as a way to help me think more positively.
However, CBT is not easy. I think that what I wanted was for someone to wave a magic wand and make it all go away, but no-one can do that. A counselor/ psychotherapist/ psychologist (arguably all very similar) can give you to tools to help you, but they can’t do the work. They can tell you to challenge your negative thoughts, and to replace them by more positive ones, but they won’t be there in your head doing it for you, and so you have to do your homework between sessions. The problem is, when I’m feeling fine, I don’t bother challenging the occasional negative thought, which means that it’s really hard to do so when I’m down. I’m also so used to thinking negatively about myself that often I don’t flag it up as negative thinking, as it just seems normal. “Oh my goodness, so-and-so hasn’t texted me back, I must have offended them” is completely automatic for me; it’s much harder for me to think “So-and-so is probably busy or has run out of battery” I even manage to think negatively about my depression- sometimes I convince myself that I’m just weaker than other people, and that I’m not really depressed. That the fact that I can’t get out of the house, or even bed sometimes is because I’m lazy or not trying hard enough. That it’s normal to beat myself up about what I said or didn’t say to someone, or to find it hard to believe that I deserve being loved. It turns out that loving myself is one of the hardest things; I am my own worst critic. This has been proved by the fact that my fiancĂ© has got me to start writing down, alongside positive things that I’ve done on a particular day, and things that I should have done but didn’t, negative comments made by others. There’s hardly ever anything in that column! And yet I often imagine other people to be thinking negatively about me, after all, I do, so why wouldn’t they? Hopefully, CBT will carry on being my second stone in my armoury, and perhaps Sozo will add another.
P.S. Apologies for the change in fonts, blogger is being a pain and not applying my changes.
