therapy Archives – Page 2 of 2 – Marty Cooper, PhD, MFT

February 2, 2011August 27, 2022 by Marty L. Cooper, PhD, MFT

Therapy or Pills?

Q: Is it better to seek private therapy or find a doctor to prescribe a pill that will help?

A: It is very important to pay attention not just to how we respond to depression, but how we think about depression. Depression feeds and reifies a limited, concrete view of a complex world and self. And so with this question: we can’t separate out therapy from biochemistry; in this complex self of ours, each part affects the whole, and vice versa. Depression is a systemic disorder which affects (especially when chronic) all parts of our system, our self.

For example, take the situation where you get a paper back and the instructor has awarded you a “C”. You think, “I’m just not cut out for college! But if I don’t get a degree, I’ll be miserable in my life. But I obviously don’t have the capacity…” Your gut clenches and your heart rate increases. Your senses narrow and your vision flattened. Your mind registers the changes in you body, and says, “It’s really bad or I wouldn’t be responding this way.” You try to think of an answer, but your panic is suppressing your clarity of thought. That’s taken as proof of your incompetence, and that is felt as indication of being existentially endangered (“This is my life forever!”).

All parts of the system-thought, feeling, sensation/body, relationship-are involved, so to privilege one over the other is to hobble change.

The real question, then, is not “Therapy or pills,” but, “What seems, at this point, to be the main cause/influence of the depression, and what needs attention?” I was at a period in my life once where, after much work at the level of thought and feeling, depression rose up primarily as a bodily experience. My various tricks and skills failed in the face of this level of depression, and I was forced to pay more attention to body (exercise, body work therapy, “pills,” brain chemistry) than to mind. But I didn’t then just stop working with depressing thoughts, or hard emotions. Rather, I focused on what was necessary in the moment, and in that moment, it was my body that needed the work.

So: head and heart and body are not opposites, and therefore this either/or question becomes a both/and.

in Depression / Therapy

November 7, 2010August 27, 2022 by Marty L. Cooper, PhD, MFT

How do I know when I really need professional help?

Q: As an individual, how do I know when I really need professional help?

A: At the point where you’ve tried what is inexpensive and less taxing and it has failed–when you’ve taken the pills, consulted friends, distracted yourself with B movies (which I often recommend!), patted the dog, went to the gym more often–and you still can’t feel better or figure out why you’re suffering, then that’s when you need a professional.

Why a professional (i.e., someone trained in the process of psychotherapy)? Because at the point where your familiar coping strategies have failed, you are facing ongoing overwhelm (whether it’s obvious to everyone, or more subtle and interior), and folks without experience in working with this situation can actually make things worse, even though they have the best intentions.

A professional therapist knows this terrain, and when to propose challenges, and when to offer support, in the service of decreasing the overwhelm and increasing the hope and motivation. When we’re lost, we often will benefit with a good guide, who has traversed the gullies and crevasses, and knows the safest route from A-B, from stuckness to motion, from despair to hope. A therapist doesn’t provide magic, but just (ideally) good guidance.

Now, that said, your own process of deciding that you’re at this point of “Help!”, that may take a day of insight, or 20 years of trying different strategies, or for some, banging your head against the problem. It’s very individual, but when everything else fails (relatively few go to therapy without a crisis in hand), there’s the recognition that you need something more, and that’s where therapists live.

in Uncategorized

July 7, 2010August 27, 2022 by Marty L. Cooper, PhD, MFT

Will depression go away on its own?

Q: If I do nothing, will depression go away like other ailments?

A: The answer depends on what the depression is based on. You can think of depression as having two basic forms: situational, and chronic. Situational is based on external, contemporary, and temporary events. It’s what you experience when a loved one dies, when you lose your job, when a cherished plan falls apart. If you do nothing, in this case in the sense of letting yourself feel what you feel, for however long that takes, then yes, it will pass just like a common cold. Our systems are organized to expel depression just like a cold, if all things go well.

Therapy and Embarrassment

Q: Why am I embarrassed about seeking therapy (I don’t have a problem with going to a doctor for a broken arm…)?

A: Embarrassment involves a (perceived) exposure of weakness of the self, or more to the point, of you. When you go to a therapist, it’s not some “connected part” you’re examining; you are not focusing on some part of your self–you’re focusing on your self.