Gimme a break, gimme a break. Break me off a piece...oh, wait.

September 14, 2010 1:14 PM

Is it common to feel like you need a break from therapy?

TL;DR: Is it a really bad idea to break off therapy for a while? Or can it actually be a good thing?

I've been in CBT therapy for lots of years, mostly on and off. During the off-phases, I would get all hard on myself, thinking that I just "didn't want to face my issues." But I'm starting to think it's something else. That I might just need a break sometimes.

I've recently hit another "off phase," in which I just don't feel like going. I want to just... live for a while. I want to have that time to, I dunno, take a class. Or make a nice dinner that evening. Or do a happy hour. Or not spend $400 a month for a while. Whatever.

A few weeks after I stopped going, I received a nice, but kind of guilt-trippy email from my therapist. She'd written about how "running isn't going to solve anything." And how I need to "resolve the issues and get closure.*" And now the email is plaguing me. Great.

I do, of course, want to move past my issues. And I don't want to think I'm crapping out when therapy gets tough or inconvenient or expensive.

But is she right about me needing to push through and get closure? (The way I see it, that will probably take a lifetime! I don't see it as, "Hey, you're better now! Get out there, Tiger!) Or is she possibly just offended I'm not in session, and missing the paycheck?

*I did give her a heads up that I wasn't coming for a while. But not much of one.

posted by hubble to Health & Fitness (11 answers total)

Generally speaking, there's no reason why taking a break from therapy is an inherently bad idea.

Specific to you, the only people who are going to be able to figure that out are you and your therapist. You're the only ones who will have access to the facts you need to make that kind of determination.
posted by valkyryn at 1:19 PM on September 14, 2010

i have been in in therapy on and off for the past ten years, with an intense amount in the past few years. i took a break this starting this spring. i felt like i had resolved a lot of things in the past few years but know that i still have more things to work on but i was just…tired of talking about myself. i didn't inform my therapist but she has always been understanding of my breaks. she never guilt trips me, never comments, never judges. i'll go back when i'm ready to get back it again and i know that she will gladly pick up where we left off.
posted by violetk at 1:21 PM on September 14, 2010

I'm taking an indefinite break from my shrink as of October, and I'm pleased as punch about it. Everyone needs a break every now and then. Yes, I wouldn't discount the fact that your therapist is a working person who has come to expect your $400 each month; I wouldn't say that's the only thing at play, but it's certainly there.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 1:22 PM on September 14, 2010

Or is she possibly just offended I'm not in session, and missing the paycheck?

That is quite possible. Everyone is human; she is also possibly feeling like a failure since you aren't following her advice to the letter and saying "gee, thanks, I'm all better now!" Some people feel like they need to be right to be validated. Good luck.
posted by Melismata at 1:24 PM on September 14, 2010

Tell the therapist to mind her own f'ing business when it comes to business. The goal of therapy should be to not need therapy, not to pad your therapists wallet. So you want to try no-therapy for a while, don't let your therapist infantilize you. "Oh you won't be able to handle life without me!" is the kind of thing said by TERRIBLE PARENTS. Her failure is in saying anything at all. I'd give her both barrels about it, but that's just me. :)
posted by rhizome at 1:30 PM on September 14, 2010 [2 favorites]

I was always under the impression that CBT was specifically designed to give the patient the tools to deal with his/her own stuff. This would mean that there would definitely be an end to going to sessions. Though, new stuff always crops up, so going back might be needed once in a while.
posted by TheBones at 1:34 PM on September 14, 2010

That sounds to me like you need a break, and I wouldn't discount the therapist's potential motives - but I can't tell from one question, probably no one who doesn't know you can.

But if you're at a point where you want to spend time and money doing some other things -- and especially if therapy isn't to resolve some acute issue but is a process that you see maybe going on for awhile - then who's to say you shouldn't take a break. If nothing else you're not into it right now so you probably won't be making a lot of progress if you don't feel like being there.

I don't think it's bad to kind of test the waters and see how you do for awhile without the therapy - especially since the goal of therapy should be at least partly to get you to where you don't need to go to therapy.

I'd be annoyed and probably feel guilty if I got that email - but she's not you and she doesn't get to decide what's best for you, so I'd politely thank her and tell her that you appreciate her input and you'll get back to her when you're ready to come back.

(I know that feeling, the little bit of dread about going because you just don't feel like it, and the thoughts about the other stuff you could do with the time, and then you write the check or hand over the cash and think about what you could be doing with the money... That spells need a break to me.)
posted by mrs. taters at 2:02 PM on September 14, 2010 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: I know that feeling, the little bit of dread about going because you just don't feel like it, and the thoughts about the other stuff you could do with the time, and then you write the check or hand over the cash and think about what you could be doing with the money... That spells need a break to me.

This, this.

Exactly what I mean. Thanks so much, guys. Maybe I should check into a new therapist for next time...
posted by hubble at 2:49 PM on September 14, 2010

CBT is meant to be a short-term therapy, so it concerns me a bit that your therapist has been working with you for "lots of years" with it; it's also not really a "working through your serious issues" type of therapy... it's more about functional tools than it is about resolving your entire past, and if it hasn't been successful at giving you some functional tools, then it isn't working, and a good therapist knows how to adapt in that case. I wonder if the actual, literal CBT part is just a bit of what you're doing? That would make sense. If you're doing CBT and it's taking that long and isn't resolving anything, it's not good that the therapist hasn't been able to adapt.

(Also, I can't imagine a reason for a therapist to seriously say something like, "running isn't going to solve anything" OR "you need to [anything]". But also, you can't "take a break" by just not telling your therapist that you want to take a break, but cancelling repeatedly. You have to tell her you want to take a break.)

Do you feel like this has been working well for you? Because that's the point of therapy. For it to help. So if it's not helping, it could be time to explore other therapists or other activities.
posted by so_gracefully at 5:20 PM on September 14, 2010

While a break can be a great thing - I'm currently transitioning to being done with therapy, at least for now, some therapists would write the email you got not because they missed the check or even because they felt guilty for driving you away, but because they felt like it was their job to challenge you to continue to work on the hard stuff. As others have said, we have no idea what the therapy relationship looked like, but I wouldn't write off this therapist just for that email. It's up to you if you want to go back to them in the future because they already know so much about you, or if you want a fresh start.

Like you, I'm really looking forward to having that chunk of my budget back. Enjoy!
posted by ldthomps at 5:35 PM on September 14, 2010

A few weeks after I stopped going, I received a nice, but kind of guilt-trippy email from my therapist. She'd written about how "running isn't going to solve anything." And how I need to "resolve the issues and get closure.*" And now the email is plaguing me. Great.

If those are direct quotes from her email, I would take a break and consider going somewhere else when/if you restart therapy. That doesn't feel like an appropriate response.
posted by QuarterlyProphet at 7:15 PM on September 14, 2010