As the title suggest, I’m looking to restart psychotherapy after taking a year long break. My experiences with psychotherapy haven’t been the most pleasant, in fact it was because of these experiences that caused me to be hestitant about attending therapy and eventually I took a year long break from therapy.
In this year long break, I’ve been coping mostly alright, I still engaged with counselling and that has been rather helpful, my counsellor taught me certain skills on emotional regulation and distress tolerance.
However, I decided to restart psychotherapy because of recent turns of events and also there’s a specific issue that I would like to work on that requires a more specialised kind of help. I’m really nervous, there’s definitely a chance that this therapeutic relationship might not work out again but I’m definitely going with an open mind, It’s a leap of faith.
I guess what I’d hope to share is that don’t be discouraged or disheartened if your experiences in therapy haven’t been the most pleasant/ great. Tbh, this is my 5th psychologist that I’m engaging, I wanted to give up but I thought to myself how therapy is/ can be helpful/ beneficial and I wanted to be able to improve the quality of my life…
I hope we’ll all be able to find a therapist we can have a good rapport with and in time that therapy will be beneficial for us because I think everyone can benefit from speaking to a professional, just need to find the right fit and I’m still on my hunt of finding one so don’t give up
Together we’ll make a better future for ourselves. Take care
I agree, it’s not easy to find a therapist that gels. I haven’t found one for myself that I really enjoy speaking to as well. What are some of the considerations you have when you are evaluating whether this therapist suits you or not?
Hmm, that’s a really good question. Personally for me the most important factor is whether over time, I can trust and feel comfortable enough with my therapist to share my issues with him/ her.
Additionally, do my therapist listen to my issues attentively and doesn’t force his/ her beliefs onto me, I ever had a therapist tell me if I stopped attending church, I’ll end up even more depressed and I won’t get better…
What are your considerations when evelauting whether a therapist suits you or not?
Sounds like you value the ability to listen and whether the therapist makes you feel comfortable or not.
I think it’s generally the same for me but on top of that, I tend to look for someone who has similar life experiences (but sometimes that can be hard to find)
I’m also mindful that I often judge too quickly so if the therapist doesn’t show that they understand me in the first 5 mins, I tend to shut off already.
While I would like someone that I can relate to, sometimes I do enjoy hearing a different perspective. Basically I like someone who can tell me where I was wrong because that’s very valuable to me. But I’m also conflicted cause if the viewpoint is too far away from what I expect then I also shut off.
@Jaws
I hear your difficulties in finding a suitable therapist for yourself but I hope you never stop searching and hopefully one day, you’ll find the one
Also side note: I managed to find a therapist and I just spoke to her on the phone, will be having an in person meeting in about 2 weeks time Hope that it’ll go well, fingers crossed
Just a little update, last week I went for my 1st session and I’m feeling optimistic about it that it’ll be different from my past experiences and this time it might really help
I feel comfortable with her and that’s very important… rapport is very important especially when I have to be vulnerable and share with her stuff that I’d probably never share with anyone else.
It’s been awhile since we last heard from you about this post, so I’m writing to check in I would also like to apologise for the late initial response, but I’m glad the peer supporters and our friends in this community have been so supportive!
I am so glad to hear that you’ve decided to restart therapy, and I wonder how has it been for you so far? Would you be able to share with us some of the things that you have found helpful, and some things that has worked? We would all be able to learn from your experiences too.
I agree with you that it’s not easy to find the right fit, especially when it comes to a psychotherapist. Even though it may feel like we would never be able to find the most suitable one, we should not give up - you are a good example of what it means to “keep going” !
Psychotherapy can be really helpful for us, and if we take our time to find the most suitable one for us, I’m sure we will be able to form a healthy therapeutic relationship with the therapist and continue to benefit from speaking to them.
Let us know how your search has been and how you’ve benefitted so far! I’m excited to know how the progress has been for you
Thanks for checking in. Through a friend’s recommendation I managed to find a psychologist for myself. So far we’ve had 4 sessions together and I’d really liked her, I feel like we’ve a good rapport, she makes me feel safe and comfortable to share and talk with her, she also validates my experiences and feelings, she always ask more about my experiences (don’t gloss through any issues) while also creating a safe and non-judgmental space . I’d really think and believe that this time therapy will help me find healing.
