Oh, I went and looked up beta-blockers since I thought
they were mostly for heart trouble, though perhaps,
looking at that phrase, it was just that, in which
case, there are plenty of times, I could have used
one! And I went and looked at the past posts but
didn't see you on the lists earlier, it seemed that
you returned after your breakup last May? Anyway, I'm
glad that you found that therapy helped, that it gave
you the validity of your own experience, and access to
different aspects of your creativity. Therapy has been
helpful to me too, in some ways, and I only wish that
I'd gone a long time ago, as it's made me aware of how
much stuff, what I'll just call these hollow
constructs of various sorts, familial wounds, had a
destructive effect upon me and my relationship.
However, I don't think it makes one a different
person, or really changes anything in one's deepest
fractures, or feelings, and perhaps there is some
sense in which it could be criticized for that reason,
it makes one more bearable to what I'll just call
social interaction, having more ways to live with
one's fractures or feelings. There are certain things
that are excruciating, some tears which never end,
even if one might learn not to bother others with
them, and it seems to me that nothing, not therapy,
not reading, not philosophy, not art, makes any
difference though they might keep one moving. But,
perhaps, that's just me. Anyway, I don't know, someone
else will have to say if you're a different person,
though I am surprised and glad for your openness and
warmth in this discussion since I had a somewhat
impression of you as more crusty, but then there is
that hidden libelling one so perhaps it just went
underground!
Cheers,
Rebecca
--- Roger Day <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> When I was at the height of my problems, I was given
> a beta-blocker. I
> shouldn't have been - I'm asthmatic - but I think it
> snapped me to
> enough to form a plan. That plan included seeing a
> therapist, whom
> I've been seeing for the past 2 years. It was out of
> this, that I
> faced the graveyard of my then marraige, my
> dissatisfaction with my
> "career" and other things.
>
> For me it's been a good experience, partly because I
> embrace it fully,
> partly as you say it's given me the validity of my
> own experience and
> perceptual and emotional complexity. That is my
> experience precisely.
> As a result, I have begun to explore other areas of
> my creativity. I
> have begun to have genuine interaction with people.
> I am, literally, a
> different person to the one I was three years ago,
> to the extent I
> suspect people I knew from those days would not
> recognise me.
> Certainly, if you look across my email history on
> poetryetc and
> britishpoets, and you compare postings then and now,
> there are still
> signs of the old me hanging around but there are
> also, I think, signs
> of growth, signs of actually reaching out to contact
> people. So, yes,
> therapy can be bad and there are a lot of caveats
> but it can have a
> positive effect as well.
>
> regards
> Roger
>
> On 4/2/06, Rebecca Seiferle <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
> <snip lots of interesting stuff>
> > To be fair, I do think that therapy often helps,
> > particularly unconventional therapies like this
> > Narrative Therapy, though there are others, and
> even
> > conventional therapies can help depending upon the
> > practicioner. When therapy does help, it helps
> > precisely because the method grants the person the
> > validity of his or her own experience and
> perceptual
> > and emotional complexity, rather than imposing
> another
> > language or interpretative mode upon such a
> person,
> > which is, often, part of the trouble in the first
> > place,
> >
> > best,
> >
> > Rebecca
>
> --
> http://www.badstep.net/
> http://www.cb1poetry.org.uk/
>
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