The Value of Psychotherapy

[Billy Rojas]

Centroids:

Nothing puts on display one form of generation gap than this WSJ article about

millennials and therapy. And not just millennials or Gen Xers, It also puts on display

a certain kind of tone deafness in which the affluent assume that everyone else

has their values and the financial means to indulge their every whim.

It isn't that I have some kind of animus against psychotherapy. The opposite is true.

Therapy has the potential to be very useful. But something is terribly wrong

when what this is, is one more example of nose-in-the-air elitism.

You  know,  "I just spent $500 on therapy sessions, how about you?"

"Well, I can't afford $50 to fix my bicycle, let alone spend a fortune to see a head shrinker."

"What fortune? Everyone I know spends hundreds of dollars on therapists, and

even their kids see therapists."

"Yeah? Some of the people I know can't afford to make it through the month

buying the  groceries they need."

"You've got to be kidding. How do they afford the meager $200 monthly for  their

$ 1000 cell phones?"

My inner tendency is to want to say to someone like that, "go f**k yourself."

When you are at the bottom of the economic totem pole you are thankful for the equivalent

of socialized medicine. And the last thing I would ever  do, anyway, is brag about

medical care, viz, about surgery or anything else. If I did, and this was some other

country, say Honduras or Angola, what would that say about me?  Someone from

a low-standard-of-living nation would resent what I take for granted. He or she

cannot possibly afford an angiogram or colonoscopy.

Then there is the factor of Silicon Valley Christianity, Re: Hedge Fund Christianity

or Oil Boom Christianity,   Christianity of the affluent. Such people don't live

on the same planet as 90% of everyone else. And it shows in the assumptions

they make.  Indeed, for all their protestations of Christian faith, what I hear

is blatant self indulgence, or s'il vous plait, " snotty elitist libertarian Christianity."

Or maybe not libertarian, it could even be a form of RC.

Kind of like the upper crust Christianity of many Episcopalians of 50 years ago

only this time around it is a form of Evangelical Christianity.  Just as snotty

even if the theology is different.  And guaranteed to generate the same kind

of serious deep resentment.

This said, what about the value of psychotherapy?   Sure, but make it available to

everyone who needs it, not just the socio-economic elite. Hence in a new kind of church

training for pastors that gives them psychotherapy skills.  A new kind of church,

a new kind of Christianity, not just a new kind of building or a new kind of worship service.

One in which, for all the wealth anyone may have, there is no possibility of unconscious

class bias, no possibility of unconscious self-indulgence. 

You know what all kinds of talk about "humility" sounds like when it comes from

someone earning $100,000 ?  Lets spell the word a little differently, same "h"

first letter, but after that the letters are "y p o c r i s y."

If you want to know.

Billy

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Millennials Are the Therapy Generation

People in their 20s and 30s seek mental-health help more often, and they are changing the nature of treatment

 

 

By 

Peggy Drexler WSJ

March 1, 2019 9:58 a.m. ET

 

Kristina, a 27-year-old publicist living in Manhattan, has been in and out of therapy since she was 9, when her parents got divorced. Back then, she says, “I had a pretty pragmatic view of what was happening, and so did my parents—going to therapy was just something you make kids of divorce do.” During her first year of college, Kristina (who requested that only her first name be used) suffered a sexual assault. Again, she says, therapy afterward was a given. “I figured I would use therapy to get through my trauma and then be done,” she says. “I eventually learned that’s not really how it works.” She has had four or five different therapists since then. So have most of her friends.

The stigma traditionally attached to psychotherapy has largely dissolved in the new generation of patients seeking treatment. Raised by parents who openly went to therapy themselves and who sent their children as well, today’s 20- and 30-somethings turn to therapy sooner and with fewer reservations than young people did in previous eras.

 

According to a 2017 report from the Center for Collegiate Mental Health at Penn State University, which compiled data from 147 colleges and universities, the number of students seeking mental-health help increased from 2011 to 2016 at five times the rate of new students starting college. A 2018 report from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association found a 47% increase between 2013 and 2016 in depression diagnoses among 18-to-34 year-olds; the report attributed the rise largely to the fact that far more young adults are seeking help.

“Many of my clients joke that they and their co-workers often start conversations with, ‘My therapist thinks…’” says Elizabeth Cohen, a clinical psychologist in Manhattan, “The shame of needing help has been transformed to a pride in getting outside advice.”

One reason for the shift is celebrities such as Demi Lovato, Lady Gaga and Dwayne (“the Rock”) Johnson, who have publicly discussed their struggles with depression. Many therapists also credit social media—often criticized as a source of millennial distress—with helping to normalize mental illness and to remove any lingering stigma from seeking support. Vix Meldrew, 32, a London blogger, says that whenever she talks about mental health online, her response from readers skyrockets because she is “making them feel less alone.”

 

‘I think the therapist’s natural instinct to listen and not give advice can be challenging and threatening to millennials.’

 

Many younger people pursue therapy as another form of self-improvement and personal growth, not unlike yoga, meditation or “preventive Botox.” (A 2015 survey by the research firm Field Agent found that millennials spend $300 a month on such pursuits.) Some millennials also use life coaches. That includes Ali Wunderman, a 29-year-old freelance journalist in Whitefish, Mont. “My life coaching and my therapy work really well together,” she says. “It’s about forming habits and behaviors that lead to a fuller life.”

But young people are struggling to find such balance. A 2018 study of 40,000 American, Canadian and British college students published in the journal Psychological Bulletin found that millennials are suffering from “multidimensional perfectionism” in many areas of their lives, setting unrealistically high expectations and feeling hurt when they fall short. This propensity can motivate them to seek assistance when something goes wrong—but it also sometimes drives them to turn that assistance into dependence.

Some young people think “that the therapist is going to provide an answer rather than help them discover the answer within themselves,” says Dr. Cohen, the Manhattan psychologist. Dr. Cohen recalls one recent 20-something client who was unsure about whether to stay in a relationship. “It really felt like she had gone from therapist to therapist looking for one that would tell her what to do,” says Dr. Cohen. “I think the therapist’s natural instinct to listen and not give advice can be challenging and threatening to millennials.”

Technology has contributed to the expectation of a quick fix. Apps and online services such as Talkspace and MyTherapist offer therapy by phone, chat, video and message board, making it more likely that young people will opt for superficial bromides over meaningful long-term help. Used correctly, however, tech-based therapies can fill in important gaps, especially for millennials more comfortable facing their devices than a therapist. Julia Koerwer, 28, a graduate student in social work in Queens, N.Y., uses textlines when she needs immediate help. “People tend to think crisis hotlines are for suicide only,” she says. “But just to be like, ‘OK, it’s Wednesday, I see my therapist on Sunday, and I feel like [expletive] right now. What can I do?’ That’s helpful.”

 

New studies also show that young couples are using therapy before moving in together or in the early years of marriage—something virtually unheard-of in earlier generations. Kristina and her partner started couples counseling in 2017 when they got their first apartment together. “If my mom and stepdad weren’t communicating well, they’d be like, ‘Oh, let’s just talk about it over dinner,’” she says. “But we work late, and then at home we’re answering emails on our phones, and talking it out over dinner just doesn’t work that way anymore.”

For many, such “self-care” doesn’t feel like a chore. “I just enjoy therapy,” says Ms. Koerwer. “I don’t enjoy getting blood drawn—I’d be looking for ways to stop having to do something like that. But I like my therapist, I have a good relationship with him. It’s not like I’m trying to figure out, at what point can I stop doing this?”

—Dr. Drexler is a New York City-based research psychologist and the author of two books about gender and families.

---------------------------------------------

[Chris Hahn]

You have a good point about the quasi-elitist nature of psychotherapy Billy.  It is out of reach for most of the non-affluent.  An exception is services for some very-in-need-of-services people who neglect or abuse their kids, and others with egregious behaviors.  Then, the State might step in and provide services; or for a serious swath of the badly mentally ill, put them in prison.

 

I think is interesting, as the article points out, that the one-time stigma about therapy has mostly gone away.  That is a good thing for those who truly need therapy, but your point is well-taken.

 

Chris

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[Billy Rojas]

Chris:

A long time ago, in Kentucky at Alice Lloyd College, I was selected for a

training program to become a group facilitator. This was the era of

the "transparent self," of self-actualization, and of such things as gestalt therapy.

The objective was to train content specialist teachers to become able to

effectively deal with at least some of the psychological issues that students

from lower economic class families bring with them to college.

Very valuable program. Probably there should have been more training than

what the program provided, which consisted of meetings and training sessions

about once per month over  a year, but at least I had a decent idea of what

this was all about and could then think about making such a program better.

None of the 18- 25 year olds I taught came from families who earned more

that maybe $15,000 in today's money.  Well, maybe there were a few,

but by and large this was the picture.

All of which helped me see my own biases and assumptions. Far from perfectly,

as you know all too well, but at least to some extent, and every bit helps.

That's the trick, seeing your own limitations.

This ties in with the SBC a few years ago,  with their grand public position

about asking black people to forgive them of their past racism.  One article

I read at the time pointed out that most black people were not impressed.

After all, what good did that do?  The black people were still mired in poverty,

their kids still mostly had sub-standard educations, and there were hardly any

black people in the SBC since it existed in a predominantly white universe.

Points well taken, it seems. The SBC did far more than pray about the situation.
They got busy and actually did some things, to the extent that the SBC a few years

after that,  had a black president.

To be sure, that didn't solve all the problems of the SBC, which is now losing

a lot of members. But, so I believe, if they did something else, whatever it may be,

they just might have a chance   -because the race issue is now pretty much gone.

It doesn't get in the way of what is needed next.

Anyway, I am very much pro-psychotherapy. But let's make it available

to everyone who could benefit from it.

Billy

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From: radical...@googlegroups.com <radical...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Chris Hahn <c...@2chahn.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 2, 2019 11:56 AM
To: Radical...@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: [RC] The Value of Psychotherapy

 

[Chris Hahn]

Billy,

 

I didn’t know that the SBC had a black president and I think it is interesting that you think the race issue has mostly gone away in the group.  I was completely blindsided by the racism that was lurking in America out of my sight, or maybe my willingness to see.  Trump’s rallies shattered my notion that racism had ebbed to fringe groups. 

[Billy Rojas]

Chris:

I can't say whether racism has increased among fringe groups on the Right.

Maybe it has, which would be bad news. But my point was simply that

the SBC seems to have learned its lesson and has become more responsible.

So, other groups should be able to do likewise.

The thing about Right-wing racism is that Trump is the kind of character that he is.

Off the wall, or all over the map, choose your preferred metaphor. This allows

Rightist crazies to project their ideals onto him. It also allows Leftist crazies

to project their worst fears onto him.  And it allows the media to pick what

they want to pick, so that they can puff news viewership or readership to get

higher circulation numbers.

About racism per se, my biggest concern is rising reverse racism, viz, black people

blaming white males for all the problems of black people, like black incarcerations.

About which I take a very dim view. Because this means more of the same crap,

black irresponsibility, unwillingness to own the fact that there is a helluva lot

of crime committed by black people, mostly black males in their teens up to

their thirties. Hence also there are big stinks about such incidents as Ferguson, Missouri,

which, it turns out, was not a case of police bias in operation but one more example

of a young punk black male "doing his thing" and committing a crime.

But so what? The media narrative  -black people and white Leftists with their hands in the air,

supposedly emulating the  black supposedly innocent man trying to surrender before

he was shot.  Trouble is, that never happened. The whole story was a myth. Also  so what?

The myth is as good as gold on the Left and in the "mainstream" media.

So, older white males get blamed for everything even though -by far- most of the problems

arise among the non-white population of the inner cities, mostly black people

and Hispanics. Can't understand why  I would be unhappy?

Skin pigmentation has nothing to do with any of this, of course. After all, when was

the last time you heard about the high crime rate among Hindus in America?

But maybe most of the motel owners in Eugene (they aren't all from India

but it may seem that way) are secretly shooting people after dark and

the cops don't report it. Ya never know.......

Billy

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From: radical...@googlegroups.com <radical...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Chris Hahn <c...@2chahn.com>

Sent: Monday, March 4, 2019 8:20 AM

[Chris Hahn]

Billy,

 

I don’t think that racism among fringe groups has increased.  I, Pollyannaishly, like to think that it has decreased, which is the point I was trying to make.  The growth of in-your-face racism in the Trump era made me aware that the underlying relaxation in racial tension was a figment of my imagination.