cherapple

The difference is between voluntary and involuntary rewards. If someone freely chooses to do something to gain the benefit of it, then the reward is voluntary. On the other hand, if you have power over someone and use a reward to manipulate them, then the reward becomes a punishment. They are required to do what you want them to do in order to get it.

Put yourself in the child's shoes. If you were the child, what would you want you to do? Do that. When you were a child, what did you want your own parents to do, that they didn't? Do that. If you try to relieve your anxiety about the child's behavior—and the way it shows exactly how you've treated him in the past—by changing the child, you will only cause more problems. Changing the child is exactly what you were trying to do by being "tough" with him. Stop using the child to relieve your own anxiety. Let him use you to relieve his. Ask him what he needs. What is he trying to accomplish? What doesn't he like about the situation he's in that he feels anxious enough to hit? Can you find another way together to meet his needs? Change yourself: Be a calm and curious presence for him, so that he may learn to become one for himself.

Change yourself, not the child.

Are you tough as a parent?

What do you mean by "tough"? Tough as in wanting to hurt people, or tough as in dissociating from hurt, or seeking to be hurt?

I'm so sorry to hear that you've had such disappointing experiences with therapists. I too had a lot of less-than-helpful experiences prior to FDR, one of the worst being with CBT. It took FDR to warm me back up to the idea of seeing anyone again after ten years of refusing to put myself through a re-inflicting of the abuse I grew up with (although I couldn't define it that way at the time). Now I have a therapist that I love. There have been a few podcasts on therapy: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/FreedomainRadioVolume5/~3/DGoD8KSxFoo/FDR_1927_how_to_find_a_great_therapist.mp3 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/FreedomainRadioVolume5/~3/NK_SW-5Lxcc/FDR_1716_Sunday_Show_1_Aug_2010.mp3 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/FreedomainRadioVolume5/~3/rLaEgqbcDjw/FDR_1575_you_are_not_alone_dr_schwartz_interview.mp3 I think the most important thing about a therapist is not what method they use, but how empathetic they are, and whether they stand on the side of the child and the realities of your childhood history. I hope these help and let you in on "the secret." ;-) Cheryl

Skype, Google+, and Facebook are also good places to meet. The first two offer face-to-face voice chats.

Hello, Ian. I enjoyed meeting you in chat today and connecting on Facebook. I look forward to future conversations. Welcome again to the community.

When you are able to exist for yourself, you will be able to exist physically for a woman.

To be more specific, it wasn't the enormous weight of having to explain myself that was lifted, but the enormous weight of a lifetime of feeling invisible. The enormous frustration of being erased, of not being allowed to exist, of being made invisible by my parents and everyone around me when I was a child ... was gone in that one sentence where my therapist said, "I see you."

Did you just look this up and book these sessions today? You were the one asking about therapy methods during the Sunday show, and I suggested this? This is the type of therapist I am working with, in conjunction with doing the parts work of Internal Family Systems therapy. My therapist is certified in sensorimotor therapy, but not IFS, although she knows enough about it to talk about parts with me. My first session with her was incredibly powerful, but I'm still resistant to doing the body work, and I want to stay in my head talking about my system in an intellectual way. Personally, the fact that I am working with an in-person therapist who *sees* me — and by that I mean sees me in physical form and draws attention to things I'm doing with my body and what it might mean — is a huge step for me. Up until this point, I had only worked with therapists over Skype (since FDR, prior to which I had refused to see a therapist for ten years because I didn't know how to find a good one) because just existing in voice was so anxiety producing. I broke down in the very first session and cried in front of my therapist, which was huge. I arrived to my first session late, so the first session was only a half hour. But I felt seen in a way that I've never felt seen before. One of the first things she said to me was, "You don't have to tell me your whole history because I can see it in your body." I want to cry with relief now just remembering the experience. It's not that I don't want to talk about my childhood history because I do, and we do. But having someone see my history as my body remembers it and expresses it took the enormous weight off my shoulders of having to explain myself and retell my whole story yet again. (She is my fourth therapist since FDR.) I highly recommend it for the healing integration of the whole system—emotional, intellectual, and physical. Cheryl

Thanks, Karl. I look forward to it!

If the meetups are arranged enough ahead of time (two weeks to a month?), so that I could get cheap tickets, I'd consider taking the bus down from Albany to join you.