# Bizarre CBT - FINALLY cleaned my room



## yeah_yeah_yeah (Mar 27, 2007)

OK now I know this is a crap 'achievement' in terms of SA, but for me its actually pretty big in terms of lifestyle. I have a terrible time motivating myself to do almost anything that bores me or has the potential to be frustrating (well in terms of chores etc). My psych tells me this is part of something called 'entitlement' which is actually pretty crippling - it can kill motivation in many areas of life including work, which is where my particular difficulty has been.

So anyway, I had a CBT exercise to write out a list of stuff I find boring or frustrating and start with the least difficult, and I then have to work up them with time - the idea being that I break this entitlement thing and learn that chores, paying bills and doing my job properly are all things I can do, are not painfully frustrating and that, if I apply myself, are ultimately rewarding.

So, this is my achievement: I have just finally mopped, dusted and tidied my room after about 4 months of putting it off. YES - 4 months. That is disgusting, and I have finally cleaned it. 

You dont wanna see what came out.

Anyway, chalk another success up - CBT makes for cleaner bedrooms.

Ross


----------



## embers (Dec 19, 2006)

> I have just finally mopped, dusted and tidied my room after about 4 months of putting it off


thats pretty gross Ross.


----------



## yeah_yeah_yeah (Mar 27, 2007)

At least I'm not talking about pooping.

Ross


----------



## sean88 (Apr 29, 2006)

*Re: re: Bizarre CBT - FINALLY cleaned my room*



embers said:


> > I have just finally mopped, dusted and tidied my room after about 4 months of putting it off
> 
> 
> thats pretty gross Ross.


I lol'd. Congrats Ross, I definitely have a tough time cleaning my room too. I usually clean it every month, after I start seeing too many spiders for my liking.


----------



## gracie07 (Jun 21, 2007)

I was actually thinking about that the other day. I thought to myself, "I wonder if anybody else with S.A. is also messy like myself?". I thought it might be a common characteristic for an S.A. person. 

But having a clean environment does feel good. In fact... 

Last week I cleaned my car out and washed it. I live out of my car and therefore I have clothes, shoes, make up, empty water bottles, etc in my car. 

But last weekend I couldn't stand it anymore! I washed my car and vacuumed the entire car at my boyfriend's house. 

My car feels soooo clean. I kept telling my bf, if my car could talk then he would be thanking me right now! haha

Anyways enough with my story, way to go Ross!!! Hip Hip Hooray! :boogie


----------



## R (Jun 13, 2006)

*Re: re: Bizarre CBT - FINALLY cleaned my room*



gracie07 said:


> I was actually thinking about that the other day. I thought to myself, "I wonder if anybody else with S.A. is also messy like myself?". I thought it might be a common characteristic for an S.A. person.


Well if you look at it this way it might make a little more sense. Most people that have SA don't have a lot of people over to there house/room/car. So there is a lot less social pressure to keep it clean. ultimately there are two pressure to keep things clean, hygiene, which modern medicine and sanitation is more or less meaning less considering none of use are going to get black plague nowadays because our house is dirty. the second is to 'impress' others or at least to not be embarrassed, we also don't have to worry about this or at least not enough to build up a routine of cleaning, because infrequent company. That only leaves us with the motivation of doing it because we are supposed to and because it is normal, which isn't much motivation at all. That's my take.

Yeah yeah yeah, you should make a thread called The List!!! then keep us posted to your progress. Every time you get something else done let us know and we can (maybe) add a little social pressure to it. You'd have to post The List!!! too so we can see what's on the next episode of The List!!! The only terms are you can not lie if you screw up, plus you know we'll be understanding anyway. maybe we could provide some advice if you hit a road block... Anyway just a though. Well not just a thought since I have been planning something similar, but don't have the courage to start it, but maybe this could help me get started.


----------



## yeah_yeah_yeah (Mar 27, 2007)

Thanks everybod for the nice feedback. Can i come for a ride in your car, Gracie, if your boyfriend doesnt mind? And thanks for the suggestion, R! Have you been in cahoots with my mum? :lol 

Urgh. 'The List' huh? That would be long, and potentially painful. As my therapist tells me that my inability to get stuff done comes from entitlement, (A feeling that I should not have to work hard or that I deserve special treatment - which can arise as a direct reaction against years of feelings of defectiveness or worthlessness) I need to learn that doing these things isn't as painful and frustrating as I think. I'm not sure I agree with the social pressure thing - more often than not I will just close the door on a dirty room and just stay in the tidy one. My flat mate teases me about my uncleanliness and I don't clean it - he just pisses me off.

In fact, when my mum calls me and hassles me to get stuff done, I usually put it off even longer. Same at work if someone hassles me - I just have this instant 'grr' reaction. Basically I am a psychological self-destructive mess and so any list would really need to be all the CBT exercises I need to do over the coming months to try and even out what my neurology has taken great pleasure in screwing up, but thats evloving every day.

So in other words, social pressure would make me dig my heels in, not make me act!! Weird I know. Thats life being me.

Basically no list just for now. Instead you can read when I actually do stuff. It makes me feel better too when I can look back and click through all the good stuff that happened, instead of looking at a list and going 'oh bugger i've still not done that'. I have THAT list in my journal ...

Ross

PS the therapy I am currently doing is not pure CBT. It is a progressive form of CBT / Gestalt / Psychodynamic therapy called Schema Therapy which is used in cases of chronic, lifelong difficulties and personality disorders :sigh Still all the CBT exercises but with greater personal insight work to shift really entrenched ways of behaving, coping and thinking. Basically SA is one problem in a long line of things I need to address ...


----------



## andy1984 (Aug 18, 2006)

Ooooh yeah my last psych had schema therapy stuff. I wanna study gestaltean psychology sometime.


----------



## yeah_yeah_yeah (Mar 27, 2007)

To all: This post is a bit of a rollercoaster ride. If you arent into deep psychology, I wouldnt bother reading. Please also realise that this is something that is helping me - if you think its a bunch of bull shirt then please go vent somewhere else. This is just something I need to write down to get out of my system and make some sense of where I am right now.

Andy - Did you do any schema work with your last psych? I'd love to know how it went because I've just started, and I admit I am finding it painful. The personal introspection element, and accepting the negative traits in myself, is very uncomfortable but is unravelling a lot of the lifelong problems I have experienced - from work to personal relationships. Schema Therapy talks about the three different ways people deal with psychological problems: Surrender, Avoidance and Overcompensation. I am firmly in the overcompensation camp and have always tried to be Mr Entertaining and Mr Wonderful - yet I always felt a hole inside me that could not be filled.

Whilst I now have more of a sense of 'maybe I did things to make people not like me', it helps me to see the world in a more balanced way. If I was genuinely acting like a d*ck, then people had a choice to reject me or put up with it. My particular style has typically been one that has caused relationships problems and that mixed in with SA has made it difficult to separate the two. I always noticed that when my SA was low, I tended to become cocky. I tried to rationalise it, but now I see it for the overcompensation it was, and how it could make other people view me negatively. Maybe others sensed my neediness and were turned off. Maybe my reactive arrogance offended them. My exquisite sensitivity to abandonment would pick up their bad reaction. My entitlement would say "how dare you reject me". My approval need would say "I need you to like me and I need to be seen as the best". On the days when my SA took over, my nervousness would have been a barrier. I would have had the SA tendency to disqualify positive evidence from my environment. Really, I couldnt win, SA or not. And thats what happened - I never won. I just swung between two extremes and never realised there was a Third Way.

Schema therapy is proving even more to me that I am not a 'victim' but a person with choices - choices how to act and behave - and that in the past my behaviour was directed by the pain of bygone events and the beliefs they gave me. Now that I know this, I have a choice of how to behave. I can behave in new ways that challenge my old schemas and beliefs that make me - and others - suffer.

If people come up against truly negative behaviour, they may have every right to reject me, though this is still not a pronouncement of my worth as a human being: Its a rejection of my behaviour at that time. I just make it harder for them to like me if a act like a tool - whether or not I realise I'm acting like a tool or not!! For me this is where the approval, entitlement, social isolation and abandonment schemas all collide, though I am still working this through with my T. This rejection due to some of my poorer behaviorual choices could possibly have lead to my developing SA, even if I was unable to understand at the time what I was doing. So now I cannot find the ability to blame others for my problem - I am in full control both of my actions, my behaviours and my reactions to others, who also make mistakes and have irrational beliefs! Yes, at the time I formed these beliefs there was no strong adult that could give me what I needed and helo me to change my ways, but those adults were suffering too. They could not provide what I needed because they too were stuck - and made some bad decisions because of it that affected me. I realise now that they love me and have huge guilt for what has happened. Forgiving them is part of what is healing me.

The CBT is currently clearing away the anxiety and depression, the Schema therapy is clearing away the garbage from the past that, by reacting with the world, reinforced it.

I realise I do not need to be controlled by age-old beliefs and painful memories. I never thought that admitting I may have some unpleasant qualities (and I dont mean the _'I am boring / dumb / anxious / ugly_' ones -I mean the ones that *dont let me feel like a victim, the nasty dark ones I didn't want to look at*: _I am arrogant / I am demanding / I must be the centre of attention_) could be so therapeutic!

Babble over.

Ross


----------



## embers (Dec 19, 2006)

I tend to let housework go too. I just get caught in this procrastination do nothing cycle and then I look at the dirty dishes and ....well feel sort of panicked. Then I continue sitting and do nothing. So having a set plan of chore doing is probably a good idea to get rid of that dirty house anxiety.


----------



## FairleighCalm (May 20, 2007)

That is actually interesting. (he said paused with introspection)


----------

