Who /exposure therapy/ here?
I started imaginal exposure this week and holy shit is it some real fucking suffering. Does anyone else have any experience with it? Any advice for dealing with the anxiety and stress? It does get easier, right?
I guess I could answer any questions anyone might have about therapy in general, too. Over the last 7 years I've done CBT, DBT, psychotherapy, group therapy and now exposure therapy.
Not a single person on /r9k/, huh? That's a real fucking shame
>>27628365
Yes but it was too hard for me and quit like a bitch. I'd rather be miserable than go through that torture.
Yeah, it fucking works!
>>27628463
Tell me more please. Why did you have to go through all this therapy.
>>27628365
Exposure therapy is pretty stupid. It's about terrifying and traumatising people until they become desensitised. How is that a healthy, stable solution?
>>27628365
Kek, baby step to the window retard, now jump out.
It worked at first when I had a positive attitude. Soon my positivity left and all I had was the anxiety and fear.
>>27629493
I'm in too deep now, there's no turning back at this point. Sorry to hear you couldn't hack it, I can completely understand why though.
>>27629524
Would you mind sharing some of your experience? I haven't talked to anyone that's done this before and I'm really curious as to how things are later down the road.
>>27629548
I had untreated bipolar type 1, a paraphilia and OCD for most of my life. The bipolar disorder's mania wrecked havoc on my life, and the OCD was so overwhelming that it prevented me from taking control of my mental health for a very long time. It wasn't until I started acting on the intrusive thoughts I get when I was manic that I realized I would wind up dead or in prison if I didn't get help. I tried therapist after psychologist after psychiatrist until I finally found a specialist who gave me the proper diagnosis, and it's all been uphill from there. The last guy I saw specialized in bipolar disorder, and now that we have that completely under control I'm seeing a guy who's specialized in OCD and forensics for most of his life. Hopefully after this I'll be able to handle things on my own...
>>27629578
It's about exposing people to what traumatizes them in a controlled, supervised environment to acclimate them until their anxiety and fear subsides. There are a lot of studies that show the effectiveness of exposure therapy on many kinds of OCD patients, along with PTSD sufferers and a few other mental illnesses as well. Only a very unskilled and unprofessional shrink would terrify and traumatize their patient. Done properly it's never meant to inflict any harm. Anxiety, yes, stress, yes, but nothing permanent.
one last bump
this definitely isn't going to be original
>>27631138
OK what do they do, show you pictures of girls?
Your a fucking joke.
>>27631256
I have no problem with women. copy pasta'ing
>Listened to a 45 minute long recording of me describing my homicidal and necrophilic intrusive thoughts to my psychologist. In explicit detail. While logging my level of anxiety and any thoughts or comments on the recording.
The intrusive thoughts that I have are accompanied by an extremely strong urge to act on them. I can't describe just how hard it is not to do something- it's like holding in a sneeze if the sneeze was the complete sum of all of your desires. Enduring that for nearly an hour straight, with no distractions, is extremely upsetting, to the point where it's difficult to function for awhile afterwards.
tl;dr They force me to confront something that tortures me day in and day out for an extended period of time. From my experience, it's more stressful than sky diving, giving a big speech or getting surgery.
This is only "imaginal exposure," after several weeks of this we'll move up to putting me in situations physically that provoke these thoughts and force me to not do anything. It's not a joke, it's a fucking nightmare.
I had exposure therapy once after a murder-suicide, yeah, it's alright. LSD was better though.
>>27631376
>murder-suicide
gonna need a greentext famalama
>>27629578
Fear is just a subconcious guess that something is dangerous. Exposure will prove that the danger isn't real, and then the fear can't be either. You assume that just because you're afraid of something, facing that something would be terrifying and traumatizing. That is wrong, wrong, wrong. The truth is you don't have any fucking clue how it would feel because you've been avoiding it. The fear that has been getting stronger and stronger while avoiding that something is just your imagination and it provides absolutly zero insight into reality. It does not tell you how you'll feel when actually facing that fear, only facing that fear will tell you that. Telling a child horror stories about how scary puppies are doesn't mean he'll be traumatized when he actually sees one. If he was really, really afraid he'd be cautious at first, but the experience can't traumatize him if it's less terrifying than he expected, it can only make him less afraid. it is never as terrying as you expect it if your fear is a medical disorder, so exposure is never traumatizing.
>>27631414
Sure.
>be babysitting at 17 for female family friend
>her stringed along ex-fiance comes over to talk
>let him in, he sits down with me
>asks me if the woman he loved has a boyfriend
>answer honestly, tell him she does because i thought he would move on
>one week later, i'm babysitting late at night and sleep over
>he shows up with a gun around 10 am
>breaks down the door
>shoots her boyfriend in the face
>kills himself in front of his two children. his ex-fiance and me
>>27628365
I have severe social anxiety so bad that I sometimes have to sit down in supermarkets to keep from fainting if it's busy. But I've also hosted two radio shows, run for public office, and am frequently in the media. In my experience the anxiety never goes away or gets better, but I become better at tolerating it. No matter how many times I hosted a show, for example, my hands would shake and I would get cold sweats before the mic went live. Every damned time. I just learned that I could live with the anxiety and that, no matter how dreadful it feels, it wouldn't actually kill me.
>>27632574
jesus christ how horrifying
wonder how the kids took it if it even fucked you up
>>27632872
It happened years ago, the children were 3 and 6, who knows how they took it. I'm fine now.
>>27632574
Holy shit. Lucky he didn't shoot you, thinking you were the bf.
>>27632950
I doubt he could mix us up because I am female. That's nice of you though.
>>27632898
good to hear it
do you have any mental illnesses or were you in treatment for that trauma alone? you mentioned taking LSD and I know it sometimes results in some real shitty shit if you have mental issues
>>27632992
I was treated for PTSD, but I don't have it anymore. Yes, the LSD was successful, I took it about 60 times over two years.
I feel no hatred or fear over the murder-suicide, nor do I have nightmares anymore. I would say I am wary of people who wear a certain expression (i.e. the face of a killer) but that's about it. I usually don't see people who look like they are about to kill someone.
Doesn't work if you are scared of real threats. I've been called paranoid for years when I know people are trying to kill me.
I had some really bad acute anxiety and depression a few months ago, and was literally bedridden for about a month. I developed agoraphobia from it, and even going outside and walking too far from my house would give me vertigo and trigger panic.
Just started making myself go to therapy every week, which exposed me to feeling okay traveling away from my house. Managed to go to a concert 40 minutes away (by myself of course) and I had an amazing time. I still bring Xanax with me when I leave the house, but exposure therapy definitely works.
>>27628365
takes a while op, just got to keep pushing on and know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel even if it looks like there isnt and 90% of the time it looks like there isnt but some days you will encounter something that used to make you anxious and it wont phase you and you'll be all "look at that, there is some hope"
>>27633629
>>27633974
thanks for the encouragement,it means a lot.
Saving this thread from extinction
Op I think it depends on what you're afraid of, and how anxious you really are when it comes to what you're scared of.
I was raped which consequently led to a fear of walking by the abuser's house, and even leaving my house to go to school. I hated mirrors because when it happened he made me look in a mirror in his bathroom. I hated going to the grocery store too, because I'd often see him there or his family.
it was so unbelievably hard to get comfortable leaving my house, but I got to a point where I could.
It takes time, patience, and it helps if you have someone or somewhere to vent to when you feel really overwhelmed. I seriously hope it works out for you and that you get the help you need :^)
I've been working on my agitation around mirrors and it's been going relatively well. So try it and see if it works for you. Sorry for rambling
>the thought of having a job scares me shitless
>get job and expose myself to it for a few months
>never again
Didn't work for me.
>>27635545
No need to apologize, I really appreciate the insight. I'm sorry to hear about what happened to you. Keep working on the things that agitate you, I hope you continue to improve.
Personally, I'm afraid of losing control of myself and hurting people. It's happened many times before, and the urges and intrusive thoughts that I get are extremely strong. The anxiety that they cause me makes it difficult for me to do even the most mundane activities, so confronting my fear and putting myself in situations where I'm forced to sit with this shit is a nightmare. Just based off of what everyone ITT has said though, it really sounds like I have a fighting chance to get better with this kind of therapy.
>>27635720
That's not entirely how it works anon. Still sorry to hear about your trouble.
