Divorcebusting.com Forums Open Forums THE SEX-STARVED MARRIAGE Madonna/Whore Complex (part 7)

And dealing with the fact that normal people deal with those issues just fine,

Yeah everyone "looks" normal and fine while the issues are simmering under the surface...until they aren't.

That's the tough part to learn. The coping mechanisms you have to keep you "normal" may be what causes the long term damage. Also that's part of what james Hollis calls the middle passages. It's when your coping skills for your "shadows" begin to fail.


It is a judgement about you, or at least an indication that you can't handle some part of your life without help.

How come people aren't viewed as weak for taking their car to a mechanic or for going to the Dentist or doctor or for that matter wearing glasses? Why go to school? Shouldn't we just be able to magically learn on our own?

FWIW, counseling is no magical cure-all and not everyone is great but I still believe EVERYONE no matter how "normal" would benefit from counseling.

I think I see what you mean. I remember all sorts of coping mechanisms that sort of worked sometimes, but "wore me down" until I couldn't use them anymore because of exhaustion, depression, frustration, or something like that.

Other people that you look up to or who might look down on you for going to a counselor may be doing the same thing, and might end up needing help years from now. A very good thing to remember.



I don't really know. Maybe because there's a lot more people wearing glasses and going to the doctor than there are going to counselors, or so it seems.



People that "get it" make it look easy. People that don't can't seem to get it no matter how hard they try, and when compared to the people that make it look easy, the people that don't "get it" look like idiots, to themselves and to unsympathetic bystanders. The same way that people who dropped out of school tend to look like idiots, even when they may be intelligent and had to drop out due to illness or unstable childhood situation or whatever.



Most of the stuff you learn from a good counselor should have been learned in childhood, but a lot of children don't get taught these things. Some do figure it out (at least enough of it to get by for a good while) the hard way as they deal with life after childhood, and some need a little more help. Maybe there is a bit of a "new religion" to it, when you think of how everyone would benefit if these things were taught to all children somehow.

Most of the stuff you learn from a good counselor should have been learned in childhood,

Sorry but I disagree a bit here. Pick up the book "Middle Passages" by James Hollis. He's a Jungian Psychologist. He gives a lot of background explaining that EVERYONE ends up with shadows. It's a normal part of childhood development.

I was a bit leery about counseling at first - not because of a negative stigma but because I thought "I am smart, well read, open-minded and willing to work through my issues why do I need help?" (plus a lousy counselor experience in college) it is AMAZING what an objective trained observer can see. I don't by any means treat my counselor as a guru. We have differences of opinion and all but still he makes me see things in a different way and makes recommendations I wouldn't get anywhere else.

And that's the whole idea Fearless. Their "job" isn't to fix us. Their job is to bring things to our attention, to turn that lightbulb on inside our heads and give us that "aha" moment.

I don't think of my therapist as a guru either, but he has on numerous occasions given me something to ponder over and it has changed my thinking path a few times.

THAT is the sign of a good therapist. One that opens your mind to enable YOU to fix/heal yourself. No one else can do it for you. And it is NOT a sign of weakness to seek help, it is a sign of strength to admit you can't do it on your own. No man is an island and we all need others to become the best we can be, and sometimes that includes therapists

Some people look at counseling as a medical model: "I'm sick and I need to get treated/cured by someone who has been to school and has answers that I don't."

I don't subscribe to this.

Others look at counseling as an education/teaching model: "The therapist teaches me things I don't know, the way I know stuff when I leave a math class that I didn't know when I walked in."

This is a little better, but still not on the mark IMHO.

I prefer the coach model: "I know where I want to be, but I need someone's help to see what I'm doing that's keeping me from where I want to be."

To me the coach model is SO much more useful and representative of what therapy is. It puts you on a par with the professional whom you hire to help you hone some skills. Golfers take lessons from a pro all their lives, so do other athletes, dancers, and musicians.

No one thinks there's anything wrong with a professional dancer who attends a class every week of her life. They just assume she is practicing, getting help polishing her skills, getting feedback from an outsider. There's no stigma attached to being coached.

Not that there's NO medical element or no educational element, but mostly it's a question of helping you do something you do know how to do but just can't seem to do on a regular basis.

Carl Rogers, the great psychologist, said that in therapy, "a person talks to himself through the medium of another mind."

LP - that's a very good way of looking at it.

My H (in all his arrogance) has said many times that he doesn't think any of them can tell him something he doesn't already know. But maybe, just maybe, they can give him some ideas to assist him in "polishing" his skills. Two heads are always better than one (hmmm, maybe I shouldn't be using that terminology on a SSM forum)

Remind him that knowing something, and being skilled at doing something, are two very different things. Anyone who plays sports knows this. Hell, it's true even for math... knowing the concepts doesn't mean you can solve a problem in a reasonable time without making mistakes. That takes practice, just as throwing a ball correctly takes practice.

And all the stuff the counselor has to tell him works the same way. He may know it, but knowing it and being skilled at doing it well are not the same thing.

But that's just the point CE - H says as much as he "knows" what the ST is telling him and can understand it, there is "nothing that can be done to change it" and it's "the way I am" and if I have to hear "it's the way I am" one more time, I will scream for sure.

Don't get me wrong, we have come a long, long way in a relatively short period of time. H acknowledges his main problem logically stems from the attachment theory (even he can't deny that) but this is where we run into his resistence to do anything about it (sounds like another Cemar to me - OMG NO!!!!!) He says it is "nice" to know what has caused all of these problems in his life but you can't change someone from what they are - of course, I TOTALLY disagree with this. I have seen so many people turn their lives around, people I wouldn't have imagined in a million years could have changed, but they did.

I keep telling him how intelligent he is and how I believe if there is anyone that can do it, he can. The response I get is "why are you trying to change me"

Heywyre,

I get what you are saying. Your H's saying "that's the way I am" is parallel to my H's staying "I've always been this way"...it's a subliminal, "I've always been this way, I will always be this way"

But saying that is all a crock of sh!t - we both know that

I would like to think that I have a lot to learn still in life, when I stop learning, it is time to move to another galaxie

Part of that learning process is how to be a better person and I am more than willing to take in any information anyone has to offer. It doesn't mean I have to put it into play, but suggestions are more than welcomed.

It is because he is scared of what he might find? Or could it be that he is so arrogant that he doesn't think he needs to change and/or improve?