Adults are STUPID!
I have decided that most adults are stupid. Especially the ones working in therapy.
I recently had a consultation with a child who had PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) which the parents said had happened as a result of an incident when the child was a baby.
The incident itself was very traumatic, it made me feel uneasy just to listen to the parents’ account of it – all of which the child had heard before from the various other counsellors and therapists she had been referred to by her GP in the past.
I felt uneasy because of the nature of the incident, I felt uneasy hearing the graphic details about the incident being spoken about in front of a child and I felt uneasy about the fact that this child had experienced this incident at an age when she shouldn’t remember it. But now she is having problems because if it.
As it happened the child was very open about the fact that she always noticed how going to the art therapist or counsellor made her feel worse. When I asked her why she said she always had to talk about the bad incident.
“It must be difficult to talk about it if you can’t remember it.” I assumed.
“No, she said, it’s easy to talk about it now as I’ve talked about it so much. But it doesn’t feel nice to talk about it, I always feel worse.”
“What I mean is” I said “If you can’t remember it, how can you talk about it?”
“Because I’ve been told a lot of details about what happened and so I can imagine how bad it would have been at that time.”
So the problems she had were based on her imagining how bad it would be to have a bad incident like the one she couldn’t remember. And the therapy she was having was all about doing that. Feeling the bad feeling to let it go. But it made her feel worse to do that.
I think that that is an insane strategy for therapy. Why make someone think about how bad something is that they can’t remember? I felt bad hearing about the incident and I’m a grown up with years of experience in hearing about bad incidents like that, but it still made me feel bad and it wasn’t even my problem. How sad to be a child being told by adults (who of course know better) to imagine how awful a bad event made you feel because your brilliant mind cleverly helped you to forget it to protect you.
Stupid adults!
I was so infuriated by these stupid adults, I almost told that mother outright never to take the child to those therapists that the gods in white coats had so cleverly suggested ever again. Of course that would be unprofessional. So instead when the mother asked “Do you think we should continue with the counselling?” I simply said “If you can see that this is having an immediate benefit – or can see how it will benefit long term then you should continue.”
Whilst violently shaking my head as I said it.
By Gemma Bailey
www.NLP4Kids.org
How ridiculous (of them)!!!
Would the so-called therapist have been so keen to keep on raking over the ashes if this was their own child and their own family?
Hi Anne, I am the “so-called” therapist you are referring to.
As it happens I don’t have any children. This article isn’t about raking over the ashes. It’s about taking an incident and noticing what can be learned from it. I’m generally a very reflective person, I think it is incredibly valuable to learn from the things that didn’t work out in the way that had been hoped. If that can shed some light on others difficulties in the future I believe that is incredibly useful. If you have read any of my previous work, especially on people building, the bulk of the articles are about me reflecting and learning from my own experiences on my journey through life. I guess others might call it raking over the ashes.
I hope that answers your question.
I had a similar experience with therapy, I decided therapy wasn’t for me because it was making me “remember” things I had clearly forgotten for a reason!! When I decided it wasn’t for me I was made to feel that it was a bad decision – I don’t think it was!
I am also a therapist, and never force clients to go over stuff their mind is protecting them from, let alone creating a false memory for them to suffer from!
If someone can’t remember something (especially a victim of possible sexual abuse) and instead suffer trauma from an imagined memory inculcated by a ‘therapist’ who should know better, (leading the client being something we were taught at all costs to avoid!) I would respectfully suggest that the therapist ‘reflect’ on how making a child suffer from a false memory can possibly be of use, when it seems to be making their current life a misery!
These are not even real ashes! They have been created by others, not the child concerned!
Agreed whole heartidly – and can I just add (in case I had misunderstood the earlier comments) that I was the _second_ therapist who did the “What are we going to do about it to make a better future instead of going over the past again” Not the first therapist who was asking about memories that couldn’t be remembered!! That’s not my style!