Before and After Psychological Trauma

Many clients who start psychotherapy to deal with unresolved psychological trauma talk about life before and after their trauma.  Psychological trauma often changes a person's self perception as well as his or her perception of the world.  Whereas the person might have been self confident and the world around him or her made sense before the trauma, after experiencing trauma, self doubt and a feeling that the world is a precarious place can set in (see my article: Trauma Often Creates Negative Expectations For the Future).

Before and After Psychological Trauma

Assuming that a client was functioning at a high level before the trauma, one of the goals of trauma therapy is to help a client to get back to his or her former level of functioning.  If the client has other underlying trauma, like unresolved childhood trauma (also called developmental trauma), resolving these underlying issues is usually a goal of therapy (see my article: Working on Developmental and Shock Trauma in Therapy).

Fictional Clinical Vignette
The following fictional clinical vignette demonstrates this before and after effect of psychological trauma and how trauma-informed psychotherapy can help:

Cassie
Cassie started psychotherapy due to her recurring nightmares about her friend's fatal accident, which occurred more than a year ago.

Cassie explained to her psychotherapist that her friend, Nina, drowned while they were on vacation in New England on a beach that had no lifeguards.  They had been to this beach many times before.  They especially enjoyed that there were relatively few people on the beach early summer.

She told her therapist that Nina, who was a stronger swimmer, went for a swim while Cassie napped on their blanket.  Suddenly, Cassie was woken up when she heard Nina calling for help before she disappeared underwater.  Cassie said she ran into the water to try to save her friend but, she couldn't find her.

In a panic when she couldn't find Nina, Cassie ran back to the blanket to call the police on her cellphone.  Minutes later, help arrived, but they were unable to find Cassie.  The rescue team searched into the night and the next morning, but there was no sign of Nina.

A day later, the police came to the bed and breakfast where Cassie was staying and informed her that Nina's body washed up on the shore.  They told her that Nina was probably overcome by a strong undertow.

Cassie told her psychotherapist that she was devastated and, since that day, she had nightmares almost every night.  She said these recurring dreams were mostly the same:  She was in the water frantically trying to find Nina, calling her name, diving under the water to try to find her, yelling for help, but no one came (see my article: Understanding Shock Trauma).

She said she would wake up panting and in a cold sweat, and the effect of the nightmares tended to stay with her for the rest of the day.

Cassie said she kept replaying in her mind the minutes after Nina told her that she was going for a swim.  She remembered having the thought that Nina shouldn't swim by herself, especially because the water was rough, but she didn't say anything to Nina about this.  She assumed that Nina would be alright because she was such a good swimmer.

Now, all she could do is berate herself for not saying something to Nina or going with her for a swim so Nina wouldn't be alone, "Why didn't I tell her not to go in the water. I should have, at least, gone with her.  Why didn't I do it?"

Cassie said that, before her friend's fatal drowning, she was feeling optimistic about her life, looking forward to starting a new career, happy to be in a new relationship, and making plans for the future.  But, after Nina died, her whole world changed.

Even though she started her new career and stayed in her relationship, Cassie felt like she was just going through the motions.  On the surface, she tried to appear "normal" (her word), but beyond the facade she was trying to maintain, she felt confused, sad, and guilty.

Cassie was aware that her perception of herself and the world around her had changed dramatically since her friend's death, and she was tired of pretending that she was alright.  And, most nights, she was afraid to go to sleep because she dreaded her recurring nightmares.

When her psychotherapist asked Cassie about her family background, she described a loving family with no major traumatic incidents when she was growing up.  She felt emotionally supported by her family and her boyfriend, but she felt no one really understood what she was going through.

Based on Cassie's information about her family background and her description of the traumatic incident when Nina died, her psychotherapist concluded that there was no developmental trauma, so their work would be focus on helping Cassie to overcome the shock trauma related to the Nina's drowning.

Cassie's psychotherapist provided her with psychoeducation about trauma and explained that what she was experiencing were common reactions to a traumatic incident.  She also explained that trauma therapy, EMDR therapy in particular, could help Cassie to overcome her traumatic symptoms (see my articles: How EMDR Therapy Works: EMDR and the Brain and EMDR Therapy: When Talk Therapy Isn't Enough).

After they completed the preparation phase of EMDR therapy, Cassie and her psychotherapist worked on the traumatic memory of her friend's death, how helpless Cassie felt, and the guilt that remained with her.

Before and After Psychological Trauma

During the course of their EMDR work, Cassie revealed that, although a part of her wanted to feel better, another part of her felt she didn't deserve to feel better.  She was surprised at how strong the part was that felt she was undeserving.

Cassie's psychotherapist normalized this part that felt undeserving by informing Cassie that it wasn't unusual to feel this way under the circumstances.  She also explained to Cassie that they needed to do Ego States therapy (also known as Parts Work) to work with this particular part of her or it would create an obstacle to their work.

Cassie and her psychotherapist did Ego States work for the next couple of months to help soften this punitive part that felt Cassie was undeserving of feeling better.  After that, they were able to resume EMDR therapy and it went more smoothly.

The trauma therapy was neither quick nor easy, but her psychotherapist knew that experiential work, like EMDR therapy and Ego States work, is usually more effective and works faster than regular talk therapy (see my article: Why Experiential Therapy is More Effective to Overcome Trauma).

By the time Cassie completed therapy, she still felt sad about her friend's death, but she no longer felt responsible and guilty.  She regained her former self confidence and positive outlook on life.  She also felt worthy of making plans for the future and enjoying her life.  She also stopped having the recurring nightmares.

Conclusion
Most clients, who experience psychological trauma, report that they notice a difference in how they feel about themselves and the world around them after a traumatic experience.

It is as if there were a line that divides their experiences before the trauma vs. after the trauma.

As is often the case in trauma work, there can be a certain amount of ambivalence about getting better when an aspect of a client feels that s/he doesn't deserve to feel better.  This can present an obstacle to doing trauma work if it is not dealt with.

Fortunately, Ego States work, which involves the therapist and client dealing with this particular aspect of the client, helps to overcome this ambivalence so that regular trauma processing in therapy can resume and resolve the trauma.

Getting Help in Therapy
Psychological trauma doesn't usually resolve on its own, and ignoring it or hoping it will get better on its own usually makes the symptoms get worse over time.

If you're struggling with unresolved trauma, you could benefit from getting help in trauma therapy with an experienced trauma therapist who uses experiential therapy, like EMDR therapy (see my article: Experiential Therapy, Like EMDR Therapy, Helps to Achieve Emotional Breakthroughs and How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

After you have resolved your traumatic experiences in psychotherapy, you can live a more meaningful and fulfilling life.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

I work with individual adults and couples, and I have helped many clients to overcome unresolved trauma.

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.

Working on Developmental and Shock Trauma in Trauma Therapy

Shock trauma and developmental trauma are different types of traumatic experiences.  

In this article, I will define both shock and developmental trauma, discuss how clients often suffer with one or both, and provide a fictional clinical vignette to demonstrate how trauma therapy can help a client with both types of trauma to overcome his traumatic symptoms (see my articles: Understanding Shock Trauma and Overcoming Developmental Trauma).

Many People Experience Both Developmental and Shock Trauma

Shock Trauma vs. Developmental Trauma in Trauma Therapy
Whereas shock trauma usually involves a one-time traumatic event like a tornado, a car accident, being mugged, and so on, developmental trauma is chronic childhood trauma of neglect or abuse (or both) which occurs over time.

A one time experience of shock trauma with no other underlying issues and a high level of functioning  prior to the trauma is easier to resolve than chronic developmental trauma.  Under these circumstances, shock trauma without other layers of shock or developmental trauma can resolve relatively quickly with trauma-informed therapy.

Generally speaking, complex developmental trauma with layers of psychological trauma, will take longer to resolve because there is more than one traumatic experience.  There might be numerous traumatic experiences throughout childhood and also in adulthood.

Whereas it is easier to find a particular target memory in trauma therapy to work on for shock trauma because it is a one-time event, developmental trauma usually involves multiple memories over time.

In addition, if developmental trauma occurs early in childhood, the client might not have coherent memories of what happened due to the way traumatic memories are stored in the brain.

A person with preverbal (before the individual develops language) developmental trauma might only have access to conscious memories of one sense and no other senses.  For instance, he might only have a memory of a sound with no other sense of the memories (no visual, tactile, auditory, olfactory experiences are available).

This also occurs sometimes in shock trauma.  For instance, a client who was hit by a car and who never saw the car coming before he was hit, might only have a vague memory of hearing the siren of the ambulance.  Even so, in most cases, shock trauma is easier to resolve in trauma therapy than developmental trauma when it is a one-time event.

An experienced trauma-informed psychotherapist can work with whatever experiences a client brings to therapy, even if it is only a partial memory or a vague sense of what occurred.

There are also frequently cases where people come to trauma therapy to deal with shock trauma and they also have underlying developmental trauma.  So, it's not an either/or situation--it can be both shock and developmental trauma.

A Fictional Clinical Vignette:  Working on Developmental and Shock Trauma in Therapy
The following fictional clinical vignette is an example of a combination of shock and developmental trauma to illustrate how trauma therapy can help:

Ron
Ron began psychotherapy 17 years after the 9/11 World Trade Center attack.  He explained to his psychotherapist that he had been on the 10th Floor of the North Tower in the World Trade Center early in the morning on 9/11 when the terrorist attack occurred.

Working on Developmental and Shock Trauma in Therapy

He had vivid memories of feeling the impact of what he later learned was a plane as it crashed on the upper floors of the North Tower, his fear and confusion about what was happening, and how he and his colleagues ran down the stairs to safety shortly after the attack.

Afterwards, as he and his colleagues stood outside the North Tower, they were shocked to see a fire on the upper floors and the sound of fire trucks racing to the scene.  They were also shocked and upset to see people jumping from the Tower.

As he walked away from the building to safety, he tried to call his best friend, Joe, who worked on the 95th Floor of the North Tower, but there was no cellphone service.  So, he and several colleagues continued to walk north to the Brooklyn Bridge so they could get away from the scene and walk home to Brooklyn.

Less than 20 minutes later, Ron remembered hearing another crash.  The impact of the crash was so strong that the walkway shook and the bridge swayed.  When he turned around, he saw that the South Tower was also on fire.

Still not knowing what had happened, he stopped a police officer on the bridge, who told him that both towers were hit by planes and it appeared to be a terrorist attack.  Before Ron could ask any more questions, the police officer, who had been listening to his radio, began to run in the direction of the World Trade Center.

During his psychotherapy session, Ron told his psychotherapist that he and his colleagues, not knowing what else to do, continued to walk over the bridge with many other people who were trying to get away in a scene that felt surreal to him.

Less than an hour later while still on the Brooklyn Bridge, Ron and his colleagues heard and felt a tremendous crash, which they initially thought was an earthquake.  They looked in the direction of the Towers and saw that the South Tower was collapsing in on itself.

Ron and his friends felt momentarily paralyzed in place as they stood in shock, not quite believing what was happening.

Throughout it all, Ron kept trying to call his friend, Joe, but neither Ron's nor his companions' cellphones had a signal.

By the time Ron got home, he turned on his TV and heard that the North Tower had also collapsed.  He also discovered more details about the terrorist attack.

Since his office was closed for the rest of the week, Ron watched news coverage non-stop for rest of the week.  Every so often, he continued to try to reach Joe by phone, but his calls kept going to voicemail.

A few days later, he received a call from Joe's sister to let Ron know that Joe never came home.  The family was hoping that he would turn up, but they feared that he was trapped and killed at the World Trade Center site.

As Ron spoke to his psychotherapist about the events of that day and the following weeks, he was surprised at how emotional he still felt after almost 17 years.  He told his psychotherapist that he eventually learned from Joe's family that he was dead, which was a terrible loss.

He explained to his therapist that he "powered through" during the next several months without the help of therapy.  He thought he was managing, but he was surprised that he recently began having nightmares about the events on 9/11.

His psychotherapist provided Ron with psychoeducation about how people can develop traumatic symptoms many years after a traumatic event.

In subsequent psychotherapy sessions, Ron's psychotherapist asked him about his family history, and Ron revealed that his father was emotionally abusive throughout Ron's childhood, which left Ron feeling that he was powerless and unlovable.  He said that he continued to feel that way as an adult.

Ron also told his psychotherapist that he also felt powerless on 9/11 because initially he didn't know what was happening and he couldn't reach his friend, Joe.

Ron's psychotherapist provided Ron with additional psychoeducation to inform him that he was suffering with both shock and developmental trauma.  She explained to Ron that his earlier childhood trauma might have made him more vulnerable to the shock trauma that occurred as a result of 9/11, especially since he felt powerless as it related to both the shock and developmental trauma.

She recommended that they use EMDR therapy to work on the shock trauma first and then they would work on the chronic developmental trauma (see my articles: How EMDR Therapy Works: EMDR and the Brain and Experiential Therapy, Like EMDR Therapy, Helps to Achieve Emotional Breakthroughs).

After the preparation phase of EMDR therapy, Ron and his psychotherapist talked about which 9/11 memories were the most disturbing and agreed to work on those memories first.  After a few months, they completed the EMDR processing of the 9/11 memories, including the loss of his friend, Joe.

Then, they proceeded to use EMDR therapy for the developmental trauma, which was more complex since it was ongoing throughout Ron's childhood and he continued to feel the emotional impact of his father's abuse as an adult.

Ron came to his psychotherapy sessions every week and worked hard in therapy and between sessions for the next several months.  The work was neither quick nor easy, but by the time Ron completed therapy, he was no longer was having nightmares, he no longer felt powerless or unlovable, he grieved the loss of his friend, and he no longer was affected by his childhood trauma.

Conclusion
Whereas shock trauma is usually related a one-time event, developmental trauma is childhood trauma that occurs over time, like physical abuse or emotional neglect.

People who experience developmental trauma are often more susceptible to developing shock trauma if they are exposed to a shocking or traumatic event.

It's not unusual for trauma-related symptoms to show up many years after the trauma, which can be confusing for anyone who experiences this.

Getting Help in Therapy
EMDR therapy is an effective type of trauma therapy to assist clients to overcome traumatic symptoms in both shock and developmental trauma (see my article: The Benefits of Psychotherapy).

Although EMDR therapy tends to be faster and more effective than regular talk therapy to overcome trauma, when there is complex developmental trauma, it can take time to overcome the traumatic symptoms.

If you have been suffering on your own with traumatic symptoms related to shock trauma, developmental trauma or both, you owe it to yourself to get help from a licensed mental health professional who is a trauma-informed psychotherapist (see my article: How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

Once you have worked through your traumatic symptoms, you have a chance to live a fuller, more meaningful life.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

I am a trauma-informed psychotherapist who works with individual adults and couples.

I have helped many clients to overcome the both shock and developmental trauma.

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.

Have You Internalized Your Parents' Anxiety and Emotional Insecurities?

Children internalize their parents' emotional experiences.   In my prior article, I provided a clinical vignette where the client feared taking risks because she grew up with parents who were anxious and risk averse (see my article: Balancing Fear of Failure vs. Future Regret).  In this article, I'm focusing on how anxiety and emotional insecurities are internalized intergenerational at a young age and continue into adulthood.

Have You Internalized Your Parents' Anxiety and Emotional Insecurities?

One of the advantages of attending psychotherapy is that you and your psychotherapist can work on separating your parents' emotions and experiences and yours and, if the therapy is successful, you won't pass on these traits to your children (see my article: Intergenerational Family Dynamics and Your Unresolved Trauma Can Have Emotional Repercussions For Your Children).

Since young children see the world through their parents' eyes, they usually internalize their parents' emotions and view of the world.  This can be an intergenerational pattern where these emotions and  views are passed down from one generation to the next for many generations.

When there has been psychological trauma in an older generation, this is often passed on to subsequent generations--even if the relatives from the generation with direct experience of the trauma never discuss it (see my article: Psychotherapy and Intergenerational Trauma).

For instance, grandchildren of Holocaust survivors will often say that neither their grandparents nor there parents ever discussed the Holocaust, so they don't understand how they internalized their grandparents' traumatic experiences.  But traumatic experiences don't have to be discussed for internalization because the internalization occurs on an unconscious level.

Fictional Clinical Vignette: Internalizing Your Parents' Anxiety and Emotional Insecurities
The following fictional clinical vignette illustrates how anxiety and emotional insecurities are passed down and internalized intergenerationally:

Tania
Tania came to therapy after struggling with anxiety and emotional insecurities about money for her entire life.

Prior to coming to therapy, Tania had always felt that she could handle her problems on her own.  When her friends told her that they were starting psychotherapy, Tania couldn't understand why they needed to get help in therapy.  It didn't make sense to her because she considered her friends to be "strong" and her view of psychotherapy was that only people who are "weak" need to go to therapy (see my article: Common Myths About Psychotherapy: Going to Therapy Means You're "Weak").

When she was in her 20s, Tania believed that she would be in a successful career and own a home by the time she was in her mid-30s.  But, although she had a successful career and she was in a relationship with a man that she loved, she couldn't bring herself to make an investment in a home.

When she turned 38, she was doing well financially, but she feared making such a major investment as buying a home.  Being only two years away from turning 40, she envisioned the years stretching out before her and remaining in a rental apartment with no prospect for change.

Her romantic partner, Dan, who lived with Tania, told her that he wanted them to buy an apartment together in the next couple of years, but Tania was too afraid to do it.

Tania also told her psychotherapist that her financial advisor told her that she could afford to buy an apartment and encouraged her to make the investment, but she was too afraid--even though she knew logically that she could afford it.

When Tania and her psychotherapist talked about her family background, Tania revealed that her parents were first-generation Americans and her grandparents struggled financially to come to the United States.

Even though Tania's parents eventually overcame the poverty they endured as children, they never got over those experiences.  Her father worked three jobs in order to make ends meet and, eventually, he started his own business, which was successful.  But, despite their hard-earned financial success, her parents never overcame their fear that everything they worked for could go up in smoke and they could become poor again.  They continued to live very frugally due to their emotional insecurities.

Tania's psychotherapist provided Tania with psychoeducation about intergenerational trauma.  She also told Tania that it appeared that Tania internalized her grandparents' and parents' anxiety and insecurities and that they could work towards helping her to separate her experience from her grandparents' and parents' experiences.

Although it made sense to Tania that she internalized her family's experiences, she didn't feel hopeful that her feelings would ever change.  These feelings were so ingrained in her that she couldn't believe she could ever feel differently.

Her psychotherapist talked to Tania about starting with Somatic Experiencing to "uncouple" her grandparents' and parents' experiences from her own.  She explained to Tania that, although she was close to her parents and grandparents, she needed to begin to separate her emotions and beliefs rather than remain entangled in her family's beliefs and emotions.

Tania acknowledged that she knew objectively that she could afford to buy her own apartment rather than continuing to rent.  She also knew that it would be a wise financial decision for her when she looked at it logically.  But when she thought about buying an apartment, she also felt dread that she would be making a mistake.  Tania told her psychotherapist that she couldn't understand how she could know one thing logically but feel something else emotionally.

Using Somatic Experiencing, Tania's psychotherapist asked her to begin by allowing herself to feel the excitement and anticipated happiness of buying an apartment with Dan.  She asked Tania to put her anxiety and insecurities aside for the moment and whenever Tania felt these feelings were about to intrude, she should continue to put them aside.

At first, it was difficult for Tania to keep her anxiety separate from her excitement.  She would start to feel the excitement and joy of buying a place with Dan, which she really wanted, but then her anxiety would intrude.  She followed her psychotherapist's suggestions about how to put her anxiety aside for now and, eventually, she was able to identify a sense of happiness and that she felt it in her chest.

Tania and her psychotherapist stayed with the sense of happiness that Tania felt in her chest and worked towards expanding that feeling.  She was eventually able to associate the feeling of happiness in her chest with various images, colors and a sense of physical warmth.  She felt that these feelings, sensations and images were her own and not related to her family's experiences, so she was able to uncouple her experience from her family's.

After a few months, Tania's psychotherapist recommended that they use EMDR therapy to work on the anxiety and insecurities.

As they set up the EMDR therapy protocol, Tania said that her negative belief about herself was, "I'm powerless."  She explained to her therapist that her feelings of powerlessness involved a fear that she would, in some undefined way, lose everything if she and Dan bought an apartment together.

Using EMDR therapy, they worked for several months on current memories and childhood memories that were involved with Tania's anxiety and insecurities.

After a while, Tania had a strong felt sense that she was different from her family and that their experiences weren't her experiences.  Rather than feeling powerless, she felt empowered.  At that point, she realized that what she knew logically came together with how she felt on an emotional level.

Shortly after completing EMDR therapy, Tania and Dan began looking for an apartment.  She remained in therapy to deal with the normal stress of apartment hunting, but she no longer had an irrational fear of buying an apartment.

She continued to be close to her family, but she also felt like an autonomous adult who was no longer affected by her family's intergenerational trauma.

Conclusion
Children tend to internalize their parents' experiences at a young age.  If their parents are emotionally secure people, the chances are that the children will also grow up to feel secure.

But if the parents are anxious and insecure, as illustrated in the clinical vignette above, the children will most likely feel anxious and insecure.  These experiences are often passed down from one generation to the next.  This is usually an unconscious process, even if the older generation never speaks about their traumatic experiences.

Getting Help in Therapy
Intergenerational trauma doesn't have to be a "life sentence" of traumatic experiences passed down from one generation to the next.

Trauma therapy can be an effective way of overcoming trauma.

Trauma therapy can help to break the trauma cycle.

Rather than suffering on your own, you owe it to yourself to get help from a licensed mental health professional (see my article: The Benefits of Psychotherapy).

A skilled psychotherapist can help you to overcome your anxiety and insecurities so that you can lead a more fulfilled life (see my article: How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

I work with individual adults and couples, and I have helped many clients to overcome psychological trauma.

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.

Balancing Fear of Failure vs. Future Regret

Many people allow their fear of failure to create obstacles in their life.  They're so afraid of what other people would think of them if they fail that they refuse to take even the most well thought out calculated risks.  Refusing to take even relatively safe risks can lead to regret in the future, so it's important to understand the root of your fears so that you don't pass up opportunities in your life only to regret it later on (see my article: Fear of Making Mistakes and Overcoming Low Self Esteem).

Balancing Fear of Failure vs. Future Regret

What Fear of Failure?
Fear of failure isn't a diagnosis.  It's an experience that many people have that often gets in the way of  their setting goals, planning or taking advantage of opportunities.

Shame is often at the core of fear of failure.  People who experience fear of failure often doubt their own capabilities even when, objectively, they are quite capable.  Self doubt causes them to back away from taking any risks.  As previously mentioned, people who experience a pervasive fear of failure often worry that if they fail, other people won't like them and they will abandon them.

The root causes of fear of failure often begin in childhood with parents who are either risk averse or who unknowingly undermine their children.

A Fictional Clinical Vignette: Balancing Fear of Failure vs. Potential Regret

Renee
Renee started psychotherapy because she was having a lot of anxiety about a major decision she was facing.

She told her psychotherapist that her director offered her a promotion with a big increase in salary for what Renee considered her "dream job" in New York City.

Although her director had a lot of confidence in Renee's ability to take on this new job, Renee had doubts and she wondered if she should remain in her current job which she could do easily rather than taking a chance on this new job and risk failing.

When her director told Renee that she had a month to consider whether or not she wanted the promotion and relocation to New York City, she became highly anxious.  She ruminated about the decision and went back and forth in her mind.

She feared that if she would be in over her head in the new job and that she would disappoint her family, friends, director and colleagues.  She also feared that the people in her life would no longer respect her if she failed.

Her close friends, who knew Renee's experience and capabilities, urged her to take the job. They had confidence in Renee's skills and expertise, and they also knew that she had always wanted to live in New York.

But her parents urged Renee not to take the promotion.  They both feared that there was too much at stake with regard to Renee's career and if she didn't succeed, she might be terminated.  Her mother advised Renee to stay where she was safe in her current job rather than risk failing.

As Renee spoke with her psychotherapist, she told her that her parents were anxious people who were very risk averse.  Her father remained in the same job for 30 years, even though he was offered promotions, because he was afraid of failing.  Her mother once had dreams as a young woman of being a designer, but she never pursued her dreams because she feared the humiliation if she didn't succeed.

Each of her parents often spoke about "what if" they had gone further in life, but their regrets were fear outweighed by their need to be "safe" and not take risks.

Renee's psychotherapist asked her to try to put aside her fears and imagine what she might actually like about the new promotion.

At first, it was difficult for Renee to imagine enjoying her promotion, but when she managed to put aside her fears, her face lit up and she seemed energized.  She talked about taking on new and exciting challenges, making a lot more money, and realizing her dream of living in New York City.

As Renee and her psychotherapist weighed the risks vs. the benefits, it soon became clear to Renee that the benefits far outweighed the risks.  She also knew, when she thought about it objectively, that she could get another job that was similar to the job she was currently doing if things didn't work out with the promotion.

When she thought objectively about what the worst thing would be if the new job didn't work out, at first, she thought about how humiliated she would feel.  But, as she continued to discuss this with her psychotherapist, she realized that her friends and family would be emotionally supportive whether she succeeded or failed.

As she continued to talk to her psychotherapist about the promotion, Renee felt excited about the new opportunity, and she decided to accept the promotion.

In the interim, she and her psychotherapist worked on stress management techniques to help Renee to manage her fear and anxiety.  Her psychotherapist also recommended that when Renee moved to New York City that she find another psychotherapist to work on the deeper underlying issues that contributed to her fear of failure.

A few months after Renee was settled into her new job and new apartment in New York City, she sought help from a psychotherapist who helped clients with fear of failure.

Balancing Fear of Failure vs Future Regret

They were able to trace Renee's fear of failure back to her early childhood when her parents discouraged her from taking even the most basic risks.

Renee also remembered that her mother often expressed doubts about her abilities even when Renee was in elementary school.  Renee's sense was that her mother was being overly protective and she unknowingly caused Renee to doubt herself.  Renee had internalized her parents' fears.

Her psychotherapist recommended that they use EMDR therapy to work on Renee's fears, which included her past fears, her current fears, and her anticipated fear of failure for the future (see my articles: What is EMDR Therapy? and How EMDR Therapy Works: EMDR and the Brain).

As Renee was working through her fear of failure with EMDR therapy, she also set limits with her parents, especially her mother, who tended to call Renee in a state of worry and panic about Renee's new promotion.  She told her mother that she appreciated her mother's concern, but her phone calls were making her anxious and her mother needed to stop talking about all the things she feared would go wrong for Renee.

As Renee continued to work with her psychotherapist using EMDR, over time, she became more confident in her ability to do her job.  She started to let go of her fear of failure and address these issues that were under her control rather than worrying about things that weren't under her control (see my article: Experiential Therapy, Like EMDR, Helps to Achieve Emotional Breakthroughs).

Over time, Renee's confidence increased, and she received positive feedback from her new director in New York.  She also became increasingly aware that if she had turned down the promotion out of fear, she would have regretted it in the long run.  This was an important lesson for Renee with regard to balancing fear of failure vs. potential regret.

Conclusion
Life is short.  One of the common regrets expressed by older people who are close to death is that they wish they had taken more risks and not worried about what other people thought of them.

Fear of failure often has its roots in early childhood.  Whether it involved growing up with critical parents who unknowingly undermine their child's self confidence or living with risk averse parents who convey that the world is a dangerous place, children learn to fear failure and carry that fear into adulthood.

Getting Help in Therapy
Balancing fear of failure and potential regret is difficult to do if you're not aware of the underlying issues involved.

A skilled psychotherapist can help you to get to the root of your problems so that you can work through your fears (see my article: The Benefits of Psychotherapy).

Rather than passing up opportunities that you will regret later on, you can address your fear of failure in psychotherapy so that you can lead a more fulfilling life (see my article: How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

About Me
I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

I work with individual adults and couples, and I have helped many clients to overcome their fear of failure.

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.

Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Mind Affects Your Behavior: A Clinical Vignette

In my prior article, Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Affects Your Behavior, I discussed the importance of focusing on your inner world and how to tap into your unconscious mind in psychotherapy using experiential therapy such as EMDR therapy, clinical hypnosis, and Somatic Experiencing.  In this article, I'll be providing a fictional clinical vignette to provide an example.

Fictional Clinical Vignette: Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Affects Your Behavior

Sam
Sam began psychotherapy because he was having problems in his romantic relationships with women.

Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Affects Your Behavior 

His last relationship ended in much the same way as his prior two relationships ended with his girlfriend, Jane, telling him that he was too jealous and possessive.  She was also hurt that he tended to be suspicious that she might be cheating on him when she never gave him a reason not to trust her.  After getting fed up with Sam questioning her about her whereabouts, she ended the relationship (see my article: Relationships: Overcoming Jealousy).

Sam told his psychotherapist that neither Jane nor his other girlfriends ever gave him a reason to doubt they were faithful to him, but he still had a hard time trusting women.  He had a very hard time controlling his suspicions, jealousy and possessiveness while he was in the relationship.

In hindsight, he would see that he was being irrational, but that insight never came until after the relationships ended.  Although he knew that there was no chance of repairing his relationship with Jane, he wanted to avoid behaving in this way in a future relationship.

When his psychotherapist asked Sam about his family history, Sam, who was in his mid-30s, revealed that he had only sketchy memories of his childhood.  His psychotherapist knew that this is often a sign that there was developmental trauma in childhood, but she wanted to wait until she knew more about Sam before she speculated about this.

He revealed that was the youngest of three children who grew up in New York City.  When he was in his 20s, his oldest sister, Anna, told him that their mother left the family household for several months when Sam was five and that he had a very hard time while she was away, but he had no memory of this.

Sam said that, according to Anna, their mother just disappeared one day while they were in school.  Anna told Sam that their mother had not left a note or phoned to say where she was or when she would be coming back, which worried everyone.

Anna told Sam that he was inconsolable after their mother left and he refused to go to school, but Sam had no memory of this.  He was aware that his mother eventually returned and his parents were still together, but this is all that he knew.

Sam talked about having chronic insomnia for as long as he could remember. He had problems both falling and staying asleep.  He also described problems with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), tension headaches and backaches.  He said his doctor gave him medication for IBS, which sometimes worked and sometimes did not.  His doctor also told him that his medical problems were probably psychologically related and recommended that Sam attend psychotherapy.

His psychotherapist, who was a trauma-informed therapist, also knew about the connection between various medical issues and developmental trauma, so she noted this information in Sam's therapy file and kept it in her mind.

She provided Sam with psychoeducation about psychological trauma and how unresolved childhood trauma, even trauma that people cannot remember from their childhood, can affect them later physically and psychologically as adults (see my article: Why It's Important For Psychotherapists to Provide Clients With Psychoeducation About How Psychotherapy Works).

Then, his psychotherapist prepared Sam to work on his issues by explaining that there would be a preparation phase to their work where she would teach him to how to de-escalate his anxiety and to use self care exercises at bedtime to deal with his insomnia and to anything anxiety-producing at the end or between psychotherapy sessions (see my article: Trauma Therapy: Using Grounding Exercises Between Psychotherapy Sessions and Trauma Therapy: Using the Container Exercise Between Therapy Sessions).

After Sam began meditating, doing breathing exercises and practicing grounding and the container exercises, which helped him to calm himself and to sleep better, his psychotherapist talked to him about the Affect Bridge in clinical hypnosis and how it could help them to understand the root of his problems.  She explained that Sam would be in a safe and relaxed state while they were doing the affect bridge, and she asked him to go back to one of his memories where he was suspicious of Jane.

Sam remembered that there was an evening when Jane was late coming home from work and he was worried about her.  He tried to reach her on her cellphone, but the call went directly to her voicemail.  He said that's when he began to get anxious and suspicious that she might be with another man.

At first while he was waiting for Jane to come home, he tried to rationalize that he had no reason to believe that she was cheating on him, but his anxiety got the best of him and it just continued to escalate.

By the time Jane came home to the apartment that they were sharing, he was in a terrible state.  He went into a rant and accused her of being with another man.

Jane had been through his rants before, so she waited for him to calm down.  Then, she told him that she was stuck between stations on the subway and she had no way to make or receive calls or texts.  She got on the computer and showed him the MTA website that indicated that there were significant delays on the train line that she used.

Then, Jane had a serious talk with Sam and told him that she couldn't deal with his suspicious nature anymore and she wanted to leave the relationship. Within a week, Jane was gone.  Sam felt devastated.

His psychotherapist explained that the anxiety that he had was related to separation anxiety, and she explained this form of anxiety to him (see my article: Overcoming Separation Anxiety).

Sam's psychotherapist asked him to go back to when he felt anxious when he couldn't reach Jane and describe what he felt and where he felt it in his body now as he recalled the memory, assuming this was tolerable for him.  Sam said it was tolerable.  He described the rising state of his anxiety and the related pain in his stomach.  He also felt angry and sad.

His psychotherapist asked Sam to stay with the emotions that he was feeling and to go back to his earliest memory of feeling this same way.

In response, Sam took a couple of minutes to focus on the emotions and the pain in his stomach.  His  mind took him back to a memory of coming home from school when he was five and looking for his mother in their  family apartment.  He looked all over the apartment and couldn't find her.  After a few minutes, he felt terrified that something happened to his mother.

Alone and afraid, he called his father at work in tears.  His father came home immediately and looked around the apartment to see if he could find a note from Sam's mother.  Finding no note, he called his in-laws to find out if she was there, but they said they had not heard from her.  Sam remembered that he was inconsolable all that night, and his father stayed with him until Sam fell asleep.

When Sam opened his eyes in his psychotherapist's office, he said that he was surprised because, until they did the Affect Bridge, he had no memory of that day.

Over the next several weeks, Sam and his psychotherapist continued to work on the early childhood memory of his mother leaving the family.  He recalled that a week or so after his mother left, he overheard his father telling his oldest sister that he heard from Sam's mother and she told the father  that she left the family to be with another man.

Over time, Sam began to remember many more memories related to his childhood.  He was also able to connect his irrational feelings of jealousy and suspicion in his relationships to his childhood memory of his mother leaving the family for another man.  Once he understood the connection, his jealousy and anxiety in his relationships made sense to him.  He realized that the unresolved trauma was still getting played out in his adult life (see my article: Developmental Trauma: Living in the Present As If It Were the Past and Understanding Why You're Affected By Trauma That Happened a Long Time Ago).

His psychotherapist explained to Sam that understanding the root of his problem was the first step, but understanding it alone would not be enough to overcome his problem when he got emotionally triggered in a future relationship (see my article: Coping With Trauma: Becoming Aware of Emotional Triggers).

She recommended that they use EMDR therapy to help Sam overcome the original trauma triggered his separation and abandonment anxiety(see my article: EMDR Therapy: Overcoming Childhood Trauma So You Can Have Healthier Adult Relationships and How Psychotherapy Can Help to Overcome Fear of Abandonment).

Gradually, over time, Sam and his psychotherapist used EMDR therapy and discovered that there were other similar memories of feeling abandoned that contributed to his current psychological and physical problems (see my article: Psychotherapy to Overcome Childhood Trauma).

Eventually, Sam was able to work through his traumatic memories in EMDR therapy.  By the time he got into a new relationship, he no longer got emotionally triggered.

Conclusion
Many clients come to therapy because they don't understand why they are having problems.  Often, they are not aware of how unresolved childhood trauma affects them psychologically and physically as an adult.

Experiential therapy, like clinical hypnosis, Somatic Experiencing and EMDR therapy, can help clients to focus on their inner world to understand how the past, even the past that is not conscious to them, affects them now.  Experiential therapy can also help clients to overcome traumatic experiences.

Getting Help in Therapy
Working with a skilled mental health professional in therapy provides an opportunity to get to the root of your problems and work through unresolved trauma (see my article: The Benefits of Psychotherapy).

Once you have worked through unresolved trauma, you can live a more fulfilling life free of your traumatic history.

Rather than suffering on your own, you owe it to yourself to get the help you need in therapy from an experienced psychotherapist (see my article: How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

I work with individual adults and couples, and one of my specialties is helping clients to overcome trauma.

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.

Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Mind Affects Your Behavior

As I've mentioned in prior articles, people's behavior is often based on unconscious thoughts and feelings, so that if you want to understand yourself, a good place to start is with your unconscious mind.   Psychotherapy provides an opportunity to understand your unconscious mind and how it affects your behavior (see my articles:  Psychotherapy: Making the Unconscious Conscious, Your Unconscious Beliefs Affect Your Sense of Reality, How Psychotherapy Helps You to Expand Your Inner Awareness, and Focusing on Your Inner Self is More Effective to Overcome Shame Than Focusing on Your Outer Self).

Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Mind Affects Your Behavior

Some people are naturally more introspective than others.  They take the time to try to understand their unconscious mind in psychotherapy by working with their psychotherapist to become aware of their underlying thoughts, feelings and dreams and how it affects their behavior.

Other people, who are naturally more outer directed, but who also want to understand the underlying issues that affect their behavior, learn in therapy how to discover the unconscious motivation for their behavior.

A skilled psychotherapist, who works with unconscious thoughts, feelings and dreams, can help clients to develop the ability to pay attention to their inner, unconscious world to understand themselves.

When you're aware of what's going on in your unconscious mind, your behavior begins to make sense.  Whereas you might not understand your behavior before you understand the underlying issues, when you've developed the ability to understand your inner world, you begin to understand that there are coherent reasons for your behavior that you weren't able to detect before.

How to Tap Into Your Unconscious Mind

Working With Dreams:

There are many ways to tap into the unconscious mind, depending upon the experience and skills of the psychotherapist.

The most traditional way is to pay attention to your dreams (see my article: Are You Fascinated By Your Dreams?).

By keeping a pad and pen near your bed before you go to sleep, you give your unconscious mind the message that you want to remember your dreams.  

In any given night, most people have 5-6 dreams.  The ones that are easiest to remember are the ones that are closest to your waking up.  

If you want to remember your dreams, upon waking up, rather than jumping out of bed or even shifting your position, remain still for a couple of minutes (shifting your position in bed makes it more likely that the dream will elude you).  

You might start by having a sense that you have had a dream.  For instance, you might still be immersed in the mood of the dream.  Or, you might remember an image or phrase from your dream.  By being patient and waiting a minute or two, the rest of the dream might unfold, usually in reverse order.

Remembering your dreams is a skill, and much like any skill, it can take time to develop.  People who are patient and take the time often remember a few dreams each morning, especially when they are in the process of writing down the dream that was closest to their waking state.  

Just like you might remember the last part of your last dream first, you will usually remember the last dream and then the one before that and the one before that in reverse order.

There are many ways to work with dreams in psychotherapy depending upon how your psychotherapist works.  

Some psychotherapists look for images or symbols in dreams that are prominent to discover the underlying meaning of the dream.

Other psychotherapists believe that every image in the dream represents a part of the client and helps clients to understand their dreams by assisting them to discover what parts of themselves are represented in the dream.

Many psychotherapists focus on the emotion on the dream:  Was the client feeling sad, happy, scared, angry, and so on, to help the client to understand the unconscious material in the dream?

Other psychotherapists work with Embodied Imagination, developed by Neo-Jungian psychoanalyst, Robert Bosnak, to work with dreams (see my article: Dreams and Embodied Imagination and Dream Incubation: Planting Seeds).

When clients are interested in working on their dreams to understand their underlying issues related to their problems, I use all of these ways of working with dreams depending upon what works best for the particular client.  Some clients have more of an affinity for working one way than another.

Working With the Mind-Body Connection

Since the body offers a window into the unconscious mind, I also use mind-body oriented psychotherapy, like clinical hypnosis, EMDR therapy, and Somatic Experiencing, to help clients to discover underlying issues (see my article: The Body Offers a Window Into the Unconscious Mind).

In clinical hypnosis, there is a technique called the Affect Bridge, which helps clients to get to unconscious issues by asking clients to use their emotions and where they feel these emotions in the body to allow unconscious material to come to the surface.

I have found the Affect Bridge to be a very good technique that often gets to unconscious thoughts, feelings and memories related to clients' problems.

Somatic Experiencing works in a similar way.  Clients learn to pay attention to their thoughts, feelings, body sensations, images or anything else that comes up for them as we are working on a problem.  

Part of EMDR Therapy, which was originally developed to help clients to overcome psychological trauma, is also now used for many other issues. For instance, EMDR therapy is also used for performance enhancement for executive, artists, performers, writers, athletes and anyone that needs help with performance enhancement.  There is a component of the EMDR therapy protocol that involves a free associative process where clients can access associative memories and unconscious thoughts and feelings.

EMDR therapy is also used adjunctively when your primary psychotherapist does not do EMDR and you see an adjunctive EMDR therapist (see my article: What is Adjunctive EMDR Therapy?).

Conclusion

Your inner world is a rich source of information that can help you to understand your behavior.

There are many ways to tap into your unconscious mind, including dreams and mind-body oriented types of therapy, such as clinical hypnosis, Somatic Experiencing and EMDR therapy.

In my next article, I'll provide a clinical vignette to demonstrate how focusing on your inner world can help you to understand how your unconscious mind affects your behavior (see my article: Focusing on Your Inner World to Understand How Your Unconscious Mind Affects Your Behavior: A Clinical Vignette).

Getting Help in Therapy

Without understanding your internal world, you're bound to continue to have the same problems because the root of your problem lies in the unconscious mind.

A skilled psychotherapist can help you to delve beneath the surface to understand the underlying issues involved so that you can get to the root of your problems and take action to change your behavior (see my article: The Benefits of Psychotherapy).

If you have been struggling unsuccessfully on your own to resolve your problems, you could benefit from working with a licensed mental health professional (see my article: How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

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.

Are You Unconsciously Choosing An Unhealthy Relationship to Fix Your Childhood Relationship With a Parent?

I've written about relationships and choosing healthier partners in prior articles (see my articles: Emotionally Unhealthy Relationships: Bad Luck or Poor Choices?, Are Your Fears of Being Alone and Lonely Keeping You in an Unhealthy Relationship? and Learning to Make Better Choices in Relationships).  In this article, I'm focusing on a particular problem with unconsciously choosing an unhealthy relationship as a way to fix your childhood relationship with your parents.

Are You Unconsciously Choosing An Unhealthy Relationship to Fix Your Childhood Relationship With a Parent?

What is Repetition Compulsion?
Most people don't consciously choose to be in emotionally unhealthy relationships.  It's usually an unconscious process based on what's familiar.  And who is more familiar to you than one or both of your parents?

The biggest problem usually occurs when people unconsciously choose a partner who is similar to one or both parents in an effort to fix their childhood relationship with their parents.

With regard to relationships, the unrecognized wish behind this unconscious process is that the repetition of a dysfunctional family pattern in a romantic relationship will provide a chance to repair what couldn't be repaired in childhood with the parents.

This dynamic is known as repetition compulsion in psychotherapy.  When people engage in repetition compulsion, they are repeating traumatic circumstances over and over again in situations where the pattern will most likely be repeated in an unconscious effort to repair the original trauma.  

People who start psychotherapy often don't see these patterns at first.  After their psychotherapist hears about the family dynamic and recognizes the same dynamic in the romantic relationship, the therapist recognizes that the client is engaging in repetition compulsion.

The person who chooses a romantic partner who has the same dynamics as one or both of his parents doesn't always see the similarity between the romantic partner and the parent.  There can be a certain amount of denial about it.  But, usually, over time, client in therapy will recognize it as the therapy evolves.

A Fictional Clinical Vignette: The Problem With Choosing an Unhealthy Relationship to Try to Fix Your Childhood Relationship With Your Parents
The following fictional clinical vignette is about the unconscious process of repetition compulsion in an unhealthy relationship and how it involves a wish to fix a childhood dysfunctional relationship:

Meg
Meg started psychotherapy because she was having problems in her one year relationship with her boyfriend, Ed.

Are You Unconsciously Choosing An Unhealthy Relationship to Fix Your Childhood Relationship With a Parent? 

During the first six months of their relationship, Meg and Ed got along well.  They enjoyed each other's company and spent a lot of time together.

After five months, Ed moved into Meg's apartment and this is when the problems began.  Then, when they were together for six months, Ed quit his job after he got into a disagreement with his supervisor.

Meg was annoyed that he left his job without finding another job first and that he was making no effort to try to find another job.

When she came home from her stressful job, she would see Ed laying down on the couch watching TV instead of job hunting.  Since she was now carrying the financial burden for the two of them, she told him that it annoyed her to see him loafing around and allowing her to take responsibility for their joint expenses.

Whenever this topic came up, they would argue.  Ed told Meg that he would find another job, but he didn't like to be pressured by her.  He said if the roles were reversed, he wouldn't complain about it.  He said he would give her time and space to figure out her next move.  And Meg argued that she wouldn't leave her job without having another job, so it was unlikely that their roles would be reversed.

Six months later, Ed was still making no effort to find a job, and Meg was furious.  She complained about it to her psychotherapist during the first two therapy sessions.  Although she was very angry, she didn't want to throw Ed out of her apartment.  She felt that it would be cruel to tell him to leave, so she allowed him to stay, but they were barely on speaking terms.

When Meg's psychotherapist asked her about her family background, Meg described a dysfunctional family dynamic.  She was the older of two daughters who witnessed their parents arguing a lot.

Meg explained that her father had problems keeping jobs because he tended to quit whenever there was a problem on the job instead of trying to resolve the problem.  This placed all the financial burden on Meg's mother, and it was a source of frequent arguments.

Although her mother complained a lot and her parents argued about the father's unstable work history, her mother frequently told Meg and her sister that she would never break up the family.  And the father spent more time being unemployed than working.  As a result, nothing ever changed, and the mother struggled financially throughout all of Meg's childhood to support the family.

As a child, Meg was closer to her father than she was to her mother.  Whereas she thought her mother was often irritable and short tempered with her, she thought her father was more sensitive, nurturing and patient.

Meg disliked hearing her mother call the father "lazy" and "inconsiderate," and she would defend her father to her mother, which escalated these arguments.  Meg would take her father's side, and her sister would take her mother's side.  This created tension in all their relationships.

When her psychotherapist pointed out the similarities between her parents' dynamics and her relationship with Ed, Meg got annoyed.  She didn't think these situations were similar at all, and she was offended that her therapist would say this.

Meg said that her father was a sensitive, compassionate man, but Ed was insensitive and inconsiderate.  For the next few weeks, Meg continued to defend her father and she maintained that her father was different from her Ed.

Meg's psychotherapist realized that, at that point in therapy, Meg idealized her father and she had a blind spot about his problems, so she realized that Meg wasn't ready to deal with this issue.

A few months later, Meg was sufficiently fed up with Ed that she decided to give him a three month deadline to either find a job and contribute to their joint expenses or move out.  In order to meet their expenses, Meg had to take on freelance work in addition to her full time job just to make ends meet, and she was exhausted.

The three month deadline came and went and Ed still refused to look for a job.  They were now arguing more than ever, and Meg really resented Ed, but she couldn't bring herself to follow through with her ultimatum.  Despite her anger and frustration, she allowed him to stay.

Her psychotherapist explored this with Meg in a nonjudgmental way to help Meg to get curious about it.  Over time, when Meg became less defensive, she could see the parallels between her relationship with Ed and her mother's relationship with her father.

Gradually, Meg developed insight into how she was looking at her father through the eyes of her younger self.  She realized that she idealized her father when she was a child because she needed to see him as being her "big, strong dad," and she was continuing to do this as an adult.

Although it made Meg feel sad to see her father's problems, she dealt with the loss of this idealization in therapy.  She also had a lot more empathy for her mother and realized that her mother was frequently irritable when Meg was a child because she was exhausted.

Meg also realized that, even though she idealized her father most of the time when she was a child, she admitted that to her psychotherapist that there were times when she felt angry and disappointed with her father.  But she never allowed herself to remain immersed in those feelings as a child because it was too overwhelming for her.  She needed to see her father as a hero.

Gradually, Meg realized that deep down she always knew, even when she was a child, that her father had these problems, but she didn't want to see it.

She also realized that she had made an unconscious choice to be in a relationship with Ed and remain in that relationship as a way to try to fix her childhood relationship with her father, "I never realized before that I thought I could fix Ed and, in a way, it felt like I could fix my dad.  My mother could never fix my dad, but I thought it would be different with Ed and me.  I really thought I could change him."

Now, she saw her father as someone that she loved very much, but she also accepted that he had problems.  She also realized that she couldn't fix her deep-seated childhood problems with her father by being in a relationship with someone who had similar problems or by trying to repeat her parents' relationship with Ed in order to have a different outcome.

Shortly after this, Meg told Ed that he needed to move out, and she no longer felt guilty about it.  By asking him to move out, in effect, this ended the relationship, but she felt better about herself.  She no longer felt like a victim in her relationship.

Afterwards, Meg dealt with the loss of the relationship in therapy.  Even though she and Ed weren't getting along by the time the relationship ended, she still recognized it as a loss.

Meg also continued to work on her childhood problems in therapy so that she wouldn't repeat the same mistake in the future by getting into another unhealthy relationship, and she could make healthier choices.

Conclusion
It's difficult to see your unconscious dynamics on your own.  Even when you're in therapy, you might have a blind spot for these dynamics before you're ready to see them.

The repetition compulsion of repeating earlier family patterns is common.

When people don't see that they're unconsciously choosing an unhealthy relationship as a way to fix an earlier relationship with parents, they can go from one dysfunctional relationship to another without seeing that they're repeating the pattern over and over again.

People often come to therapy because they're having problems in their relationship, and they believe that the problem is with their particular partner at the time instead of seeing that it's the same dynamic repeating itself with different people.

Once you're ready to explore the unconscious dynamics in therapy, part of the work is grieving for what you can't fix in your childhood history.

You will probably grieve the end of your relationship if you realize that it's emotionally unhealthy for you, but you also have a chance to make a positive change in your life and choose a healthier relationship in the future if you work through the repetition compulsion.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you're struggling with problems that you've been unable to resolve on your own, you could benefit from working with a licensed mental health professional who can help you to work through these problems (see my article: The Benefits of Psychotherapy).

As I mentioned earlier, unconscious behavior is difficult to see on your own, but working with a skilled psychotherapist can help you to recognize and change these unhealthy patterns (see my article: How to Choose a Psychotherapist).

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist (see my article: The Therapeutic Benefits of Integrative Psychotherapy).

I work with individual adults and couples, and I have helped many clients to recognize and change unconscious dynamics that were making them unhappy.

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.