From: anon-1209@twwells.com (just me)
Newsgroups: alt.sexual.abuse.recovery
Subject: Cognitive therapy - can it help with sexual abuse recovery/depression?
Date: 17 Oct 92 01:13:47 GMT
Organization: Anonymous Posting Service at twwells.com

ANON-Name: just me


I have been having trouble with depression for several years. I just
got through another near-suicidal bout around three weeks ago.

I went in for counseling through our employee assistance program, in
order to be referred for more permanent treatment. The first time I
was pretty near bottom. I was all tears, and the counselor was talking 
about anti-depressants and ongoing counseling arrangements. He stated 
that he thought the root cause of my depression was the sexual abuse I 
endured as a young girl (surprise, surprise), and that my current job 
problems were aggravating this deep depression by making me feel even 
more insecure. He was a very effective listener, and the first session
really helped me feel better.

So by the second session I'd come up enough that I was shakily "fine", 
and the counselor referred me to a women's-only group-therapy/class 
arrangement offered through my health-care provider. OK, I thought, 
we'll see.

The first session was last night. First of all, I get there and there
are four men in the room. Now, I have nothing against men, but I was
looking for a women's only class because my perpetrator was my father,
and I have deeply-rooted feelings that I don't really feel comfortable
discussing with anyone, and especially not with men (except my husband
who has proven his love and trustworthiness to me again and again).

Secondly, everything's based on cognitive therapy. I understand the
purpose of cognitive therapy, and I think it's useful for some people,
but I don't think it's for me. I am a chameleon. I know how to hide;
it was a survival skill when I was a little girl, and it's one I still
use a lot today. I can tell you enough so you think you know me and that 
I'm spilling my guts, but I'm not - I'm hiding by making you think I'm 
out in the open. There are layers and layers and layers, and I can let 
you in just enough so it doesn't hurt. Consequently, there are a lot
of people who think they know me well who really don't know me at all.

And I already use my cognitive self to control my emotions. That's
how I survive. The problem with my depressive bouts is that they rise
to the surface because the emotional self has (temporarily) won the 
battle against my thinking self.

I don't know if I'm even going to go back to the class. The first session 
was pretty pathetic. The instructor was very ill-prepared and didn't
seem like she understood the material herself. I think some people found 
some comfort; I know one woman I was partnered with for a "mini-session" 
was helped by the fact that even though I'm a software engineer, sometimes 
I feel stupid and don't understand what's going on (she's a secretary and 
feels intimidated by all of the engineers she works with). But it didn't 
do a damn thing for me except help me decide I want my deposit back. The
techniques used aren't strong enough to get deep enough inside to touch
anything.

I don't know how I'm ever going to get better inside. I've been repressing 
and repressing for so many years now that I'm afraid to perturb what works 
for me most of the time. But the problem is that I can crash and have
crashed, and when I do, I crash really hard. I'm afraid that one of these
times I won't be able to keep myself from committing suicide (which is all 
I can think about when I do crash; I keep planning and plotting various
means to commit the act so that I'll actually go through with it and will
really die instead of just hurting myself badly or making myself sick). 
The only thing that stopped me this last time is that I love my husband 
so much that I wouldn't put him through the pain of having to deal with 
the aftermath. I'm afraid there may come a time that this might not be
enough and there might not be anything else.

So my question is (and please post - I'm not ready to get e-mail from
or send e-mail directly to anyone yet), has anyone here been helped
by cognitive therapy? Should I just accept that I'm always going to
have to repress everything and just learn to live with the hurt inside?
(Which seems to be what my counselor is advocating by referring me
to such a superficial program?) I really don't know where to go from
here. I don't think I can get into a company-paid program unless I'm
referred by the employee assistance program (although I haven't explored
all means yet). Does anyone have any ideas that might help me?


Thanks in advance,
just me



--
To use this service, send EMAIL to:
anon-ping@twwells.com  -- test path/get anonymous id
anon-help@twwells.com  -- for an automatically returned help message
anon-admin@twwells.com -- ANON administrator
anon-0@twwells.com     -- anonymous e-mail to ANON administrator
anon-asar@twwells.com  -- post anonymously to alt.sexual.abuse.recovery