Helping A Person Working With A Psychologist

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

“I am pleased with the changes that are happening to me, but my loved ones seem to constantly strive to push me back into the swamp, from which I just got out. And I need their support."

It would seem, why support someone who already receives help, and even from a professional? However, a person working with a psychologist may really need the support of loved ones.

At the first stages of work, new realizations often occur, which for some time can be unsettled. Also, feelings and emotions that were once repressed into the unconscious begin to be experienced. And this is very unusual and requires a person to concentrate more on himself and his experiences.

That is why loved ones often complain that the relative who is undergoing therapy becomes more withdrawn. However, in reality, this is a temporary activation of the "energy-saving mode".

Changes that are often not perceived by loved ones as positive can be very useful and meaningful for the person himself. He often becomes more "selfish" in building relationships with others. However, this is only a consequence of the fact that he begins to acquire his own boundaries and self-reliance and becomes less “comfortable” for his family. Here, already close ones should think about their "egoism" and decide whether they want the person to be happy, or want him to meet THEIR expectations.

This point seems to me very important, since changes in one person strongly affect the entire family system or the system of relationships in a couple and often reveal the problems of other participants in these relationships. And then the question arises about the need for them to turn to a psychologist. But not everyone is ready to admit the possibility of their own problems, which could once become the root cause of the problems of their son / daughter, husband / wife. And often you just don't want to leave your usual zone and change something.

Often, relatives of people undergoing psychotherapy reproach them for the fact that, it turns out, they could be different, they just did not want to make an effort before. “That means you can! If you were five years ago.. . As much as we want, we cannot change the past. And now we have two paths: regret what was not before, or rejoice in what is now.

You should not demand that a person undergoing a course of psychotherapy tell stories about what is happening in the sessions, but it will be very useful if relatives let him know that they are ready to listen to him at any time.

Also, relatives should not react sharply to the fact that a person may experience very vivid emotions of a different spectrum for a psychologist - from love to hate. These emotions are, as a rule, directed not at the specialist himself, but are the result of the transfer to him of feelings that the client once experienced for people who are significant to him. And these feelings are very important for therapy.

And in the end, I would like to emphasize that all the positive changes in working with a psychologist are the merit of not only the psychologist, but also the client. This is always the result of joint, sometimes hard work. And this work deserves respect and support.