Probably am, but CBT issues and really need help.

[Elleherd]

I’m using a ‘self help guide to using cognitive behavioral techniques.‘ It's based around doing exercises to try and change mindsets etc. Written by clinical professionals and part of the DoH ‘Book on prescription’ scheme.

I’m struggling with a few things. One is a requirement to identify how you feel when doing exercises.
(has also come up in another context- I couldn’t locate changed feelings after doing vocal exercises?)

I often either can’t identify a feeling, and with one important exercise (It’s the base to many others) am having the wrong kind of feelings for the exercise to work as I assume it should.

Ie: you are asked to imagine in detail, how you would like something to look.

Then how you feel about it, and what part of your body you feel it.

You are then asked to put your hand where you feel it, engage with it and ask what this feeling means to you. Then write down the steps you need to maintain the feeling.

I can see the logic. But when I worked out how I’d like the thing to look, I found how I felt about what I thought I wanted, to be anxiety and discomfort,
not the positive feelings I would have expected to find.

Am I doing something wrong? What to do with this? Should I work on trying to blot out these feelings (my normal response) and try and superimpose what I think I should feel, or is that going to mess up the result?

I’ve already done a lot of work in trying to deal with and tackle my issues and had high hopes (I can’t afford CBT and have spent years waiting for six IAPT sessions) when I found this book.
What’s going wrong here and what can I do, please?

Hi. Accredited CBT therapist here!

I'm struggling to really understand the situation due to a lack of context. I'm not familiar with this exercise, can you please give a bit more detail?

Especially this bit:

I often either can’t identify a feeling, and with one important exercise (It’s the base to many others) am having the wrong kind of feelings for the exercise to work as I assume it should.
Ie: you are asked to imagine in detail, how you would like something to look.
Then how you feel about it, and what part of your body you feel it.
You are then asked to put your hand where you feel it, engage with it and ask what this feeling means to you. Then write down the steps you need to maintain the feeling.
I can see the logic. But when I worked out how I’d like the thing to look, I found how I felt about what I thought I wanted, to be anxiety and discomfort,
not the positive feelings I would have expected to find.

What's the 'something' you're trying to imagine in detail? A body part, or something else?

If you're feeling anxiety and discomfort, then respect that and let's try to find out why that is. You're definitely not supposed to ignore those feelings or superimpose what you're 'ought' to feel on top of them. Not every CBT technique works for every problem and CBT isn't right for everyone, though I'm not saying that's the case here. I'm hoping if you can give a bit more background to this technique and to your current problems I can help. Can't promise I'll make it back ASAP (busy NHS CBT clinic, on my lunch!) but I'll try.

Bless you!
Imagine a room how you would like it to look.

CBT only works if you connect with your actual feelings and thoughts.

If you just try and squash your responses you're not going to achieve anything. I'd say the very idea you have that your feelings are "wrong" is part of the issue to address, so squashing them is counterproductive.

Maybe you need to start at the very beginning with thought / worry diaries so you can learn to notice, connect with and label your feelings (and the difference between thoughts and feelings).

Google "CCI self help resources" - they are CBT-based and start at a more "basic principles" place. They're often used in NHS therapy.

I agree with the PP, you need to start by noticing and labelling your feelings if you're not good at identifying them.

I did this in therapy after growing up in a household where I wasn't really allowed to have feelings or was often told that I was wrong for feeling a particular way.

The exercise is: Ask yourself, How would I like this room to look? Describe in detail what the room would look like, including color, items of furniture and space.

I've done that, using the furniture I have (some done up - ie potentially dye annoying curtains into pleasant) and what would be in there, and mentally arranged and re-decorated it, making it light, airy and with plenty of space.

I was expecting to feel pleasure, contentment, or satisfaction or similar, and the instruction to: 'Then write down the steps you need to maintain the feeling,' implies it's reasonable to expect a positive response.

Thanks for recommendations. I'm (as far as I know) able to identify the difference between thoughts and feelings. But I am normally engaged in challenging many of my thought processes as I can see they are part of the problem.

My suspicion was that trying to super impose 'better' feelings wasn't the answer. Just a bit of a knee jerk in wanting these exercises to work, as I can see at least some of the potential end results of replacing a negative situation with something positive to work towards, and having positive reasons for what I'm trying to do, rather than the need to reduce negative behaviors because they're negative.

Hmm. The thing is with CBT, even when it is getting into reframing or challenging thoughts, it is never about just replacing negative/difficult thoughts with fluffy perfect rainbows-and-butterflies positive thoughts. It's about considering evidence in support of or against your perception and considering alternative views.

Not just labelling all your existing responses as "wrong" and replacing them with the direct opposite/butterflies. That's not realistic.

You also need be able to recognise when your anxious response is appropriate and justified (because that protects you from danger) and when maybe your anxious response is a reaction to how you are framing your thoughts and is not so justified. Discomfort and anxiety are important emotions, using CBT to simply try and suppress them leaves you at risk. You still need to be able to trust yourself.

For instance, maybe I make a mistake at work and my instinctive thought is "I'm a worthless failure" which makes me feel miserable. CBT wouldn't tell me to replace that thought with "I'm a fantastic success", it would ask me to be reflective and consider alternative fairer views (what is the evidence for and against my thought?) - which might lead me to a more balanced thought of "I made a mistake today but normally I do a good job and this mistake doesn't define me" and that leaves me feeling better and allows me to learn from the mistake without beating myself up. Do you see the difference?

Personally, I struggle to see how the somewhat abstract exercise you've described would help you. I'd have thought you'd be better off applying CBT principles / doing CBT exercises on real scenarios in your life. Then you're actually making progress towards your goals of changing your life.

It sounds like these exercises aren't really connecting with you. It is ok to acknowledge that and try something different and more practical that could be a better fit for you. Ultimately this book is one possible way to apply CBT, it's not the only way. Different approaches suit different people.

You might want to consider looking into alexithymia - it's not a disorder as such, but it might well affect how you approach CBT

Chouetted Thank you, an interesting read, but don’t think it’s me. I have generally very normal emotional reactions and responses to most situations, people, animals’ relationships etc. Good and bad.
It’s the somewhat more nuanced stuff that apparently others feel all of the time about anything and everything that I may miss or not notice.
ie: the vocal exercises thing. We’d sat in a circle making sounds at each other with our eyes closed. Apparently, others felt energized, or cleansed or up-beat afterwards. In that situation I felt nothing.

Midairchallenger Thank you for your response.

*It's about considering evidence in support of or against your perception and considering alternative views.^

From what I can see that is what most of it seeks to do. Ie getting you to recognize how behavior beliefs and emotions intersect and play into maintaining the unwanted position, and helping you find alternatives.
It just seems to have assumed (as I did) a positive reaction to that base exercise.

Personally, I struggle to see how the somewhat abstract exercise you've described would help you. I'd have thought you'd be better off applying CBT principles / doing CBT exercises on real scenarios in your life. Then you're actually making progress towards your goals of changing your life.

It is real life unfortunately. I should have spelled the problem in the OP, but feared that it would make people not engage.

I am for my sins a compulsive hoarder. The book is ‘Overcoming Hoarding – A self Help Guide to using Cognitive Behavioural Techniques.’

It has taken me more than half a lifetime to consciously recognize space as a desirable thing, rather than a place to put something. My parent was a squalor hoarder, I’m a slightly obsessively clean organized one.

I want out of the situation so badly.

I’ve already worked hard on stopping myself accumulating and attempting to dispose. Trying to shed the shame of the condition etc, trying to rationalize a lot of it, learning to live with anxiety, uncomfortable feelings when disposing, etc.

In terms of where I started, I’ve come a very, very, long way. But the reality of the size of the problem and where I actually am, and especially what I need to be able to do in a couple of weeks’ time, I’m nowhere near where I really need to be.

I think maybe trying to continue forward with the exercises accepting the base stone is a bit wobbly may be my best hope.

You feel what you feel, there really is no right or wrong. Feeling nothing is actually still a feeling. Is the room exercise a visualisation of a safe space type thing?

Ahh I just saw your update. It sounds like you have come a very long way and worked really hard.

I preface this by saying it is years since I studied CBT and I don't hold a formal qualification in it but...

That makes perfect sense to me! You hoard things because it fills a need and comforts you so your empty room in your imagination is bound to make you feel anxious.

Rather than try and replace that anxious feeling it might be more helpful to consider what about it is making you feel that way. Weigh up the evidence, what has happened before when you have cleared things or changed things? What was good about it? Did anything bad happen?

No CBT expert here but your update about hoarding seems to make perfect sense to me. The book you are reading seems to assume everyone values space, airiness etc but in the one hoarder I have known space and emptiness would make them very anxious and agitated. Part of that was worrying about the "loss" of things they perceived as precious and valuable (but others would view as junk). So what came to my mind was what thoughts do you have that lead to that anxious feeling? And do you get the same anxious feeling if you imagine a hypothetical airy spacey room that is not related to your house. A sort of fantasy space? I'm wondering if it's the sense of space that makes you anxious or the loss of things that are currently in that space. Or something else!

Big apologies and thanks to the last two posters on this thread. I went looking for this thread while re reading the book, and saw I'd managed to miss them. Your insights about what space means look to be really important (though not sure yet what to do with them)

@Usethedata I worry that I'm habituated to being surrounded by stuff. I don't think it's concern for the loss of things in the space as at least for some time to come, I could store them. Even on a small level on the one hand I will actively appreciate space if in a caravan, hospital etc, on the other instinctively start retaining, collecting and/or placing personal stuff where it's visible rather than away, and surrounding the area I'm using like a 'nest.'

@Mandatorymongoose You may well have hit on something.
I love outdoor space and huge horixens, and think I like space indoors but behavior contradicts it, and actually when I thought about when I had space in order to respond, it was always connected to loss, or having to move on.

I grew up in abysmal conditions floor to ceiling and 'goat paths' through it.

The first time in my life I had space was when I was removed from 'home' and parent. I do remember the sense of then needing to fold up my camp bed asap as I was now 'wrongly' taking up someone else's space. (later informed parent now dead)

There was space but I became a pass the parcel and each time I rebuilt any life it was swept away, along with most of anything I owned. Enforced independence from forever. I did then focus on how to keep things that mattered to me.
However I've had an unstable situation a long time and moved many (approx 30) times with normal enough homes until what was supposed to be my 'forever' one (finally housed) with children, and partner.
Cue major losses. I think I had started to clutter after first one, but the effects wern't that noticeable. The final one was multiple and when I started really 'gathering' and retaining.

Lots to think about over why the exercises aren't quite working for me, but I'm doing what I can to work around it, and adapt them to fit as best I can.

(in the meantime I'm also trying to throw away a frighteningly huge amount of stuff)
I want out of this so much.