Writing about the trauma: is it helpful or counterproductive?

[Blueberry]

 

Well put TBB.
From my own experience the memories can also lessen in their intensity as a result of processing. I've only had EMDR once, but most of the night after I lay awake while feeling as if my brain was re-sorting and refiling a whole bunch of stuff. It was obvious to me that my brain was processing.

[Saluki]

Thanks for the explanation, TBB. Okay, that makes sense.

I avoided therapy for a long time because when I was a teenager/young adult, I had so many absolutely horrible tries at therapy/counselling and I didn't understand why I just felt so much worse as a result.

I think I thought if I said what was wrong, there was some magical process whereby the therapist would know how to make you feel better. Well, nobody told me what to expect, or that therapy takes a very long time. Nobody told me that sometimes therapy can make you feel worse before it starts helping you feel better. Nobody told me either that it's so difficult!

I remember one particular psychiatrist. Well, I was living with my violent, sadistic psychopath ex husband at the time and I was terrified that what I told the therapist would somehow get passed on to him. I didn't trust anyone not to pass on anything I said about him. So this psychiatrist used to sit at the other end of a long room and said absolutely nothing and I said nothing and it was pointless. I asked for someone else and I was told I'd have to go back on the waiting list (over a year) so I just quit. A counsellor I saw once tried to convert me to her religion. That was crazy (and unprofessional).

I did finally find an amazing therapist when I was living with the psychopath and she helped me figure out an escape plan. But we never "processed" anything because it was more important at the time figuring out a safety strategy. And there were only a certain number of sessions available (through a charity) and bless her, she let me have a huge number of sessions after they ran out.

I'm so relieved to finally have a lovely therapist after years of being scared I'd never find another good one.

I always want to just have bad memories erased, but the reality of that is that if it were even possible, not knowing who's dangerous would make that a very dangerous thing! Maybe figuring that out is part of having processed a few things?