When Anger Is Justified – Part 72: An Introduction To Therapy: College Freshman Year – Section I

***The following post mentions suicide. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room. You can also call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

An Introduction To Therapy

After my conversation with my newfound friend about my suicide attempt, I busied myself during the morning and midday getting rest and preparing myself for travel to my downtown appointment. it would be my first time talking to a professional therapist.

I went for lunch early enough in the cafeteria to avoid the crowds and any stares. Then I set about getting caught up on laundry. It was a typical morning without classes, and the day was fine up until I went for my very first professional therapy session.

I took the bus downtown and found the office. It was a huge building with several different offices inside. I met with three different therapists all at once, and that was overwhelming to me. I had expected to just talk to one person, but these therapists worked as a team.

It was a physically draining experience for me. It was more formal and businesslike than I had originally expected, and mainly, all three therapists met with me to gather information as a part of an intake session.

One of the main questions I was asked on the intake form was the reason for my visit. I went for honesty. I needed help. I wrote on the form, “suicide attempt”. After completing the form, the three therapists decided on who would take me for the first session. I thought this was strange, and right away I did not feel that either therapist took my visit seriously.

Sessions

My first session was with a female therapist. She was extremely formal and very business-like. There was no warmth from her at all, but I would imagine that it being my first time as her client, she did not know what to expect from me either.

She seemingly had no affect. Her voice sounded matter-of-fact, and she seemed to smile with an attitude … as if it took a lot for her to smile. It was as if hiding behind her smile was the true expression of her face … one huge gigantic smirk. I was more than disappointed with what came next. “So you tried to take your own life, huh? I see that didn’t work out too well for you.”

The therapist’s statement caught me off guard. I remember looking into her face to see if she was being sarcastic or if that was the normal way she handled her clients. I could not tell. Her face did not emote. She continued with asking me questions – only taking time to look up at me from writing my responses when I paused to give a response.

The intake/first session was fast. There were never any questions about why I wanted to take my life or anything about that night that I attempted to take my life. It was as if that night had never happened, and it was as if the reason for my visit was just a formality. Because I was a freshman, this therapist attributed my issues to being a first year student away from home. She summed it up to me being depressed and not knowing how to handle school stress.

I felt myself become extremely angered by her reaction to me. I did not feel that she was taking me seriously at all. I was not stressed about school. I barely had any classes to be stressed about. I only had two classes! Where was the stress in that? I had too much time on my hands. I had gone from a busy high school student to a bored college student. Yet, this therapist had not bothered to even look into my history at all regarding this. She made up her own conclusion just because it seemed like a normal response.

I was so surprised that the therapist actually gave me a homework assignment. My first homework assignment until the following week was to throw ice chunks at my dorm room wall if I felt overwhelmed and needed to vent about my stress. I remember glancing at the therapist when she said this – believing that she was joking, but she was serious. It was my first professional therapy session, but I thought it was a strange way of dealing with a first time client who had contemplated taking her own life. Ice chunks?!??!?

When I returned back to the dorm, my newfound friend met up with me to see how my day went. “So how was your little therapy session?” When I responded to my newfound friend’s query about it, I noticed that she seemed to turn up her nose at me. It was not an outright nose-turn up, but it was more a look of condescension. Intuitively, I felt that she did not approve of therapy at all. I did not know why and did not bother to ask her, but I remember not necessarily feeling her support at all. I made a mental note of this for later.

Homework

Although strange, I did follow the therapist’s suggestion to throw ice chunks at my wall. My newfound friend was as skeptical as I was about this assignment though, and did not see the point. “Hmm … I’m not sure how that’s supposed to help you, but have at it.” I suppose that throwing ice chunks was supposed to be a grounding technique, but I was not exactly sure. Or maybe I did not feel overwhelmed enough to feel a release when I threw them very hard at the wall. If anything, I simply made a mess. Pieces of ice and water were splattered over the concrete walls and onto the floor.

From the first therapy visit, I concluded that maybe I was not going to get much out of therapy. At least it was free for the time I was assigned to go. So maybe that is why I was not taken seriously. How were these therapists getting paid for my sessions if they were free to me? I did not know, but the dorm mother encouraged me to continue to go. So I did. I went a few more times.

In fact, I went to therapy four more times before coming to the conclusion that therapy was not going to work for me. First of all, there was no consistency with a therapist. I saw three other different therapists with the last four sessions. None of them seemed to really know my story except from the notes they gained from the previous therapist from a previous session.

I sensed that no one really had time for me. That was not something I thought was a good idea in terms of dealing with a suicidal client. Yet, I did not know enough about therapy at the time to know if that was normal. I just knew that I was not taken seriously as a suicidal client. I felt like my life did not matter, and none of the additional assignments I was required to do such as continue with throwing ice chunks or thinking on the positives of life were helping me at all. I did not know if those therapists were really trying to understand me or just placating their time with me.

Relentless For Help

I ended my time with that group of therapists. It was not really a tough decision to make. I just was not happy with the outcome. Even though I did not know what to expect, I did not expect to get what I got … which was even more frustration and increasing anger. I was relentless about finding someone to talk to, however.

So I kept looking and discovered that the campus chaplain counseled students. I had attended a church service when a campus-mate rudely mentioned to me regarding my suicide attempt that “You need Jesus! Go to church!” So, that is exactly what I did. I attended the campus chapel services.

The first two services I attended were a bore. The service seemed to drag on. Culturally, it was not a dynamic that I was accustomed to. There was very little singing – just two songs from a hymnal. I reasoned that this chapel was for formalities only because this church was not alive. It was completely dead.

But then, when a new chaplain was announced by the church leadership and it turned out to be a woman, something within my spirit stood straight up during the service. When the chaplain greeted me with a warm smile, I could feel a warm kindness come from deep within her. It turns out that the chaplain was the bright light that I needed at that very moment in my life.

After a few services, I spoke with the chaplain about needing help, and she gladly scheduled sessions with me. The first session that I talked with her was the first time I was able to freely discuss my suicide attempt and how it had affected me. It was also the first time that I was able to freely cry about it without ever feeling judgement. The chaplain did not judge me at all.

The chaplain allowed me to cry. Then she gave me a passage of scripture from Jeremiah 29:11 but in the form of a message and poem. Jeremiah 29:11 states, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” I have kept the original document the chaplain gave me up to this date. I have often referred to it when I feel down.

The chaplain saw that I needed support. So she scheduled meetups with me once a week until we both felt that I no longer needed therapy. The chaplain was a lifesaver for me. I would not have made it through my four years of college without her spiritual support. In fact, on the day of my graduation, she was my very last goodbye on campus, and I left her with a parting gift. Even though I told her, “Thank you,” she may never know the magnitude of her help to me.

Unfortunately, the support from some of my peers was mixed, and I faced a lot of scrutiny until it would eventually fade.

Continue to read on for what happened next.