Does anyone else have horrible anxiety about therapy?

[neverbeenright]

Hi everyone. Just wondering if I'm alone here. I've had anxiety and depression pretty much all my life, even as a child. Been in and out of therapy several times, but I hate it so much that I always quit as soon as I feel a little better - without ever really accomplishing anything. Could be a lot of reasons for failure. For one, I was drinking alcoholically through a lot of it. Maybe HMO therapists just suck. Anyhow, I've been sober for several years now, and my anxiety and depression are really acting up lately. Nothing feels good anymore. I wake up in the morning with a jolt of adrenalin and a sick feeling in my stomach. The world is grey - know what I mean? So I'm thinking, maybe I need to go back, find a doctor, maybe get back on some meds. Probably the best years of my life I was on Effexor. Part of me wants to go to therapy - to talk to someone. But here's how my therapy sessions go: on the way there, I get an anxiety attack - "why am I doing this, why am I doing this, what was I thinking?". I sweat my way through the session, feeling sick, cry, leave with a headache, and then beat myself up for the rest of the day because I feel like I said something stupid or looked foolish. Yeah, I have a lot of social anxiety as you might guess. Can anyone relate? I'm just wondering if it's even possible for me to get help - other than a prescription, I mean.

[Kitten]

i used to feel like that to.. about therapy.

i was twenty when i found out that i suffered from depression, this was fall 2003. (i didn't really notice the anxiety untill my depression was better, Also i always just though that i was totaly defected. emotionally, that i was just messed up.. not that i had a problem that could be fixed, or that i could get help so that i can cope with this. i was REALLY relived that it had a name, that i was suffering from something not that i was just wrong in some way)

i didn't start therapy until march 2005.... from 2003 til 2005, i was like i need therapy( i especially thought this when i had major depressive episodes, they would usually come in the afternoon- night, when the doctors office is cloesed and when i woke up in the morning feeling better, i would find all sorst of reasons why i SHOULDN'T go to therapy. e.g:
i don't need it,
talking about this won't help,
i'm to far gone to be helped,
i don't want to tell some stranger about my problems and about my family
i can deal with this myself etc etc

but then in early 2005 my boyf made me call my doctors office for an apointment, and then i had to find a therapist. i got really lucky though cause i found one i have great chemestry with. ( i never even thought about that untill i called for an apointment and the secretary said that i should plan just one session first to see if i had chemestry with the phsycologist.)
i don't regeret it though. i feel my phycologist have really given me some great tools from coping with this, she has also helped me know that i am not a defected human being. i have nothing to be ashamed of.

i also recongnise what you said about how the sessions go. I to, in the begining, felt like an idiot, and i was so worried about what i said, etc. (i used to have a HUGE problem with worrying about what i said... i could have a 2 min conversation with someone, and then spend 20-30 mins thinking about what i had said, if i was rude, if i had said something stupid... etc.)

i do think there is hope for you to get better, it will take alot of work, but i think you'll be able to get better.

i don't know if you preper for your sessions, but i find that it is helpful to make a list in my head or on paper on issues and things i should talk about. or if i'm having questions about certain feeling that i'm having .. for exaple; for years i've been experiencing a kind of a pressure or a flutter over my lungs, that for a few seconds makes it hard to breathe. it feels like someone has their hand on my lungs, pressing down on them.

also i like it when my therapist gives me assignments and homework for the next session, when she gives me direct instructions on things i should work at. (she has the outside perspective, experience etc to beable to recognice issues that i really need to work at.) for example: i have issues with my mom, for a really long time i couldn't see her, or talk to her on msn or on the phone. it would just cause me so much stress and anxiety... so my therapist told me that i should practice on protecting myself and to put limits for myself.....


sorry this message is so long :p i hope you fdind it some what helpful though ;) not just dribble from a stranger hehe

[neverbeenright]

Thanks so much for your response - sounds like you know just what I'm talking about. I love your little list of why NOT to make an appointment. I've been using that list for a few years now. So now that you feel better, when it's therapy day, or you're on your way to your session, you don't feel all freaked out about it? I saw my last psychologist for three years and never felt good about it. She was nice, I just don't trust people. I could never believe that she really wanted to help me - because why would she? It was just her job to talk to me. Man, sorry if I sound really pathetic. This is just a real problem. I'm worried I'll never get up the courage to call.

[Kitten]

it doesn't sound pathetic at all! :)

a very good friend of mine and my brother have both had the smae problem; not really trusting their therapist. i totaly understand what your saying! i have thought at times: how sincer is she?after all i pay her alot of money per hour... this is her job... my friend also had the problem that she couldn't get herself to open up.

well, i have been seeing her for 2 years, in the beginning i went once a week.. then every other week... it tok me about 2 months to get rid of the anxiety about going.. though i had problems afterwards for over 6 months, cause i felt like i said too much, or that i sounded stupid, or that iwas a big cry baby etc... but now i don't feel that at all.

now i go once a month and i don't feel anxious before i go, but it is hard sometimes to get going when she asks me how things are and so on. it can take me like 10 mins to get the talking and opening up going.