# so much for therapy



## dalailama15 (Aug 13, 2004)

> dalailama15 wrote:
> . . . next time I think I will ask the mental health professional beforehand if they are willing to spend a little time reading some stuff and to spend a little effort trying to understand it, [before our first session], just to save some time.


*Jeff (1A) wrote: *


> I am convinced that the vast majority of mental health workers, be they psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, etc. don't wish to prepare for sessions with their patients. . . . They want to deal with you and try to help you only when you are in their presence.


Yup, Jeff, I think you're right. The current therapist said something like: "I usually like to do the work during the session," which is fine.

But the next thing I should have said is:

"What work? Seriously. Simply talking to you is in no way therapeutic. I do it in the hope that you can use this information in some way to suggest or practice some specific and useful therapy tailored to my specific sets of complaints. God, is it too much to ask that you behave like any other competent health-care professional on the planet? Of course I know this is asking too much but I still would like to know: What work?

Do you honestly believe you can wing some comment or association on the fly that I hadn't already considered, or that in any way would affect or help me? This isn't some dumb ass movie where you find some secret and I have an epiphany and we all weep together. Please understand that I can't remember one minute in the hundreds of hours of "therapy" I have had that I found in any way therapeutic. I need to find someone who can do something other than sit there and listen to me and toss in some banal observations here and there. And I'm sorry to say that that person, I already know, is not you."

Instead I patronize her, as I have all of them, so she won't feel bad about being so incompetent.

So much for therapy. I'm serious. I have no clue as to what these people think they are doing. And unless they are pretending, these "therapists" I have seen are some of the dumbest people I have ever met.


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## Inflammed (Aug 10, 2004)

I think that DP/Dr is not a problem you can actually attack face to face.
You have to attack it's flanks =)
All that surrounds it must be faced...that's where it takes it's strenght.
thats my opinion =)


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## Blake (Aug 10, 2004)

Im with inflamed.... attack the flanks (well put)...
and yes... 4 out of 5 mental health professionals will have no idea what dp/dr is and guess what? if they attempt to research on their own, theyll find out what we have found out.... theres really not that much out there. other than the dsm's definition of it and obscure studies that they MAY be able to get their hands on.

it weird to find yourself patronizing a therapist ( i did it to my last one ) and the minute you start doing it you should definitely reevaluate the situation. i.e. find someone else to talk to... or tell him/her the brutal truth.

blake


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## sebastian (Aug 11, 2004)

I agree with you DL...whole-heartedly...but i would assign that apathy and ignorance to about 4/5 of the therapists, psychologists, and what have you. That number may even be lower...i just kind of threw it out there. And as i was saying to my therapist last night, with whom i do find progress is being made, for the most part, they're just stupid. I mean, they're just lazy and stupid, and they do indeed think that psychotherapy is like in the movies...with the epiphanies and all that. These charlatans, who are really one step up from fortune tellers, in my opinion, pander to the other idiots around them who need them for some mundane and incomprehensively idiotic purpose...like two parents who need a therapist to tell them that they have to "communicate" with one another. Wow. What a revelation. Com---com---how do you say it...communicate?

Fools. The lot of them. 9 out of 10 people on this planet, unfortunately fall into this category, and while i'm often castigated as an elitist for this point of view, it is absolutely true. Much to the chagrin of the might 10% however, we find ourselves frustrated and annoyed when we come up against a "professional" who's spouting off the same psychological platitudes we've read about in 1st year psych courses or seen in Woody Allen movies.

If i can give you any advice, DL, it would be to keep searching...you can usually tell after a session or two...and hopefully you will find someone who can, if not cure you, at least challenge you enough to change yourself, and with whom you won't feel like you're just throwing money away.

Good luck...

s.


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## Inflammed (Aug 10, 2004)

I actually see a Psychologist since a few months (6 maybe) and she's quite good and helping me out alot with my anxiety problem.

She also worked a few years in a mental health hospital in Montreal so she have a great knowledge of mental disorders.

She knows weel what DP/DR is, but for her...it's only a symtpom of anxiety that _occurs only in an advanced panic state_.
And I'm the first person she meet with a *chronic* DP/DR problem.

So I think that there is not many _professionnal _help we can actually count on.
Alternative Medecine like plants and therapy are great I think.

*Anyways I just wanted to share with you guys how a good psychologist learns about DP/DR...she aks me !*


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## Inflammed (Aug 10, 2004)

Oh I forgot....

Her technic for fighting DP/DR is like mine...go for the flanks and take non prisoners...!


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## Guest (Aug 17, 2004)

every doctor & psychologist ive talked to so far have at least heard of DP/DR, its just some have no idea on how to treat it or what it is exactly. They usually associate it with Anxiety,which in my opinion is correct but still i wish there was more knowledge of it. The strange thing is, my new therapist & new psychiatrist have all said they've seen & treated a good amount of cases where DP/DR is a symptom. I think one of the problems is, even with us is that we sometimes fail to recognize or we forget that it is infact a symptom of Anxiety, Depression,Trauma, Stress, & possibly those things combined with drug use. It is very rare that someone just has DP/DR. The thing i don't get is if you have it along with anxiety, why does it still remain when you aren't anxious anymore? Like some people only have it when they physically feel anxious, i have it 24/7, no matter what.


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## Guest (Aug 17, 2004)

flammed my therapist also believes that i have an anxiety/mood disorder which is causing the DP/DR, or more so DR.


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## Inflammed (Aug 10, 2004)

it's pretty much like the egg or the chicken that came first...i'm not sure if it's the same expression in english but hey ! I think you'll get it !


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## Guest (Aug 17, 2004)

Personally, I think there is little else that is so disheartening as sitting in on your first long awaited visit to a therapist,
only to hear the therapist tell you that they have never heard of dp! :roll:

It might be true that they don't have to know what dp is to help you but it feels so much better to be understood.
Not to mention some comfort gained by getting an indication of their knowledge.

best Shelly


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## Guest (Aug 17, 2004)

Oh, listen....if the therapist has LITERALLY never heard of depersonalization, run out of the office and do not give them a check.

I just emphasize that to be good and highly effective, the therapist need not be a dp expert, nor will they really spend much time trying to "treat the dp" per se. That's a fantasy of the patient, there is no way to Treat it except for meds. The treatment is on other areas within the patient and ultimately, it's going to amount to the patient learning enough about him/herself to be able to no longer resort to dp as a ground of being.

But in all seriousness, depersonalization is NOT some exotic symptom. If a trained mental health professional does not even know what it is, you must leave. I'm really not kidding, guys.

Peace,
Janine
p.s. also, see my thread in the Psychological/Freudian Forum on therapy. It pretty much says it all like it is.


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