Trigger warning: this post will discuss therapy and other mental health-related topics. If you suspect that the contents of this post will upset or trouble you in any way, stop reading now.
Therapy is gaining popularity. We see it in TV shows and movies, our favourite online creators promote it through sponsorships, and we’re all very much familiar with the Freudian image of a patient lying down on a fancy sofa, pouring their heart out to a grey-haired, glass-wearing doctor consciously taking notes on his clipboard. Although it’s not as stigmatised as it once was, we still have fixed, cookie-cutter views on what therapy is supposed to be, and millennial culture has gone as far as to romanticise the need for therapy. And these are the main reasons why I wanted to write about therapy at some point on the blog.
In this post, I will share my candid, fairly recent experience in the world of therapy and how I feel about therapy at the end of my journey with it. For the sake of clarity, I use the term ‘therapy’ to refer to all forms and types of therapy out there, including talking therapy, couple therapy and counselling, as long as they are defined from a mental health standpoint. I must also mention that my experience with therapy consisted of six months of CBT (cognitive-behavioural therapy) done through the NHS. This post will remain as inclusive as possible regarding different types of therapy, though.
I went into therapy because I needed to talk to someone impartial, that could introduce me to a new perspective on things. When it comes to our mental health and our cognitive and emotional experiences, it is very hard not to be subjective and to be open to different potential explanations for why we feel the way we feel. Having come from an environment where therapy and mental health were strongly stigmatised – nobody would admit to having gone to the school counselor, and yet the lady still had a job – I was used to keeping my emotional experiences to myself, and the fact that I was struggling sometimes made me feel ashamed and afraid to open up. Doing a course in psychology and growing up in a new, vastly different cultural environment helped me understand that, in fact, you shouldn’t be ashamed that you struggle just like you wouldn’t be ashamed of having a cold. I was relieved and a bit more confident about the whole thing, so I decided to bite the bullet and give my uni’s counselling service a call.
At no point did I go to therapy because I wanted to rant to someone, or because I felt as though I couldn’t talk to my friends about my struggles. The fact that I was recommended I’d try CBT speaks for itself: cognitive-behavioural therapy is all about changing the way you think and behave in order to tackle issues from a different perspective. During those six months, I went in weekly to get to know myself better and learn how to manage my emotional experiences in a more positive way. And I’m not being dramatic when I say that those six months have radically changed my life. Am I still the same person? Absolutely. Do I still struggle? Sometimes, but therapy isn’t about eradicating the faults in one’s mental health. Just like drinking two litres of water a day, eating your fruit and veggies and exercising regularly, therapy is good for keeping your mental health in shape, teaching you ways of coping with trouble when it arises and making you more self-aware. But more on that in a moment.
If you want to learn more about therapy and how it works, a good place to start is understanding the different types of therapy that are out there. Even that is a bit tricky, because one can’t really put a certain type of therapy in a box based on its features, aims and outcomes: that would imply we have different mental health conditions set in stone, and one thing that I learned these past three years of university is that diagnostic guidelines are blurry at times. But to give a helpful example, CBT is different from traditional talking therapy, or counselling, where a patient would come to talk about their life to a rather uninvolved practitioner, and the purpose of that would just be dumping all your thoughts out and getting to a conclusion on your own.
There is no good or bad type of therapy, just specific types of therapy for specific situations. I, for one, felt that CBT was the thing for me but I’m aware it might not be the thing for other people. My advice is that you don’t feel discouraged if somebody tells you they didn’t have a particularly happy experience with a certain kind of therapy or a certain therapist. We’re all different people, we all have different needs, physical or emotional. What somebody’s experience was like says nothing about what your experience might be like.
(source: Pixabay on Pexels)
Regardless of the kind of therapy that we’re talking about, the general stigma is that 'therapy is just for crazy people’ , and I want to unequivocally call BS on that. I could go on for hours about the dangers of labelling and the lack of psychological education in people who, yet, come forward and talk about therapy like they’ve been there themselves, but even that is a bit over the top because, frankly, almost everyone needs therapy at some point in their life. Just like with catching a cold or a stomach bug or twisting an ankle or scratching a finger, things sometimes happen to our mental health. We go through times and challenges that make us feel stressed, discouraged, scared, angry and there should be no shame in asking for help when everything becomes too much. I mean, would we ever shame somebody for taking a painkiller for their headache? Do we call them ‘weak’ because they didn’t endure the pain until it went away? As a society, we are all so sensitive and mindful of physical pain and struggles, and that is okay. But I think it would be ideal if we extended the same care to mental health, too.
Plenty of people in my life have struggled at some point, and some of them sought therapy, some of them didn’t. At the end of the day, it is a personal choice but it inadvertently makes you wonder how many of them didn’t go to therapy because they were afraid of what others would’ve thought about them if they looked for help. If in my fairly short and not-so-spread-geographically life I had, literally, dozens of people struggling and not going to therapy or counselling, I can’t begin to imagine what the numbers might look like on a bigger scale.
Actually, I can. 1 in 4 people are likely to struggle with their mental health at some point in their lives. That is a quarter of the world’s population. Legitimately, almost 2 billion people might need therapy at some point, and we are still afraid to talk about it in an ordinary, day-to-day conversation.
Okay, that doesn’t make me feel angry at all.
Even when people do actively seek therapy and start engaging with it, they might feel intimidated by the prospect of talking to a complete stranger every week, and they might not fully reap the results or it or they might give up altogether. I know I felt like that about halfway through, and for a while I had trouble seeing the use of what we were doing in our sessions in improving my ways of dealing with my emotions. Therapy was also scary because it was crucial that I delved deeply into my emotions and my past in order to understand where I was heading next. No, ‘scary’ is too small of a word, it was terrifying. I do think this is an obstacle that everyone must overcome if they decide to pursue therapy, and it’s just part of the journey of knowing and understanding, and as a result of that, treating yourself better from a mental health-focused standpoint. Almost six months after I finished my course of therapy, I know it made sense that I felt that way then, and it was essential for me to move past my fears and enjoy therapy for what it was, to get where I am now.
In case you do relate, my advice for you is that you take a deep breath in and relax. Therapy won’t work unless you let it work, and contrary to your otherwise natural worries, your therapist doesn’t try to intrude or mess around with your head. Although it might not seem like it, you’re in control of how therapy goes and what kind of influence it’ll have on your life, and the more you relax and you let things flow, the greater the results will be. That is another life-changing thing that I learned from therapy: I am in control of my own life, and I manifest this control by responding to the events in my life with the decisions that I want to make. Nothing more, nothing less. Nothing passes without my approval.
Although therapy was a positive experience in my life and, I’d dare say, even a turning point, I sometimes catch myself wishing I didn’t need it to begin with. In response to whoever out there thinks going to therapy is ‘sophisticated’ and it means that you are a precious butterfly that needs protection at all costs, therapy isn’t fancy. From almost every single perspective, it’s nothing more than a medical appointment. It gets hard and ugly sometimes, and you don’t always feel like you achieved something by the end of a session. Therapy is a process with ups and downs, and only time can tell whether you’re getting somewhere or not; the rest is just plain, sometimes even boring waiting. I didn’t tell people I was going to therapy for the entirety of those six months, so nobody walked on eggshells around me: life carried on, it didn’t stop for me to get my thoughts and emotions in order. Travelling to and from my practicioner took two hours from my day, hours that I had to book out from work every week. It was all worth it, don’t get me wrong. I’d rather not have anybody romanticise therapy for me, though. You may be able to fool others, but you can’t fool those who’ve been there.
Chances are, you’ve read this post because you’re wondering whether you need therapy yourself. Although I am bound to finish my degree in psychology very soon, I am not an expert or a counsellor myself, so you’re better off looking for the answers someplace else. Whether you’re in education or in the workforce, most institutions have their own counselling/support office where you can go and ask any questions you might have. An open chat with an expert will help you decide what it is that you need and how you can accommodate it around your other commitments. I will also link some helpful resources and websites down below, but it is ideal that you speak to a specialist first before making up your mind.
Maybe that’s really the only piece of advice I can give: talk about it. There is an entire support network out there, for any kind of situation and circumstances. You might not be comfortable talking to a relative, friend or colleague, but there are people out there actually hired to help and have a broad expertise in the field. All it takes is for you to come forward and open up, and it might feel scary at the very beginning but I promise, it will be worth it.
I would absolutely love to carry on the discussion in the comments down below! Also, please check the sources linked below for more information and support.
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Photo source:
Gold Framed Eyeglasses on Pexels, by Pixabay - CC0 License (link on picture).