I'm pretty sure I need therapy. I gave myself the ultimatum that I would seek therapy if my problems weren't magically resolved by the end of my first year of college. It's now 3 AM on the second to last day of finals week. The big issue, though, is that I don't know how I could go about asking my parents to find me a therapist.
I'm a millennial slacker, okay? I don't know how to find one myself. I've always done everything through my parents and I don't know any other way. My parents are both quite emotionally distant and I've never talked to them about my personal feelings before. They know that I'm not the same as I used to be, but they've long-since given up trying to change it. If they ever did try. My memory is very patchy. My mother once told me to just "get over it" and my father is too anxious to even speak to me without his voice quivering. Saying that I need therapy is going to make them suddenly inquisitive about my feelings, and I don't want that. I just want to be with a therapist and to not have to think about how it seems to others. My parents were really pressuring me to get a job over the summer, so if I don't drop this bomb on them then I'm going to have to deal with that can of worms instead. I've been thinking about just texting the phrase "I need therapy" to my mother and ignoring every cry of concern that isn't to the tune of "Okay, sure", but I know that this is going to permanently alter the way they see me. But it's killing me to go on like this, and every time I see the social anxiety in my parent's eyes I worry that I'm going to keep myself from doing this for my whole life and never get better.
I've been restraining my emotions and behaviors for almost a decade now, to the point that some people have wondered if I'm a sociopath. Everyone has these contrived views of what my actual personality is like, because I never speak up to shatter their illusions. How do I break this silence?
Do you go to a large university? They should have a health clinic on campus, at which they can either treat you or refer you to a place that can.
I can tell you that breaking the silence gets easier the more you do it, and gets easier to do after you start therapy.
if youre over 18 you can get free therapy,(Family therapy its called) I did. Just look online in your city for free or low cost family therapy. Actually, you can get meds too from a low income psychiatrist, but I didnt like taking drugs.
>>17136014
We're just about out for the semester, and the dorms shut down over the summer. So I can't turn to a health clinic now.
>>17136097
From what I've read of it, family therapy sounds absolutely horrible. I don't want to bond with my parents, and they're both just as ill as I am. Part of the reason I think I need therapy is that I can't stand social interaction like that, and I tend to prefer letting my problems stack up if it means having to talk to someone to solve them. I don't think that being locked in a room with my parents would help at all. In fact, I think it's the one possibility that would make me absolutely not want to seek therapy. Aren't there more private ways?
>>17136124
I'm not kidding about this, by the way. I would much rather be rendered into a coma than have to talk intimately with my parents. I would do everything in my power to actively avoid a situation such as that. That prospect seems completely and utterly gruesome to me.
>>17135894
Go to your uni health centre. Believe it or not, you will not be the first to come to them with this problem. They will either have therapists on staff or be able to refer you to specialists. And it might be covered by your student insurance.
>>17136128
Just to give you something to think about. I am a mother and I can tell you no matter how things might seem, your parents love you to death. Especially your mom. No matter what, don't forget this. And the moment you get to be a father you'll understand what I'm trying to tell you.
Except your parents are the inhuman psychopath type, the kind that murders and torturers their own offspring to death (which I highly doubt).
>>17136756
And I'm not telling you that the things they've done are right, I mean you can love someone and make mistakes. Just try to have some empathy for them as well and never forget that they love you and only want the best for you.
>>17136266
As I said, school is about to get out for the summer and the dorms are closing. There's no way for me to use any sort of university health center right now. I'm looking for solutions regarding the immediate summer.
>>17136756
Whether that's true or not, it's simply too painful for me to talk to my parents. They suffer from some of the same problems I do, and it drastically influences the way that they react to me. Let me tell two stories, here:
I once had to be analyzed by a child therapist due to some trouble that I had gotten into in middle school. The therapist decided that I must have been raped when I was younger and that I was traumatized and depressed. He never explained any of this to me, only my parents. The only reason that I ever found out that he said this is that my mother told me on the ride home "That guy actually thought that you had been raped. Isn't that ridiculous?". She said it like it was the most silly, inconsequential thing in the world. Even though I was clearly depressed and suffering, she didn't balk in the slightest at the notion that I had been raped.
Story number 2: Also during middle school, my grandmother was on her death bed. One day, as my father was driving me to Sunday school, he asked "Did you hug your grandmother the last time you visited her in the hospital?". I was half-asleep and confused, but replied that I had. He then said "Good, because you'll never be able to do that again". That's how I learned of my grandmother's death.
You see, my parents don't do the whole "emotion" thing very well, nor are they particularly adept at speaking. If I were to have to talk to my parents about my feelings, they would inevitably just put on a show about how much they were concerned while treating every qualm I voice as an unnecessary obstacle. It wouldn't be like some touching moment in a sitcom. It would be horrible.
>>17135894
you sound like me. except i can't afford a college education.
