Carlow Psychotherapy : What is Psychotherapy

therapy

The psychotherapeutic process while offering support for the emotional overwhelm that is caused by such events as mentioned earlier also focuses on uncovering and helping people change the unconscious patterns of behaviour that they developed in childhood in order to cope with the stresses and strains with which they were faced. These behavioural patterns enabled survival but unless we learn to develop them to fit more adult situations they end up causing us to respond in the same way to our adult problems as we did to our childhood problems thus making things worse for us. Since these patterns were developed in our childhood and we have relied on them into adulthood they have become so habitual that we often think that the behavioural pattern is actually our personality that this is who I am.

Psychotherapy involves learning to identity the defences we are holding onto from our childhood and then helps us to dismantle them through processing the emotional hurt from which they were protecting us. Over time we are then able to put in their place a more flexible spontaneous defence appropriate to adulthood. From this description one can understand how the psychotherapeutic process will take a much longer time to be effective.

What Psychotherapy can help with…

Relationship Issues

There are times in all relationships (with partner, family and friends) when things don’t run smoothly. Often, this is because people have conflicting expectations, are distracted with other issues, or have difficulty expressing what is on their minds in ways that other people can really hear and understand what is being said. Sometimes they just don’t know what to do to make a good relationship. Psychotherapy can assist clients in enhancing their relationships and working with common relationship problems.

Depression

Depression — a sad or discontented mood—can leave a person feeling lethargic, unmotivated, or hopeless, and in some cases, depression can lead to suicidal ideation.

A person experiencing depression is likely to encounter difficulty coping with daily stressors and may feel helpless and alone. In fact, sometimes the most mundane of activities—getting out of bed, bathing, and dressing—can feel like an impossible feat. These challenges can leave a person more susceptible to a decline in positive mood, resulting in a negativity bias that informs all experiences.

Self-esteem Issues

People with low self-esteem often think of themselves in very critical ways, such as “I’m not good enough,” “I’m a failure,” or “I’ll never amount to anything.” And with these thoughts come painful feelings, such as sadness, anger, anxiety, fear, and worthlessness. People with low self-esteem may find it harder to make decisions, because they doubt that they’ll be successful. They also find it harder to make friends, because they’re shy or they don’t think other people will like them. In addition, people with low self-esteem frequently stay away from situations in which they might be judged, so they avoid taking chances or trying new things, especially when other people are around.

Grief

Losing someone or something you love or care deeply about is very painful. You may experience all kinds of difficult emotions and it may feel like the pain and sadness you’re experiencing will never let up. These are normal reactions to a significant loss. But while there is no right or wrong way to grieve, there are healthy ways to cope with the pain that, in time, can renew you and permit you to move on.
Read about Counselling

Counselling is short term focused therapy with clear goals. It can be very helpful dealing with personal crisis.

Counselling focuses on current crises that may cause emotional anguish and which may prevent us from functioning as well as we would like in our lives:
Read about Counselling
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