dumbass__stupid OP t1_j6gt1h7 wrote on January 30, 2023 at 5:21 AM

Reply to comment by Dan_Rydell in eli5 what is the point of therapy? by dumbass__stupid

I have asked this exact question to every therapist I've had lmfao. It either gets answered with for someone to talk to or what do you think the best answer to this is. And im confused.

km89 t1_j6gyzgw wrote on January 30, 2023 at 6:25 AM

Taking a risk of making some big assumptions, I think I might see your problem here.

There are many types of therapists, but they fall largely into two categories: talk therapists, and behavioral therapists.

Talk therapy is used when you really need help sorting out problems, emotions, hang-ups, whatever else. It's a way for you to vent your problems and explore what their root causes are under the guidance of someone who can help you tease out these answers by yourself. They're not there to tell you what to do or how to feel, they're there to help you decide what to do and how to feel.

On the other hand, behavioral therapists do tell you what to do. Usually, you'd approach them with a problem that you want help resolving, and they can help you develop the skill to solve that problem. As a personal example, I recently crashed hard due to burnout at work, and one of the symptoms of that was uncontrollable anxiety and frequent panic attacks. I went to see a behavioral therapist, who explained in part about how panic attacks are essentially a short-circuit in your brain causing panic where it isn't warranted, and she suggested several methods of interrupting this process so that I could reassert control. The result was me becoming functional again, and ultimately to the anxiety diminishing as I learned to handle it.

It sounds like you've been going to talk therapists when what you're really looking for is improvement on specific things that are bothering you, based on your other comment that you want to make things work and get better.

If that's true, you may want to come up with a list of specific things you want to improve on. Maybe you have trouble getting to work and you want strategies on how to motivate yourself. Maybe you struggle with anxiety and you need strategies on how to handle it. Maybe you find life joyless and want strategies on how to bring back the happiness. Maybe you don't even know what's wrong and you need strategies for identifying things that are bothering you. Behavioral therapists can help with that.