1. I see my psych once every two to three months now, but before being stabilized on meds I seen her once a month. I see my therapist once every two weeks. We are doing safety work at the moment. Once I start doing exposure therapy that will increase to once a week.

2. Exactly how much I see them now. If I need more time I let them know, if I need less I let them know. They also do the same of me. I have no set time, just what I need to meet my needs currently.

3. This completely depends on where you are in the healing process and what route you took for healing. I am doing exactly the process as the trauma diaries. Exposure therapy. This takes place in three stages; safety, exposure, and integration. The three stages tend to hop all over the place (it is not a linear process.) For the safety stage (which is coping techniques, reducing symptoms etc.) and the integration stage (management stage) I only need to go once every two weeks so that I have a chance to implement the techniques I am learning. For the exposure I need to go every week, so that I am digging at it until it is all unearthed (being pushed basically) and being more closely monitored due to the increase in symptoms.

If you are doing CBT only, it is considered to be a short term, coping/technique based therapy that works on the here and now. It tends to run from 6 to 12 weeks long. I realize there are more methods ( I refuse to even consider blasted EMDR in my responses!) but someone who is living it should answer those.

What ever method you are doing, you should have a clear idea of what it is, what stages there are and how long the approximate times should be expected. Therapy is useless unless there is a clearly defined and attainable goal discussed and agreed upon. If your going to therapy and have no clue of what method your doing, what to expect, or a time line (remember time lines are only general, they change as you go) then you are not seeing a professional therapist that is client oriented.

bec