I'm a pretty huge advocate of personal, couples, and all kinds of therapy. Why? Because it works to have someone neutral to help you handle your shit, in my personal experience and opinion. It's become more acceptable and mainstreamed to go to therapy and I very much embrace and appreciate that.
My husband and I have been going to therapy for two years and this past year was healing and breakthrough, finally. He goes to individual therapy, as do I. It feels nice to have someone on your side who can actually help you see yourself objectively.
I recently received what I consider to be a gold star in my personal therapy and my husband and I definitely got one in our couples session. After two years of struggle, plus another 4 years of utter muck, this feels beyond gratifying.
Having a fresh outlook is not something that comes easy for me. I'm miss obsess, miss overthink and miss inner conversationalist. Taking this down a notch, or twenty notches, has been a daily struggle but guess what? I'm figuring it out.
Being open about being in therapy and having support has been hit or miss. Some people are super supportive and others kind of wonder why I "need" it or spend my time that way. The thing is, even though we act as though our entire lives are on social media and there is no more privacy, all of our inner and mental battles go everywhere with us and no one else can truly, completely know what someone else is going through. Enter empathy. Empathy is huge.
I think most of us can kind of "idle" as a happy depressed person. We can hide a lot. My therapists say often that I rarely come in airing of anxiety and depression, you really have to get under that surface facade that I can wear. Chinks in the armor I like to think of it as. Most people I talk to who have suffered trauma say that people, "Never would have known," because it all looked neat and pretty on the outside. It usually does.
We all handle our struggles differently. Some medicate, some numb, some deny, deny deny. Some have a balance of all those things and some indulge in more of them than others. Life is hard! That's one thing you can't deny.
It is hard work, all of it. Sometimes I'm all happy to go talk it out in therapy and sometimes it can feel heavy. You are forced to face everything you avoid when you're not in that office, which can be so daunting, but then again, so liberating.
The gold stars came from hard work. Self realization, awareness, staying positive through the rough times and appreciating the good rather than focusing on the bad, all helped with the therapist supporting and stating how impressive it was and acknowledging the progress. This made me smile because sometimes after those sessions I don't actually feel better.
My personal therapist reminds me often that it's not some requirement of therapy to leave feeling better but she likes to check in towards the end of the session. Usually therapy sessions don't go how I think they will, either. I'll go in there ready to hash out some stuff and leave having focused entirely on a separate issue that I didn't even know was in there. It's complicated.
I think a fresh outlook is just another form of hope. Feeling hopeless is crappy. You can spend years wishing, hoping, even praying but when you put in the real work everything can turn around. I made excuses for years to keep us out of therapy, but it's the best time and money I've ever spent on something considered to be a luxury or non-essential thing. I don't regret any of it.
Healing from trauma and brokenness is hard work and it takes a tribe, openness, and in my humble opinion, therapy! You don't have to agree. In this day and age we have so many outlets and opportunities to find help all over, but for me, and for us, we needed some professional help. Not being ashamed of that, is also huge for me.
I head into the long weekend, the time with family, with all of the things with a fresh outlook and it feels really, really, long overdue and fantastic. Not carrying extra stress and worry is a feat all on it's own for me. If you have any questions about my journey, reach out, because I'm going to be talking about it more and more.
Go enjoy the 4th of July holiday, readers!
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