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Have any of y'all tried gestalt therapy?

Ginseng

Ginseng

Christian
V.I.P Member
I went to a new therapist and she plans to use a combination of gestalt and Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) on me. I think this may be a little to confrontational for me. I am kinda apprehensive about this, but she seems good and knowledgeable. And surely she won't move faster than we have established a therapeutic rapport. I have a lot of trauma in my history so this concerns me.
 
I can't speak for "gestalt" therapy personally though I'm dubious about anything that uses roleplaying.
CBT I have tried, supposedly tailored for autistic needs and it was a complete waste of time for me. Some people seem to have benefited from it though.
 
None that I've tried so far. I've kind of given up on it in recent years. CBT I found quite patronising and invasive. Like I say, no therapy works for everybody, and I think it's possible that for some people, no therapy will work. It doesn't hurt to try though.
 
Yes, I have those concerns too. I think they can both be invasive, especially gestalt. I guess I will find out.
 
Good luck with it. I really hope it does help. I look forward to hearing of your experience with it :)
 
I have applied Gestalt technique to making sense of my own dreams.

Taking each element in the dream and asking myself what it means to me
to be that particular thing/attitude/action, in what ways is it true.
 
But have you ever been to a therapist who used it on you? I think that might be overwhelming actually. And she is not familiar with autism and used to be in the military. I think this may well be a learning experience for both of us. Not sure how I will fare in the role playing either.
 
You are having anxiety thinking that the therapy is something done to you.

I think it would be more useful to consider that you would be shown how to
apply an approach to your thoughts and feelings.

I have no idea how your therapist plans to proceed.
 
I really like you tree! You are right! I am not thinking about this right. This will not be done to me. We will do it together. I hope anyway. :) She is a empathetic person. So surely she will pay attention to what I can handle and not go beyond that. It is just that I think i can handle so little at this point. I hope I do not disappoint her. I am still recovering from the traumatizing therapist I had a few months ago. I am hoping she helps me deal with that issue too.
 
Would you feel comfortable just coming right out and letting your therapist know you don’t feel you can handle ...whatever it is. ?

If she hits on a topic you’re not ready for or don’t feel you can handle just yet,
Would you come right out and say
“I’m not ready” or “I don’t feel I can handle that”?
 
Yes, Gracy, I would and will. I hope she understands. I am not sure she has a plan B. She usually uses gestalt and CBT. I was thinking when i read she used person centered that she mean Carl Rogers. That's more my speed. :)
 
Autistamatic said:
I can't speak for "gestalt" therapy personally though I'm dubious about anything that uses roleplaying.
CBT I have tried, supposedly tailored for autistic needs and it was a complete waste of time for me. Some people seem to have benefited from it though.
Click to expand...

Do you mean that it was a form of CBT designed especially for autistic needs, or that CBT is a therapy tailored for autistic needs?
 
I don't know about gestalt therapy - in fact, I hadn't even heard of it until now, but I had about two CBT sessions. My reaction was similar to that of @Autistamatic - it was patronizing and invasive and didn't really help me - it didn't add anything or tell me anything that I didn't already know. I had to write a mood diary and I found this difficult because most of the time I didn't have any kind of mood that I was aware of, I was just neutral, and if I did have a mood, then what would the point of writing it down be? CBT might work for some people, but it didn't work for me. What I did find useful for anxiety though was the mindfulness, focusing on the moment and not on your problems and worries.
 
Mood diaries are also pretty pointless when you're alexithymic too. I brought this up in regard to my "autism specific" CBT only to be told it wasn't likely that I was alexithymic because it was "a very rare condition"
?????!!!!?!?!?!??!!!!!!!!!
a. It's not a "condition".
b. It's a personality trait shared by about 7 million people in the UK alone and half of all autistic people.

Even before I gave it a go, that kind of shook my faith in it. Mindfulness, on the other hand, is a simple to understand technique that could be explained in a thin pamphlet and is something many people discover for themselves.
My wife has even been offered CBT to "cure" her M.E.
 
Wow!!!! My previous two therapists that I saw briefly told me some far out beliefs too. I’m still shaking my head and trying to recover from the first one attacking my sense of reality. I am hoping the therapist I am seeing now will hear me.
Autistamatic said:
only to be told it wasn't likely that I was alexithymic because it was "a very rare condition"
Click to expand...
 
tree said:
@Autistamatic
By M.E., do you mean
What is ME/CFS? ?
Click to expand...

Indeed; Myalgic encephalomyelitis, colloquially referred to as M.E. You may be aware that there was a highly publicised debate about M.E. treatment in the UK Parliament yesterday, the first of it's kind, wherein a number of MP's actually voiced their constituents concerns over M.E. being treated as a mental illness in the UK.
 
@Ginseng
Ginseng do not let a therapist make you feel like you failed. They are most likely not autistic and they will never understand what it is like to live as one. They are there to help you. If it doesn't work you haven't failed and if it makes you uncomfortable you don't have to do it. I have a hard time with doctors of all kinds. Use them to help you. Good luck.
 
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