# Question for people who found CBT useful



## bottleofblues (Aug 6, 2008)

Personally i didn't find CBT to be of any benefit to me whatsoever, i find its far too rigid, simplistic and a quite naive approach to my vastly complicated problems. But i understand there are many on this site who it has helped. Now back quite a few years ago i went to a therapist (who to be honest i had rather negative therapy experience with, but thats another story) and she would constantly give me photocopied handouts from "the anxiety and phobia workbook". When i explained to her that this was nothing new that i had done all this before (writing down counterstatements, exposing myself to anxiety provoking situations) she said "well we're gonna do it again."
So off we went relearning the stuff i'd already tried but hadn't helped me in the slightest, when after a few sessions she said "you're very good at writing these counterstatements, now do them in your head", which was new none of my previous therapists had suggested that.
So i tried to do what she said, and i got really good at thinking "rationally" but still i would feel anxious and depressed, it just had _no_ effect at all, i might as well have said "i am a blue chicken" for all the good it did me.
The problem i have is that i have literally hundreds of negative/paranoid thoughts throughout the day that to counter every one of them means i spend so much time in my head that it just becomes mentally exhausting.
And i realize part of CBT is also exposing yourself to situations you fear, which i've done anyway because life has worked out that i've really had no choice, which has helped a bit, but still my SA remains.
So what i wanted to know from others out there, how does CBT benefit you? Did you find that when you wrote down your negative thoughts you had in a situation and then followed it up with a counterstatement, that gradually your thought patterns began to change? Or once getting enough practice doing it on paper did you then start to do it in your head out in the real world?
Because if it's the latter then do you not have literally hundreds and hundreds of negative thoughts you have combat constantly?


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## rezdog (Oct 13, 2009)

I dont think what my counsiler and I do are even considered CBT therapy. We just go through my life, what is happening, what trigger my anxiety, and she helped me realize that I really do think negative and weak of myself compared to other people, and many other things.


You have to find the right counsiler, I have seen many guy therapists and female therapists. This is the 8th therapist I've found and she is awesome. And I plan on sticking with her. What helps best is she helps me with small talking and just holding conversations. Even though I get extremely uncomfortable. She helps me out. 


Shes maybe early 30's female, and I'm a 21 yr old guy so. I dont believe in that rule where they say you should see a therapist of the same sex as you. Find whoever your most comfortable with.


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## bottleofblues (Aug 6, 2008)

Nah I'm done with therapy, its never helped me and in a couple of cases actually made me worse off. Good luck to you with your therapist, I only wished i had actully met someone who can help me with this on going BS i call life.


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## paulyD (Feb 16, 2011)

bottleofblues said:


> Personally i didn't find CBT to be of any benefit to me whatsoever, i find its far too rigid, simplistic and a quite naive approach to my vastly complicated problems. But i understand there are many on this site who it has helped. Now back quite a few years ago i went to a therapist (who to be honest i had rather negative therapy experience with, but thats another story) and she would constantly give me photocopied handouts from "the anxiety and phobia workbook". When i explained to her that this was nothing new that i had done all this before (writing down counterstatements, exposing myself to anxiety provoking situations) she said "well we're gonna do it again."
> So off we went relearning the stuff i'd already tried but hadn't helped me in the slightest, when after a few sessions she said "you're very good at writing these counterstatements, now do them in your head", which was new none of my previous therapists had suggested that.
> So i tried to do what she said, and i got really good at thinking "rationally" but still i would feel anxious and depressed, it just had _no_ effect at all, i might as well have said "i am a blue chicken" for all the good it did me.
> The problem i have is that i have literally hundreds of negative/paranoid thoughts throughout the day that to counter every one of them means i spend so much time in my head that it just becomes mentally exhausting.
> ...


what ive found is that cbt is next to useless unless its properly combined with unconcious programming.

its your unconcious mind that makes you anxious in social situations. it has control over your emotions. using cbt to conciously say something rational to yourself whilst your unconcious mind is doing the exact opposite is a no win situation cos the unconcious mind is powerful beyond measure

habit and imagination is far mopre powerful than logic and will power. people who are addicted to cigarettes or food can go a day or 2 on a diet or a day or 2 without a cigarette with will power but its always a struggle and eventually the habit wins

you have to make changes at the unconious level 1st in order for cbt to become effective


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## bottleofblues (Aug 6, 2008)

paulyD said:


> you have to make changes at the unconious level 1st in order for cbt to become effective


I agree with you 100% on that one, this is something i discovered a few years ago, that my unconscious mind was actually superior to my conscious one. Sometimes i feel like I'm doing better at a task when i'm not consciously thinking about it all, especially when i do art.


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## LostPancake (Apr 8, 2009)

I tried doing some cognitive therapy on my own last year, and it was helpful, but it seemed very much on the surface level of thought. And when bad things happened I honestly didn't have the energy to go through a whole thought record and dispute everything I was thinking - I was too depressed. 

The CBT audio series is nice in that it starts off immediately by getting you to recognize when you're having negative thoughts, and just start to break them up by doing something positive and distracting. It actually seems more helpful than doing the thought records and arguing with the thoughts, though I think that comes later on - I'm only a month into the five month series. 

And he also really emphasizes repetition and reinforcement, and sinking these techniques and rational statements deep into your brain, which is something I didn't do in CBT 20 years ago. It seems to be pretty helpful. It's about developing new habits, which does take time.


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## odd_one_out (Aug 22, 2006)

It's partly CBT (which _must_ include exposure) and partly other things that have cut my SA by half - it took a few years, and improvements are still occurring. The CBT, combined with improving my critical thinking skills (you can buy concise books on critical thinking and use them as handbooks), has given much relief. Instead of being stuck with my narrow sets of beliefs and assumptions about everything, it's become habitual to think wider and explore possibilities, and see, and more importantly _know_, the logical flaws in my thinking. It's like coming upon new horizons. You see beyond what you knew and find some peace. I don't use paper anymore because it's become habitual. Although I rarely enter the downward spirals of biased, distorted rumination, I still experience swarms of automatic negative thoughts daily, but nowhere near the level I used to, and recovery is quicker.

To get to this point took years. At first I had poor therapists and, in addition, found CBT too superficial. There were deeper questions I needed to answer first because I wasn't ready for change until I had those answers. I spent a few years exploring my questions in great depth. It needed to be done - I knew there was much more to it than social anxiety. I discovered autism and got a diagnosis. With this information, and after taking the time to understand it in depth, I was ready for change because I wasn't working blind anymore. There was a map. I could work with the strengths and accept the weaknesses. I could be more realistic with goals. It's unfortunate it has to be alone, since there are no specialists in CBT I can access for my conditions, and this has greatly retarded progress.

However, my point is that to have the CBT be an effective tool for me, I had to know what I wanted from it and why. It's not there to explore deeper questions. It's just a tool for change that might suit you or not, or might only work at certain times in your life or with certain therapists or alone. Tailoring it to your conditions and taking account of comorbids and other issues is key.


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## jangle1 (Jan 11, 2011)

I'm midway to end stage of CBT treatment. My therapist and I have been using 3 independent measures (surveys - LSAS, BFNE, and another one I forgot) to chart my progress and take averages. Roughly I'm somewhere between 40-50% improved. Roughly 20-30% improved on physical symptoms of anxiety.

My CBT was mostly exposure therapy. I didn't find writing down counterexamples as useful because I never could think of them during actual anxiety provoking situations. We did weekly exposure sessions followed by out of session exposure sessions.

The in session exposure sessions lasted roughly two hours long, and consisted of things such as me going out and talking to strangers, giving presentations to audiences, and having "social" interviews. What we would do is have about 10 trials, each trial being about 6 or so minutes long, and then inbetween trials have the group I was presenting to fill out feedback forms on questions such as "how anxious did I appear." "Would you think less of him" etc. The feedback forms I saw eventually gave me confidence so that I felt less anxious in presentation situations.

I would basically end an exposure exercises completely drenched in sweat, but the body can't maintain the adrenaline response, and in fact towards the end (roughly an hour or so into exposure) my anxiety levels would go down so much that I felt like I was talking to them without SA. Then I was able to do "threat" appraisals and play with my SA a bit, like while I was presenting I would ask myself, "What's really the consequences of looking anxious?" "Why should I be worried so much?" "I'm perfectly safe and can handle it"

I would find that after an exposure situation I would find myself reminiscing a lot about it and building my confidence up. This transitioned into my daily life in that social situations that used to bring on symptoms of anxiety no longer did, or did so in a reduced manner. Like recently an old friend I hadn't talked to in years saw me in my cafeteria and invited me to talk with her and her friends, which I did without any anxiety.

If you asked me pre-CBT, if I could eat lunch with a group of girls most of whom were strangers... I would have exploded in anxiety.

So yes CBT can work, but make sure you're getting good CBT. I shouldn't say that I wasn't doing cognitive sheets, because I was - but I mostly found it was the exposure exercises that actually caused me to change.


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## ambergris (Oct 15, 2010)

There was really very little emphasis on exposure when I had CBT. I'd get told to do stuff, I'd nod my head, go away, not do it, and there were no real consequences. Or I'd do it once, to prove that I could, and then never do it again. But then I was referred on the basis of my depression rather than my anxiety, so I'm guessing they thought that once I felt better I'd go out and do stuff anyway?

I find that when I'm in distress it does help to go off and do a thought record to calm me down, but I have serious problems with the assumption that negative thoughts = irrational things which can always be vanquished through the power of logic, and positive thoughts = entirely rational notions which logic can only support. This would only be true if life was intrinsically good and lovely.

The only way out of this impasse seems to be to accept that all thoughts are equally worthless pieces of nonsense, which I can accept on an intellectual level but is hard to put into practice. How would I even do that? Not think? I have tried switching my brain off and doing nothing but playing tetris for hours on end, but the people around me seem to think it is a waste of my potential. Sigh.


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## rezdog (Oct 13, 2009)

bottleofblues said:


> I only wished i had actully met someone who can help me with this on going BS i call life.


How would you expect to be happy when you think negative thoughts like this? I mean doesn't it make sense that happy people are happy because they think happy thoughts? Go ahead keep thinking that way, I can make a bet you will never become a happy person who is happy from negative thoughts. That doesn't make sense.

We all go through our own personal hell's in life. And it is a struggle to change your thought patterns, it's a struggle to do anything in life really. But it's up to you on if you want to change or not. Not a therapist or any drug.


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## Cerberus (Feb 13, 2005)

Negative thinking hurts you. Hurting yourself is irrational. Are all negative thoughts irrational? No. Are most that we have because of SA and depression irrational? Yes. Negative thinking can often seem rational because we set up self-fulfilling prophecies. We think people won't like us, so we act distant, and, because we act distant, they may not like us.


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## daniel11206 (Jul 1, 2009)

I've made massive improvements with cbt, mostly i think cause of exposure. I would force myself to do exposures every day. I still have anxiety but now could live a mostly normal life, still need to improve on some parts. The part i didn't like about cbt, yeah i had so many thoughts it would literally take an hour or more to counter them, seriously i don't have time for that. Also the exposures is like going thru hell (yeah at least for the first hour, then it seems like i don't have anxiety after)am i going to have to go thru hell for the rest of my life to get over every fear i still have.
I still do CBT but now I'm trying to move on to ACT, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and do exposures. It has shown great results for anxiety. What Ambergris was trying to do, not thinking is sort of what ACT kind of is. You just let the thoughts come thru and just notice them, just notice them until you start to seem distant from them. That's just part of act theres more to it than that, I'll try to explain it better another time. Plus I'm still learning about act.
http://socialanxietydisorder.about.com/od/therapyforsad/a/acttherapy.htm
http://socialanxietydisorder.about.com/od/therapyforsad/a/actprinciples.htm
http://www.socialanxietysupport.com/forum/f60/acceptance-and-commitment-therapy-act-84061/



jangle1 said:


> The in session exposure sessions lasted roughly two hours long, and consisted of things such as me going out and talking to strangers, giving presentations to audiences, and having "social" interviews.


I'm still working on talking to strangers, where do u usually go to practice talking to strangers? I could use some ideas.


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## jangle1 (Jan 11, 2011)

Well I haven't done talking with strangers in while. Typically what I would do is go to the bus stop for the campus bus and if someone was sitting on the bench I would start talking with them.

No one I talked to rejected me at all. Most conversations died fast, since well, we were strangers.


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## daniel11206 (Jul 1, 2009)

jangle1 said:


> Well I haven't done talking with strangers in while. Typically what I would do is go to the bus stop for the campus bus and if someone was sitting on the bench I would start talking with them.
> 
> No one I talked to rejected me at all. Most conversations died fast, since well, we were strangers.


Most of my results were the same, a couple of long conversations but most of them were short and die. I wanna try to get better.


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## stevedav (Mar 17, 2011)

well its not ever assisted me and in a twosome of situations really made me poorer off. Good luck to you with your therapist, I only desired i had actually contacted somebody who can assist me with this on going BS i call life.


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## roverred (Dec 23, 2007)

CBT has been very helpful to me, but lack of constant physical exposure has me quite stuck. I've tried telling a few people about CBT, but all tend to label it as a naive "positive" thinking. But I can see how CBT on the surface can seem like a some frivolous technique. I remember in high school, they would teach us about the harms of negative thoughts and the need for positive thoughts, but I always thought it was stupid. CBT really stuck to me I think because the way I learnt it (from reading around). I learned the concepts of what CBT was about and it really simplified why humans act the way they do. I started questioning and everything and it changed my perspective of life. Well I was very self-centered back then, as in emotions always equaled the truth. Countering negative thoughts doesn't work for me unless the counter makes sense and I understand why I am having those negative thoughts. My brain simply won't believe it.


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## ilsr (Aug 29, 2010)

I've been starting out with the CBT audio lessons and .pdf recommended in the resources section.


I quit therapy a long time ago after having wasted money and years on it. Most therapists and counselors are incompetent and are only doing it like a civil service job. I still believe there are effective therapy and competent people in the field out there but the chances of finding one unless you're super rich is nil.


That said, the first lesson, stopping ANT , "automatic negative thoughts", is good advice. I keep going back unconsciously to the same hurts and hates about what people did to me. And I like following these audio lessons rather than someone ambivalent (like a sibling) who said they're trying to help me but still cut me down and worsen my SA due to childish uncontrollable jealousies and insecurities. And friends can't help either. They are busy, or they are just using you since the SA person has insecurities. Like therapists, chances finding a friend who has such integrity and virtue to help you instead of hindering you at the same time is nil. 

It's a stupid simple step. But maybe stopping one's one mind from getting carried on with negative thoughts no matter how many other "supportive people" want to make you feel guilty, is the only step to get started on improvement with CBT or any therapy. I can't "counter" all the negative thoughts, for now I can only try to stop them as they pop up and direct my mind to something else more productive. I've tried for 20 years to "resolve" the negative thoughts and it hasn't worked. So the only thing I can do now is work on stopping them and it does take work and practice. As SA people, we are so far behind the social skills curve we still need to start from pre-school.


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