How does therapy help?
Everyone comes in with their own complex life story, with their own presenting problems. Therapy—trauma treatment, EMDR, or more traditional talk therapy—can help you learn skills to manage triggers, make sense of your life story in connection with your current behaviors and symptoms, and help improve overall functioning.
Some specific skills therapy can Support are:
- Emotional regulation–feeling feelings is completely normal,
but sometimes the intensity can feel overwhelming. Treatment can help you learn to moderate them. - Coping and regulation skills to allow you to work through situations that would typically cause you anxiety, fear, or avoidance.
- Stress management techniques to apply to deal with stress within your everyday life, such as with your job and family.
- Skills and techniques to help you better navigate relationships, identify and maintain appropriate interpersonal boundaries, and work through relationship troubles.
- Improve and strengthen your sense of self.
- Understand your own skills, strengths, and positive attributes and learn to quiet your inner critic.
- Find a resolution to the issues that originally led you to therapy, such as panic attacks, experiencing traumatic events or having trauma responses, or sleep disturbances.
There are a wide variety of reasons to begin therapy ranging from a diagnosed mental illness, help managing daily stress or a transitional period of your life, or experiencing trauma. It is your individual treatment plan, and it will vary based on your strengths, abilities, and desired outcomes.
What to expect on your first visit?
Your first therapy session has two main goals:
1. Assess your circumstances
We will take the first meeting to assess your current circumstances. While my areas of expertise may be consistent with your reasons for coming to therapy, we will need to address specific areas that are unique to you, and your current circumstances. From there, we will be able to better determine what type of therapy is right for you, what it will entail, and what it will look like for you in terms of fitting it into your day-to-day life. If you are seeking EMDR treatment, we can start the process of identifying the material you want to work with and what you are hoping to achieve in treatment. I may provide you with homework to prepare for later sessions, such as practice a certain technique, or read a specific book, as it is important you take on an active role in your healing.
2. Build a relationship
Our first session will be more like a two way interview. I’ll get to know you, and you’ll get to know me. I will ask you questions to help me better understand your primary issues and concerns, as well as your history in terms of other events in your life, family, childhood, and career.
You are welcome to and encouraged to ask questions. In order for therapy to be successful, it is imperative we establish a client-therapist relationship that is supportive and honest. In fact, it is the nature – and the quality – of our relationship that can impact the success of your overall therapy goals. Each client-therapist relationship will be unique but certain values and themes are true for all sessions, and you can expect the following:
- You can expect to be treated with dignity, compassion, empathy, respect, and understanding.
- You can expect to be presented with someone who is available to listen to you and listen to your interpretation of what you are currently experiencing.
- You can expect to receive knowledgeable and evidenced-based techniques and information to assist you in overcoming your mental health-related struggles.
- You can expect to arrive in a safe, supportive, and confidential space.
- You can expect to receive real strategies and techniques you can use to enact positive changes on your life.
Is therapy confidential?
As a general rule, all therapy sessions are confidential and anything you discuss with your therapist will remain between the two of you, unless you request otherwise. This is as per protection rules by law, which all therapists are legally required to follow, and no information from the session can be disclosed without prior written consent from the client.
However, there are exceptions to this law. The therapist will disclose information from the session to legal authorities or appointed persons if any of the following are true:
- If the therapist suspects an individual has caused, or is threatening to cause severe bodily harm to another person, therapists are required to report it to the police.
- If an individual intends to harm him or herself, or expresses to the therapist plans for suicide. While the therapist will attempt to work through this in the therapy session, if it appears to be unresolved or the client does not cooperate, additional action may need to be taken to ensure the safety of the client.