Afraid of therapy
Hi ,
I don't know how to start this threat just wanted to see if other people can relate .
I used to be a sensitive child who grew up with emotionally immature and neglectful parents and other adults . To deal with the trauma , i learned to completely numb my emotions and feelings and just went into survival mode .
3 years back , i decided to go for therapy and the more i talked about my childhood the more anger and resentment i could feel bubbling out , i was still living with my parents and that's why i stopped abruptly . during that time ,I hardly managed to talk to my parents normally because looking at them just reminded me of my childhood and i didn't want to lash out .
Now , finally i am far away from them in another country, i still have to call them once a week but it's better than living with them.
I am finally at peace and actually happy but the past keep on dragging me . I'll be having the best time of my life but the past will haunt me out of no where.
I am thinking of going into therapy but i am afraid i will lose my ability to numb my emotions and deal with things . It's the only thing that has kept me going for so long. I never had any adult figure i could rely on or have support. And now i am very hyper independent and do not get close to anyone even if the other person is amazing.
@BlueMoon133
Hello. I've had some bad childhood experience, too, and the way I understand it:
Without starting a therapy you may tend to numb your emotions, or freeze them, as I liked to call that. In general it seems OK, because you're isolated from difficult feelings and may feel more in control. But in fact, it isn't.
In my case it was body as tense (especially neck and head areas) as to cause frequent terrible headaches and other pains. Instead of feeling in control I felt overwhelmed and "exploded" emotionally more often. Some people start to get shaky and cry out of the blue when they're pressed too much by some ordinary everyday life trouble. Some of them start to shout or destroy things.
It may seem peaceful on the outside, but actually this blockade is using enormous amounts of energy and does not make feel you any safer or, in particular, happier. Going on without a therapy is like unhealed wound. The wound should be open, cleaned, and then it can be healed.
Otherwise, as you said, the past traumas may "keep haunting you", wasting your health and energy. You may move to another house or another country, but you are never completely free, if you are dragging your emotional pain and traumas inside you, wherever you go...
As far as I understand a therapy it is about learning to name your feelings first and to express them in the way which is safest for you and people around you. Addressing your feelings of being mistreated and harmed in the past. Confronting your pain and fear. Knowing how to better understand and express yourself.
The first step is being happier, safer and more in control of your life - but not full of regrets or numb. When you proceed further, you may observe your feelings and check them with the reality around, what can give you another level of freedom.
I hope you make decisions which turn out to be right for you 👍
@BlueMoon133
Last but not least, what was the most important in therapy for me:
I learned to trust people (obviously, not all of them), believe in people and how to live among them without losing my identity.
@BlueMoon133
we can relate we growing up with parents that were not really there other then yelling and hurting us. mom went to things with us only to take our friends over as her kids. we felt isolated and well like you we numbed emotions until we felt none at all. get was going thro toough the motions of life. just surviving.
we married to get out of parents home only way dad would allow us too. the man tricked us into marring him. so week later he was abusing us. we had 3 kids under 5yr nightmare due to hubby. lost the kids and little later we left him. we was cout order to go to community mental health. we had really bad workers there who did notlisten then when moved back in with parents. due to having no were to live. that community mental health pushed us onto our mom. they were not listening to us. this made us have more flashbacks and other actions that were unhealthy. even after we got own apartment that happened.
so we when we moved away from them to new city. wr free now but due to the bad treatment we got at community mental health there. we end up with a fear of mental health workers. but we was told we need to be there even threatened with if we stopped we get put in adult foster care. like you we was very numb no emotions showed.
but here we been treated better learned coping skills. but fear hard to get passed. most get worst when doing healing work them get way better. we are now starting to feel emotions again. it scarey but we can feel now even the good feelings and the other ones too. feelings are warning signs without them we not see the warning as can only feel them. so emotions are good to havebut scary.
we told someone not long ago about our deep rooted fear of mental health worker. it still there but we working on feeling again but fear losing the ability to numb emotions too.
sorry you dealing with this too but we found emotions are not all bad to feel
Therapist might find better way of coping with emotions rather than being numb. Showing them isnt necessarily bad, feeling anything is better than feeling nothing regardless. Therapy sometimes takes years to accomplish some improvements. Its a big and hardest step, im really happy you are reconsidering it even after a "bad" experience.
