Rarely, but sometimes, things get a bit scary.
I am working with a woman who I have seen for a long time and she is doing very well/ But still, at the slightest mention of the wrong thing, she will dissociate. She really, really goes away and isn't there.
It can happen in an instant. Her lip curls, her brow knits and her eyes glaze over and she doesn't hear or respond for anywhere from thirty seconds to two minutes. She says that if it happens at home and no one knows what to do she will be "away" for much longer. She really can't tell how long.
She says it feels like she is floating out there. She can't feel her body and she really can't control her mind, or tell me where she goes or what she is thinking. She just goes away.
I can bring her back slowly, but she is exhausted. She says her body stays numb for a while, she cries, and then she get very angry.
She knows what it relates to, and we can see what triggered it afterward, but the trigger can seem very remote until we look at it.
Such a strong reaction makes it difficult to work on the underlying trauma because the mere mention of thinking about working on it can be the trigger.
Thankfully, otherwise, she has worked very hard to put together and maintain a successful life.
I have a great deal of admiration for her
4 comments:
We all need safe places to go to sometimes.
The work you do is very important, isn't it? I mean, I already knew that, but when you describe this sort of problem, it seems to make it more real for me.
Hope your weeke is good. :)
Dissociating is difficult...There is a new therapy out here that is very effective in trauma resolution. It is, in fact, called trauma resolution therapy. Instead of dealing with all of the symptoms (dissociating, self injury, flashbacks), it deals with the actual trauma and helps the client release it. It works. I'm living proof because I am still alive after a horrible 2007...
I saw a therapist last year (I'm in school majoring in psych) who attempted to deal with my symptoms, which were anxiety attacks, nightmares, dissociating.
She was supposedly an expert in trauma but constantly threatened me. "If you (fill in the blank -- ie, self injiure), I will not see you anymore." It was difficult for me to work with her because her threats to refer me on felt neverending no matter what I did, but she was my first therapist and I decided to keep trying (and pleading with her to give me another chance at least every other session). I did not self injure. I did everything she said, but I became obsessed with her dumping me as her client and it became 90% of our communication. Partially due to my own issues and being fed by her threats.
3 months into treatment with her I was hospitalized twice because I felt suicidal. I dissociated so bad in sessions with her that I couldn't remember what we even talked about.
I was sent to DC to a trauma clinic and once locally. 5 months into seeing her my mother died suddenly. 6 months into therapy with her I was hospitalized 2 more times and had overdosed. She dumped me with the first overdose, the second was 2 weeks later after she had dumped me as her client.
The things she said to me while I dissociated were horrible. One session she would ask to sit next to me so she could hold me while I cried for 2 hours and the next session she would berate me and tell me she didn't think she could continue seeing me. She told me I gave her sadistic thoughts that made her want to slap me. She told me I emotionally blackmailed her with my suicidality. She took me with her to HER therapist. Finally, the day I overdosed, she accused me of stealing her clock and told me to f---ing give it back (which I didn't do, but she had given me a key to her office, I made it there before she did and wham -- I have no defense). She said I was the most manipulative person she had ever known and then claimed I had borderline personality disorder. She would burst out crying in our sessions or scream at me for the feelings I expressed. I had to quit my job, almost lost my marriage and my family all in 8 months.
Spring ahead now...6 months later. I have a full time job, I am back to being a full time mom. I am off all meds except wellbutrin, I am in school full time (which I had to quit last year). I am now in therapy with an EXCELLENT therapist and spent 3 months doing trauma resolution on ex-therapist before childhood trauma could even begin to be explored.
And I say all this to say...I no longer dissociate in sessions. Trauma resolution helps "me" stay there throughout the sessions so I get the full benefit and can grieve the losses I experienced. I made it through a horrible childhood and then a horribly abusive therapist only because trauma resolution worked so well. I feel normalcy again.
Kindy
I disassociate but don't realize I disassociate. I survived abuse and trauma as a child, and left it all behind. No manifestations of other personalities just total amnesia of the traumatic incidents. Consequently, if traumatic events occur, I just don't remember them.
Post a Comment