Posted by sunnydays on March 31, 2007, at 11:29:26
In reply to Group therapy is hard, posted by Daisym on March 31, 2007, at 0:31:23
I don't know. I'm in a group now, and I've had some of the same problems. I feel like I can't relate a lot of the time (I'm the youngest there, so a lot of people have had experiences like marriage that I just simply haven't had). And it feels a lot of the time to me like no one knows what to say to me, even the therapists (one's a trainee, so we have two for a group of six). I finally figured out that part of my problem is that I feel like I have to be given permission to talk, so someone has to ask me something for me to say something. Other people it seems like can just jump in and talk with no prompting, which I don't know how to do. I haven't been able to talk to my therapist about it yet (see post above), so I don't quite know what to do about it.
My therapist knows the group leaders, so he can tell them some things. But he wants me to just keep trying different things to see what works to make me feel connected. Like maybe saying that I don't feel connected when there's period of silence, or saying what I want people to say to me, even if it feels contrived.
I'm glad you posted this Daisy. Makes me feel like maybe it's not an uncommon problem in groups. My therapist told me he was proud of me for sticking with it, even though I could easily have decided I wasn't ready or didn't like it or something. I'm proud of you too. You keep going, even though you don't have to. Keep trying different things is my advice, I guess. But I totally get how hard that can be, and how lonely you can feel in a group of people.
sunnydays
poster:sunnydays
thread:745674
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20070324/msgs/745739.html