Do you ever have those days when you just DON’T want to go to your therapy appointment? (To my wonderful, sweet therapist: If you’re reading this, I’m sorry! But read until the end).
You don’t feel like talking because you have nothing to say, you feel like you’re doing okay, or because you just don’t feel like telling your therapist all the fucking shit you’ve been going through.
Maybe you’re mentally exhausted because your anxiety has been through the roof. You haven’t slept because EVERY SINGLE PERSON YOU KNOW has called you this week to tell you about their problems (compassion fatigue anyone?!).
Going to therapy today feels like a chore. Do I even like therapy? I think my therapist annoys me. I’m definitely not going today.
But you go anyway. And the session is pretty superficial and filled with a simple recap about your week (what you did, but not actually how you feel). You use humor and jokes to avoid any deep feelings (a blog post for another day). You manage to get your therapist to talk about THEIR week. You are doing an excellent job of avoiding talking about anything that has to do with how shitty you’re actually feeling.
By the end of the session, you think to yourself, “That was a pretty pointless waste of an hour.” You go about your evening and it hits you. “I kind of feel better. Why do I feel better?”
Maybe not EVERY therapy session has to be an in-depth, emotional, cry-about-your-trauma type of session. Maybe just having a conversation with someone you trust, someone who will listen, and someone who (definitely) knew you were avoiding the deep stuff but just went with it, can make a huge difference.
The truth is, therapy can be exhausting when it involves bringing all your emotions to the surface. Or when you’ve had self-realizations about stuff you maybe didn’t want to learn about yourself.
But the superficial sessions can be beneficial too. My therapist gave me the space to talk about whatever I wanted. She didn’t push me to talk about things I didn’t want to. She let the session be whatever I NEEDED it to be.
So even though sometimes I dread going to therapy, it reminded me that therapy is for ME. I can spend that hour avoiding every problem, struggle, or emotion if I want, and that is OKAY. Therapy is a safe space to be myself and take from it what I need that day.
So to my therapist I say, thank you. Thank you for being a safe space. And thank you to my friend (you know who you are) for talking me into going to my session that day.
And to all of you I say, get your ass to your therapy appointment. It helps.
If you are looking for a therapist, you can search here: Find a Therapist