- Hey everybody, it's Wednesday
and that means I'm on the website.
And if you haven't gotten on my website,
then you're really missin' out,
'cause there's like chat rooms and forums and
messages and you can make friends and it's wonderful.
So I'm on there.
Then I was also on YouTube,
so if you asked your questions using the hastag, KatiFAQ
I may have even already answered them.
Sometimes I amaze myself.
Not really, but I answered some questions already
and then I have four
and they're actually pretty long today,
so I've cut out the journal topic.
I know some of you get very upset about that,
but I'm sorry, these are good questions,
but they're just more lengthy,
so I wanna make sure I keep this under, you know,
I don't wanna make my videos like 20 minutes.
That's craziness.
So, first question.
Hi Kati, how do you stop yourself
from being triggered by your recovery?
When I was in school I was bullied extensively,
most of which I had suppressed.
I'm finally starting to open up
and talk to my therapist about it,
but it's bringing back a lot of negative feelings
and I've also began to use old coping skills,
self harm mainly.
Do you think there's a way to separate my daily life,
or to separate your daily life from the emotions you explore
within therapy?
It's really difficult, especially at the beginning
and what you're experiencing is very normal.
Things that we stuffed for a really long time,
they're coming up (yells),
we're talking about 'em and we don't really have
any new coping skills and so,
there are a couple things that I would recommend.
The first thing, being honest with your therapist.
Let them know, in between sessions I'm just feeling
really overwhelmed.
It may be a good time to double up on your sessions
if that's something that's available to you.
Often times when my clients are really,
like really struggling,
I'll either seem them like twice a week
or we'll try to get them involved in group.
And it just gives you a little bit more support,
a little more of an outlet
in the in between times, between sessions,
and it kinda can, sometimes keep us going.
Another thing that I would recommend
is trying out new coping skills.
Do you want to try to paint?
Try to paint.
You wanna try to learn to play the guitar?
Learn to play the guitar.
You wanna sing?
Sing.
You wanna dance?
Dance.
Do something that gives you an outlet,
something that makes you feel like,
like for me to be truthful and to be 100% honest,
baking is really cathartic to me.
It doesn't even matter if I'm like baking meatballs
or if I'm baking like banana bread,
just something about putting things together
and them coming out
and then being able to share it with Sean
and my friends and stuff, I love that kinda stuff
and that feels really good to me.
So find one of those things that feels really good to you
and then try to make time,
maybe everyday for like 20 minutes or whatever,
depending on what it is and how long it takes,
but try to make time to give yourself an outlet
so that you don't feel that
such feelings of overwhelm.
And if any of you've worked on this and gone through it,
as always, always leave your helpful hints
and comments below, okay?
I hope that helps a little bit.
I know it's really hard, but it will get better, promise.
Question number two.
Now this is a really long one
and there's actually two questions within this,
because it's a topic I wanna talk about.
I would really appreciate if you would read this answer.
I am.
So when I first started recovery from an eating disorder
and depression I went to one therapist
and I didn't feel like we meshed well.
So after three sessions
I couldn't even bring myself to tell her
I wasn't coming back, I just never schedule another session.
Which is actually okay,
as long as you didn't schedule one and miss 'em right?
Well on Friday at yoga class that I've been going to
for a few weeks now, she just walked in
and I felt so awkward.
Like is she mad at me and she was right behind me
in class, so I felt like she was just staring at me
the entire time.
Ooh, that would like ruin my yoga experience.
I really loved the yoga class until now,
but now that she's showed up to
and apparently has been going to this yoga studio
for a long time, I kinda feel scared to go back,
kind of like I felt about going to school everyday
when I was being bullied.
What should I do?
How do I handle this?
Should I find a new studio?
Keep going to this place and act like I don't even know her?
I know she recognized me.
I just feel horrible and embarrassed,
like everyone in the yoga studio's
going to find out that I'm in therapy
for an eating disorder, depression.
And like everyone's gonna look at me funny.
So I'm gonna be some sort of freak.
Please help. (screams)
And then the second question,
which is a similar topic, she said,
hey Kati I have an appointment with an LPC,
which I'm assuming's some kind of counselor,
I don't know all the acronyms all the time,
because we don't use that in my area,
on Friday.
I was wondering if it's really okay for me to see her
as my therapist because she used to be
my Girl Scout troop leader when I was in middle school.
Is it okay to her,
is it okay to her a past relationship with a therapist
before seeing them?
I guess, is it okay to have a past relationship?
Okay, so the whole question around these are
dealing with what we call in the therapy world,
dual relationships.
So you may have seen a therapist,
like the first question,
you see a therapist and it didn't really work out
and you just never made another appointment.
And that's okay.
Is she mad at you?
No, she maybe curious as to why you didn't
or if there's you know,
but that happens a lot, to be truthful okay.
So don't think that we take offense to it.
It's not that kind of relationship.
And will anybody at the yoga studio
know that you are in therapy?
Hell no, and if they do,
then you can actually file a report
because it's illegal for us to break confidentiality,
illegal and unethical, to random people.
'Cause when you come into therapy,
as a therapist we hold your confidentiality right?
You'd have to sign a release
for us to tell anybody about it.
So go to your yoga class and if you run into her,
it's actually up to you to even say anything.
As a therapist, if I run into a client,
and I'll even tell them this,
if I see you out at the grocery store
or at the coffee shop, I'm not gonna say hi.
It's up to you to say hi.
Because let's say I do come up and I'm like,
hey good to see ya,
they're like how the hell do you know that person?
And then you have to either lie
or then you have to say I'm seeing a therapist,
which you may not wanna say.
It might be like you're with your boss or something,
you know, and so that would be against
you know the rules for me.
I'm supposed to hold your confidentiality.
So I might look at you,
like I've run into clients out at bars,
I've run into clients at restaurants,
I've run into clients everywhere,
and it honestly always catches me by surprise
and I probably give 'em one of these looks,
like you double take and they're like,
and you don't anything and I walk away all awkward like.
But it's up to them to approach
and a lot of them do and they're like hey Kati bah.
So there's that.
As far as the second question, the past relationship,
if it's okay with you and it's okay with them,
'cause you don't have that relationship anymore,
so it's fine, as long as you're okay with it.
If it makes you uncomfortable
and you're like eh, I don't know
and if you don't want that, then find someone else.
But if it doesn't bother you,
then I say go for it!
Maybe if she's a good Girl Scout troop leader,
then maybe she'll also be a great therapist, right?
We've all held odd jobs,
so anyway you can definitely do that.
Okay, question number three.
I've been in therapy for a few months
and my eating has gotten better.
Who hoo.
Well I'm not purging anymore,
but my depression has gotten a little better as well,
though neither me nor my therapist know why
because I've never attempted to address emotions and such,
but currently I'm at a loss for therapy goals.
Like I know I'm not where I wanna be,
but at the same time I don't wanna change anything.
Does that mean that I should take a break from therapy
until I find more motivation slash reason to go?
Not at all.
This happens all the time
and in therapy and the therapy world
of therapists talking psychobabble,
we use terms like resistance
and that's the most common.
There's a lotta other terms that I could throw out,
but that just will confuse us all so, resistance.
Resistance is honestly something,
it's just like what it sounds.
We're resisting help
and we're not doing it consciously,
we're doing it subconsciously.
And our depression and our eating disorder
or self harm, whatever it is we're struggling with
is really tricky, because at first it'll be like,
it'll flare up when it thinks we're gonna get help.
It's like, oh my gosh, no,
and it'll get really bad.
And then sometimes it'll be even sneakier
and then it will pretend that it's getting better,
but we know it's not because we haven't done anything
like you're saying.
I haven't really worked on anything,
but I'm not where I wanna be, so what do I do?
It's honestly, and I don't know,
this is kind of the work of your therapist.
We're supposed to push you,
we're supposed to find those buttons
that are holding the key to this resistance
that you don't know is going on
and ask you about it.
Like one particular client of mine comes to mind
and she was talking about,
I remember even when she first came to see me,
I'm not gonna talk about (makes repetitive noises).
There were certain things and I'm like okay.
But in my head I'm taking note,
'cause I'm like these are things
we're gonna have to talk about.
And she had a much more conscious
I guess, she was consciously aware of the fact
that she was resisting,
but that's kind of what's happening.
So I would tell your therapist how you're feeling.
I'd be honest about the fact you feel like
you're not getting anywhere and it's been a long time
and you know you're not working on things,
but you don't know why.
And I would say, you know,
is this resistance that I'm dealing with,
'cause I know people do that
and just see where it goes from there.
And you may even wanna start journaling
and kind of venting things out
and see where that leads,
'cause that might give you a key as well.
But don't give up, we can break through it.
And no matter if you switch therapists
or terminate, the problems will still be there
and the resistance will still be there
so this is a great learning for us to get through okay.
Question number four.
Gotta scroll down.
These questions were long, so I gotta scroll.
Okay, so about seven months ago
I lost my father to a combination
of mental and physical illness.
There was a lot of stress in our family relationship
and everything, but he was still my dad
and I still loved him.
I'm so sorry for your loss.
I know how it is to lose a father.
And if you haven't watched my grief and grieving video,
I would definitely encourage you to check that out.
He got really sick in '09 and never really got better.
Around 2011, my mother started acting out,
almost because she wasn't happy with their marital situation
and even now that she's gone, she's still doing it.
Recently she met a guy and I feel like suddenly,
as if I wasn't already in a position of having
far too much responsibility for a 17 year old,
everything is on my shoulders.
She goes all night, does these irresponsible things,
and then when someone says anything about it,
she gets so defensive and starts attacking.
I'll try to explain to her why I get insulted
when she stops talking to me out of nowhere
and she'll call him
and suddenly I become rude and judgmental,
overbearing child that wants her alone
for the rest of her life and to never become happy
because all she does is bend over backwards for me
and I give nothing in return.
And part of it is my fault,
because I spent most of my life shielding her
from my emotions so she'd have it easier.
And now, even if I try to discuss this with her
she can't deal with it.
I mean I don't think I'm asking for too much.
I just want her to start acting like my mom again.
How do I bring this up
and how do I cope with this guy that's entering my life?
Should I go back to seeing my therapist regularly about it?
It's all happening so fast and I need some kinda help.
I wanted to read it all,
because I know lots of us have situations like this where,
to be honest, what's happening here is that we're
the parentified child,
like the person that wrote this was saying.
Like I have way too much responsibility for a 17 year old
and that is so true.
And it is really hard for us to get out of that cycle
of being the parent, the parentified child.
Do you kinda get the term?
So, I would definitely go to therapy.
Please, please, please call your therapist right away
and tell, you know, start setting up regular sessions,
because you do need some kind of help
and you need some support.
And something that really has to happen
for us to get out of that role,
is to stop the family dance, as I like to call it.
Like, when we talk about systems and the way families work,
it's like we're all dancing together.
Like maybe we're doing the Salsa.
I don't know, but we're doing a dance together, right,
and it's all working together,
we're all working together
and but if one person gets out of step
it messes the whole thing up
and it can be really stressful.
But working with a therapist and working through this
we'll find our own steps, we'll find our music
and we can dance on our own,
while still being aware of our family,
but we don't have to keep in that cycle.
I hope that makes sense.
But therapy will really help
and make sure you just tell them what you told me
and they'll help work you through it.
Okay everyone, I hope that this was helpful.
I love you all.
Tomorrow's Thursday so I'll be on Twitter.
So ask your question.
Use the hashtag KatiFAQ and I will see you then.
Bye.