I Am Not Now--Nor Have I Ever Been--Crazy...REALLY!

I have been in therapy three separate times--each time for depression. I never will apologize to anyone for doing therapy, as it has helped me in one way or another each time. Actually, I very much feel every person could benefit from doing therapy at different times--it is just good to have a neutral party to talk to about things. And, for the most part, this is all I needed each time.

The first time I saw a therapist was for postpartum depression. It really wasn't hard to imagine ANYONE getting depressed in my situation: I had a newborn baby with colic (she NEVER slept), we lived in a TINY two bedroom mobile home, my husband worked swing shifts (I was alone A LOT), we were fairly new in town so I didn't know many people, and it was HOT that summer (at least it was to me as I baked in a trailer without a/c)! The therapist I saw decided I needed to learn some relaxation techniques and things would be all better. Now, I'm not sure how much postpartum depression was being diagnosed at the time, but that is not what he saw in me. The relaxation techniques helped me in other areas of my life, just NOT with my depression. When K put the down-payment on this house, my mood lifted (DUH!) and the therapist said things will be all better now! I was told I was done with therapy.

MANY years later--maybe too many years--I needed to see a therapist because of depression, again. Truly, I think I may have been close to a breakdown. And it involved the colic-kid, only she was 15 at this time. In a nutshell: we had many problems with her, she was uncontrollable, she was declared incorrigible and put in a youth home, and then The Parents stabbed me in the back by deciding they believed her instead of me and took our oldest to live with them--all the while declaring what a horrible mother I was! (There is, of course, much more to the story, but I will leave that for another time.) Again, is it a wonder I was depressed? Anyway, the therapist I saw this time was WONDERFUL! The one thing he made me realize was: despite any mistakes I made, I was not a horrible mother and I hadn't done everything wrong. It made all the difference in my life. I do believe he probably saved my life and I will be forever grateful. I was in a real good place when we decided I was done.

About seven years later, I wound up in therapy again. This time it was because we were having problems with our other daughter. (I sometimes wonder if I really WAS a bad mother! ;)) Anyway, here is where the story gets good, cause this therapist was a piece of work.

First of all, I decided to see a woman, thinking a woman would understand another woman better. I REALLY should have run from my first appointment with her, because she was just too disorganized for me--I am almost anal at times with how organized I am. She almost seemed to attack some of the things I said. (I once said how things wouldn't have gotten so bad with our first daughter if some of the authorities, etc. would have given us direction or help in trying to solve our problems. She took this as me saying it was everyone else's fault and I was showing paranoid tendencies.) She really didn't HEAR me when I spoke--I think she had her mind made up about me before we even met for the first time. But, I continued with her because I felt it could only get better. Boy, was I wrong.

One day, she suggested I join the group she was about to start. I thought it would be a good idea and I agreed. Bad move. You know how there are some people you meet that there is an instant, mutual dislike between the two of you? Well, I met one of those women the first night of group. (The therapist, later on, asked me why I didn't like this woman--who was it she reminded me of? I thought for a second and answered, "ME!" I saw all of my bad qualities in this woman, and I didn't like it. This was the first time I completely made the therapist speechless!) I did, however, decide that I would continue going and try to work out my dislike for this person. Things went fairly well for the first few weeks. Then, the last time I went to group, things went downhill. First, we were to "share" something we had learned about ourselves the previous week. I said how I had mentioned one of the other people in the group to one of my spiritual advisors and how I realized just how much more tolerant, much less judgmental, I was becoming. That did it. The woman I couldn't stand (WICS) jumped down my throat because I violated the other person's privacy by even mentioning ANYTHING about another group member. Now, you have to understand, I NEVER mentioned the person's name--just a circumstance that I would normally be intolerant of--and I had been talking to one of my SPIRITUAL ADVISORS. It would have been different if I had been talking to the bagboy at the grocery store, then I would have been in the wrong, but I believe the red flag was "spiritual advisor." I believe WICS wouldn't tolerate ANYTHING that even gave off a small feel of religion. This was our first confrontation of the evening. AND the therapist took HER side of the conflict. Fine, I could deal with it--I said nothing. Our next confrontation was more obvious, but the therapist never could see it. (I am changing the particulars of the story, just not the overall gist, for privacy purposes.) We were asked to name one thing that we really felt strongly about (the truth). When it got to me (this is a falsehood), I said I thought killing animals for ANY reason was just plain wrong--and that I felt very strongly about it. That went okay. Later on during the evening we had to each (and I can't remember exactly WHAT the exercise was about) relate a story. When it came to WICS's turn, she looked straight at me--just daring me to say something to her--and said (another falsehood), "I once killed a rabbit with my bare hands. I was hungry and this is what I had to do to survive!" Okay. I'll deal with this--again, I said nothing. The evening ended shortly after this.

We didn't have group the next week, so I had a chance to really analyze the situation and I decided I wasn't going to get anywhere with this group of people--actually, with WICS. I let the therapist know that I needed to discontinue the work with the group. To say this didn't go down well with her is an understatement. She told me I needed to come and discuss the situation with her, which I agreed to do. I explained my reasons--about the way WICS was itching for a fight with me and how it wasn't fair to the rest of the group to have two people going at each other like I could see happening with us. As I said, the therapist had her mind made up about things and wouldn't even try to understand my point of view. She absolutely didn't see WICS's baiting me that last evening. She accused me of running away from my problems instead of confronting them and trying to work on them JUST LIKE I ALWAYS HAD DONE! That was when I KNEW I would NEVER speak to her again. And, believe it or not, she still has a practice in this town.

So, even though I'm one-for-three in the therapist department, I still am an advocate for therapy. I still think everyone needs to see a therapist at least once in a lifetime. I just KNOW that you have to do a little shopping around before you pick the therapist that will actually help you.