PSYCHOTHERAPY

● What Is Psychotherapy?

Psychotherapy is a psychological treatment that is based on talking to a therapist, a counsellor or a psychologist in order to seek help for any personality, psychological or behavioural problems. It is also commonly known as talk therapy. Psychotherapy can help eliminate or control troubling symptoms so that a person can function better and can increase their well-being and healing.

Psychotherapy may be used with a combination of medication. Although medication provides a ‘band aid effect’, psychotherapy digs deeper to eradicate the problem or provide a more lasting solution.

● Problems treated by psychotherapy

• Impact of trauma

• Coping with daily life and its stressors

• Addiction and alcoholism

• Sexual, physical or emotional abuse

• Sexuality

• Eating disorders

• Medical illness or loss

• Mental disorders such as depression and anxiety

TYPES OF PSYCHOTHERAPY

There is a wide array of types of psychotherapy. The choice of therapy type to be used depends on the client’s issue or illness and their preference. Therapists may combine elements from different approaches to best meet the needs of the client.

a). Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

CBT helps people identify and change thinking and behaviour patterns that are harmful or ineffective, replacing them with more accurate thoughts and functional behaviours. It can help a person focus on current problems and how to solve them. CBT therefore focuses on the role of thinking in what a patient feels and does.

CBT can be helpful in treating a variety of disorders, including depression, anxiety, trauma related disorders, and eating disorders. For example, CBT can help a person with depression recognize and change negative thought patterns or behaviours that are contributing to the depression.

b). Interpersonal Therapy

Interpersonal therapy focuses on a patient’s interaction with people that may contribute to psychological problems. It helps patients understand underlying interpersonal issues that are troublesome, like unresolved grief, changes in social or work roles, conflicts with significant others, and problems relating to others. It can help people learn healthy ways to express emotions and ways to improve communication and how they relate to others. It is most often used to treat depression.

c). Dialectical Behaviour Therapy

This is a specific type of CBT that helps regulate emotions. It is often used to treat people with chronic suicidal thoughts and people with borderline personality disorder, eating disorders, and PTSD. It teaches new skills to help people take personal responsibility to change unhealthy or disruptive behaviour. It involves both individual and group therapy.

d). Psychodynamic Therapy

Psychodynamic therapy is based on the idea that behaviour and mental well-being are influenced by childhood experiences and inappropriate repetitive thoughts or feelings that are unconscious. A person works with the therapist to improve self-awareness and to change old patterns so he or she can more fully take charge of their life.

e). Supportive Therapy

Supportive therapy uses guidance and encouragement to help patients develop their own resources. It helps build self-esteem, reduce anxiety, strengthen coping mechanisms, and improve one’s social and community functioning. Supportive psychotherapy helps patients deal with issues related to their mental health conditions which in turn affect the rest of their lives.

f). Play Therapy

Play therapy is a form of therapy used primarily for children. That’s because children may not be able to process their own emotions or articulate problems to parents or other adults. A trained therapist can use playtime to observe and gain insights into a child’s problems. The therapist can then help the child explore emotions and deal with unresolved trauma. Through play, children can learn new coping mechanisms and how to redirect inappropriate behaviors.

Some other types of psychotherapy may include:

• Creative arts therapy: This is the purposeful use of visual arts materials, music, dance, drama, poetry and media in intervention, counseling, psychotherapy, and rehabilitation. It is used with individuals of all ages, families, and groups.

• Animal-assisted therapy: This involves working with dogs, horses or other animals to bring comfort, help with communication and help cope with trauma.

Psychotherapy Formats

Depending on the type of help and assistance an individual needs and the illness they are struggling with, psychotherapy sessions can be conducted in a variety of formats. The therapist along with the patient will decide on the format best suited to the patient's needs.

● Individual Therapy

A patient receives individual one-on-one counselling with his/her therapist to overcome and treat mental illness, a disorder or a personal obstacle. Individual therapy are used to treat mental illness, grief, the end of a relationship, loss of a loved one, help with self-esteem or any number of things. This type of therapy has proven to be very successful as it allows the patient to confront their issues and develop healthy coping mechanisms.

● Group Therapy

This is therapy that is conducted in a group setting with anywhere from three, four, or more members. Members often have a similar issue or problem. Group therapy creates a safe, judgement free environment where people can share common experiences and thus have a better understanding of their struggles. They can draw strength from each other's successes and know they are not alone in what they are going through. It is a particularly successful form of therapy for people struggling with an addiction or coping with grief.

● Couples Therapy

It is mainly designed as a therapy session for two people who are in a relationship and who are going through some conflict or problems. Traditionally it has been used by married people or couples who are in a romantic relationship. However, over time the definition of couple's therapy is evolving to include any two people in a relationship of some sort who are experiencing interpersonal problems, for example, a mother and daughter, two friends, etc. The focus in this type of therapy is improving communication between the two individuals and allowing them to see and understand things from different viewpoints.

● Family Therapy

The concept of Family Therapy is based on the belief having familial support and understanding increases the effectiveness and success of a patient's treatment. It also provides a comfortable setting where families can openly discuss the struggles they are going through or experiencing as a result of the issue at hand. This type of therapy can be especially useful if there is abuse in the family or if someone is struggling with a mental disorder or addiction as this can have an effect on everyone involved.

NB: A successful treatment plan for an individual may include a combination of this. The therapist may determine that in addition to the individual therapy, an important part of the treatment process for the patient involves counselling with their spouse and family therapy with the children or parents.

Psychotherapy Techniques

Some popular psychotherapy techniques used by mental health professionals are:

♤ Thought Records

The therapist encourages the patient to write out both sides of a negative thought or experience they had. This allows the patient to analyse the outcome of a decision or a thought in a rational, balanced manner instead of jumping to conclusions and feeling the world is turned against them.

For example, if a patient had a fight with their wife, instead of assuming his wife hates him or is having an affair, writing everything out objectively puts things in perspective and may help him get to the root cause of the argument, which could be as mundane as him not taking out the trash when asked to do so.

♤ Happy Activities

This is a very effective technique in treating and overcoming depression. The patient is instructed to set aside time on a daily, weekly basis for a pleasurable activity. Anything healthy that brings the joy that the patient has not done in a while or would normally never do. Doing these activities increases the positive emotions, gives the patient motivation to get through the day and over time helps them develop happier feelings.

♤ Behavioural Experiments

This allows the patient to test their beliefs about themselves or things around them, get results, reflect on the outcome and revisit their initial belief.

For instance, an individual may believe that if they walk under a ladder, they will meet with an accident. The therapist will encourage them to walk under a ladder as an experiment, and it will allow the patient to see their belief was unfounded or without merit.

♤ Imagery Exposure

This forces the patient to relive and focus on a negative experience or memory and go through it over and over again in as much detail as possible until the memory no longer gives them anxiety or causes stress. The idea is to remove the power of the negative experience so it cannot act as a trigger for future experiences and allow the person to cope with it healthily.

To summarize all we have discussed about psychotherapy, it is important to note that no one fix psychotherapy solution works for every kind of disorder or illness, nor is one type or technique of psychotherapy better than another.

A successful treatment regime will often come about as a result of a combination of various techniques and factors including the client, therapist relationship, a strong external support system from family and friends, the individual's personal goals and motivation and in some cases medication.

The hardest step for treatment and recovery is acknowledging there is a problem and being willing to get help. But remember that most mental illnesses and disorders can be managed and treated successfully through psychotherapy without medical or biological intervention.