Common Myths About Psychotherapy: Does Going to Therapy Mean You Are "Weak"?

In a previous article, Common Myths About Psychotherapy: Therapy Takes a Long Time, I addressed the lingering misconception regarding the timeline of clinical healing. Today, we will dismantle another pervasive and damaging barrier to mental healthcare: the myth that seeking therapy means you are "weak."

Unresolved trauma often leaves us standing in the shadow of a critical past—making us mistake our paralyzing survival responses for a personal lack of strength.

In the United States, our cultural fabric deeply praises rugged individualism. We are told to "pick ourselves up by our bootstraps." While resilience in the face of adversity is admirable, the human nervous system has physiological limits. If any individual is subjected to prolonged, chronic stress without emotional support, the system will eventually bottleneck.

Reaching out for psychological support is not a symptom of vulnerability or failure. Seeking therapy is a profound sign of strength, self-awareness, and courage.

Case Study: How Internalized Stigma Drives Psychosomatic Pain

To understand how this myth functions in real life, consider the case of John (a composite vignette created from common clinical presentations, with all identifying details altered).

The Roots of Emotional Stoicism

John grew up in a tight-knit small town where his family faced severe financial hardship. Despite qualifying for public assistance, his parents adamantly refused it, viewing structural aid as a shameful "handout." John and his sister learned early on that complaining was unsafe. They adopted their parents' stoic demeanor.

In John’s household, emotions were never spoken of, and affection was rarely shown. Sadness or anxiety were treated as self-indulgent luxuries. John internalized a dangerous rule: Keep your feelings to yourself, and never burden anyone with your problems.

When the Body Keeps the Score

Years later, John moved to New York City to build his career. Whenever loneliness, grief, or anxiety surfaced, he felt intense guilt. His coping mechanism was simply to work harder and suppress the discomfort.

Eventually, his psychological suppression manifested physically. John began experiencing severe, chronic back pain, chronic headaches, and gastrointestinal distress. When diagnostic medical exams revealed no underlying physical pathology, his physician recommended a psychotherapist.

John was shocked. His doctor had to explicitly explain the mind-body connection—how an unexamined, over-taxed nervous system will force the physical body to pay the toll for unresolved emotional trauma.

Overcoming the Shame of Seeking Help

Because mental health care was taboo in his family, John felt immense shame setting up a consultation. As a man, he felt he had failed a cultural test of strength. He dreaded what his father would think.

In the safety of the therapeutic space, John began to unpack his rigid internal rules. He discovered how his deeply ingrained beliefs were actively generating his suffering. Over time, John realized that navigating his deepest emotional wounds required far more courage than remaining in silent pain.

As he processed his unresolved emotions directly, a remarkable shift occurred:

• His psychosomatic medical symptoms (back pain and GI issues) faded.
• His baseline anxiety and sadness dissipated.
• He broke through his isolation, built healthy relational blueprints, and formed meaningful friendships.

Why the "Therapy is for the Weak" Myth Lingers

Cognitive distortions about mental health remain ingrained because they are passed down through generational and societal trauma loops. This specific myth acts as a psychological barrier, preventing individuals from accessing life-saving care when they need it most (see my guide: Tips on Overcoming Your Fear of Asking For Help).

True strength isn't staying stuck in the dark to prove you can endure it. True courage is taking the first step up the stairs and choosing to walk into the light of healing

True strength is not the absence of struggle; it is the willingness to confront it.

Ready to Break the Cycle? Connect with a Specialist in NYC

If you recognize your own patterns in John's story, you do not have to carry the weight of your past alone. Working with a licensed mental health professional can help you safely decode your body’s signals, restructure limiting beliefs, and step into a more fulfilling life.

About Josephine Ferraro, LCSW

I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, and advanced specialist in experiential, mind-body modalities including EMDR, IFS, AEDP and Somatic Experiencing. 

With over 25 years of clinical experience, I help adult individuals and couples safely process developmental trauma, alleviate high-functioning anxiety, and resolve psychosomatic pain.

• Office Location: Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York, NY 10011 (Available for in-person and online sessions across NY).
• Complimentary Consultation: I offer a free 15-minute phone call before settng up an appointment.
• Call 📞 917-742-2624 during standard business hours
• Email: josephineferraro@iCloud.com

What is the Corrective Emotional Experience in Therapy?

Most contemporary psychotherapists today agree that intellectual insight alone isn't enough to repair traumatic experiences.  Many of them would agree that a corrective emotional experience in therapy can go a long way to healing trauma and is a much more transformative experience for clients than developing intellectual insight alone (see my articles: Experiential Therapy Can Lead to Emotional Breakthroughs and The Therapist's Empathic Attunement Can Be Emotionally Reparative For the Client).

What is the Corrective Emotional Experience in Therapy?

What is the Corrective Emotional Experience in Therapy?
The concept of the corrective emotional experience in therapy was developed by Franz Alexander and Thomas M. French.

The corrective emotional experience in therapy occurs when the client has an experience with the therapist that challenges old distorted beliefs and perceptions.

For instance, if a man grew up with an emotionally abusive or neglectful mother, he might have the distorted belief that "all women are abusive and neglectful, and they can't be trusted."

If this same man comes to therapy and he experiences a woman therapist as being empathetic, warm and trustworthy, he is having an experience with his therapist that challenges his belief about women.    He is now having a new experience that he and his therapist can explore further in therapy.

In other words, he is having a corrective emotional experience that can be healing for him and help him to grow.

A Fictionalized Vignette as an Example of the Corrective Emotional Experience in Therapy

Sam
As an only child, Sam grew up with parents who were preoccupied with their own lives and who didn't have much time for Sam.

Sam spent most of his time with his nanny, who provided basic care, but who wasn't especially warm or caring.

Even before Sam was born, his parents knew that they wanted a child who would eventually follow in his father's footsteps.  Sam's father had his own law firm, and he expected that any child of his would eventually join the firm.

From an early age, Sam was aware of his parents' wishes.  Although he loved to paint and he wanted to be an artist, he hid his passion for painting from his parents because he knew they would disapprove.  This made Sam feel invisible to his parents (see my article: Growing Up Feeling Invisible and Emotionally Invalidated).

Instead of showing his parents how passionately he loved to paint, he pretended that he wanted to be an attorney because he knew this was the only way that his parents would approve of him.

Whenever his parents talked to him about law school, Sam would pretend that he was interested and his parents were happy and praised him.  But hiding such an important part of himself and pretending to be someone that he wasn't made Sam feel ashamed, guilty, lonely and a fraud (see my articles: Understanding the False Self: Part 1 and Understanding the False Self - Part 2: Getting Help in Therapy).

As a result of pretending to be what his parents wanted him to be, Sam believed that no one would accept him for who he is and, if he wanted to get along in the world, he would need to pretend to be someone else.

Throughout law school, Sam felt depressed.  He did well academically because he was smart, but his heart wasn't in it.

Sam's parents never seemed to notice that Sam was unhappy.

Sam felt that his parents didn't see him for himself at all and had no idea who he really was.  They only cared that he gratified their wishes.

After he joined his father's law firm, Sam was miserable.  He hated the work and didn't feel suited for it.  He longed to paint and to be his own person.

Beyond casually dating, Sam avoided getting into a relationship because he didn't believe that any woman could appreciate him for who he really was.

What is the Corrective Emotional Experience in Therapy?

When it became too much of an emotional strain, Sam began therapy.

At first, Sam was afraid to express his true desire to become an artist.  He feared that his therapist would be like his parents and would show disdain for his passion.

But one day when he was talking about how miserable he was as a lawyer, his therapist asked him what he would really like to do, and Sam took a risk and told her that he loved to paint and he had always wanted to be an artist, but he feared displeasing his parents.  At that point, he discovered that his therapist worked with many different kinds of artists, and he was relieved.

This discussion opened up a much larger discussion for many sessions about how Sam believed that no one could really care for him as he really is and he needed to pretend to be someone else (see my article: Overcoming the Fear that People Won't Like You If They Knew the Real You).

What is the Corrective Emotional Experience in Therapy?

As Sam opened up more with his therapist, he sensed her compassion and genuine interest in him and his passion for painting and this allowed him to be more open and vulnerable with her (see my article: Why is Empathy Important in Psychotherapy? and The Holding Environment in Therapy: Maintaining a Safe Therapeutic Environment For the Client).

As they talked about what it was like for Sam to experience a caring, open and compassionate individual who was genuinely interested in Sam for who he really is--rather than who he thought he had to pretend to be--Sam had an emotional breakthrough.  This was his corrective emotional experience and he realized that his belief that no one could ever accept his true self was a distortion.

Sam mourned in therapy for what he didn't get from his parents.  He also continued to allow himself to be genuine and vulnerable with his therapist, which was emotionally healing.

Eventually, not withstanding his parents' disapproval, Sam began a Master in Fine Arts program to pursue his love of painting.

He also began dating and felt for the first time that he might meet a woman who would care for him as his true self (see my article: Becoming Your True Self).

Conclusion
Corrective emotional experiences can occur in therapy when the therapist is empathetic and can provide the client with a new healing experience that challenges distorted beliefs and perceptions.

In order to experience the corrective emotional experience, the client must feel safe enough with the therapist to have a new experience.  For some people, who are severely traumatized, it might take a while to trust the therapist enough to allow this experience to occur.

The corrective emotional experience is a transformative experience for the client and opens up the possibility for big changes and psychological growth.

Getting Help in Therapy
Traumatic childhood experiences are difficult to overcome on your own.

As a result of those traumatic experiences, you might have developed certain beliefs and perceptions about yourself and others that are distorted.

Psychotherapy with a skilled therapist, who knows how to provide a safe and trusting therapeutic environment, can lead to a corrective emotional experience that can transform your life.

Rather than allowing distorted beliefs perceptions to limit your sense of yourself and others, you could benefit from working with an experienced psychotherapist who can help you overcome these obstacles.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

I provide an empathetic and supportive therapeutic environment for clients to allow them to have emotional breakthroughs in therapy.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Discovering That Your Thoughts and Feelings Aren't Facts

There are many clients who begin psychotherapy believing that their feelings are facts--whether it's their feelings about themselves or others.  For those clients, psychotherapy offers an opportunity to develop an ability to self reflect so they can stop confusing their feelings with facts and develop emotional intelligence.

See my articles:  

Developing Emotional Intelligence

Creating Time For Self Reflection

Gaining a New Perspective in Psychotherapy About Yourself and Others

The Benefits of Psychotherapy

Discovering that Your Thoughts and Feelings Aren't Facts

Intuition and gut feelings are certainly important, and this isn't what I'm referring to when I say that feelings aren't facts.

I'm referring to believing that distorted feelings and thoughts are facts and the need to develop an ability to take a step back from your feelings to question whether what you feel is objectively true.

When you don't self reflect and question whether you're being objective, you run the risk of attributing meanings to yourself and others that are false, which can create problems in your life.

Examples of Feelings Not Being Facts:

• Tom noticed that his supervisor had an angry look on his face when he looked in Tom's direction.  As a result, Tom assumed that his supervisor was angry with him, and he avoided his supervisor for the rest of the week.  At the end of the week, Tom's supervisor told him that he realized that Tom was avoiding him and he wanted to talk to him about it.  During that same conversation, his supervisor told Tom that he was angry because their director was making unreasonable demands of him.  At that point, Tom realized that his supervisor's angry look had nothing to do with Tom and that Tom's original feeling about the situation was inaccurate.

• Lynn had a feeling that the new woman, Jane, in her book club was arrogant and standoffish.  One day one of the other women in the group invited Lynn and Jane for coffee.  During their conversation, Jane mentioned that she tended to be shy and quiet, especially around people that she didn't know well, and this often caused people to think that she was standoffish.  Jane said she welcomed the opportunity to join them for coffee to get to know them better.  After that, Jane was much more friendly in the group, and Lynn realized that she misinterpreted Jane's quiet demeanor for arrogance.  She realized that her original feelings about Jane weren't true.

• After her boyfriend ended their relationship, Rena had a strong feeling that she would never be in another relationship.  She assumed that she would be alone for the rest of her life because no one else would want to be with her.  This made her feel lonely, sad and hopeless.  But a few months later, Rena met a man at her friend's party and they began dating.  As their relationship developed, Rena realized that, even though her feelings had been strong that she would never meet anyone else and that she would be alone for the rest of her life, these feelings weren't objectively true because she was now in a new and wonderful relationship.

As in the examples above, feelings--even strong feelings--are often disproved by life's circumstances.  But a change in circumstances doesn't always occur, and people who believe that their feelings are facts remain convinced.

Discovering That Your Thoughts and Feelings Aren't Facts

When people have strong feelings and beliefs that make them unhappy, they often come to therapy to deal with their unhappiness.

One of the goals of therapy is to help clients to step back from their feelings, reassess their feelings objectively and develop insight.  By developing the ability to step back to self reflect and stand outside of personal feelings and beliefs, clients in psychotherapy can develop emotional intelligence.

This can be very challenging for clients when their beliefs that feelings are facts has been longstanding.  They might have learned to identify with their feelings so strongly that it becomes difficult to see beyond these feelings.

Conclusion
It's easy to confuse feelings with facts, especially when you have strong feelings about yourself or others.

Rather than being swept up by feelings and taking action based solely on your feelings, you can learn to become more self reflective.  By being more self reflective, you have an opportunity to be more objective.  And by being more objective, you can see yourself and others in a more accurate way.

Developing this ability on your own can be difficult, especially if you've been in the habit of believing that your feelings are always objectively true.

A skilled psychotherapist can help clients to become more aware of their feelings and beliefs so that they become more self reflective and objective.

Getting Help in Therapy
Most people come to therapy because they feel stuck in some way.

People who believe that their feelings are objectively true have an opportunity in therapy to develop more insight into how they think and how their feelings and thoughts are affecting them.

If you feel stuck in your life, you owe it to yourself to get help in therapy with a skilled psychotherapist who can help you to overcome the obstacles that are getting in the way of your having a fulfilling life.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

I have helped many clients to develop insight into their thoughts and feelings so they can change their lives.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Relationships: The Problem With Trying to Change Your Partner

Are you someone who has the tendency to choose romantic partners that you try to change to try to mold them into who you want them to be (see my article: I'll Change Him/Her After We Get Married) ?

Relationships: The Problem With Trying to Change and "Improve" Your Partner?

This is usually more of an unconscious process than a conscious one which often leads to disappointment and frustration for both people involved.

In healthy relationships people develop and grow together.  There is a mutuality.  There is reciprocity. Each person contributes to the growth and development of the other in different ways.

The dynamic that I'm referring to in this article is where there's a pattern of choosing one romantic partner after the next as a "project" to be worked on, changed and "improved."

Often people who tend to engage in this dynamic focus on their fantasy of what they want their partner to be rather than who he or she is at the moment.  It's as if they get caught up in the fantasy and lose sight of the actual person in front of them (see my article:  Relationships: Are You In Love With Him or Your Fantasy of Him?)

Assuming that their partner goes along with this dynamic (for his or her own unconscious reasons), this becomes a codependent relationship where each person in this relationship usually ends up being frustrated, disappointed and resentful.

To explore this dynamic further, let's take a look at a fictionalized vignette:

Jane and Ed
When Jane met Ed, she was attracted to his gregariousness and easygoing nature.  Unlike the men that she usually met, he was kind and unpretentious.

Although she liked him and she was attracted to him, she felt that he needed to lose weight and, since she was so health conscious and physically fit, she knew that, with her help, he could lose the weight.

Relationships: The Problem With Trying to Change and "Improve" Your Partner

As they began to date, she wanted to be tactful about how she broached the topic of his weight.  So when he mentioned that he admired her for being so health conscious and fit, she saw an opening to talk to him about changes that he could make to be healthier.

Ed was open to hearing her suggestions and expressed a desire to lose weight and get fit, which thrilled Jane.  By the following week, he accompanied her to the gym and she invited him to her aerobic classes.

Within a few weeks, Ed was starting to lose weight and feel healthier.  He was grateful to Jane for her help, and Jane felt a great deal of satisfaction in helping Ed to make these changes.

A few weeks later, while she and Ed were at a party where her friends were talking about a book on the best seller list that , Jane realized that, compared to her, Ed wasn't as well read.  She felt embarrassed that Ed had nothing to contribute to the conversation about that book or any other books.

Not wanting to offend him, Jane talked to a close friend about this and asked her if she thought it would be offensive for her to give Ed a list of recommended books to read.

Her friend warned Jane against doing what Jane had done so many times before--working so hard to change the man that she was seeing and feeling frustrated and angry when it ended badly.

Jane understood what her friend was telling her, but she felt that this time it would be different.  She really cared for Ed and she felt that he could benefit from her guidance.  She didn't detect any of the resentment that she experienced from prior boyfriends.

Relationships: The Problem With Trying to Change and "Improve" Your Partner

But when she gave Ed a reading list, she was surprised at his reaction.  He took the list and looked at it with an absent stare.  Then, he handed it back to Jane and told her that he appreciated her intention, but he felt that she was saying he wasn't smart enough for her and this hurt his feelings.

Jane felt anger welling up in her and she took a moment to compose herself outwardly.  But inwardly her thoughts were racing:  How could he be so ungrateful?

They tried to talk about it, but their discussion devolved into an argument, so they agreed to take a couple of days apart to cool down and then talk again.

When Ed called her a few days later, he told her that, even though, he appreciated how much she helped him to be more fit and healthy, he felt hurt and annoyed that she was now trying to get him to change his reading habits--as if she was saying that he wasn't good enough.  He asked her if she could accept him as he is without trying to change him.

At that point, Jane realized how much she hurt and offended him and she felt badly about this.  But she also realized that she didn't want to accept him without trying to change him and this was a problem for each of them as well as for their relationship.

She thought about what her friend told her and she realized that, once again, she was on the brink of ruining another relationship by trying to change and "improve" Ed.

Although she felt confused and conflicted, Jane apologized to Ed for hurting his feelings and she told him that she needed more time to think about why she was doing this.  So, they both agreed to take a break from each other for a few weeks until they could both sort out their feelings.

At the suggestion of her best friend, Jane got into therapy to try to understand why she was always trying to change and "improve" the men that she went out with and why she kept doing it even though things ended badly each time.

Exploring her family history revealed that Jane's mother did the same thing with Jane's father, pushing him into one self improvement endeavor after another.  And even though Jane's father, who was passive, went along with it, her mother would still express to Jane, from the time Jane was a young child, how dissatisfied she felt with her marriage.

Jane became aware that, without even realizing it, she came to believe that all men needed improving and it was the woman's role to change them.

When these unconscious beliefs came conscious for Jane, she was surprised and dismayed.

Awareness is the first step in making a change and, with this new awareness Jane realized why she tried to "make over" her boyfriends.  She also realized that she wanted to stop.

Using EMDR, over time, we processed her childhood experiences that were triggering her current behavior (see my article:  Overcoming Childhood Trauma That Affects Your Relationship).  She was able to process her anger and disappointment towards both parents as well as the distorted beliefs that arose from her childhood experiences.

Relationships: Learn to Stop Trying to Change and "Improve" Your Partner

Once the triggering experiences were gradually processed using EMDR, Jane no longer had the urge to try to change Ed, and her relationship improved over time as she accepted him as he was and she stopped trying to change him.

Conclusion
People who get into one relationship after the next where they're trying to change their romantic partners tend to have underlying issues that trigger this behavior.

Often, these underlying issues are unconscious and once they are made conscious, this awareness is the first step in changing this dynamic.

But awareness isn't enough.  The underlying issues need to be processed and experiential therapy, like EMDR, is usually the best type of therapy for processing.

Usually, after the underlying issues that are triggering the behavior are processed, the current behavior tends to change.

In the fictionalized vignette in this article I gave a particular family dynamic that triggered these issues for "Jane," but there can be many other underlying issues.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you have a tendency to try to change and "improve" your romantic partners, you could benefit from seeing a licensed mental health professional who uses experiential therapy so you can work through the underlying issues that are triggering this behavior.

Overcoming the urge to change your romantic partner is beneficial for you, your partner and your relationship.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Overcoming the Confusion Between Compassion and Responsibility in Therapy

In Part 1 and Part 2 on the topic of confusing compassion and responsibility, I began discussing the problem that many adults, who traumatized as children, have with this issue.

Confusing Compassion With Responsibility:  This  Pattern Often Begins in Childhood

As I mentioned in the prior articles, traumatized children often take on the responsibilities of the parents in a dysfunctional family where one or both parents are impaired due to mental illness, substance abuse or some other problem.

Developmentally, the responsibilities that these children take on is way beyond what any child should ever have to do.  But they do it because they have become "parentified children" who function beyond their years in order to rescue their parent(s) and/or other siblings.

As parentified children, they develop distorted beliefs, which include confusing compassion and responsibility, and they usually continue to perpetuate this problem in their adult relationships, often with disastrous consequences.

Unfortunately, as I mentioned in my prior article, most of the time, adults who had these experiences as children never get help in therapy.  As a result, they often go from one destructive relationship to the next without even realizing that they're repeating patterns from their childhood.

Even when they come to therapy, they often have a hard time letting go of their distorted beliefs--even when they're able to see it logically.  This is usually because these beliefs have a tremendous hold on them emotionally.

To illustrate the dynamic that I've been discussing, I've presented a scenario below that is a composite of many different cases to protect confidentiality:

Ed

Ed came to therapy because he just ended another unhappy relationship, and he was beginning to despair that he might never be in a healthy relationship.

As we went over his family history, Ed described a highly dysfunctional family where his father drank excessively and hit Ed and his younger siblings, and his mother gambled most of the family's money.

Ed grew up feeling that it was his responsibility to take care of his siblings.  

When Ed's father got drunk, he would often hit Ed and his younger siblings.  As the oldest, Ed would try to shield his siblings from their father's blows, which only angered the father even more and made him more abusive.

Ed grew up feeling that if his father was physically abusive towards him, it must be because he deserved it.  

He believed that if he could be the "best son" that a parent would want to have, his father would stop drinking and his mother would stop gambling, so he tried as hard as he could do be "perfect."  

Confusing Compassion and Responsibility

But since this was a distorted belief, there's no such thing as a "perfect" person, and his behavior had no bearing on his parents' problems, his efforts never worked the way he hoped they would. 

When the father was out drinking and the mother went to the casino, Ed took care of his siblings, cooking for them, washing their clothes, helping them with their homework, and so on.

This often meant that, rather than go out and play with his friends, Ed would stay home with his brothers and sisters and take care of their needs.

During the times when his mother gambled away the family money, Ed would take on jobs before school, like delivering newspapers, to try to make up for the short fall so the family would have food.

Even though life was very difficult for Ed, there were times when his father would vow to stop drinking and the mother would say she would stop gambling, and life seemed like it was going to be normal for a short time.

During those times, Ed felt a great deal of love and compassion for each of his parents, and he knew that they were struggling emotionally.

Unfortunately, those times never lasted very long.  After a while, the father would begin drinking again and the mother would return to gambling, and the household would be chaotic again.

This cycle was repeated over and over again.

Each time that his parents attempted to have some normalcy in their lives, Ed hoped that it would last.  But each time he was disappointed.

When it came time to go to college, Ed chose a local college so he could continue to live at home and help his younger siblings.

He was so accustomed to juggling home and school that he didn't realize that he was exhausting himself.  Eventually, he got sick and was bed ridden.

During that time, his maternal aunt came to visit from out of state.  Shortly after she arrived, she realized how bad things were and she gave Ed's parents an ultimatum--either get help or she would contact Children's Services to report their neglect.

After that, things began to improve at home, which was a relief for Ed, but the emotional damage was already done.

As Ed entered into one romantic relationship after another, he continued to perpetuate the same dynamic that he grew up with as a child.  

The women that he chose initially seemed emotionally healthy but, over time, it would come to light that they either had a drinking problem, a drug problem or a gambling problem.  

Confusing Compassion and Responsibility

Ed felt compassion for each of his girlfriends, and he would feel, as the boyfriend in a committed relationship, that he had to do everything that he could to try to help each of these women.  But each time it was the same--he would exhaust himself physically, emotionally and sometimes financially, but he couldn't save any of them.

His friends would tell him that he was so focused on his girlfriend at the time that he wasn't taking care of himself.  On on intellectual level, Ed understood this, but on an emotionally level, Ed felt compelled to continue to try to take responsibility for each of these women.

After several disastrous relationships, Ed came to therapy and we were able to trace back his pattern to early childhood.  

We began working on the earlier experiences that were impacting his adult life using EMDR, Eye Movement Desensitization and Processing therapy, which is a therapy that was developed for trauma (see my article:  What is EMDR?)

Even though Ed knew that his beliefs about compassion and responsibility were distorted, these beliefs remained very strong for him on an emotional level.

As is often in the case when this happens in therapy, there was a part of a young part of him, a child self, that wouldn't allow Ed to overcome his early experiences.

So, having seen this many times in similar situations, I asked Ed to ask his younger self what he felt he needed.  

Tuning Into Ed's Younger Self

As Ed tuned into this younger part of himself, he sensed the younger self letting him know that he felt he couldn't allow Ed to let go of the trauma without feeling that his parents were taken care of.

As an adult, Ed knew that his parents had overcome their problems when he was 20.  But his younger self, who acted as the container for those earlier memories, was stuck at an earlier time when the father was still abusing alcohol and the mother was still gambling.

At first, Ed was confused because he couldn't understand why this younger part of himself was stuck in the past and had not gotten caught up with the present reality.  

So, I explained to Ed that we are all made up of many different aspects, including the adult self, the teenage self, the child self and many other selves (see my article:  Psychotherapy and "Parts" Work).

This is a normal experience.  This has nothing to do with multiple personalities or dissociative identity disorder.  

It so happened that in Ed's case, as often occurs for adults who were abused and traumatized as children, that this younger self was the repository for these earlier memories and remained stuck emotionally.

So, in order for the therapy to progress, we had to take care of this younger self's needs first.

Over time, through gentle exploration, we discovered that this younger self would be willing to allow Ed, as an adult, let go of his distorted beliefs if he felt that Ed's parents had ideal parents that would have taken care of each of them so they wouldn't have grown up to be so unhappy that they used alcohol and gambling to deal with their unhappiness.

Of course, there's no way to actually change the past, but one effective strategy is for the client to use his or her imagination to overcome this treatment impasse.

So, guided by what Ed's younger self communicated that he needed, Ed began to imagine the kind of idealized parents that his father and mother would have needed.  

I helped guide Ed so that he could use his imagination to make each of these idealized parents as vivid as possible with all of the qualities that his younger self felt was necessary.

Then, we took each of those images and Ed imagined his mother as a baby being held and loved by her idealized parents.  He imagined his mother growing up as a young child, a teenager and as an adult with these idealized parents who were loving and nurturing so that Ed's mother grew up to be a loving mother towards Ed and his siblings.

Ed did the same thing for his father--imagining him with loving, nurturing parents, so that his father also grew up to be a loving father towards Ed and his siblings.

By using his imagination, facilitated by an EMDR technique of using tappers to strengthen this experience, Ed created a new symbolic memory (see my article:  Mind-Body Psychotherapy: Healing Trauma With New Symbolic Memories).

The interesting thing about using your imagination in this way is that, even though the logical part of your brain knows that things didn't really happen this way, the emotional part of your mind experiences it as if it  happened, so that it becomes a healing experience.

There are some clients who difficulty with this because they remain so aware that reality was so different from what they imagined that they have a hard time allowing themselves to suspend disbelief.

For those clients, I usually gently ask them try suspending disbelief for the sake of the exercise so we can see what happens.  Most of the time, they're able to experience the healing that comes with this.

Ed was open to using his imagination and, afterwards, he discovered that his younger self felt taken care of to the point where he was able to allow Ed's adult self to process his traumatic experiences.

Over time, Ed mourned for the childhood that he wished that he had.  This was an important step for him.  

Many people avoid coming to therapy because they fear that they'll be overwhelmed by their grief.  But if they have a good rapport with their therapist and the therapist can provide a "holding environment," most people discover that letting go of their grief isn't nearly as upsetting as they had anticipated (see my article: Creating a Holding Environment in Psychotherapy).

Gradually, Ed learned to distinguish compassion from taking responsibility.  He discovered that he could feel compassion for someone, but he didn't have to take on their problems.

As he continued to make progress in therapy, Ed also no longer felt the need to rescue women that were in trouble.  He learned that it wasn't his responsibility to "save" them. 

A Healthy Relationship

Over time, he was also attracted to healthier women, so he was able to enter into a relationship that was healthy and satisfying for the first time in his life.

Getting Help in Therapy

The scenario that I presented in this article is, unfortunately, common for adults who were abused and traumatized as children.

Getting Help in Therapy

If this scenario seems familiar to you because you had similar experiences, you owe it to yourself to get help from a licensed mental health professional who has experience working with trauma.

You can overcome emotional trauma that's keeping you stuck and unhappy.  

Making the decision to get help is the first step.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individuals and adults.

Helping clients to overcome trauma is one of my specialities.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.