# too anxious for therapy?



## spindlehollows (Mar 7, 2013)

I have been to over a dozen therapists since I was six years old. I am 20 now. Every time I get really uncomfortable, even when I practice and meet with the person regularly. "Uncomfortable" is an understatement. I get this intense, pulsing, fiery feeling in my gut and I can't look them in the eye and the shame just overwhelms me. I leave each session shaky and miserable and sometimes in tears. I can't handle it. It takes me so long to recover from a session that it seems counterproductive. But recently my life has become really really unbearable/my mind has . . . and I know I need to go back, but I don't know how it could help me. I feel absolutely helpless. Talk therapy has never seem to help . . . I am already excessively introspective and obsessive about my past and my current state. Is my anxiety preventing therapy from being an effective treatment for me? I don't know what to do. I don't even know where to begin anymore. I feel like I have to start all over for the billionth time. I am so exasperated. I am completely debilitated by this. What should I do?


----------



## spindlehollows (Mar 7, 2013)

cypher said:


> Were your therapists aware of your anxiety for just going to therapy? If I was a therapist (and Im not), I would focus on that first, obviously. Otherwise, therapy would be counterproductive. If you go back, tell them about this and that you need them to help you to relax in the sessions.. They need to first focus on that first so that you can actually benefit from the therapy sessions.
> 
> ed. Also, are you taking any meds for your anxiety?


thank you for responding!

yes, they were aware of my anxiety . . .

I am currently on zoloft and xanax but I've only been on them for about a month (they were a last resort) and don't seem to be helping all that much (but I can't really tell yet)


----------



## rainy cobblestone (Jan 25, 2012)

sounds familiar. first couple of times I went to a therapist (when I was 23) I started crying in her office. so I stopped going...
but they were 'one on one' sessions and six years later I've discovered that going to group therapy actually helps, because I see, I don't make up the "freak" part of the room all by myself. and a lot of it is simulation and learning self help. 

but I have to add that I never tried medications and my level and/or type of anxiety is probably different. still, you should consider group therapy, it helps being among "my kind".


----------



## ThePeon (Sep 13, 2012)

Perhaps look for a therapist who specializes in severe forms of SA?

Also, make sure they know in advance that you will have such strong anxiety just BEING in therapy.

Don't give up on therapy, though I have a long way to go, I shudder to think where I would be now without it.


----------

