Has anyone found therapy to be of benefit to them?

[kobacat1981]

I have tried therapy over the years and through I had 1 therapist who was nice enough, I found the whole process kinda frustrating. Any of the other therapists I spoke to were incredibly invalidating, one refused to believe that I had ADHD because I was 'quiet' and didn't fidget all the time (her words). They would also lecture me about not having a support system which further made me feel even worse about myself.

Sometimes I think it would be great to speak to someone who understands and to actually find a therapist who is neurodiverse themselves, but it's been impossible to find any real level of support because most of the support is geared towards children and teenagers. Has anyone else found the same thing?

I had cbt years and years ago before I knew I was autistic. The psychologist was a decent chap and it was fine.

I was supposed to go for some kind of mental health assessment last year because of severe depression, but an awful woman from the mental health services place phoned me and was barking question after question at me and I couldn't deal with her attitude, so I cancelled the appointment.

I have no intention of ever engaging with any of them again.

Like barrow I don't engage with mh services anymore. Cbt was trash for me and my GP when I was trying to explain my suicidal feelings and being unable to cope in public anymore and my autistic meltdowns, cut me off and was like awww everyone feels like that at times, helpful

Oh god, GPs. It's like trying to reason with eight year olds 😖

My last psychologist was ok. She realised that CBT wouldn’t work and CBASP wouldn’t work - she was actually capable of updating her thinking - and so moved onto ACT which was a bit more useful. She suspected neurodiversity early on. So she had some strong points. However she acknowledged she wasn’t equipped to deal with the ND aspect so once diagnosed I was sort of thrown back into the system (plus my sessions had basically run out by then, with much time eliminating what wouldn’t work) and no one has actually picked up the pieces as it seems like..no one is equipped to deal with it? Most of the time therapy has been deeply rubbish. Lecturing and invalidating aplenty!

It took me a lot of trial and error to find a therapist I clicked with. I think it’s a lot like dating. I’m fussy about who I get intimate with.

CBT is too cerebral for me. I have adhd so I can hold four or five versions or arguments in my head at once. And my brain doesn’t stop playing with words once the therapist is satisfied that we’ve got to the right point - it just keeps going.

I found NLP very helpful at scrambling some of my unhelpful thought patterns around suicide. Afterwards it was like getting a 404 file not found message. It helped hugely with panic and anxiety too because it gave me strategies to change my feelings quickly.

In the long term I found a therapist who practices Carl Rogers client centred therapy. It’s slow but really powerful. The point of it is to get in touch with how you are actually feeling and validate that. There’s no shoulds involved.

neurodivergenttherapists.com/

I self referred to Talking Therapies a while back after having a series of events in life which had me struggling. I explained to them in great detail that I was not mad, bad or sad. That I was overwhelmed because physical health conditions was making me weary and less resilient. They said they would discuss my case with a manager and ring me back depending upon what type of therapy would work for me. I warned her very politely that if they came back and said CBT I would never engage again. I explained that I didn't need to be fixed, and I was not in a negative thought pattern. I know CBT can work for some people, but in my humble opinion it is very much not often the solution. In fact I find it very patronising.

Anyway, she came back to me and said she'd had a convo with her manager and they agreed I knew my stuff. And so I was referred for specialist counselling. Still not perfect (nothing ever will be as I expect people to get exactly what I am saying and of course that is never going to happen 100%)

My worst experience was with Psychodynamic Psychotherapy.

At the time of engaging in this therapy (for C-PTSD) I was exploring my neurodiversity and went onto to have an assessment and diagnosis of autism and the therapist refused point blank to acknowledge my diagnosis and said that I was not autistic as I had empathy.

I replied 'I'm autistic, not a fucking psychopath'.

I found her style to be like a form of gaslighting and from the day I divulged my autism diagnosis and her making that comment, I had zero trust in her and stopped attending shortly afterwards.

The best therapy I've had was EMDR and talking therapy - with the same person. He was great. I think a lot of things stem on whether you 'click with' and trust the therapist. If not, you're doomed!!!