To think counselling isn't always the answer to any problem

[Cheesenredonion]

Any problem relating to low self esteem or difficulties in childhood, that is.

I wish people would acknowledge that firstly counselling is out of reach of most people due to the cost. I know it is available on the NHS in some areas, but this tends to be for limited periods (it's 6 sessions here) and there's a long waiting list.

Plus, although depression and anxiety are medical issues some problems are not. Having a difficult childhood isn't, having slightly low self esteem isn't, and so on.

It's not always easy to get to if you have young children and/or don't drive.

Also, is it effective for everybody? I'm concerned as I feel counselling is, to be blunt, the new cure-all, but I don't think it's helpful for everybody but every problem on here at the moment - 'get counselling!'

I have had counselling which I didn't feel was enormously helpful, but this isn't saying it is never helpful - it's saying its a possibility amongst other possibilities.

I remember reading an interview with Charlene Lunnon, who was kidnapped and repeatedly raped in 1999 on her way to school with a friend.

She was made to go to counselling after the event and felt it relived the trauma for her.

As an aside, I do wish people would spell it correctly - it weakens the argument somewhat when someone earnestly tells you 'councelling can help.'

There are different types of counselling.

www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Depression/Pages/Treatment.aspx

Certainly some types of counselling are worse than useless. CBT works for a lot of people and gets results quickly if it's going to work. My son really benefitted from CBT.

Freudian, NICE recommend a combination of drugs and therapy for severe depression. Someone who is on the edge of needing hospitalisation is not going to be helped by a simple chat. Very few people who ate that ill can make the necessary changes without drugs to raise seratoin levels in their brain. Sometimes people have depression without obvious cause and raking about in their childhood is pointless. Depression can be caused by hormonal factors. If the brain chemistry has gone seriously AWOL then drug are needed.

Anti depressants have been shown not to work on a very large (sorry don't have time to research, it's between a third and half) portion of the population. They are really not the wonder drugs that NICE (influenced by drug companies) like to have us think.
I'm not saying they are never needed and never useful I'm saying that the medical model has been peddled out waaaay more than it should have been.

Has to be the right connection. It's taken the weight off my shoulders - I no longer blame myself for being a failure or different or perhaps bipolar. I wish I'd done it years ago. It has enabled me to unpack my past, which I had to keep very hidden, and explore how my experiences produced my anxious mind and why I would spend nights and nights crying like a baby. Totally worth it and I would always recommend it to anyone depressed/anxious. But I must say, I didn't go straight into counselling. It took me years to find answers, first by reading some key self-help books (alongside some crap ones) that clicked with me then getting the guts up to speak to someone when I thought they would just tell me nothing was wrong and I was oversensitive. For me it has been part of a larger process, not just a counsellor but a whole reexamination of my self and my life. It's not something you do in isolation and I think it's like giving up smoking - you have to be in the right frame of mind to do it, otherwise what can you achieve?

I am well aware of the recommendations around the use of drugs combined with talking therapies

My reply was to that all people with server depression need drugs for therapy to work. Not all people who suffer with sever depression use medication or need it for therapy to work that does not mean therapy will work some people manage their own depression they find their own way too some without drugs, therapy or the combination of both

The implication is that it will work - that it can't not; the only possible reason why it might not is because of reticence or 'not ready' on the part of the person going

That is so wrong! Counselling does not come with any guarantees. The one I saw explained that to me. She told me that there are many reasons why it may not give me what I expect or not work. There has to be a connection between the counsellor and the person and if there is not, it isn't anyone's fault. Not every counsellor will suit every person - they may not be 'right' for that person.
Of course reticence will cause problems or delay progress but that is not the person's fault, it is where they are at that time. It is not a cure all but it is a start.

FreudiansSlipper
What is your definition of "severe depression". Severe clinical depression is very different to someone having a hard time. A person with severe depression will be seriously disabliated by their illness. For example when I had severe depression I completely stopped eating and had strange delusions. My thought processes were so badly distrupted that I could had never managed any kind of counselling.

There might be someone's life when they are desperately unhappy to the point that they want to die. For example if your family was murdered would you want to go on living? A person in that kind of situation might have no chemical imbalance in their brain but still need a lot of support. A person who is suicidal for understandable reasons might have their brain chemistry messed up further if they are given medication.

I feel we need to distinguish between what is an illness and what is adject unhappiness. Sometimes its medically normal to feel wretched. People need to find real life support and friendship rather than relying on rent a friend.

Does severe depression need a set of boxes to tick if someone is not able to function and another person is but both are constantly thinking their life is worthless maybe thoughts if harming themselves and acting in this does it mean one is more depressed than the other

We are now understanding depression better than ever but still have a long way to go. There are some people that will only go out of their house to see their therapist others will attend after a day in a high powered job who seem to love a wonderful life

And as for reasons the presenting issue/issues are so often just part of the reasons for how clients are feeling. Often the most complicated clients to deal with are those that will say I do not know why I feel this way I have lived a charmed life

We have to be careful when talking about chemical imbalances in regards to depression as a fact has it been proved or is it a theory

I tend to agree with Freudian. Severe depression can manifest in very varied ways. And the science behind the current hypotheses that brain chemistry imbalances cause or are caused by depression (and thus, will be ameliorated by medication) is not by any means conclusive.

People in hospital sometimes have severe depression treated with electroconvulsive therapy

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-23414888

This still happens in British hospitals in 2015. It is a treatment reserved for the most desperate of cases who fail to respond to drugs and other theraphies.

As I wrote earlier, some posters have no understanding of what severe depression is.

The clip at the bottom of the bbc article is really interesting. I find it interesting that there is a difference in the brain structure of some people with severe mental illness.

Having had severe depression makes you an expert in your own severe depression, it doesn't make you an expert on severe depression.

A family member has had ECT.

Agree with MonstrousRatbag

ECT is a highly controversial form of treatment

Sadly because many people as so apt at hiding their depression others do not see how desperately ill they are and some feel unable up reach out to others, I believe this applies more to men than women. I am sure we have all heard accounts of people taking their own life and those that knew them had little or no idea how much they were suffering this is why when someone says they are depressed it should not be ignored or dismissed as well they can't really be as they seem ok but too often it is

"Having had severe depression makes you an expert in your own severe depression, it doesn't make you an expert on severe depression."

Depression is a continium and thankfully I never had depression bad enough to require hospitalisation. I was looked after the in the community thirteen years ago.

I never claimed to be an in expert in any mental illness. However you do not need to be medically qualified to say that some people are far too ill for counselling to be effective. For a start people need an awareness that they are ill. They need to have sufficent energy and the thought processes left to engege with consellling. Severe depression is not how unhappy someone is, but how severely the brain is affected. Some people can go through hell in life, but still can function mentally.

Some conditions like bipolar, schizophrenia or autism have a neurological cause. Medical understanding of mental illness is getting better all the time. Some conditions are life long conditions and counselling may help people adapt, but it will never cure.

I had a couple of short counselling courses over the last year, which I accessed through an employee scheme at work. The counsellor was very supportive, and I have to say I did find it useful and beneficial.

What I would say is that anyone expecting counselling to 'fix everything' or to answer all their problems is setting it up to fail. For me, counselling allowed me a space to unburden myself with issues I didn't feel comfortable discussing with those close to me (this had a huge isolating effect when I was at the lowest points of my depression), and as such it gave me a more solid floor to stand on, while I concentrated on dealing with and 'fixing' what was wrong myself.

" Some conditions like bipolar, schizophrenia or autism have a neurological cause. "

I'd love to see research that proves beyond reasonable doubt that bipolar and schizophrenia have a neurological cause. Link please.

" Severe depression is not how unhappy someone is, but how severely the brain is affected."

What?? Nothing in this sentence makes any sense to me.

Long term counseling /psychotherapy can be helpful for someone who is "far too ill ".

Sorry but I disagree with pretty much everything you are saying.

Agreed AliceScarlett.

Neurological correlate does NOT equal neurological cause.

Categorising "mental health problems" as "medical problems" is largely meaningless IMHO, except to say that they tend (rightly or wrongly) to be treated by medics.

OP, YANBU. Counselling is far from a catch-all solution (and can be a massive waste of time and money). Works for some, though.

I had some long term counselling, which cost a lot, and looking back on it I feel gobsmacked at how dangerously incompetent the counsellor was. If I had followed her "professional advice" my life would have been devastated. Among other things, I would have aborted one of my much loved children. And yes, she was qualified, registered, etc, but really had no idea what she was doing. Counselling gives you a feeling of the counsellor being superior to you, understanding you better than you understand yourself, etc, which can be really dangerous.

Sometimes a therapist role in therapy is simply being there and accepting

At times very little is said and nothing which to the outside world will seem significant but the therapist is there in that space with the patient/client

And that is very powerful and for some in their most desperate state is helpful for others it is not

That is why every person should be treated individually how depression manifests, how people deal with it, react to treatments (not talking out when people are apart sedated) it's not one treatment is right for all or if you tick these boxes then you have depression if you don't then you are not really that depressed

Quartermass

I didn't think Counsellors were supposed to give advice.
No Counsellor wants you to feel inferior to them! and they don't claim to understand you better than you do yourself. Their role is to listen and offer their understanding of what you are saying and the idea is you come to realisations yourself.

that was my experience freudianslipper, there are small things I remember from my counselling that just hit me from time to time, things that were probably obvious to the counsellor but didn't even occur to me. A lot of the time we sat in silence, he was just waiting for me to speak, and sometimes I spoke to fill the silence, feeling a bit awkward with it all. I felt drained afterwards, the first session I just sat and cried for an hour.

I think it helped, it let me get it out, and what I got out wasn't what I expected it to be about!

my counsellor never acted superior, that was never part of it.

" No Counsellor wants you to feel inferior to them! and they don't claim to understand you better than you do yourself."

In an ideal world, which we all don't live in. Unfortunately "us vs them, we are the experts who knows whats best for the poor ill people we are treating " is (imo) prevelant, and I know a lot of mental health professionals.

Quartermass

What you describe is truly awful. A counsellor should never give advice.

Some of life's problems have no easy solutions. Often ruminating on the past keeps you in a destructive place. Some types of councelling can leave the client with more problems than they started with.

There are lots of different types of counselling. Good counselling tends to be short term as the client becomes independent and develops skills they need to tackle life. CBT is very skills based. It won't make life better, but enable you to cope better with what life throws at you. Other people find mindfulness helpful for dealing with intrusive thoughts.

Quartermas

You should report whomever 'counselled' you

like all professions counselling has its bad apples but they need to be reported and dealt with asap as they are often dealing with vulnerable individuals