Drawing Upon Life Experiences

Maybe it is due to the schooling I received and the types of therapy that I embraced there.  Maybe it is due to the types of clientele that I see.  Maybe it is due to the style of supervision that I receive as a therapist intern.  Maybe it is due to where I am in my middle age as I see people each week.  Maybe it is due to the decisions that I have made through the years and the enormous amount of experiential knowledge I have gained recently. – Whether it is one, some, or all of these, what I know is that I often draw upon my marriage, my parenting, my spirituality, and indeed, my life experiences, as I do psychotherapy.

I have wondered if a fellow therapist with much more experience might be alarmed or even aghast that I would share who I am with those who come to see me.  I have likewise wondered if a veteran fellow therapist might condescendingly take me aside and state, “that’s how it is done.”  I can only say that I feel comfortable sharing who I am as I endeavor to help those who come seeking help.  And perhaps because I have not had clients with overwhelming psychopathologies (code speak for being “really messed up”) or perhaps because I am not disposed to pathologize them (code speak for telling them they are “really messed up”) or perhaps because I have pathogical issues (code speak that I am “really messed up”), I seem to relate and connect with most of them.

Somehow the experiences of my life seem to have a measure of relevance.  Being a 57 year old intern allows me the luxury of having experience from which to draw, and while not always directly applicable, they seem to be close enough.  For example, I have not had what I would consider a full blown addiction, but I do have experience feeling triggered and obsessing over not-so-nice thoughts, and I have seen addiction first hand.  I have not been through a divorce, but Ann and I got somewhat close some years ago.   I did not have parents who physically or sexually abused me, but I did have a mother who occasionally would emotionally abuse me, a father who was emotionally distant, and their marriage that lacked emotional and physical intimacy.  I did not have siblings at home, but I know what it is like to be an only child, and I did witness four siblings interact as children in my home.

I have been in psychotherapy for quite a while and know what it is like to be “on the couch.”  I have had a son who has been addicted to drugs and I know that heartache.  I have had experiences with the Twelve Steps and the whole recovery milieu.  I have had a wife who knows and understands how behavioral boundaries function in a marriage, and who knows how to be a loving and supportive.  I have had children who have made decisions that were not wise, and I likewise have made decisions that were not wise.  I have overcome my fears to go back to school to get a degree in my 50s.    I have learned many life truths, such as “recovery/change happens when the pain of addiction/not changing becomes greater than the pain of recovery/change, and will not happen when the pain of recovery/changing is greater than the pain of addiction/not changing,” and “let go and let God.”

I am in the transition of learning to be an effective psychotherapist.  Occasionally, I will get down upon myself (another life experience with which I am extremely aware), but I know that I am making progress and constantly learning.