Tag Archives: Psychodynamic

May 30 2013

Still Alive; Doing Well

I’ve been intending to write this for about two weeks, but simply couldn’t be arsed. Truthfully, I’m probably only being arsed today as I’m procrastinating – this, whilst an intended exercise, is in many ways an attempt at avoidance of putting a pitch together. Ideas surge through my brain cells like a bullets through air, but unfortunately those brain cells don’t send those same neural signals to my fingertips.

To be frank, money issues aside, I don’t care that much at the minute. Insofar as I believe in the concept – which is actually not very, but whatever – I’m quite happy at the minute. Such an admission must come as an utter shock to those of you that have known me in the long-term, particularly in the days before I started writing here and was blathering a constant stream of negativity via a typographical fog horn elsewhere. It comes as a shock to me, probably most of all. My absence from this blog is symptomatic of not being at the soul-suckingly low points of the past – it was rare for me to not blog for more than a few days back then. Now though, rather than writing about life…well, I am living it.

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Feb 19 2013

Change

Jane didn’t come to the session tonight. Apparently she phoned Robert’s boss during the week to complain, though she hasn’t spoke to him nor Ellie about what happened last week. The group has made it clear that if she doesn’t return, we’ll miss her – however, I think the cohesiveness and support present in tonight’s session made it clear that if she doesn’t, we’ll still do good work without her.

It may simply be that after last week’s nastiness, she simply needs a break, or it may be that she was so offended by things that she can never face any of us ever again. I hope it’s the former, but if the latter, I still believe that this group has, and will continue to have, a positive impact upon my life.

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Feb 13 2013

Awkward

We’re nearly half way through the planned sessions of group therapy; last night was eight of the 20 we have allocated. It was also the first where there was something of a confrontation. Interestingly, it was the therapists that precipitated it.

It went something like this. There is one woman, let’s call her Jane, that has often done most of the talking, usually about one specific relationship that she’s been struggling with. This has frequently served as the basis for the other three of us to talk; perhaps we see in Jane’s relationship what we’ve seen in some of our own, perhaps we understand why she struggles as she does. Whatever, it doesn’t really matter – the main point is that she’s brought it up a lot, and that to use the parlance of the one bloke in the group (John, let’s say), the other three “bat off her.”

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Oct 31 2012

Group Therapy?

So many ideas, so little motivation. My drafts folder is overloaded with stuff. I think of an idea, whip out my iPhone and note the idea plus some basic points about it down, then get back home and stare at the closed laptop in contempt, and go and do something else (until yesterday, that was mainly playing Dish0nored, although I’ve completed one ending of it now. Gamer? Go and buy it if you haven’t already done so!). Or, more frequently, nothing else.

I go through periods like this quite frequently, so if you’ve heard nothing from me on Twitter, on your own blogs, via email or in response to comments left here, it’s because I’m hiding from the world. It’s not that I’ve lost interest in any of I'll Be Backyou – never that. It’s just that my social awkwardness often extends into the online world, particularly when I’m feeling low. I wouldn’t describe myself as depressed as such, but I recognise that the symptoms of an episode are wider ranging that just mood. Not that I would describe said mood as sublime, having said that. Does that ever happen outside a manic episode? I don’t know what I believe about that any more – a subject of one of these billion unwritten posts, indeed. Anyway, sorry. To coin a cliche, it’s not you, lovely people; it’s me. The whole SAD thing doesn’t exactly help matters.

Anyway, I’ll be back!

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Jun 6 2012

Guided Imagery in Therapy – Part Two

This is the second post in a series I am writing exploring the use of guided affective imagery as a psychotherapeutic device. Each post is/will be, broadly speaking, a free-writing exercise based on my experiences of this technique in my own therapy sessions. The first post in the series can be found here.

The door is open, and I can now see inside the house. There is a corridor – well, a hall I suppose, but it feels more like a corridor, as it’s not particularly homely – stretching out in front of me. It’s a musty brown in colour, though it feels as if I am looking at it through a lens of grey. It doesn’t feel frightening as such, but there is something about it that urges caution in me.

What leads off from it? the voice enquires.

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