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Therapists be like

My therapist has made these faces before when I talk about my dad tbh. How is #Therapy going for you?

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When was the last time you felt like a doctor believed you?

In a lot of ways, it’s heartbreaking that we even have to ask this question, but we also know it’s a pretty common experience for Mighties to feel dismissed by health care providers and professionals.

So we’re curious about the good experiences you’ve had lately, no matter the type of provider or specialty. Who believed you? Who validated your pain, symptoms, or struggle? Who didn’t question your lived experience?

It’s always worth saying: You deserve to be believed. It should be the built-in bare minimum of care. We see you.

#MightyMinute #CheckInWithMe #MentalHealth #Anxiety #Depression #ChronicPain #ChronicIllness #RareDisease #Disability #CheckInWithMe #Undiagnosed #Caregiving #Cancer #Therapy #Suicide

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AI "Therapy" Can't Be Actual Therapy

...And it shouldn't be.

In a world where some people would be happy to see everything operated by a computer, it is a reality that not everything can, or even should be.

I've seen a number of stories in the past couple of years about the attempts to create AI therapists. There was even a story discussing an unethical situation that involved a company pairing people with AI therapists, without their knowledge, in order to test their model. The result of this was that, within a few months, everyone paired with an AI therapist ended up leaving their "therapy", purely sensing that something was off about the interactions they were having with, as it turns out, a computer program and not a person.

While there are a whole host of problems with the idea of AI providing therapy, one that will not be able to be overcome is the issue of empathy.

Why is empathy such a deal-breaker?

Empathy arguably plays one of the most important (if not, the most important) role in how people connect. And when I say empathy, I'm not simply referring to empathic comments, such as, "It sounds like you've had a stressful day." One can make empathic comments without them actually coming from a place of empathy. And one can also relay empathy without having to make empathic-sounding comments.

Actual empathy comes from a deeper, often unconscious place within ourselves that can only be experienced between two people, whether or not words are even spoken. This is an important piece -- words are not needed to relay empathy.

Words, without the underlying empathic sentiment, are generally experienced by the other as empty, or void of emotion, and usually will not be able to be taken in or land appropriately, if at all. Imagine a moment in your life where someone has made an empathic sounding comment, but that you felt within yourself was not actually connected to the real emotion, or felt misaligned. In these moments, it can feel uncomfortable, dissonant, or even like you're being manipulated. The feeling is off, it's not a good feeling, it makes people squirm and want to turn away.

While words are, of course, important to some degree, it is the underlying empathy that lays the foundation for the words to land. Empathic communication is often unconscious and unspoken, not only in therapy but also between people in life. Underlying (unspoken) empathy is instrumental in how we hear, how we take in, how we sit with, and how we form a genuine connection with another person.

With this in mind, it is just not possible for a computer program to relay empathy. Empathy is a phenomenon that is created between two humans interacting in a shared space together. This happens whether in-person or virtually. As long as there are two people interacting in real time, empathy has room to exist. (However, it does not work the same with text or email, which is why people often misinterpret the tone of written communication. The other isn't there to detect the underlying emotion and they end up projecting their own experiences in these moments.).

If you are interacting with another person, some sort of underlying empathy or regard is at play, even if you don't always consciously acknowledge or tune into it. Even if there are no spoken words. If you are attempting to interact with AI and no words are spoken, there is nothing.

Even if AI were to speak to you and use empathic-sounding recordings of human voices, it still cannot create and relay empathy. Why? Because even an empathic human voice recording wouldn't be connecting with you in your subjective space. It cannot create a deeper, unspoken connection with where you are emotionally, mentally, or physiologically. The responses of a recording would be coming from a disconnected place (or it would be coming from a moment of connection with someone else when the recording was created), and that disconnect would be felt, even unconsciously. Even if it were possible to be "fooled" at first, this would erode as the inconsistencies in connectivity and lack of true emotion were to be experienced.

(I should also point out that it's utterly impossible for AI to provide therapy. A great deal of therapy is based on the experience of the shared space between the client and the therapist. AI can't truly have this experience).

Is AI "therapy" more harmful than good?

There is also a greater danger with AI "therapy" which one should consider. If you're attempting to create a connection to a computer program for an emotionally-based experience, there are potentially drastic consequences to your mental health being set up. Empathy is the cornerstone of how one develops emotionally, from infancy and childhood and even through adulthood. This involves not only how your parents (or others) talk to you, but how they feel towards you. When there is little underlying empathy or attunement from parents or caretakers growing up, this opens up a range of potential mental health issues, from anxiety or depression to even more severe issues such as antisocial personality disorder (sociopathy), and others.

If you're engaging in a pseudo-therapy with an AI computer program, the result is more likely to distort (or even mute) your own empathy and your ability to connect with others, as well as to potentially disconnect you internally from yourself. Even with a therapist who speaks less often, there is always an underlying feeling, empathy, regard for you. This silent, yet still highly empathic communication is crucial to not only the developing child in the world from their parents, but also to any human experience, which includes the therapy experience. So even a less talkative therapist can still relay a great deal of empathy.

In the end, an AI "therapy" program can make pre-determined comments. It can sound supportive on the surface. It may offer a coping skill. But these are merely algorithmic responses to words, or even possibly a tone or other "markers" that sets off a pre-programmed response. But it cannot truly know or feel you, or understand or "get" you, or be able to have the vast experience of a seasoned therapist who can discern between what someone else may need in a moment, versus what you personally may need that differs in a very similar situation. While empathy is not the only piece to consider in why AI "therapy" should never happen, without the ability to truly have empathy the entire rug is pulled out from under a therapy -- or any relationship for that matter.

#Therapy #AItherapy #MentalHealth #Empathy

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Learning new things in therapy

I go to therapy weekly.
One or two times.
Group therapy and individual therapy.
And I am being really brave.
First of all for showing up!
That does take a lot sometimes.
And secondly for making myself available for change.
By sharing, learning, seeing patterns, receiving advice and home work.
It you have ever been in therapy or are right now; I applaud you!
It takes a lot.
So does the homework.
I am finding it all quite challenging.
Also, I am a perfectionist.
I want it all done right away and in a A+ manner.
But that's not how healing goes AT ALL...
So I was happy I found this on Pinterest:
Instead of thinking "It's too hard, I can't".
I am now practicing saying "I need more practice. It will take time and that's okay. It's all new to me. I am doing good".
And showing myself grace.
Don't know who needs to see this.
But I imagine one or two of you do - like me.
#Therapy
#MightyTogether
#Support
#MentalHealth
#BorderlinePersonalityDisorder
#AvoidantPersonalityDisorder
#Depression
#Anxiety
#Burnout
#HighlysensitivePerson
(Picture from Pinterest)

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Weird time to be Jewish, struggling with mental health

I learned in the absolute worst way, that my therapist just happened to be antisemitic.

Our first session after the massacre went ok, she mentioned just enough so I knew she was a little Pro-Palestine, but not a ton, and she listened to me cry about the massacre, and cry about the feeling Jewish liberals have of being abandoned by the left. I’ve talked about my Jewish experience many times, and she knew how affected I am by all of this, and that my grandmother’s a holocaust survivor.

I had another session with her a couple of weeks later- which was when the Pro-Palestine movement was really picking up in the most terrifying way, I texted her before the session to make sure it wouldn’t be an issue. She assured me.

Before our session I was feeling a bit better about everything, it was the same day of the huge Jewish gathering in Washington, I watched the whole thing live streamed while I worked; watched hundreds of thousands of Jewish people sing together, and support eachother, it was beautiful, I wasn’t alone.

The entirety of our session, she argued with me about war, said some pretty insane things that I guess she believes to be true, things that don’t make any sense, that no one would possibly believe, if it wasn’t Israel; but alas, here we are.

She made me cry, and not in the good kind of therapeutic cry, she made me terribly uncomfortable; and then I paid her.

When I texted her to tell her I wasn’t going to see her anymore and how bad she hurt me, she didn’t understand- she said - “I didn’t incite violence”…. I didn’t think inciting violence was where that line was.

She thought, “from the river to the sea” wasn’t a death chant, but then recognized that she knew killing the Jews were on the first page of the Hamas charter.

She brought up Gaza, and asked me what my definition of genocide was…. My definition?? I didn’t know that’s how definitions worked. I didn’t know you get to create your own definitions to match your personal options.

She said Israel’s overly aggressive response to the attack was what was fueling the rise in antisemitism. Overly aggressive. October 7th was the worst day for us since the Holocaust. The absolute horrors that were performed that day, to civilians, to children, the children that are still being held hostage.

Then- she said that she didn’t understand why we wanted that land anyway, surrounded by Muslim countries; and that when they were figuring out where to put us, there were some other countries in the conversation. Why would the Jewish people would want to live in their homeland? Every prayer every story in the Torah, it all happens there. And, I definitely shouldn’t be put in a position to defend that in therapy.

I had been trying to not engage, so this session, with my therapist, was the worst encounter I’ve had, I wasn’t arguing with trolls online, I’ve been staying out of it, letting it eat at my insides, needing so badly to talk it out, in therapy.

I’ve been with her for 5 years. Our opinions have always aligned, I’ve always considered myself to be a liberal social justice warrior, too. I never thought I’d have to take being Jewish into consideration when it came to healthcare.

It’s always hard to start over with a new therapist, but I feel like now in particular- I need to be able to comfortably talk about my feelings surrounding the war in Israel; also- I have a very very long and severe history of mental illness that is hard enough in itself to start new with.

On October 7th, when I was told Israel was at war, my first response was- oh no, this is going to be really bad for us. And was told not to worry, there was an absolutely horrendous terrorist attack, antisemitism isn’t going to rise over this, they were very obviously the victims.
Which- would be the only thing to make any plausible sense, I’m sure it would be the only response, if the “they”, weren’t Jewish.

I can go on forever about how this is making me feel, but not here, in therapy, with someone who isn’t rooting against me in a war that I can’t possibly afford to lose. With someone who believes in the only free democracy of the Middle East, before buying into the will of an autocratic terrorist regime.

#MentalHealth #Depression #Anxiety #Therapy #Jewish #PTSD #generationaltrauma

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The martir: is the therapy working?

#Depression #Therapy
Well.... Martir, that was the word the psyquiatrist used today. I felt so bad that the thought of ending my life came back.
I was able to get distracted with some stupid tv, however it is 12:37am and I am awake with a stupid headache from crying.
I take shit from a lot of people, it is not to be a victim, a saint, nothing like that.
In the first place, I HATE arguing; then feelings are so more complex then what they look like.
The therapist, a psychiatrist, thinks I'm complicating the easy, that almost insults my intelligence; he tries to say that I put myself in places that are bad for me! I don't exactelly choose that. It's not black and white!!!
What happens is that I do bad things to people, then I feel bad. Or I can see the other side of bad people, and feel horrible for them! I am not really punishing myself, I just want things to be ok.
And after the appointment I was overcome with such a feeling of ... I can't explain, I felt horrible, like everything will always be bad because I make it bad for myself, I can't stop!
I can't stop this train that goes so fast and all the destruction that is left behind. This giant wave that leaves so much mud.
So... Yes,I am done! I'm so done ... I'm so lonely! I thought I could get help in therapy, but feels like he sees only the bored middle aged woman! He sees the present, he says I can't work my past, he says I always want to find what's wrong with myself.
All I want is help, he asks what kind of help: I want all these to go away, or at least hurt less.
It hurts so bad ...
How would I know if I'm walking to the right direction? My feeling is that I irritated him !

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Healing Things

Listening to music, looking at the ocean, and looking at the stars are very therapeutic for me.

What are things that are therapeutic for you?

#ChronicIllness #BipolarDisorder #Anxiety #Depression #MentalHealth #Therapy #Music #ocean #stars

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Inner child work #PTSD #childsexabuse #Depression #MentalHealth #Anxiety #Therapy

#PTSD I am going to therapy. I have seen probably at least 7 different therapists throughout my life. Currently, I am seeing a lady that I really like. In fact, I wish I had found her sooner. I have had a lot of “firsts” with this therapist like sharing something with her I have never told anyone about.
Just recently, I have noticed that i feel like I am two different versions of myself: adult me and child me. Whenever we meet, my mental state feels very childlike. It is hard to explain. I get nervous and stutter sometimes. I have NEVER felt like a child with a therapist. I don’t stutter usually. Is this my inner child coming out in therapy because she finally feels safe enough to do so? Do I just roll with it? How do you tell the difference between them? I am confused as to why I feel this way and why has this never happened before. I am planning to discuss this with my therapist of course. Has anyone experienced this before?

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Therapy for CPTSD

I’ve had 2 very harmful therapy/treatment experiences, both of which ended this year and I’m feeling completely lost and exhausted and hopeless.

Do any of you have bad therapy experiences you’d like to share? #MentalHealth #Therapy #ComplexPosttraumaticStressDisorder #PTSD #Depression

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GriefShare...

It was brought to my attention from my therapist that she suggest I try out some GriefShare groups for my grief.

I told my therapist I was willing to give it a try. I have yet put any effort in it due to the "not knowing" part.
Not knowing how it'll be.
Not knowing of where to go.
Not knowing if it's for me due to how long it's been since I've been with grief.

I guess where I'm going with this post is, if any of you Mighties have participated in GriefShare Groups.. could you share some insights. Some tips. Some advice.

I'm wanting to give this a try!! I do.

#Anxiety #Depression #Insomnia #PTSD #Healing #Therapy #Grief #griefshare #GAD #GeneralizedAnxietyDisorder #Migraines

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