Recieving counselling

Cinnabar_wing said:

give myself a 'hug' to make me feel better when I'm being hyper-vigilant.

What that means in context is hard to imagine to me too...    Are you talking here about the balance between feeling/allowing oneself to be aware of the perceived threat of the deeper issues and pushing it away by self hugging?  Perhaps the difference is one of the "self hug" being a pretence one adopts as a mask versus the genuine positive self love one gives?

Perhaps this might be a metaphorical hug of allowing oneself to stim when feeling hyper-vigilant so that one might begin to identify when one is distressed to start with and interrupt the routine response one has become accumulated to making?  This would allow time for analysis of what is/has occurred and consideration of how it might be influencing one in the present perhaps?

Cinnabar_wing said:

I'm run by logic so if I can reason out of negative behaviour it would be more effective than simply trying to feel better about it.

This is tricky as one may well be analysing past events from the perspective of being in a survival mode where one's "take" on things can be somewhat shifted.  I find myself caught here on the possibility that I might be biasing my analysis of negative behaviour when in survival mode away from a picture of reality that others have.  This is not to say this picture is necessarily wrong - just that if they and I are seeing things from very different perspectives (that dual empathy problem...)

Cinnabar_wing said:

used to working out what people want and how to avoid conflict that trying to work out who I am without that is such an unknown.

doing the empathising work of two people is hard - furthermore if one is not being oneself how can the other person empathise?  

Yes It's hard - as regards the therapy - maybe it is a roll of the dice as regards outcome -  depends how much is riding on it as to how one feels about proceeding perhaps.

Best Wishes

I'll mention it again here:

A lot of therapy is based around NT thinking. Mostly people want help to regulate their emotions.

But if it is confusion that is dysregulating you because things don't make sense, this approach is just a sticking plaster and misses the point. You need to talk about the issues and understand them. Mostly they go slowly into the issues and not too deep to avoid upsetting emotions. But this is the opposite of what is needed, which is what you feel.

Depth is what helped me, and I kind of took over. You can then process them in your own time once you understand. I showed little or no emotions in sessions, but always had at least one point to think about afterwards, which I then researched like crazy and came back with my conclusions at the next session.

But my issue was burnout which had allowed lots of suppressed stuff out, then I got diagnosed to make it more confusing.

Thank you both for your perspectives on your experiences!

this!

Like you say it assumes you can change the way you think. My experience of CBT is that I just end up with more rules to juggle and eventually burnout.

I'e been in and out of therapy most of my life from C-PTSD, ADHD and GAD. I don't think therapy works very well for me - mostly because it's based around CBT, which assumes your thought patterns are faulty, but they're not, with ND the thought patterns are just fine, they're different and dont need 'correcting;'. I made this realisation late into therapy and now know why I didnt actually work very well for me after all these years. I  just quickly picked up a sense that they would might as well be talking to someone else and not me, the advise kind of made sense, but didnt actually apply to me. I felt myself agreeing and going along with it as to not be awkward - at that moment, I knew this wasn't for me. Most therapy feels generic CBT - it just never quite hit the mark. 

All of this! I used to shut my eyes and then get comments about 'being sleepy', when I just didn't like anything on my face. I can see my sensory issues now, but I can't navigate phonecalls to find a 'new' one after moving here 8 years ago -I tried two near the beginning but wasn't comfortable enough to go back again. I need to do it for my kids though, at I've been cutting their hair too since the pandemic as I don't have a hairdresser to take them to.

Yeah that makes sense it’s similar to why I started seeing one. Hairdressing I hate talking to them but luckily my hairdresser knows that and just lets me have a head massage and relax…. I can’t make small talk and a really don’t want to. I just used to say to them oooo I love getting a head massage it makes me fall asleep getting my hair cut… I think they got it in the end that I didn’t want to talk much but still like them. So they give me coffee and a biscuit and ask me how it looks at the end (don’t like that bit either haha) but it’s better than forced conversation for an hour 

pietro_21 said:

I thought generally this was self care, it’s actually self compassion

Yes, this is such a hard skill to learn, self compassion when you aren't used to it.

Yeah, that makes sense too, I started as I needed to know why I had needed to leave my job, and a lot of that came down to discovering I'm autistic and in burn out in the end. 

I would really like to be able to overcome some things, which are also down to autism, like getting a haircut which I've not been able to bring myself to do for 6 years, and has always been difficult. Now I understand the sensory issues involved and the social anxiety, (I didn't understand why I was so useless before), I might stand a chance with some help now.

Rereading some earlier posts from this thread. This is spot on I only remembered today that I am often too giving to others (almost like a reflex action) talking giving me them things I actually need. 
Asking for things I need or doing things I need to t crucial times can be problematic too. 
I thought generally this was self care, it’s actually self compassion. 

I think you know about yourself and “developing new traits” is one of those inconsiderate terms similar to people assuming you are paranoid without any evidential basis, it’s basically a dismissive term about factual information that they are not interested in exploring. I would definitely suggest getting a new therapist and one that has experience with ASD. It sounds like your therapist has an agenda almost as she shouldn’t be interrogating you in that way. Maybe what you need isn’t a therapist perhaps it’s a life coach that specialises in ASD. A life coach is better if you’re not dealing with past pains in a deeply traumatic way. A life coach can help you navigate current social dilemmas , sometimes with neurotypical people these dilemmas are based on past experience but I think with ASD they’re more often based on the new experience - they’re always confusing it’s not held by trauma that we can’t assess and move past them it’s due to inability to assess what people are inferring etc. we learn from our past experience sure but it still doesn’t mean we are equipped to deal with new experiences accurately or that the new experience is directly similar to the past scenario. So it’s possibly more relative that you don’t need a therapist you may just need a life coach with good direction that helps you understand the current situation 

I realised I never got back to you Phased , I've been considering a lot of what you had said and it's been back on my mind again about whether to keep going or not with therapy. Especially as it's coming up again.

Phased said:

getting me to be kind to myself, empathising etc.  In truth this didn't get to the root of what was causing me distress

I think this feels true, and I know I just started, but I can't feel it when I'm told to give myself a 'hug' to make me feel better when I'm being hyper-vigilant.

Phased said:

I am of the opinion that ultimately many of the why's can be traced to being autistic in a neurotypical world and therapy for that would be a more logical approach

I really agree here, I'm run by logic so if I can reason out of negative behaviour it would be more effective than simply trying to feel better about it.

Phased said:

Phased said:

A further complication to perhaps consider is that emotional insight involved in meaningful therapy can be compromised by alexithymia - perhaps correlated by years of ignoring how one feels because of being in "survival mode" most of the time.

I think I am perhaps really blind to myself and as you said have been in survival mode so long and used to working out what people want and how to avoid conflict that trying to work out who I am without that is such an unknown. 

I think sometimes it feels already that one base reason she's found is being applied to everything, even though it doesn't feel like the whole story all the time. So me being bullied as a kid was for her the suggested reason for not speaking to other parents at a Halloween party (not sticking my head above the parapit), but I didn't get a chance to say it's also the fact that a loud hall and trying to get into conversation with people who are already talking is too much for me. If I could have sat on my own a minute and then start talking to one or two, then I'm fine. She is trying to help and said I need to 'find my voice' when I'm with others, but I'm struggling even to do it in therapy as it feels too much like contradicting someone who knows better.

Anyway, thanks for all the thoughts,  sometimes I think about things so much I forget to respond in the real world. I'm thinking of postponing it and maybe not going back as I think I'm difficult to help.

Cheers and take care!

Okay so in America NORMALLY you have to search for it and hope that it is covered by your health insurance lol. I say “normally,” because in my case for this particular therapy it was weird. My daughter’s school got a grant to help pay for families to get therapy, so we jumped on that and they found the therapist for me. I just lucked out that it was an awesome fit and was paid for by the school. Otherwise, my insurance would not have covered it.

I think it can be group based, but the one I had was individual.

Cinnabar_wing said:

I grab an old envelope or scrap of paper and start just drawing abstract lines, patterns, repeated graphics.

Oh yeah, it sounds like art therapy would be absolutely perfect for you!

the emailing the therapist first telling them what youve been thinking about between sessions can really help. I feel its for them to structure the sessions. Also it takes someone else to simplify things and to get look at them objectively. You yourself might be sending yourself in a negative thought loop.

If you just talk about stuff that ls comfortable it won't help.

The whole point is to address things that make you uncomfortable. It is to get you to recognise and accept the hard stuff, ask why you are doing it or avoiding, then think how to help improve it.

Sometimes just naming the problem out loud is enough. This is the case for shame and guilt issues. It can be very hard to expose yourself.

They can give you exercises to do between sessions. These may also not be easy.

In general growth comes from pushing and confronting things.

Beware of trying to steer the sessions to avoid things. I was doing this subconsciously a lot. I was intellectualising things to avoid emotions.

You mentioned in a previous response that you're not sure what is taking place in the sessions / what strategies the therapist is using Cinnabar_wing 

I've had counselling a few times - as I recall it a lot of it was trying to "build me back up" with positive statements about me, getting me to be kind to myself, empathising etc.  In truth this didn't get to the root of what was causing me distress - appeared to be applying some sort of psychological band aid.

I suspect that much of this is based upon how neurotypical people might go about addressing psychological harm for neurotypical people.

To me much of the distress I experience in life comes from encounters where my differences in "executive function" as an autistic person come  into conflict with neurotypical behaviour and thinking.

There are deeper patterns that perhaps might be explored in how I have gone about trying to protect myself from this conflict.

In this one might consider how masking behaviour towards others and by necessity one has masked distress from oneself (at least superficially) as one has to cope.

I am coming around to the idea that myself and others could well have been living in "survival mode".  Mental health care terminology talks about "coping skills" - on a practical basis coping by spending all day bailing out a leaking life raft is not conducive to one's mental health I suspect.

I personally have "armoured myself" with a range of strategies to try to make myself less vulnerable in a threatening, competitive and dangerous world - regretfully this can make one less flexible to adaptation and change.

From what I can make of it strategies such as CBT first look to help the person accept their vulnerability and then "rebuild" an alternate approach to negotiating life.

I think that naturally under the circumstances post diagnosis an autistic person may already possibly be feeling intensely vulnerable - having had a defining list of deficits given to them as part of the diagnostic process.  For this reason care and understanding and tailoring the process to the individual is especially important.

I also suggest that being always on the search for understanding "why" and that so much therapy appears to be about enabling the person to work things out for themselves.  I am of the opinion that ultimately many of the why's can be traced to being autistic in a neurotypical world and therapy for that would be a more logical approach if it weren't for how resistant to therapy neurotypical people are in this respect.  

Notwithstanding this understanding how trauma can trap one in a "stuck state" along with regularly finding that it is very very difficult to live to personal moral standards in a neurotypical world that appears to play fast and loose with these and perhaps finding alternate strategies and insights how to move on and thrive are worthwhile goals.

A further complication to perhaps consider is that emotional insight involved in meaningful therapy can be compromised by alexithymia - perhaps correlated by years of ignoring how one feels because of being in "survival mode" most of the time.

And then just to throw a biggie into why therapy is hard is simply because by the time we come to get it we are often at our lowest ebb.

If many years ago someone had metaphorically put an arm around and gave us the therapy we needed closer to the time when we first experienced trauma maybe things wouldn't have turned out as they have.

Still we are where we are and we can only start there.

Best wishes Cinnabar_wing 

Yes, I think even if I have some notes in front of me (I do it via zoom), then I can always use them/not use them as I feel I need. I seem to go a bit blank when in conversation and need a lot of promting. I wonder if emailing some ideas would help then, just so she has a vague idea of things we can bring up if I fail to say anything?

That is interesting that ADHD folks mask too, I suppose suppressing all that movement if you are hyper side would be exhausting too!

Thanks, yes it was something that has come up, that I have difficulty extending the same empathy I show others to myself.  I know what you mean about the same holes, as if I mention one thing and she says about trying to allow something for myself, I'll tick that off my list as a thing I've spoken about once so probably don't need to mention again, but fail to apply the same understandings to a different issue. As a grown up, I would tell someone else it takes time to build up self esteem from nothing, but I can still be blind to thinking I can fix something after a few sessions. 

And yes, very wobbly at the moment, and I don't know whether I need to give myself a breather or plow on regardless (the latter being my normal way of doing things). 

Yeah, I think because I haven't mentioned all my issues, I don't want her to think I am making them up, so maybe if I am clear these aren't regressions but just things I hadn't spoken about yet it will help. If I then feel it is causing a barrier, then I could think about alternatives.

Oh art therapy sounds wonderful, I love art (the biggest longest interest I've had). I love drawing/painting, but I think I also stim draw too -when I am turbulent inside, I grab an old envelope or scrap of paper and start just drawing abstract lines, patterns, repeated graphics. I know America is different, but how did you find out who does that? Do you just search for art therapy and does it have to be for ND's/is it group based?

It might be good to try and work out what I am trying to do certainly. I think I am actually confused myself about it, which is probably not helping. The initial reason for seeking help changed a bit with discovering some of it is autism related, but the wider issues are still there.  I think taking the time of the holidays to work out what I need myself is a good goal to have before I do have another session, and do as you said about discussing that with her.