Speaker 1: Hey, y'all, this is Dr Joy from the Therapy for
Speaker 1: Black Girls podcast, and this it's a booster session. As
Speaker 1: a reminder, the information included is meant to be educational
Speaker 1: and entertaining, but it is not a substitute for a
Speaker 1: relationship with a licensed mental health professional. Hey y'all, it's
Speaker 1: Dr Joy and I'm back with another booster session. So
Speaker 1: if you caught Insecure last night, you probably knew that
Speaker 1: I would have some thoughts I wanted to share, and
Speaker 1: I definitely did. Last night's episode was a really good one,
Speaker 1: and I have feelings about quite a few things. But
Speaker 1: for this booster session, I wanted to specifically talk about
Speaker 1: the fact that we saw Molly in another session with
Speaker 1: her therapists. Yeah, she's still in therapy, and she's talking
Speaker 1: about how she doesn't feel like she's getting her props
Speaker 1: at the new law firm, and she comments that she
Speaker 1: doesn't want to keep getting caught up in situations that
Speaker 1: don't move her forward, like that situation Withdrew. And at
Speaker 1: that moment, we hear a record scratch as her therapist asked,
Speaker 1: who's Drow? So y'all know, I found that hilarious because
Speaker 1: it's actually not at all made up. There definitely are
Speaker 1: times when clients will leave out seemingly huge pieces of
Speaker 1: the puzzle that opens up an entirely new dimension for
Speaker 1: the work. So I wanted to share briefly about two
Speaker 1: reasons you might not be being honest with your therapists
Speaker 1: and how you can change that, because, of course, if
Speaker 1: you're not being honest, then you're not getting everything you
Speaker 1: could be getting out of the therapeutic experience. So the
Speaker 1: first reason you might be withholding a part of the
Speaker 1: story from your therapist is that you're afraid of their judgment.
Speaker 1: And if this is the case, I want you to
Speaker 1: ask yourself what's making you feel like they would actually
Speaker 1: judge you. Is it something they've actually done, or are
Speaker 1: you projecting stuff from other relationships onto your therapist. If
Speaker 1: you're projecting that, I'd like to challenge you to try
Speaker 1: something new within the confines of this relationship and see
Speaker 1: if you have a different outcome. A part of what
Speaker 1: makes therapy effective is the creation of a space that
Speaker 1: is non judgmental. So it's the perfect time for you
Speaker 1: to try a new behavior and for you and your
Speaker 1: therapists to be able to check in about how it feels.
Speaker 1: People have often asked how are we as therapists able
Speaker 1: to be non judgmental, and a large part of it
Speaker 1: is training and knowing how to hold something that others
Speaker 1: might judge you for as the space where the work
Speaker 1: needs to happen. We're not doing our job if we're
Speaker 1: using the pain you come into therapy with as a
Speaker 1: tool to shame you, so in essence, we're not doing
Speaker 1: effective work. So that's my suggestion for how you might
Speaker 1: make changes if fear of judgment is keeping you from
Speaker 1: being completely honest with your therapist. The second reason you
Speaker 1: might be withholding the truth from your therapists is that
Speaker 1: you're not really ready to make changes in a certain
Speaker 1: area of your life. You might be surprised by this,
Speaker 1: but it's actually not uncommon for people to come to
Speaker 1: us with quite a bit of ambivalence about making changes
Speaker 1: in their life, even if they feel like at some
Speaker 1: point they would benefit from the change. So in this instance,
Speaker 1: our job as the therapist might be to sit with
Speaker 1: you in the ambivalence and explore it to see if
Speaker 1: that helps you to move into an action stage, and
Speaker 1: to see what barriers might be getting in the way
Speaker 1: of you moving to action. If this is the reason
Speaker 1: you're withholding information from your therapist, I'd encourage you to
Speaker 1: share exactly how you're feeling and have a conversation about
Speaker 1: what fears, concerns are trepidations you have about how your
Speaker 1: life might be different if you did something different. I mean,
Speaker 1: we have to be honest. Even when we change for
Speaker 1: the better, transitions can still be really hard, so it's
Speaker 1: understandable that sometimes it takes a while to move into action.
Speaker 1: So I'm curious to hear if you had experiences with
Speaker 1: not being completely honest with your therapist. Was it for
Speaker 1: one of the reasons I shared or something else. Let
Speaker 1: me know on social media using the hashtag tv G
Speaker 1: in session. Thank you all so much for joining me
Speaker 1: for another booth of session, and I'll chat with you soon. Bye,
Speaker 1: m Fie.