Posted by fallsfall on August 24, 2005, at 20:45:16
In reply to Attachment and loss...possible trigger, posted by gardenergirl on August 24, 2005, at 19:28:09
>I've learned that I'm not really so much depressed as I am anxious. The way I tend to deal with anxiety is to retreat, which looks and feels like depression.
We have a lot in common, GG. I didn't understand the anxiety part for the longest time.
I've had these conversations, but my therapist says that I can keep therapy even if I get better. He once said that therapy gets better as I get better. If I were to lose therapy when I stopped being depressed, I would stay depressed forever. I assume that at some point in the very distant future, that I won't feel the need to go to therapy, and that at that point it will be OK with me to let it go. But that is a long time away, and I have lots of work to do first.
I guess the difference is whether I will quit therapy because **I** don't need it anymore, or if I would need to quit because someone else says I don't need it anymore. I've lived in the later world for too long - and every day was painful.
I would be really surprised if your therapist recommended shedding therapy before you were sincerely personally motivated to do that. At some point, I think that you (and I) will get there (and I even think Dinah will get there). And when we are there, it won't be painful to leave therapy - it may still be sad, but not painful.
I believe that you don't have to "prove" that you are healed by quitting therapy. That the proof will come when quitting therapy isn't a big deal.
(((GG)))
poster:fallsfall
thread:546244
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050824/msgs/546297.html