YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

My therapist has stopped my treatment. He was clearly frustrated and annoyed at me. He said we're constantly hitting the same block. He wants me to finish the book I'm reading (about emotional intelligence) then he's going to send me a series of books and articles to read. He then said, if I feel ready to go back and beat the block to be in contact. Pretty sure thats the therapy version of 'lets still be friends'.

So that's it, not fixable, given up on. No hope left.

Wow, that's really shitty. Like give you the books and articles, sure. Encourage you to help move past the block, sure. But to dismiss you and say "Come back when you're ready" is just so condescending and shitty. I'm really sorry that that happened to you. I hope you can get another therapist who will treat you better.

Depends on what my doctor does next, no way I can afford private therapy. Been through CBT 3+ times, waited 2+ years for this referral to a psychologist. Not sure where to go from here.

Guess it's all over.

What is the block, if you don't mind me asking?

Please take care, neufena, we don't think you are unfixable.

To be honest I'm struggling to see what the central 'block' is. I see the same themes coming up over and over. It seems to stem from his inability to understand. I have no intrinsic worth or value and need to work around that in all social environments. His attempts to get me to be selfish and say what I want or feel are incredibly aversive as without me ensuring I please people I have nothing.

I've been trying to find a way to explain it it to people who do have worth and so far this is my best attempt:

Imagine 2 blocks of wood, one is suspended below the other by thin strings. Each of these strings represents a social 'tie' keeping me and another social entity (person, group etc) together and affiliated. Depending on the situation these could be various 'ties' like attractiveness, shared interest, skills, money. Anything really that 'links' people together. Most people have some kind of 'base' link. I have very few if any at all. I have had to build up my links thread by thread by making sure I say the right thing in conversation, agree to the right things, do the right things, dress the right way etc etc. When I'm asked a question (for example today, "what pub shall we meet in?") I have to evaluate all the options against the 'threads' and make sure none can be damaged and if possible new ones could be formed. I need to know things like how far a person is willing to walk from their bus stop, their budget for beers, what kind of beer, music, decor etc they like. My feelings on the matter come last as they don't build threads but can very easily destroy the threads. The threads are fragile and can break with the smallest mistake on my part.

I doubt that makes sense, I never was any good at explaining things to people.

Yeah, I think I understand what you are saying. Without an inner sense of self-worth to guide you, your connection to people seems tenuous and frail, and so you must manage your tenuous connection to people so very carefully or else you will lose them and then you will have nothing.

I have a problem with constantly thinking negative thoughts. Maybe some stuff that helped me might help you.

Maybe you need to practice faking having an inner sense of self-worth and faking having the skill to make easy connections with people.

I am constantly looking for clues in my posture and my mindset for if I am in my old habit of thinking a lot of negative thoughts. If so, I replace the negative thought with a positive thought, and I forget the question of if the negative thought might have some validity. Because for human animals to be effective, they have to have a constant stream of positive thoughts going through their heads - people with a constant stream of negative thoughts are depressed and not effective at all.

Maybe you just need to fake having an inner sense of self-worth, because effective people have a constant stream of thoughts reinforcing self-worth going through their heads. Don't worry if it is really true that you have no self-worth.

It takes a lot of practice and effort. And me replacing negative thoughts with positive thoughts raises my mood just a bit. But it helps.

Please just take this as a suggestion, I don't wish to push my experiences to try to negate your experiences. Please take care. It makes me sad that you are having to endure this suffering that you don't deserve.

Thanks,

With the greatest of respect, I don't think that approach works. The 'fake it till you make it' idea works short term, believe me I've done it many times. About 2-3 months in you start to believe your one lies like the old "repeat a lie enough times it become true". The thing is, it's not true, it's just a lie. Then you believe your own hype. Go for one of the things you have lied to yourself enough to 'deserve'. You talk to someone in a bar, you ask for a promotion, you say "no I don't want to do that". And then the lie comes crashing down as that moment of believing your own leads to you being brought sharply back to reality.

After trying too many times living a false reality is not for me, I need reality, I need to learn to accept and deal with reality. Not build up another web of lies that will ultimately fail.

I hope all this works out for you, and the situation sucks....May I offer this as a what not to do?

If i go back to my last suicide attempt. Three days after it happened. I felt all that guilt and shame associated with all that had transpired. I was sitting with all my mentally ill friends in the mental ward. Watching tv.

As I got up and walked to my room, it hit me. I was 46 years old. A full fledged grown up that was not very successful at dying, so I had to live.

I instantly recalled about 25 years focused on how I feel, and realized my problem may never go away, AND SO WHAT!

I could either spend another 20yrs reaching for this impossible (for me) emotional perfection, or just get on with things.

After this, I found therapy more productive and life, in general, went better.

It was similar to the "fake it till you make it" but it felt great to not worry about it all the time.

I'm 34 and I'm not very good at dying too. I know that it's the best thing for everyone, I hope to be hit by a truck on ym way to work or something but (like a lot of things in my life) I fail an doing what's needed.

But I totally get what you mean, this isn't going away, I'll never be worthwhile or valuable as a human. But so far I havn't found any help (either online or at therapy). I just need someone to agree with me. Say "yes you're worthless and here's how we're going to stop that hurting" instead of trying to fill my head withg lies that I have worth.

Yeah, I hear you. It is just life is cruel to people who have internalized that they have no inner worth. Please take care, all the best, you are not alone.