Posted by noa on February 5, 2003, at 5:25:02
In reply to Re: Why can't you see more than one therapist at once? » JenR, posted by Dinah on February 3, 2003, at 22:12:06
Dinah, when I read books by expert therapists, I always feel a little wary of just how neat and tidy their treatments work out. It seems that a lot of times, they pull composites together, and concentrate anecdotes, etc. I have doubts about how often things really go the way they are described. I do believe that the anecdotes are true, but that the overall progression of the treatment they describe is not really as smooth and successful as they describe it--ie, there are great moments in therapy, I'm sure, but I also think that these are probably interspersed among all the lousy moments and periods of "stuckness", you know--the more boring, muddling through not feeling like much progress happens phases.
My therapist has also acknowledged he doesn't always know what is going on with me, or how to get me unstuck, etc., but I really get a sense of confidence from him that he will work through it with me and explore until we figure it out. I find that much more honest than the super-confident authors (imo, Yalom, author of "Love's Executioner" is a good example, and maybe Virginia Axline, author of "Dibs in Search of Self").
I also think it is probably common for us to wish that our therapists would have "the answer", or some magical power to find THE thing that will cure us. We have so much doubt in ourselves and the world, why wouldn't we want to turn to someone who knew exactly how to make things better, right?
When I first started therapy (different therapist) at age 22, I had a slightly paranoid idea that my therapist knew what the key things were that I had to uncover, but that because therapy was a process of SELF-discovery, he was making me find it myself. But I was convinced he was withholding the info from me. I think this is partly based on my conception of therapy, which was at that time based on books--both fiction and non-fiction, and movies. In books and movies (especially of the era preceding my initiation of therapy), psychiatrists and psychologists were so all-knowing and able to quickly diagnose and then succinctly explain a person's problem in pat, reductionist, self-assured terms, usually of a Freudian nature, in a way that described the person as their problem and did not (I realized later on) really acknowledge the complexity of the individual.
Interestingly, later that year--ie, the first year I was ever in therapy--Judith Rosten's book, "August" came out (sorry--no good link came up from Amazon). In some ways, this book kind of broke out of the pattern I was talking about, but it also sticks to the idea that one clear early life experience can explain all of the patients problems. She portrayed the main psychiatrist as a real person with plenty of problems and self-doubts. And, the patient's pervious psychiatrist is portrayed as having major countertransference and boundary problems. Also, we saw in that book, from the point of view of the main psychiatrist character, how arrogant some of the other psychiatrists could be. On the other hand, the book is essentially a mystery to uncover "the" event (in this case a traumatic one) that led to the patient's psychiatric problems, with neat clues, and all. It kind of made me think that there must have been a key event for me, and I just needed to find it and then I would get better (like the character of the patient).
poster:noa
thread:2321
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20030203/msgs/2504.html