Talk therapy does NOT heal.

This is likely going to get me a lot of push back but, that’s even more proof as to why it’s important to make sure to get out there in the world because people deserve to be provided the RIGHT care and the TRUTHFUL answers.

I don’t send this message out in the world lightly. I know the industry benefits from the current setup. Those who fall through the cracks of it are rising in number and we have to be willing to go against the grain, even if it means calling out an entire industry. Those who would refute that this industry truly has its patients best interest at heart need to take a moment to consider if they agree that a terminal prognosis for a brain that regenerates itself multiple times in one’s lifetime demonstrates ones best interest.

Most likely those that will push back the loudest will be the commonplace “trauma informed” narcissistic therapists parading around as compassionate mother hens that are personally satisfied by enabling a woman to wear a victim/survivor badge as if they’re performing some act of nobility and goodness for humanity.

I know trauma. I know every kind of abuse. I know suffering. I know suicide. And not just by witness but first-hand experience.

I AM “trauma informed.” Talk therapy is about one of the most damaging things we have made mainstream. And we have lost so many because of it.

Why?

Talk therapy does NOT deal in matters of the subconscious. And so what happens? Hurting, vulnerable, traumatized, and emotionally exhausted people go into a session divulging their stories, exposing light on every corner and then, the hour is up. They leave with a freshly picked wound that they will carry through the week while it bleeds out and sends them into a hypersensitive state of fight or flight. Chewing on the old trauma event, creating new connections (known as synapses), strengthening the negative emotions or even recharging memories that were dormant for years WITHOUT guiding them through a healing method. Being that they’re old memories, the interpretations and translations that have filled the gaps of this original memory ferment into new meaning while this person is floundering unattended to, until the next therapy session — whenever they can afford the absurd per session costs uncovered by most insurance policies…with no end in sight.

Like treating a wound that needs surgery with a bandaid and pain pills.

Therapy has a place, a potential benefit for some. A controlled environment to sort, attempt to make sense of or define the unclear. But it has no business in the trenches of one’s trauma or the aftermath thereof. I have zero charge or sentiment that therapy cannot be useful — it certainly can as I’ve detailed. My challenge is where we define it like the method for healing as a whole and not a very small module of the process. The chewing part of our digestion. Necessary in some cases, but is not responsible for the assimilation of nutrients, nor the build of muscle, nor the aid of processing waste, etc. It would be akin to crediting the first cut a surgeon makes to remove cancer. The cancer, at the first cut, is still there in the body. The cut was a step toward removing the cancer but we cannot just walk away at that point. Many other steps must be taken. Those that don’t need surgery, can be well suited by a talk session. It does not complete the process for most.

Trauma occurs when we tell our story so well that we re-injure ourselves in the telling of it. Every single time we tell it, we drive it further into our amygdala. Over time, our amygdala and hippocampus both shrink from prolonged exposure to an imbalanced surge of neurotoxic chemicals that deplete your executive function (your “higher sense of self” that performs self-soothing & reasoning functions controlled by the pre-frontal cortex that you stop accessing after spending enough time in a survival state.)

Talk therapy is sitting in the dark, talking about the dark. People who are wanting to create change, end dysfunctional habits or heal trauma need someone to sit next to them in the dark and then GUIDE THEM TO THE LIGHTSWITCH not talk endlessly for 17 years about how the dark makes them feel while feeding them pills that make it harder for them to feel.

We’re setting them up to fail and its killing people.

I am calling for a NEW way to approach mental health, one that doesn’t leave people bulldozed by labels, misdiagnosed, enabled to their destructive patterns, dependent on — or inaccurately prescribed meds, endlessly feeding the bottom line of the “therapy” industry, addicted to their trauma and defenseless against their mind.

We need to empower, enable, and equip them with a deep understanding of their mind so they know its a tool THEY are in charge of.

We need to stop giving irrevocable power to feeling and emotion.

We need to EDUCATE them about the mind, its process, and purpose.

We need to break down the how the personality is created, and what can be done to adjust it by choice.

We need to discuss what trauma and ptsd ACTUALLY are chemically, metaphysically, and neurologically in the mind instead of leaving it to the terrible imagination and stop glorification of victimhood.

We need to talk about redirecting triggers, properly self-soothing, healing childhood wounds, redefining traumatic events, releasing trapped emotion, balancing logic and emotions, and creating a bonded relationship with self that is strong and sustainable.

And most importantly, we need to bring these people OUT of the machine and into the know, exposing everything AS it IS, not as is beneficial to their care providers so THEY CAN MAKE their own informed choices about what path is best for them to realize complete wellness.

If therapy worked for you, wonderful. You may have only needed to sort and make sense of your thoughts out loud. But there are people who need deeper work and we need to stop selling therapy as the remedy because when they are seeing where its not working, they think its something wrong with them. Its nothing more than rough prepwork. Talk therapy prepares you, it does NOT heal you.

It can be on the path to healing, but it is not the path to the destination of being a fully healed human. We, as humans, need to come together on the destination and agree that’s the only thing that should govern our care for our clients.

That said, if therapy has proven effective in your individual experience, then you should fully celebrate that in your life. I think as a whole, we as humans can agree that if therapy is not working for someone, we should all be willing to bring the mental health machine into question as to whether or not it should be the only validated methodology legitimized by the industry.