Fellow communication-challenged mefites: how do you work around your communication problems to participate effectively in therapy? Often I find that regardless of whether I have my thoughts lined up or not, I cannot. get. words. out, as though someone cut the circuit between my brain and my mouth. So far I've had no luck circumventing the issue by writing things down; same problem. It's inhibiting my ability to (a) convey the severity of the problems I'm experiencing and (b) address them adequately if we happen to hit upon relevant topics by chance. TL;DR details inside, but that's the gist -- any suggestions for other work-arounds? [more inside]
posted by dorque on Nov 11, 2010 - 14 answers

i grew up in a home where asking an innocent question such as, "why" resulted in verbal or physical abuse ("why are you so stupid", "don't ask why", and if I did, a hand or a fist would come at me). no surprise that i've also come to realize that I am SO much more insecure than I thought I was. now that I look back, I see that i've never asked the right questions at work, with doctors, or anything like that. My brain would shut down and I would just nod and agree to what I was being told only to think about what happened much later and realize that I should have asked this or that or responded in a certain way. My thought/response patterns have been pretty consistent throughout my life (sad, I know, as I'm nearing 40) and I desperately want to work on communicating better. I struggle to figure out how to say things "nicely" or in a way that's effective as opposed to what often times is more harsh/rude/ineffective. [more inside]
posted by anonymous on Mar 21, 2010 - 15 answers

Has anyone gone through a period in their life where they've just become too overanalytical and serious? I started therapy a little over a year and a half ago and it has been great. I've gained a lot of additional understanding of myself which has been helpful but at the same time I think it's actually detrimental in other ways. [more inside]
posted by Garden on Oct 23, 2009 - 12 answers

Any suggestions for a pre-marital counselor in Chicago? My fiance and I are doing a church wedding, and we are doing the Catholic pre-Cana requirements, but we actually think our church's requirements are too...minimal. [more inside]
posted by bibbit on Mar 10, 2009 - 3 answers

I feel like the punchline of a joke: on top of everything else, apparently I suck at therapy. I've given it a while - a year and a half - and I still can't do it properly. Now I'm at a loss. Help. [more inside]
posted by anonymous on Feb 27, 2009 - 30 answers