Progress is as Progress Does

My appointment with The Shrink this morning was alright. By alright I mean that nothing went spectacularly wrong but I didn't come away with any startling revelations, deep insights, or pearls of wisdom. He was half an hour late today, which is late even by his standards. (His assistant is out this week. She keeps him organized and without her, he got the time wrong for his first appointment today. Arriving early to do some paperwork, he found himself already late.)

On the other hand, I didn't mind a bit. For I was playing with a new toy while I waited. I call it BOB. BOB is an internet tablet. And it is TOTALLY AWESOME!!! It is an eBook reader, a web browser, a GPS navigator, an audio/video player, a image display and lots of other stuff too. BOB is cool. BOB got his name because he is my new ThingamaBOB and he is the Banisher Of Boredom. I just got BOB for my birthday and was playing around with its features and reading the beginning of a truly awful book on it. (It was the only one I had gotten downloaded onto it at that point.) So the wait didn't bother me at all.

So once we did get started, we ended up flipping back through my (rather large) chart. We realized I have been seeing him weekly for over 2 1/2 years. He read the initial treatment we created and we compared it to where we are at now. Not surprisingly, most of the things on it are still things we work on today. Dissociation, suicidal ideation, self-harm, self-worth, anxiety, motivation, thought patterns, etc. The treatment plan, of course, had the nice measurable goals. The Shrink is fond of his nice little 0 - 5 scale. (I hate it and want to rank things 3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375103 just to screw with him but I don't.)

As far as where I am at now compared with where I was then - wow things have improved. I can clearly remember sitting in his office, rocking back and forth, shaking like a leaf and trying to figure out how to move oxygen in and out of my body while I waited to see him that first time. The constant panic attacks, time loss, hallucinations, confusion... I was one week out of the hospital and didn't want to be there, didn't want to be anywhere except asleep in my bed.

But as far as where I am now compared to where we set those original goals... meh, not so good. No dissociation. Better than before as it mostly intentional when it happens now. No panic attacks. Well, down to very few of them that others can see. Overall anxiety at or less than 1. I spend most of the time, most days around a 2, with significant increases when those people are upset. During busy times of the day (that is from 2:45 until 7:30 or 8:30, depending on the day) I perch on the edge of a 4, my nerves raw, temper short and biting back the panic more or less successfully. Ironically I even have anxiety over my anxiety. Suicidal ideation less than 1, which he says means the thought pops up every once in a great while but is dismissed without consideration. Uh... yeah - or not. Those are still very active, though less imminent than earlier this spring and than other periods of my life. But, at this moment, I give it a 4. No Self-harm. I'm doing much better on that. I fight off the urges but I am fighting them off. I don't remember what other criteria there was, to be honest. Just that the numbers are getting better but we aren't done yet, not by a blue mile.

The thing that gets me about all the progress that I've made is that not only is there so far yet to go, I seem to slip backwards on a regular basis. Sometimes it's just a minor setback. Other times it's a pretty big flop. I know it's a learning process and therefore susceptible to the whole two steps forward, one step back. It's just that it so often feels like two steps back for every step ahead. I feel like any change is coming at either a snail's pace or with great pain and quite often both.

Now, I understand fully that this how lasting change happens - you work hard, often painfully, change is slow but when it comes it is more likely to stay. That doesn't make it much easier to live through. And because it is a well-known fact that it just works that way, I cannot talk to anyone about it. Because the very best I can expect is a pep talk. Generally these come in one of two flavors: the 'but you're making so much progress i can see it why can't you' or the 'change is always like this but it will be worth it in the end' and frankly those aren't helpful right now. They feel dismissive of how I feel. And how I feel is tired and discouraged.

The Shrink and my Guardian Angel both keep trying to tell me that feelings aren't good or bad and they even try to tell me that I can't control my feelings, only my reactions to them. But if this is true, why do people refuse to hear that I already know this is normal but I am frustrated by it?

I'm guessing it our own discomfort at seeing others in pain. It is our urge to make them feel better. And telling them how things aren't as bad as they feel to the person may be a form of trying to lift them up. But if there is one thing I have learned, it that before offering any silver linings, acknowledge the existing feelings.

Please, don't tell someone not to feel whatever they are feeling, no matter how good or how bad or uncomfortable to you that they seem. That only makes the person feel like they are doing something wrong by having those feelings, that no one understands how they feel, that talking about how they feel is a bad thing, and that they have to find a way to make those feelings stop. This can lead to stuffing feelings, shutting people out, and a constant inner atmosphere of guilt and shame.

Here is what I tell my kids when they are having feelings they don't necessarily want or that I don't necessarily want them to have:

"Can see where that would be [fill in emotion: scary, frustrating, painful, sad, etc]. I'm not going to tell you how to feel. You can feel any way that you want or need to feel. But I will tell you that you don't need to feel [repeat emotion] because [insert logic or bright side or comforting phrases here]."

Here is an example I recently used with Kid-2...

What Not To Say:
Kid-2: Kid-2: I'm scared of this quiz tomorrow. I'm afraid I'm going to get a bad grade and you will be mad at me and I'll get a bad grade in the class. (not verbatim)

Wrong: Oh don't be silly. You'll do fine on the quiz. You're smart. Stop worrying!

Better:

Kid-2: I'm scared of this quiz tomorrow. I'm afraid I'm going to get a bad grade and you will be mad at me and I'll get a bad grade in the class. (not verbatim)

Me: I can see where that would scare you. It's not fun to get a bad grade or to feel like someone is mad at you. I'm not going to tell you how to feel. You can feel scared if you want to, but I will tell you that I love you regardless of your grades in any subject and nothing, especially not grades can make me love you any more or any less than I already do. If you get a bad grade on this quiz, and I don't think you will, then we will do what we can to pull your grade up. So, while I can see that you are nervous about it, I can also see that you don't need to be.

Cheat Sheet:
1. Restate the problem you heard the person say.
2. Acknowledge their feelings - whatever they are.
3. Suggest alternative outcomes and/or point out the silver linings. (Be prepared to skip this one if the person is just venting emotions. Sometimes I ask specifically, "Do you want another point of view or are do you just need to talk?")