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What are Feelings Anyway?

Everyone knows what a feeling is, right? Well, it turns out that this is not the case and many of us are either unable to experience feelings at all, or get thoughts and feelings mixed up.

Early on in my training I had a tutor who would tell us ‘when in doubt, hunt the feeling’. It is arguable that this is the purpose of the therapeutic interaction that enables both empathy and relational understanding to take place.

So what is a feeling?

Feelings are emotional responses that we experience which can then be thought about and communicated using language. Let’s delve deeper and understand how feelings operate.

When we have a physiological response to stimuli – this can be external or a thought process – the cluster of physical responses are called ‘affect’. Affect is primal and is something we find across all mammals. Broadly, affect is a proto-emotion and expresses itself through what we would describe in words as:

Seeking;
Rage;
Fear;
Panic;
Play;
Lust
Care.

Affect is not relational, meaning it neither functions nor is used to communicate feelings to another.

Above affect we have our emotions, which are more sophisticated and nuanced and whose function is to let both us and those with whom we are in relationship know about what is going on for us. Emotion is the link between mind and body, and, affect and feeling. Our primary emotions are:

Fear;
Anger;
Sadness;
Joy;
Disgust;
Surprise.

Emotion defies language in that it can be felt and communicated through relationship and experience. However, effect is communicated using projection and projective identification – the ‘putting’ of feelings into another.

Feelings sit at the highest level and are behavioural and cognitive. They can be thought about and defined in language and conceptualised by another.

How can things go wrong?

Infants do not have the ability to use language and nor do they think using words. They experience affect in their body and communicate their emotions to their primary carer using projection. With early trauma where the primary carer (the mother) has not been adequately internalised, the infant projects their affect out into the universe, rather than into the other. They can neither make sense and soothe themselves nor locate soothing in another and are adrift with overwhelming emotions.

In psychotherapy

In relational psychotherapy, feelings are communicated through verbal and non-verbal cues but are also present in the transference in the shape of emotion. By receiving the patient’s projections and giving shape and form to them in the therapy, the therapist assists the patient in digesting their emotions and converting them into feelings.

When is a feeling not a feeling?

Often people will talk about feelings when these are actually thoughts. In language this is expressed as ‘I feel that…’. As soon as the word ‘that’ follows the word ‘feeling’, you know you are dealing with a thought.

Why does all this matter?

Integrating thinking and feeling lies at the heart of the therapeutic process. If unexpressed and crucially, unexpressed in a relationship, then a person is likely to remain stuck experiencing the world and their current relationships clouded by past experiences. In the words of Freud: “Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in uglier ways.”

 

Mark Vahrmeyer, UKCP Registered, BHP Co-founder is an integrative psychotherapist with a wide range of clinical experience from both the public and private sectors. He currently sees both individuals and couples, primarily for ongoing psychotherapy.  Mark is available at the Lewes and Brighton & Hove Practices.

 

Further reading by Mark Vahrmeyer – 

Client or patient; patient or client – does it matter?

The psychological impact of the recession

Why do people watch horror movies?

How to minimise Christmas stress if you are hosting

Can couples counselling fix a relationship?

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Defining Happiness

Happiness is linked to a sense of joy, ease, and gratitude. It is also linked with a general positive evaluation of one’s life, past and present, which usually contributes to positive expectations or and looking forward to the future.

An ability to sustain a state of happiness depends on many factors, including how a person deals with stress and adversity. There is strong evidence that early attachments are a crucial determining factor in a child’s brain development, and consequently the formation of their world view and perspective in life. For example, a child who grows up with ongoing exposure to stress and trauma, and few or no positive early relationships is likely to feel preoccupied, anxious, and even depressed rather than happy and at ease. In turn, a child who grows up feeling emotionally and physically safe, though positive early relationships with others and therefore themselves, will very likely continue to cultivate these qualities throughout life.

Happiness can also be seen as a temporary emotional state, which comes and goes. Life satisfaction and mental wellness are qualities which can be cultivated and even created through conscious life choices in areas such as relationships, nutrition, exercise, work and spirituality.

What is the link between social connections and happiness? What aspects of having strong family ties and good friendships promote happiness?

Good relationships are a vital component in living a satisfying and fulfilling life. Human beings are relational beings. From day one we depend on our carers to survive and thrive in life. A sense of belonging, meaning, purpose and acceptance comes from relationships that are healthy, dependable, and enduring. Through others we feel seen, heard, and validated.

In turn, giving to others brings us a sense of satisfaction and fulfilment, and makes us happy as well. We don’t choose the families we are born into; therefore, good family ties aren’t a given for everyone. Those who are fortunate enough to have strong family ties and good relationships with their families are lucky. However, building strong friendships and relationships are also a way of creating a ‘family of choice’ with those we value and with whom we have things in common. Without good relationships we invariably feel lonely and isolated, which leads to poor mental health.

What is the link between happiness and self-compassion and gratitude?

Self-compassion and gratitude are ways of cultivating a positive view of self, others and the world around us. The way we think has a direct impact on how we feel about ourselves and others. This differs from positive thinking or being out of touch with reality. Our negative bias can lead us to developing self-defeating thoughts and a bleak view of the world. This then becomes our reality as we constantly search for things to confirm this view. Things are mostly neither always good nor always bad. The ability to hold a balanced perspective on life and hold both positions at the same time is what defines a healthy mind. Therefore, cultivating a positive thinking loop, rather than a negative one will impact our ability to feel happy.

Is happiness a choice? 

Increasing our capacity to feel a full range of emotions such as sadness, anger, love, etc will also increase the likelihood of experiencing happiness. To feel happy, we need to get better at feeling in general. This means appropriate emotional responses to different situations. There are different ways of developing emotional literacy, psychotherapy being just one example. Therefore, we could say that there is a choice in improving one’s ability to feel happiness, as well as others feelings too.

 

On our website you can find more information about our counselling and psychotherapy services and how to contact our team.

Sam Jahara is a UKCP Registered Psychotherapist, Clinical Superviser and Executive Coach. She works with individuals and couples in Hove and Lewes.

 

Further reading –

What are the benefits of counselling and psychotherapy?

Why is mental health important?

What makes us choose our career paths?

Antidotes to coercive, controlling and narcissistic behaviour

An in-depth approach to leadership coaching

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Five Top Tips for Surviving Christmas Day

Christmas can be an emotionally challenging and difficult time for many of us. There is such expectation on how Christmas ‘should’ be. Yet like the weather fails to deliver on the ‘winter wonderland’ scenes on the TV adverts, for many of us, our family experience often falls far short of the loving idyllic family reunions depicted in those same snowy adverts.

What makes Christmas particularly difficult?

Aside from the expectations we put upon ourselves, it has all the classic ingredients of being either an explosive disappointment or a damp squib.

Family of choice versus family of origin

Christmas is often a time when we get together with family members we would only ever see on other festive days or, as the saying goes, weddings and funerals. Often, we have little close relationship with these family members. Yet somehow we expect to feel a close bond with them on this day in particular.

Many families are now what is referred to as blended families.  Nowadays, it is normal to grow up with step-parents, step-siblings and half-brothers and sisters. While this does not necessarily lead to conflict, it can make the delicate balance of Christmas Day complicated and fractious. Compromise is often the order of the day.

Christmas is often a difficult time thanks to the ghost of Christmas past. Many relationships break down over Christmas and can leave us with tainted childhood memories of parental feuds and the accompanying grief.  This then plays out in the present, potentially contributing to conflict with family members – the trauma repeats.

And then there is the one extra ingredient that can make things seem so much worse than they are; the explosive charge in many Christmases – alcohol. Consuming alcohol in and around Christmas is normalised and we can often feel under pressure to ‘join in’. Many of us also use alcohol as a way of coping with the day, the family members who descend upon us, the expectations, unhealed rifts and so on. However, when it comes to managing emotions and conflict, alcohol has never been a solution.

Five top tips to surviving Christmas Day

  • Support through relationship

If you are in a relationship, talk to your partner.  Explain to them that you may find the day hard and agree how you will ask for support when needed, or how you will support each other. Examples may be anything from starting the day together and connecting through to holding each other in mind. You can demonstrate this through small reassuring gestures such as visually checking in with one another.

  • Reality Testing

Christmas is only a day. The expectations we feel in relation to it are largely in our own head.  By pausing and accepting that there is no such thing as a ‘fairy-tale Christmas’ (except perhaps for some fortunate children) we can gain a little space to see it for what it is.

  • The past is not the present

Memories of past Christmases, while present, need not dominate our experience in the here and now. Accept that it is a difficult time for you, know that it is for many others, be compassionate with the feelings that the season evokes and remember it is only a day.  Sometimes we feel strong emotions on particular days that are simply reminders of the past – echoes – and we have the power to create something different.

  • Alcohol makes things worse

Nobody is telling you not to drink on Christmas Day. However, if it is a day that evokes sadness or anxiety, alcohol will not improve these feelings for long. Once it wears off, they will be back with a vengeance and accompanied by a hangover. The opposite of using alcohol to self-soothe is to soothe through relationship. Even if you are not in a relationship with another, you are in a relationship with yourself and can hold yourself in mind.

  • Hold Yourself in Mind

One of the traps people often fall into is that they imagine that they have no choices on the day; they simply have to do what is expected. Doing what is expected is a choice in itself!  Even if you do feel that there is little on offer for you during the day, a change of perspective and holding in mind why you are choosing to make these choices can be helpful. For example, rather than framing it as “I have to go see X person, or Y will be disappointed”, you can rethink it as “I choose to see X person as I want to give that as a gift to Y’.

Even if the day feels full and focused on others, it is always possible to take a few minutes out to calm yourself. You can breathe, come back to the here and now and remind yourself –  Christmas is only a day. See my blog on avoiding panic attacks for a simple but effective practice to calm yourself and return to the here and now.

 

Mark Vahrmeyer is a UKCP-registered psychotherapist working in private practice in Hove and Lewes, East Sussex. He is trained in relational psychotherapy and uses an integrative approach of psychodynamic, attachment and body psychotherapy to facilitate change with clients.

 

Further reading

Can couples counselling fix a relationship?

How to get a mental health diagnosis

What is psychotherapy?

How to improve mental health

How do I find the right psychotherapist?

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How to Minimise Christmas Stress if you’re Hosting

Christmas can be an emotionally challenging and difficult time for many of us. There is such expectation on how Christmas ‘should’ be, yet like the weather, it often fails to deliver on the ‘winter wonderland’ scenes on
the TV adverts. For so many of us our family experience often falls far short of the loving idyllic family reunions depicted in those same snowy adverts. And if you are hosting, this can bring with it an added pressure to deliver the ‘perfect Christmas’.

There is lots of advice available on how best to organise yourself practically in advance in the big day, such as food prep hacks, however, I wonder if there is another way of not only coping but getting something
from the day for yourself?

Think about your own needs first

An example that I often use in clinical practice when illustrating to patients how it is vital that they think of their own needs, is the pre-flight safety briefing that happens before a plane takes off.

Anyone who has flown has sat through at least one of these and there is a particular point in the briefing where the cabin crew explain what you should do if the cabin loses pressure, the oxygen masks drop down and
you are travelling with a dependent. The correct approach is to attend to your own mask first and then your dependent, however, it is surprising how many people think that they should help their dependent fit their
mask first, before attending to their own. Why is it this way around? Because if you try and help your dependent first and have not tended to your own needs, there will be two people in distress rather than one.
And yet for so many of us the inclination is to ignore our own needs and attend to those of others.

Applying the same logic to Christmas, before deciding whom to invite and having any conversations with family and friends about the day itself, first think about your own wants and needs. What are your physical limitations and needs? What can you and can’t you do? How many people can you host without feeling overwhelmed? Who’s company do you enjoy and who is draining? What do you want to get from the day?

The next step is to think about what is negotiable and what is a firm boundary. For example, it may be that you are willing to cater for an additional number of people if you have help or support from others with
cooking. Or, it may be that you are willing to tolerate the presence of someone you find contentious, if another member of the family assures you that they will help you manage that person. However, a firm boundary may be that you have a certain time by when you request everybody leaves (stated in advance).

Wants vs needs

The nature of Christmas combined with the pressure to host, can often mean that any consideration of what you may want from the day gets lost and the focus shifts to being one of ‘surviving the day’. What if it
does not have to be like this? What if you could take some time to calmly consider how you would like not only to ‘host’ the day and cater for everybody, but to play an active role in creating the day that you would like? In other words, what if you were to value your own needs as much as you value everybody else’s?

Hosting does not mean sacrificing yourself

Consider how you do not need to sacrifice yourself in order to host an event for others. People who are worth being in relationship with (and therefore arguably worth spending Christmas with), should be people who are interested in your well-being and needs and will therefore be open to hearing about not only what you can and can’t offer on the day, but also what you would like from it. If they aren’t, then perhaps question whether they are really wanting to celebrate with you as a person, or are simply making use of what you can provide.

Support through relationship

Putting your needs into the mix can feel daunting if it is not something that you are used to doing. And it is generally only possible if we can rely on having an ally, or allies, by our side who are encouraging – this is
often our partner or a close friend. If you are in a relationship, talk to your partner about your needs and wants of Christmas well before the day arrives.  Explain to them how you wish to approach hosting Christmas and risk asking for support – emotional as well as practical. This is something you can do with a friend, or friends too.

It can also be really helpful to agree up front how you will ask for support on the actual day and how you would like your partner or friend(s) to support you. Examples may be anything from starting the day together and connecting, through to specific practical requests. You can demonstrate support for each other throughout the day through small reassuring gestures such as visually checking in with one another or making physical contact.

Reality Testing

Christmas is only a day and that is really worth bearing that in mind. However the day goes, the world will keep on turning and in all likelihood, the relationships that matter will still be there for you. The expectations we feel in relation to Christmas are largely in our own head and can therefore be challenged.  By pausing and accepting that there is no such thing as a ‘fairy-tale Christmas’ we can gain a little space to see it for what it is. It does not have to be perfect nor is it likely to be. Is the goal a ‘picture perfect’ Christmas, or one in which you feel like you are connecting with loved ones and friends?

The past is not the present

For many, memories of past Christmases are difficult and they can reappear like ghosts. However, these ghosts need not dominate your experience in the here-and-now. Accept that it is a difficult time for you and know that it is for many others too, be compassionate with the feelings that the season evokes and remember it is only a day. Sometimes we feel strong emotions on particular days that are simply reminders of the past – echoes – and we actually have the power to create something different. The more you are able to anticipate your wants and needs ahead of Christmas, the less likely the ghosts of the past are to appear and dominate the day.

Alcohol generally makes things worse

Nobody is telling you not to drink on Christmas Day. However, if it is a day that evokes sadness or anxiety, alcohol will not improve these feelings for long. Once it wears off, they will be back with a vengeance and accompanied by a hangover. The opposite of using alcohol to self-soothe is to soothe through relationship. Even if you are not in a relationship with another, you are in a relationship with yourself and can hold yourself in mind.

Even if the day feels full and focused on others, it is always possible to take a few minutes out to calm yourself. You can breathe, come back to the here and now and remind yourself –  Christmas is only a day.

Listen to your body

This doesn’t mean act impulsively. It is more about listening for what the vulnerable part of you needs. This may be a hot bath with a good book, a warm drink by the fire, a nice home cooked meal or spending time with a supportive friend. It could also be a long run, or a dance or yoga class. Whatever self-care tool helps you feel well and connected should form part of your preparations for the day and be in place after the day.

 

Mark Vahrmeyer, UKCP Registered, BHP Co-founder is an integrative psychotherapist with a wide range of clinical experience from both the public and private sectors. He currently sees both individuals and couples, primarily for ongoing psychotherapy.  Mark is available at the Lewes and Brighton & Hove Practices.

 

Further reading by Mark Vahrmeyer – 

Can couples counselling fix a relationship?

How to get a mental health diagnosis

What is psychotherapy?

How to improve mental health

How do I find the right psychotherapist?

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As I Walked Out One Evening

Some years ago, I was given a card that quoted the second and third verse of Auden’s poem, ‘As I walked out one evening’. It was wonderful, the idea that someone could be loved until two continents met across the Pacific Ocean. What a romantic notion.

For many of us, when we fall in love we feel outside the ordinary world, a kind of intensity and madness that takes us beyond the limitations of everyday life. Auden illustrates this feeling at the beginning of the poem, The lover says that they will love the other until impossible things come to pass, ‘till the ocean is folded and hung up to dry’, that is they will love the beloved forever.

As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.

And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
‘Love has no ending.

I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you
Till China and Africa meet
And the river jumps they over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street

I’ll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.

‘The years shall run like rabbits,
 For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
 And the first love of the world.’

(verses 1-5)

The idea of a never-ending romantic love is a seductive narrative and I believe a pernicious one. This is because it implies that the power of romantic love, i.e. being in love, is enough to overcome the vicissitudes and transitions of human life. But these are inevitable because we live in time and in space.

In order to fall in love we have to avert our eyes from the ordinariness of the other, to believe they’re special and by being loved by them we are too. Time passes and the ordinary person emerges; time passes and what first attracted us is now irritating; time passes and what matters to us has changed and we don’t share the same interests; time passes and our bodies have grown older and less attractive; time passes and we become forgetful, frail and fearful; time passes, perhaps we become ill and eventually we die.

What happens to being in love? Auden’s poem continues with a warning that love cannot overcome time. Time is watching us from the darkness, perhaps occasionally we are aware that our relationship has a time limit, but often ‘In headaches and in worry, Vaguely life leaks away,’. In the poem there are warnings about the lover’s relationship, the glacier knocking in the cupboard, the desert sighing in the bed and the cracks in the teacups.

But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
“O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.

‘In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
‘In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
‘Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver’s brilliant bow.
‘O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you’ve missed.
The glacier knocks on the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.

(verses 6-12)

Couples come to therapy full of regret and resentment and tell me it’s been like this for years. They recognise there were signs that they needed to pay attention to their love and changes in their relationship and these opportunities were missed. I suggest that some of this is because people want what they had at the beginning, I want to it to go back to how it used to be. To recognise change in a relationship can mean mourning the loss of those early feelings of being in love, that intoxicating pinnacle of romance.

Part of the work of couple therapy is to be able to remember and respect those initial feelings and to find a more fluid and changing narrative about romantic love. One that recognises that time passes and we cannot, we just cannot, stay the same.

Where the beggars raffle the banknotes,
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.

O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress;
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.

O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.

It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.

(verses 13-16)

Apologies for any misinterpretations of Auden’s poem.

 

To enquire about psychotherapy sessions with Angela Rogers, please contact her here, or to view our full clinical team, please click here.

Angela Rogers is an Integrative Psychotherapeutic counsellor working with individuals and couples in Hove.

 

Further reading by Angela Rogers –

Thinking about the menopause in energetic terms

Poetry: A space to ponder

Relax: Watching people using their hands

What is Andropause and what happens to men when their testosterone levels decline?

Am I cracking up or is it my hormones? Pre-menstrual Dysphoric and the importance of tracking symptoms

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In Support of Being Average

Ask yourself if you would like to be described as being ‘average’ and it might not be your first choice. Average might feel like a vague insult, a reflection on yourself that you’d rather not have. When we use the term ‘average’ we don’t see much that is positive about it.

What is ‘average’?

By definition ‘average’ speaks of a central or typical value across a data set. Average comes with connotations of mediocrity, not setting a very high standard, lacking motivation or even having given up. Average has little to make it feel desirable, but that doesn’t mean that we should write it off.

Perfection: The opposite of average?

Modern society, especially in the world of social media, seems to have no time for average. We are encouraged to seek perfection, to rise above what is seen as average and to strive and compete for a perfect existence. Flaws and defects wont do, only achieving a level that cannot be exceeded is acceptable.

In writing this we are presented with the thought that perfection is very subjective and is also very hard to achieve. We all carry a sense of who we are and the pursuit of perfection is something that we mostly define for ourselves.

Our sense of what is perfect is tied to our sense of self. Early messaging that one isn’t good enough and the associated feelings of inadequacy can make perfection feel appealing. By being perfect we compensate for our inadequacies and are beyond reproach. One becomes insulated from the feelings of judgement from oneself and others. Perfection and the pursuit of it become the solution to challenging feelings.

To always want to be perfect means that we never have to consider what failure feels like. Part of being human is that we are sentient beings and not merely machines carrying out limited functions in a repetitive fashion. To be simplistic we aren’t and can’t be all-knowing and therefore we are flawed and failure is possible.

The pursuit of perfection can impact our personal relationships and deny us the opportunity to explore and be curious. If perfection becomes a motivating factor how can be relate to others when we are managing our own anxiety around feelings of being judged. If it feels unbearable to think of failure how do we learn and develop?

Thoughts of being ‘average’ and psychotherapy

Considering how thoughts of being perfect can impact our life and relationships we might think of how we can move away from this high standard. To be less than perfect, we have to consider how we tolerate what has previously felt unbearable. The thought that it’s ok not to be perfect is a challenge and can expose one to questions of self critical, judgemental feelings that have been defended against. Psychotherapy offers the opportunity to think with a therapist and explore what is behind such feelings. Can we challenge this unconscious sense that anything other than perfection is bearable? Can we be ‘average’ and be happy with that?

Being an advocate for ‘average’ is not about promoting mediocrity, it’s a reaction to the rigour of perfection and a way of finding a more compassionate sense of self that can be at ease with and maybe even enjoy.

 

David Work is a BACP registered psychotherapist working with adults, offering long term individual psychotherapy. He works with individuals in Hove .

To enquire about psychotherapy sessions with David , please contact him here, or to view our full clinical team, please click here.

 

Further reading by David Work –

The challenge of change

Thinking about origins

Bridging Political divides

Save? Edit? Delete?

Football, psychotherapy and engaging with male clients

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What does Couple Counselling do?

At a fundamental level, couple counselling provides an opportunity for a couple to explore their relationship with a therapist who facilitates the exploration. Couples have said to me that they really value the dedicated time, space and support to talk about feelings and difficulties that don’t feel safe to share with each other elsewhere. What else couple counselling does is more provisional and it’s perhaps helpful to think about what couple counselling can do?

First of all, I’d like to make it clear what, in my opinion, couple counselling doesn’t do. Couple counselling is not about the counsellor determining whether a couple should split up or stay together. Nor is it about the counsellor telling either individual how to behave or taking sides. (There are exceptions to this if one of the partners is coercive or violent.) The more behavioural approaches to couple counselling often provide communication exercises and homework between sessions, humanistic and psychodynamic approaches tend not to do this.

I think a key element of what couple counselling can do, is to give a couple the opportunity to see their relationship from a more objective position, to help a couple step away and see themselves as if looking in from the outside. People are often familiar with repeating patterns in the interactions with their partners. They know which situations end in a row or sulking or tears – “you always …,” “you never …” but they can’t necessarily recognise the dynamic that underpins the patterns. How they both act in a way that means these situations keep playing out in the same way again and again. They know that over time painful feelings have built up, such as hurt and resentment, frustration and fear, disdain and humiliation. These feelings can reach a point where one or both partners question whether they can carry on living like this or would it be better to break up. Then they come to couple counselling.

A couple counsellor can notice and comment on what they see being enacted between the partners in the session. They and the couple can think about how this dynamic can play out in the relationship and the way it impacts how they feel about each other. This close attention from the therapist can make couple counselling challenging, each partner becomes aware that their behaviour is coming under scrutiny. They may be fearful of owning their own behaviour and ashamed about revealing aspects of themselves, aspects that may be protecting them and hiding feelings of weakness, vulnerability or lack of self-worth that probably originate from their past.

A therapist can encourage both partners to be more compassionate with themselves and each other, to let go of the feeling that their partner is a potential threat and they need to defend themselves. A couple can then begin to see their partner as someone who is on their side, who is on the same team but perhaps brings a different perspective.

Hopefully a couple can recognise the dance between them and acknowledge the relationship they have created together is a shared responsibility, both the positive and negative parts. This means that the project of creating a more satisfying relationship, or a constructive separation, can also be shared and is perhaps more possible than they imagined at their first counselling session.

 

To enquire about psychotherapy sessions with Angela Rogers, please contact her here, or to view our full clinical team, please click here.

Angela Rogers is an Integrative Psychotherapeutic counsellor working with individuals and couples in Hove.

 

Further reading by Angela Rogers –

Thinking about the menopause in energetic terms

Poetry: A space to ponder

Relax: Watching people using their hands

What is Andropause and what happens to men when their testosterone levels decline?

Am I cracking up or is it my hormones? Pre-menstrual Dysphoric and the importance of tracking symptoms

by Leave a Comment

Understanding Feelings of Guilt

Guilt can be a particularly tortuous feeling and, for some, a chronic state of mind. Below, I will think about different aspects of this complicated emotion.

Origins of Guilt

For Melanie Klein (1), guilt is part of a small child’s normal development, when they realise that they can hate and feel aggressive towards those they also love. The guilt arises out of fear that the infant is responsible for the potential or actual damage and loss of their mother/caregiver – on whom they absolutely depend.

These early experiences will be made better or worse by several factors, including the love and stability given to the child as it grows. Future events, particularly those early on in life, may help to relieve or compound the individual’s more complex or unresolved relationship to guilt.

Function and Dysfunction of Guilt

While painful, particularly when we are consumed by it, it’s important to realise that guilt is a normal part of our emotional lives. When it functions, it is helpful for us as individuals and societies. It is strongly connected, for example, with morality and conscience.

Being able to feel guilt is a healthy capacity and is connected to remorse. Guilt can lead us to accept our responsibility and take action, if necessary, to make reparation. This can take often place in ordinary ways, for example, saying sorry to someone we feel we’ve hurt.

However, when the awful and terrifying feelings of guilt in childhood have not been resolved enough, they can persist into adulthood in chronic and acute ways, and for some people becomes a regular place in their minds to go to. Feeling perpetually guilty can lead to, and be bound up with, intense feelings of anxiety and persecution.

Guilt can get located into all kinds of irrational parts of oneself and can become a way of avoiding other difficult feelings. For example, guilt can be bound up with unresolved feelings around regret and loss or can be a response to uncomfortable feelings of anger. Or it can be used as a way of cushioning against feelings of a loss of control – for e.g. following an external trauma.

Defences against Guilt

For some people, feelings of guilt are so hard to bear they find different ways to get rid of them.

For example, they may become extreme in their efforts to ‘make reparation’, like compulsively putting others first. This is problematic for several reasons, not least of all because underlying this dynamic is often – and understandably – growing resentment which cannot be acknowledged. Inevitably this can simply perpetuate further cyclical feelings of guilt.

Fearfulness around feeling guilt can also lead to a difficulty in taking ownership and another way of avoiding guilt can involve being critical and blaming of others. This is often unconscious and a defensive way of managing guilt by projecting it out – so that others will hold all the guilty feelings.

How to get help with Guilt

If we think back to Klein’s ideas of development, it is the acceptance of responsibility that can lead to repair and resolution. In adult life it is similarly important to be able to bear our guilt without fear and attack (on ourselves or others). Taking responsibility for our actions is so important to our psychological health, and allows us, at times, to repair and this will also feed back into our sense of self and confidence.

Chronic and more compulsive feelings of guilt however are problematic and likely to be bound up with complex childhood (and, also, sometimes adult) losses and traumas. These can be worked through in therapy or counselling.
Group therapy can be particularly useful in tackling pervasive feelings of guilt as the individual can gain a great deal from the reassurances of other members. Also, seeing others grapple with familiar emotions around guilt can be powerfully therapeutic in thinking about one’s own relationship to it.

Therapy can encourage and support people in coming to terms with responsibility, regret, and remorse where this is helpful and appropriate, while still questioning and exploring more chronic and corrosive feelings of guilt.

 

Claire Barnes is an experienced UKCP registered psychotherapist and group analyst offering psychodynamic counselling and psychotherapy to individuals and groups at our Hove practice.

 

Further reading by Claire Barnes

A new psychotherapy group

The process of joining a therapy group

What is ‘othering’ and why is it important?

How psychotherapy groups can help change our internalised family systems

Is a Therapy Group Right for Me? Am I Right for a Therapy Group?

 

Reference – 

(1) Melanie Klein (Psychoanalyst) b1882 – d1960. Love, Guilt and Reparation (1937)

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Can Couples Counselling Fix a Relationship?

Most people enter into couples counselling when their relationship has got problems. These problems can take the form of a crisis, such as an affair, or be more chronic, such as a loss of intimacy between a couple over a long period of time.

What does it mean to ‘fix’ a relationship? The word ‘fix’ would suggest that something is broken, and in some instances this is indeed what may have happened, such as where one party in the couple feels their trust has been broken.

It may seem instinctive to want to simply ’fix’ a problem when one arises, however, more often than not, the problem is a symptom of a deeper issue that may need addressing.

Couples counselling can be invaluable in making sense of the problems in a relationship and in coming to understand each person’s perspective. This in itself can improve the dialogue and communication between the couple and make whatever decisions they need to make easier and more empathic. Couples counselling is a process of facilitating dialogue and empathy between a couple, but it does not have any investment in whether a couple stay together or not.

The idea that couples counselling is not invested in whether a couple stays together often comes as a surprise. However, the process works with the desires of the couple – which can often be in conflict – and it is contingent on the couple working out whether they indeed wish to continue with the relationship – essentially to ‘fix it’ – or whether they would be better separating.

As stated, most couples enter into the process of couples counselling as they are in a crisis and they are unable to have a dialogue that enables them to constructively find a way forward.

Couples also enter into couples counselling in order to make use of the facilitating element a trained professional can bring to a complex conversation. For example, it is not uncommon for couples to enter into couples counselling after a significant event such as a life changing illness, a child leaving home or a change in career. The facilitated environment can create a felt sense of safety for the couple to explore ideas and options relating to their future which otherwise may become inflammatory without the stability that a third person can bring – a little like the stability that
comes from adding a third leg to a two-legged table.

If a relationship has hit a real crisis and a couple present for couple counselling, then it is likely that your counsellor will work with you to both explore why the problem arose as well as to work through the feelings that each member of the couple feels. Even in the case of an affair, some degree of responsibility is likely to lie with both members of the couple, even if only one has strayed.

Therefore, rather than the onus being on ‘fixing’ a relationship, perhaps a more realistic approach is to see couples counselling as a process through which intimacy can be re-established and trust built whereby each member of the couple is willing to see the other’s perspective. At times, as painful as it may be, a successful outcome of couples counselling can be a conscious uncoupling – a decision to separate on friendly and kind terms.

One thing is for sure, if one or both parties feel that a relationship is ‘broken’ the way forward is rarely to try and ‘fix’ it the way we might a broken object. Instead it is to see whether something new can be born from what has gone before – and it may just be that something much more intimate, much stronger as a relationship, can rise from the ashes.

 

Mark Vahrmeyer, UKCP Registered, BHP Co-founder is an integrative psychotherapist with a wide range of clinical experience from both the public and private sectors. He currently sees both individuals and couples, primarily for ongoing psychotherapy.  Mark is available at the Lewes and Brighton & Hove Practices.

 

Further reading by Mark Vahrmeyer – 

How to improve mental health

How do I find the right psychotherapist?

Why do people get the birthday blues?

Is happiness the opposite of depression?

Are people with mental health problems violent?

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Collective Grief

Recent Events: The Death of Queen Elizabeth and COVID

The recent death of Queen Elizabeth has drawn people together in grief in a ways both individual and shared. Having been Queen and a globally public figure for 70 years, her death felt like the loss of what had been a constant and stable presence in our lives.

The COVID pandemic forced us to engage with mortality in a way that many people hadn’t ever had to. We found ourselves experiencing emotions and feelings in ways that were unexpected and unsettling. We had to find a way to feel safe, in the face on what could feel like an invisible threat. Sharing the vulnerability of COVID became a way of coping with our feelings when so much felt unknown and uncertain.

Both of these events gave rise to feelings of loss and grief that were public and shared, yet they felt very different.

Contrasting experiences of grief

The experience of loss is something that no one can assume to avoid in life. It is part of human existence and can be the most obvious way in which we experience grief. The experience of grief is subjective and effects people in ways as individual as we are. Whilst some people appear unmoved and stoic, others can feel intense and uncontrollable emotions. Grief can be present in life in ways that can be hard to explain, either at the time, or at points in the future.

The death of a public figure and our sense of grief gives us an understanding of how we related to that person. Do we feel the loss of someone that we felt a closeness to, or do we find ourselves having ambivalent feelings? How does the loss affect our lives and what does it mean for us? Answers to these questions show us how unique our grief can be.

Sharing our grief over the death of Queen Elizabeth can feel as if it gives us permission to mourn and experience our own grief. We can attribute our emotions to an event that is shared and understood. We find comfort in sharing grief with others with a similar lived experience.

Looking back at the pandemic it could be hard to find ways in which to express feelings of grief, when everyone was trying to make sense of what was going on. Why we felt the way that we did wasn’t always easy to understand.

The pandemic also challenged us to experience death in ways that were far from what anyone would want. The absence of the ability to share grief at collective events like funerals and memorials left a sense of something unfinished and denied us the opportunity to find ways to understand our grief.

Comparable experiences of grief

Comparing the experience of loss and grief between the COVID pandemic and the death of Queen Elizabeth might seem rather obtuse. Both are joined by the collective nature of the events and how there felt like something inescapable about being aware of a collective sense of grief.

There is some comfort in the shared nature of what has happened and the sense that ‘we’re all in this together’ offers some reassurance, yet grief is still an individual experience

Grief and Psychotherapy

Loss and grief are parts of our existence, yet they can affect us in ways that can be unpredictable and unsettling. Being able to think with a therapist about how one is experiencing loss and grief can help to give understanding and a sense that what can at times can feel overwhelming can become less acute.

 

David Work is a BACP registered psychotherapist working with adults, offering long term individual psychotherapy. He works with individuals in Hove .

To enquire about psychotherapy sessions with David , please contact him here, or to view our full clinical team, please click here.

 

Further reading by David Work –

The challenge of change

Thinking about origins

Bridging Political divides

Save? Edit? Delete?

Football, psychotherapy and engaging with male clients

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When do you need Couples Counselling?

It is not so long ago that couples would have needed to be on the point of permanent separation before they would consider any type of counselling for themselves. If they did decide to embark on such a course, it might well be done as a last-ditch attempt to save things, often within the context of one or other of the couple having already made up their mind as to the outcome they wanted.

A dearth of couples counsellors working in private practice was another issue, with couples often turning to church members and leaders to find help. Although, much excellent and wise counsel could be found through this route, it was not always perceived as a non-judgemental space, particularly when one of the pair was not committed to the church in the same way as the other.

This picture, a common one until relatively recently, might help to explain the reluctance of people to seek help with matters they feel (and those around them feel) they should be able manage themselves. It also reflects the general stigma associated with any thought of ‘not be able to cope.’

These social, systemic difficulties, which can prevent people seeking help, are often exacerbated by other less-conscious forces within the people themselves. People may be carrying feelings of shame, guilt or anger. Perhaps they have hurt each other; perhaps they feel their (or their partner’s) behaviour has let them or their family down. Whatever the difficulties, it would seem at times that they would lose the whole relationship rather than face the pain of working through whatever their issue might be.

Changing Attitudes

Over the last ten years, there has been a steady change in attitudes to mental health generally. This has been led by the young – often millennials – who have grown up in a society where it is becoming easier to discuss their inner world as a matter of course.

Schools are becoming much more mental-health savvy, with many staff trained in mental-health support.  Consequently, the stigma associated with seeking help is beginning to dissipate. It is no longer necessary to put a brave face on what is troubling us – either in our individual lives or in our relationships.

Learning from our children

I am not sure Wordsworth had matters of our mental wellbeing in mind when he wrote that ‘the child is father of the man’, but his sentiment, that we could learn much more from our young than we might first think, is a wise one. In the matters of relationship support, it is surprising how many middle-aged couples are seeking therapy prompted by their children.

Not only do those children suggest support, but they also model a non-judgemental approach to difficulties within the scope of wellbeing.

Changing patterns

What is noticeable in the therapy room is that there is a growing number of younger couples seeking counselling. Many of them are not seeking help with a relationship that is on the brink of catastrophe, but instead are looking for a space to better understand each other and, crucially, to learn how to communicate effectively. As one of my clients put it to me, they wanted to ‘future-proof’ their relationship, hoping to head off difficulties long before any crisis is reached, or defensive behaviours become so established that clear and effective communication becomes difficult.

Back to the question

When do you need couples counselling? It could be any time and it could be at different times for different purposes. If you feel there is a problem preventing you from communicating effectively, why not address it? If there is something driving angry or resentful feelings, why not talk it through with someone who will not judge but may well
help you to understand what is the root of the difficulty that feels so overwhelming. It may take a few sessions, or it may need longer. Of course, for some couples, the visit may be one of last resort – but it does not have to be.

 

Kevin Collins is a UKCP registered Psychotherapeutic Counsellor with an academic background in the field of literature and linguistics. He worked for many years in education – in schools and university. Kevin is available at our Lewes Practice.

 

To enquire about psychotherapy sessions with Kevin, please contact him here, or to view our full clinical team, please click here.

 

Blogs by Kevin Collins –

Facing the Green-Eyed Monster

When it comes to parenting, are you a builder or a gardener?

I never thought my son would watch pornography

Care for a dance?

Name that tune

 

Further reading by Kevin Collins –

Facing the Green-Eyed Monster

When it comes to parenting, are you a builder or a gardener?

I never thought my son would watch pornography

Care for a dance?

Name that tune

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What Can Relationship Counselling Help With?

For most of us, the start of a relationship is an extremely exciting time. Not only is the relationship itself hugely enjoyable – fun and life-enhancing – but it can also seem to transform our world. Put simply, it makes the world seem a better place.

It seems odd to think that something that develops from a place of such unbridled joy, can be connected to the development of so much unhappiness for many couples. The intimacy the couple once shared freely and with delight, now feels like a chore and is doled out with resentment; the home they once thought of as their refuge has become their prison; the person who was once lover and confidante is now an enemy. And so on.

Of course, not all relationships that run into difficulties have a narrative that can be summed up in as binary as fashion as that above – but they do all have a narrative. The exploration of this narrative is the generic purpose of couples counselling. As the couple talk through the journey of their relationship, it will help them to understand the reasons – often unconscious forces – behind their behaviours and feelings. They can then make choices based on understanding rather than unconscious drives.

Communication and the presence of the past

It is difficult to avoid the presence of the past in almost anything we say or do. We learned our communication skills when we were very young from the family and environment in which we were raised. It is no surprise that those skills will play out strongly in our relationships as adults. If our communication skills are poor, we may feel misunderstood. If we feel misunderstood, we may become defensive, which might well be experienced by our partner as hostility. Over time the behaviours driven by such communication may leave both partners feeling isolated, which in turn will drive further alienating behaviours.

One of the most important aspects of relationship work will be to explore how the couple communicate and, importantly, what is driving those communication methods. If there is will, whatever has been learned can be unlearned and replaced. It just takes a little bit of work!

Intimacy

Intimacy is not necessarily the most important area in a relationship, but it is often a touchstone for other matters and its lack can be felt intensely by either or both partners. It can be difficult for couples to understand how something that once seemed so colourful and vital now appears so pale and lifeless. The prospect of intimacy can be threatening. It touches on areas of desire, shame, self-worth, driving fear – again often making us aware of
the presence of the past. Through an exploration of this aspect of the relationship, the couple will have a better understanding of what is behind their behaviours in the area of intimacy and can begin to move towards a re-connection in this most vital part of how they relate to each other.

Surviving conflict

Couples counselling will help us to understand what is happening with us when we are in conflict. Many couples will want to avoid conflict, and it can be difficult to understand that dealing with it can be good for us. It can help us learn that we can be in dispute – with all the anxiety associated with it – and then return to a place where we feel safe again. Conflict does not have to mean catastrophe. However, this is another aspect of communication, and
we need to develop our resilience in the area to avoid becoming (once again!) prisoners of our past.

Knowing me, knowing you

The ‘unexamined life is not worth living’ might seem a little reductive. Perhaps Aristotle should have put it more positively – more like, ‘understanding oneself has great benefits.’

However, within a relationship, understanding yourself and your partner does indeed have great benefits. I would argue it is one of the significant rewards of attending therapy as a couple. Being valued, being understood are the building blocks of love.

Talking and listening

It is not unusual for couples to find it difficult to talk to each other. Over time, the pair may begin to avoid difficult topics, often through fear of conflict, or maybe through fear of potential outcome more generally. Couples counselling will help the couple discover and explore these areas of difficulty and, importantly, help to build a model which can be used outside and beyond the sessions to make sure that couples have the skills to talk and listen
effectively.

A good ending

A cursory look at divorce rates would demonstrate, starkly, that many relationships do, and will, end. Sometimes, the issues couples bring to their therapy, either as individuals or as a pair, lead them to decide that what is between them is overwhelming and that their best option is to separate. Couples counselling can help to navigate these challenging decisions and the very difficult feelings associated with them. All of us must deal with endings in our lives, and all endings involve loss of one sort or another. Although dealing with endings is often the one of most painful processes of couples counselling, it does not have to be catastrophic. If the decision is to end the relationship, counselling will help the couple to find a way to keep intact as much of the positive connection between the couple as possible.

 

Kevin Collins is a UKCP registered Psychotherapeutic Counsellor with an academic background in the field of literature and linguistics. He worked for many years in education – in schools and university. Kevin is available at our Lewes Practice.

 

To enquire about psychotherapy sessions with Kevin, please contact him here, or to view our full clinical team, please click here.

 

Further reading by Kevin Collins –

I never thought my son would watch pornography

Care for a dance?

Name that tune

Why is it hard to make decisions?

Communication, communication, communication

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Will counselling save my marriage?

One of the most common questions asked by individuals enquiring about couple’s counselling is whether the process will save their marriage? This is an understandable question and is driven by anxiety in relation to thoughts of a break-up.

The answer to this question is not simple and the variables lie with the two individuals in the couple, rather than with the therapist. Allow me to explain:

If a couple enter into couple therapy with clarity about wanting to work through some difficulties with the goal of continuing with their relationship AND this is reflected in the work then it is likely that the outcome will be a stronger relationship between the two individuals in the couple resulting from improved dialogue and intimacy.

However, this is often simply not the case. At best one partly frequently has ambivalent feelings about staying in the relationship or simply cannot get in touch with whether this is something they want due to the strength of feeling around unresolved issues.

Let us take the example of an affair. This is a fairly common presenting issue with couples who seek out couple counselling. In a typical scenario where one party in the relationship has been unfaithful, the other is likely to be feeling betrayed, hurt, angry and mistrustful.

Until these emotions can be worked through in session (if they can) and the hurt party can both come to terms with the affair, as well as with how both parties in the couple contributed to a loss (or avoidance) of intimacy, the question of whether the marriage can be saved remains a moot point.

Working with a skilled counsellor or psychotherapist can only benefit your relationship in terms of providing you both with a therapeutic relationship and environment in which difficult feelings can be worked through and better dialogue and understanding reached between to two members of the couple.

As painful as it is, sometimes the best outcome for a couple can be that both amicably go their separate ways.

 

Brighton and Hove Psychotherapy is a collective of experienced psychotherapists, psychologists and counsellors working with a range of client groups, including fellow therapists and health professionals. If you would like more information, or an informal discussion please get in touch. Online therapy is available.

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What are the Benefits of Counselling and Psychotherapy?

Counselling and Psychotherapy can help with a range of issues that we may find difficult overcoming by talking to friends and family. There is a significant difference in talking to a skilled professional outside of your social and family circle, someone who is formally trained and experienced in what they do and understands how to work with psychological issues. I won’t go into the differences between counselling and psychotherapy, as this has been addressed in a separate blog. Rather I will focus on what makes talking therapies so beneficial.

Providing a safe environment

Anyone going through a crisis or wanting to discuss sensitive issues needs to feel heard, validated and understood. The therapy space is one which is designed to create containment, consistency, and safety. Weekly sessions usually at the same day and time, a calm and relaxing setting without distractions, an hour dedicated to you, and a professional who creates an environment conducive of trust and safety are all important aspects of the “talking cure”. These elements comprise what we call the “therapeutic frame”, which underpins and supports the work we do as therapists.

Someone who listens but not just listens

In my opinion, listening skills are highly underestimated. Listening isn’t just about listening, but also about making sure that the other feels heard and understood. Although this is considered a basic and essential skill in any talking therapy, listening takes presence of mind, body, and spirit. It is not as easy as it seems. The last thing anyone wants is a distracted therapist or one who seems they don’t listen or understand what you are telling them. For some it can bring up painful past and present experiences of lack of care, it can also convey a lack of interest and touch on previous abandoning and rejecting experiences. So, to get the basics right is very important!

Getting stuck in

Once you have a place to come where you feel comfortable, at a set time each week, with a person you feel you can trust and speak to without being judged, then the work can begin.

“The work” can be compared to an exploration, excavation, unpicking and un-knotting of the different strands of the issue or issues that you came to talk about and get help with.

This can be sophisticated work of great skill, but also messy and clunky at times. There is much uncertainty about what will be revealed and the paths that you will walk together.

The therapist’s job is to help you keep on track, but also allow for new pathways to be discovered. This is what makes the work interesting, fascinating, and rewarding for both parties. This relationship can be one of collaboration, creation, and deconstruction. None of this is necessarily smooth or easy but knowing ourselves is always ultimately rewarding.

The benefits

All the above is designed to support trust building, lessening isolation, creating space and safety amongst turbulent and uncertain situations, helping individuals regain control over their lives, feel and process difficult feelings, make sense of confusing situations and build or rebuild better relationships with self and others. Other benefits include: increased self-awareness, self-development, psychological and emotional strength and resilience, finding more meaning and purpose in life, making positive changes, and better communication amongst many other things.

On our website you can find more information about our counselling and psychotherapy services and how to contact our team.

Sam Jahara is a UKCP Registered Psychotherapist and Clinical Superviser and Executive Coach. She works with individuals and couples in Hove and  Lewes.

 

Further reading by Sam Jahara

What makes us choose our career paths?

Antidotes to coercive, controlling and narcissistic behaviour

An in-depth approach to leadership coaching

Demystifying mental health

Women and Anger

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What to expect from couples counselling

Starting couple counselling can feel both daunting and anxiety provoking, especially if it something you have not previously undertaken.  Knowing up-front what to expect can reduce some of the anxiety and enable you to focus on what you actually want to get from your sessions.

Your counsellor or psychotherapist should be suitably qualified

You are taking an emotional risk inviting a third party into your relationship and thus it is imperative that they are well trained in working with couples as well as suitably supervised and have membership of either the BACP (in the case of counsellors) or the UKCP (in the case of psychotherapists).

You have the right to enquire about a clinician’s training and experience and you also have the right to make the decision that you do not wish to work with a particular person if you do not feel comfortable enough in their presence.

Your counsellor is not invested in the outcome of your work

Whilst it may sound counter-intuitive, couple counselling or psychotherapy is not about ensuring that a couple stay together. A good therapist will work with you to establish what it is that you as individuals wish to get from the process and then how best to support you and work with you as a couple.

A successful piece of work from the perspective of a couple counsellor or psychotherapist is where a couple are able to, with support, navigate difficult conversations together and reach an outcome where both parties can consider the other’s feelings and experience.

Where children are involved and a couple make the decision to end their relationship (whether driven by one or both member of the couple), the therapist will be considering the needs of the children throughout the process and working with the couple to ensure that the separation is as kind as possible to all concerned.

Impartiality

You can expect your couple counsellor or psychotherapist to be impartial – indeed, this is essential to the work. Your therapist is not there to take sides and their role is to ‘hold’ the couple as an entity, rather than focus on one individual’s needs at the expense of the others.

Session regularity

If you and your counsellor contract to work together then it is likely that this will be weekly initially, possibly moving to fortnightly over time. The process can take time.

 

Brighton and Hove Psychotherapy is a collective of experienced psychotherapists, psychologists and counsellors working with a range of client groups, including fellow therapists and health professionals. If you would like more information, or an informal discussion please get in touch. Online therapy is available.

Hove Clinic
6 The Drive, Hove , East Sussex, BN3 3JA.

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