Discussion Strange & unhelpful experiences in therapy

[BlueWidow]

I just wondered if anyone else here has had any strange experiences in therapy.
The reason I ask is because I moved to the place where I live now about a year ago. For all that time, I've resisted going to a doctor because I just don't trust doctors at all. However, my sister-in-law has been bugging me all that time to go to a doctor, so I finally relented in early September and went to one basically to get her off my back. Just as I expected, this doctor didn't really do a whole lot to help me. He put me on Wellbutrin (which hasn't been making me feel any better, but has been giving me all sorts of horrible side effects) and he told me I should go and see a therapist. I've been seeing therapists off and on for the past 37 years. I don't really think seeing one more therapist is going to do much to help me.

It did get me thinking about some of the stranger experiences I've had in therapy though, so I thought I'd share a couple of them with you.

Both of these experiences just happen to be about my mother. My mother died when I was 3 years old of breast cancer and I have no memories of her when she was alive. My first memory is of being at her funeral. My whole life I've had all kinds of questions I wish I could ask her. I've also missed her and felt an excruciating pain for my whole life due to her absence. The following is two examples of ways in which therapists thought they could help me with these problems.

One therapist wanted me to lie on the couch in her office and put a scarf over my face. She wanted me to ask myself questions and then pretend like I was my mother in her coffin answering the questions.
First of all, this doesn't help me because I find it a little bit creepy. Secondly, the whole point is that I don't know what my mother would say because I don't know anything about her, except what other people have told me. I have no firsthand knowledge of how she would answer my questions. That's kind of why they've gone unanswered all these years.
A different therapist told me the following story about why missing my mother and feeling sad about her death is a bad thing.
She said, " What if your mother is up in heaven and she has a lantern. The only way she can move around and fly with the other angels is if the light in her lantern comes on. However, as long as there is someone on earth missing her and feeling sad about her death, the light in her lantern won't come on and, therefore, she won't be able to fly with the rest of the angels".
The implication of the story is that because I am missing my mother and feeling sad about her death, I am causing her to not be able to fly free with the other angels, and therefore I should feel guilty about missing her because I'm holding her back with my sadness.
First of all, I don't understand how trying to make me feel guilty about missing my mother is supposed to help me. Secondly, I just think this is a strange story. I've never heard anything like it in my life. I'm just wondering if it's just me, or do other people have weird experiences with therapists too.

 

[Eurus]

I've had a docter,use me as a subject for his "students" and flat out say "subject is experiencing this and showing signs of that" as I'm sitting in front of all 4 of them. And when I was younger I had a stay in a psych hospital where I was in a room with 2 other people and I don't even know how but I got blamed and put in the "quiet room" for putting toilet paper in the hole that allows for the bathroom door to shut. I vehemently protested it wasn't me and even got looks of belief from other staff members but due to the fact "the staff can't be wrong" I was shut away and silenced per se

 

[ArtsyDrawer]

One therapist wanted me to lie on the couch in her office and put a scarf over my face. She wanted me to ask myself questions and then pretend like I was my mother in her coffin answering the questions.

I'm sorry, I chuckled.
And then I read about the other experiences, and... what the fuck.
This is some high caliber what-the-fuckery. I'm dealing with a therapist because I'm trying to keep it together for when my big day arrives. Not the ctb big day, a different big day.
What I can conclude from these stories is that you have some WEIRD therapists.
Pretending you're your mother in a coffin? Guilt-tripping you with angels and lanterns. Yeah, I miss my mother too,
I can't imagine even one person putting on their happy face "for mom" so that her supposed lantern boots up, or something of that nature. Switch therapists pronto. I don't know anything about this guy save for the fact he's some kind of lunatic and might need to have some therapy himself.
"Why don't you be happy for dead mom" isn't exactly a great approach, I imagine you'd agree. I don't know how much you're paying this guy, but even 10% of however much that is is too much. He's a moron. Run! FLEE!

 

[BlueWidow]

I've had a docter,use me as a subject for his "students" and flat out say "subject is experiencing this and showing signs of that" as I'm sitting in front of all 4 of them. And when I was younger I had a stay in a psych hospital where I was in a room with 2 other people and I don't even know how but I got blamed and put in the "quiet room" for putting toilet paper in the hole that allows for the bathroom door to shut. I vehemently protested it wasn't me and even got looks of belief from other staff members but due to the fact "the staff can't be wrong" I was shut away and silenced per se

That's horrible and unfair! I think I was in two different places when I was younger that both had a "quiet rooms". Seems to me it was just a place for a staff member to send you when they got tired of dealing with you when you were upset. They would tell you that you were being "over emotional", even when you were reacting in a perfectly normal way that any regular person would react to something, and they would send you in there for anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours at a time. Sometimes they would provoke people just so they could put them in there, I guess to "get you out-of-the-way for a while". I hated tha crap!

I'm sorry, I chuckled.
And then I read about the other experiences, and... what the fuck.
This is some high caliber what-the-fuckery. I'm dealing with a therapist because I'm trying to keep it together for when my big day arrives. Not the ctb big day, a different big day.
What I can conclude from these stories is that you have some WEIRD therapists.
Pretending you're your mother in a coffin? Guilt-tripping you with angels and lanterns. Yeah, I miss my mother too,
I can't imagine even one person putting on their happy face "for mom" so that her supposed lantern boots up, or something of that nature. Switch therapists pronto. I don't know anything about this guy save for the fact he's some kind of lunatic and might need to have some therapy himself.
"Why don't you be happy for dead mom" isn't exactly a great approach, I imagine you'd agree. I don't know how much you're paying this guy, but even 10% of however much that is is too much. He's a moron. Run! FLEE!

Yes, If this hadn't really happened to me, I think I would probably laugh about it too.
I remember, in both instances, I was just sitting there while the therapist was talking to me thinking, " What in the hell is wrong with you?". And, yes, both instances were the last time I saw each one of those therapists. The angel with the lantern thing happened about 12 years ago. You'd think after that I would never want to go back into therapy again, but I did reluctantly go back into therapy a couple of years later. That's when the first story about pretending to be my mother in a coffin happened. That was actually the last day that I saw that therapist. That weirded me out so much that I never went back to see her again. Actually, in both cases they were female therapists.
Now, I have another doctor telling me to go see a therapist again. I just wish they'd come up with a new solution. They keep telling me to do the same thing over and over that I've been doing for decades to try to get better and it never works. Everyone of them seems to think it's going to work this time even though it didn't work the last thousand times that I did it. Didn't someone say that was the definition of insanity (doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result)?

 

[Subhuman]

It's not just you. I had several very weird experiences with these so called professionals. My first psychologist really disliked me and didn't even try to hide it. She grew more and more frustrated with me the longer I went to see her, getting mad at me for the (honest) answers I gave her, acting like I was antagonizing her or something.

Another one told me to just be grateful for what I do have instead of focusing on what I don't have... as if I were just moping around for no reason and I could just fix my severe depression (which he knew of) by turning my frown upside down. I was also told I wasn't getting better because I didn't want to get better.

Then there was a really creepy situation with some of the staff members at the mental hospital I was doing outpatient at... something so unsettling I can't bring myself to write about it to this day. I also think nobody would believe me if I did muster up the courage to share the story... it's that weird. So yeah, it's definitely something that happens regularly and that regular people have no idea about. They think therapy is a panacea when the reality of it couldn't be further from the truth.

 

[BlueWidow]

It's not just you. I had several very weird experiences with these so called professionals. My first psychologist really disliked me and didn't even try to hide it. She grew more and more frustrated with me the longer I went to see her, getting mad at me for the (honest) answers I gave her, acting like I was antagonizing her or something.

Another one told me to just be grateful for what I do have instead of focusing on what I don't have... as if I were just moping around for no reason and I could just fix my severe depression (which he knew of) by turning my frown upside down. I was also told I wasn't getting better because I didn't want to get better.

Then there was a really creepy situation with some of the staff members at the mental hospital I was doing outpatient at... something so unsettling I can't bring myself to write about it to this day. I also think nobody would believe me if I did muster up the courage to share the story... it's that weird. So yeah, it's definitely something that happens regularly and that regular people have no idea about. They think therapy is a panacea when the reality of it couldn't be further from the truth.

Thanks for sharing the experiences that you felt comfortable sharing.
Yes, I can relate to many of the things you said. I have gotten the old " Turn your frown upside down" and the "Just be grateful for what you do have, instead of always focusing on what you don't" speeches from therapists as well. I've also had therapists tell me that there are many other people in the world worse off than me who are not just moping around and feeling sorry for themselves. And I always think that that's good for them. I'm happy that they can persevere and get through whatever they have to get through, but they aren't me. Everybody is different and everybody has different levels of tolerance for stress and life situations. Sometimes I feel like I was cursed with a lower tolerance level than everyone else.
The one I hate and resent the most is when they tell me, as you mentioned above, that I obviously don't want to get better or I'm not trying hard enough. Just because all the stupid asinine "solutions" they've given me haven't made me feel any better, they always try to turn it back around on you and tell you you're not trying hard enough or you don't want to get better because if you did the dumbass suggestions they make would make you feel better. It doesn't work that way and anyone who actually has a depression knows it doesn't work that way. There is no magic pill, There is no magic therapy that's going to suddenly make your life go from total shit and darkness to sunshine and roses! When therapists, or anybody, gets mad at me and accuses me of things like that, I feel like what's really going on is that they've actually only been trying to make me feel better because they want to be able to pat themselves on the back and point to me and say, "Look what I did. I made this person feel better. Now they don't wanna kill themselves anymore. I'm such a compassionate wonderful person that I saved this poor soul's life. Everyone, be awed by me. I'm so great". Therefore, it's not really about making me feel better at all. They only do it so they can stroke their own ego and make themselves feel better. And, of course, when I don't do what they want and get better, or at least pretend that I'm better for their benefit, then they get angry and turn it all back around on me. That's why I wish everyone around me would just go away and let me deal with my own problems my own way. At this point, I'm not asking for anyone's help anymore. I've decided to take care of the problem myself and I've chosen the solution that I like best- CTB. If other people around me don't like it or agree with it, that's their problem. Now, of course, no one around me actually knows what I'm planning because I don't want to risk ending up in a psych ward again.