Today I see a new therapist who specializes in PTSD. I want so much for it to be the best experience. One where I really feel someone knows what is going on with me and can give me clear direct advice and support. To this point I really have hoped someone would come in with a magic wand and say this is where you are, this is what you have to do and this is what you can expect if you do these things. Then I could be clear on where I am going and somehow that seems to be the best but it is not going to happen. Not knowing and having to be your own advocate really pisses me off. Just feeling a bit sorry for myself. I know all the good self talk but it really makes me mad that when I am not able to think clearly I am at the whim of others and then there is the clean up. Seems like wasted time. Time being one of my obssessions that I am convinced I am running out of (Everyone dies on me). Oh well, today I am going to trying and not have expectations. Really! Because when I can expect a miracle without expectations I am always delighted to my core and I am restored in the belief of "the process".
Patty

Patty,

I wish you the absolute best of luck!

It is always a good idea not to have "expectations". But it's also a very good idea to think about what you want out of therapy, if you have a preference on how you want to go about things, so that you can talk this through. More than anything, be open minded, and take it as it comes.

Again, best of luck, thinking of you

Lisa.

I say best of luck with this Patty, and tell us how it goes please.

I don't know if I like this guy or not. I will reserve judgement until visit 3. I really think that I am reacting to what Ptsd'd Off talked about when going to therapy...the feelings of being afraid, nauseous and sad. I got sick to my stomach and panicked. I felt like I was going to be stuck in the wave of emotion and my coping scale is so tenuously balanced right now that I am afraid I will get suicidal again. I am starting to hurt myself because the pain is so great inside I want it to come out and that is what makes it feel better. I can't visit it in my head but the aftermath of cutting makes me separate the pain from me. I have told my psychiatrist and both therapists about the self abuse. That is my pact to be honest. I just never thought I would be here how childish I should know better but it is my sickness and for the first time in my life I can start to see this and it brings me relief and freedom in expressing what is going on. So to get back to my start, I think I am just afraid that the time between sessions is going to be a time I won't be able to work through this stuff on my own.
Always...trudging the road of recovery,
Patty

Patty, nobody can help you unless you want to help yourself, that is the key to this. It is like all those who go to a therapist or shrink, then only tell them half the story, or don't tell them much at all, they don't really want to help themselves at that point, because if they did, they would expose everything including their vunerability and let the other person deal with it and hopefully provide something useful to the information, if not for anything else than to just listen from a personal vent of the full story.

Its quite amazing how most people do this... and even if it comes to it, you should print out things you write here and give them to your doctor or therapist, atleast they know what is truly going on in your head one way or another, which is better than not at all.