Reporter: T at’s great – out of your struggle grew some insight. Anything else that felt helpful or even unhelpful? Annie: Well, there was a part, maybe around that time, where I talked to her about sadness and grieving for the part she’d lost. T is didn’t seem to hit home for her. I think she was still rebelling and didn’t want to acknowledge it.
Reporter: T at’s a great turning point! Was there anything else that was helpful or even unhelpful? Jackie: Well, there was something that was a bit of both. Annie talked about grief. I couldn’t understand the kind of grief she was talking about. I told her I wasn’t grieving. T is changed for me when I heard someone talk on TV who’d been in the Alton Towers rollercoaster accident. I realised that, because I didn’t have a physical loss, I thought I could get bet er. When I remembered what Annie had said about losing a fi ſt h of myself, that’s when I understood the grief part.
Reporter: I believe that, at your last session, Jackie brought in some drawings she’d done. Can you tell me about that? Annie: Well, I was amazed when Jackie brought the drawings to the last session. I remember her rollercoaster representing her emotions – she wants to do things but can’t. I remember the downs on the rollercoaster as the physical downs. Jackie had also drawn tethers, which she had talked about as holding her back. In her drawing, she represented tethers with the reframe that I’d suggested to her – using her intelligence to plan safely. I don’t know why the notion of safety harness came to me but it really seemed to help her see that, rather than being constrained, she was using her intelligent voice to plan safely. Her last drawing was about rest and recuperation – how to keep going and trying to live life but refi lling her bucket and being OK to rest and recuperate. Jackie’s drawings encapsulated our journey in therapy and her progress. She told me she’d started writing a blog and had added her drawings to it! T e drawings were so impactful to me and showed me there is a lot of processing going on underneath for clients – what we think the client is taking from sessions isn’t always what they’re taking.
Reporter: She defi nitely had a good experience with you despite or even because of the struggle! What did YOU learn f om this experience? Annie: I think I learned that sometimes therapy IS a struggle but, if we can stay with it and not take fl ight, it can work. I realised we never know what’s possible or even what’s going on inside the client. I also learned a lot can be done, even if therapy is short term. I had oſt en wondered about that, but this experience taught me that good work is possible. I was extremely glad to get the opportunity to have this feedback from Jackie – that’s an opportunity we therapists in private practice don’t oſt en get. It really helped me hear Jackie’s perspective and I hope it will make me a bet er therapist!! Reporter: T anks so much for talking to me – it was great to hear about your experiences!
Reporter: I believe that you did some drawings about your therapy journey? Can you tell me what prompted you to draw about your experience? Jackie: Annie asked me what I wanted to do with the last session. I decided I wanted to draw. I use drawings to make sense of something. I need to be able to ‘big picture’ things so I can get them out of my head. I think in pictures. T e fi rst drawing is of me with 20% missing – represented by my leg, with the caption “Everyone needs balance, not just me”. I came to represent myself as ‘T e unbalanced woman’! T e second was of a rollercoaster, representing both my ambition and also the rollercoaster of my emotions. T e caption is “Emotional rebellion with intelligent planning”. T e third drawing is of me ‘tethered’ to two posts. I had seen my condition as tethering me or holding me back. Annie helped me to reframe the tethers as a ‘safety harness’. T is was such a great positive version of what I was feeling. T e caption is “Tethers or safety net? Measuring limits/testing boundaries”. T e fi nal drawing is of me on the sofa being lazy, representing the illness forcing me to rest. T is was a massive thing to get over. My intelligent brain had to come in to help me see I had to rest sometimes. T e caption is “Not lazy – refi lling my bucket”.
Reporter: T at’s amazing. What a creative way to track your journey! To sum up, how would you describe the whole experience? Jackie: Well, when I go back and look at my drawings and read my blog, it breaks my heart to see how I struggled. I also realise how far I’ve come. T erapy with Annie taught me what I can let go of. Its an admission. It taught me not to push through. It taught me that it’s OK not to do everything. I also realised that get ing it out of my head was important. I realised that making sense of things is very important to me. I’m glad I sought help from Annie. Reporter: Jackie – thank you so much for talking to me. I don’t know whether you realise how helpful it is for Annie to have the kind of feedback you gave her about this process. Best wishes.
AFT news As we settle into 2018, we hope the year is proving to
be a good one for you; it is hard to believe we are half way through February already. We thank you for renewing your AFT membership for 2018 and look forward to seeing you at some of our events. As we write this piece for Context, we are looking forward to
our Aspens day, to be held in Manchester on 20 January and also our “Making a diff erence in Wales day” on 15 February. We are grateful to all our members who have supported these events. Looking further ahead, we have our Eileen Jamieson day on 1 June in Belfast, with Matthew Selekman from the USA on “Working with challenging high risk adolescents”, a topic that may be of interest
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to many of you. Feel free to attend the event from wherever you live in the UK or overseas. At £45, this is exceptionally good value and accommodation can be arranged locally. Arrangements for our annual conference in Manchester are currently being made and thanks to the Manchester branch for their hard work in drawing together a programme on “D/Evolving Identities”, which we are sure you will fi nd of immense value and interest. Further details will be available soon, but please note the dates in your diary – 13 and 14 September. This year will be extra special, as the European Family Therapy Association meeting will take place alongside the conference, which will give the opportunity for us to network with our colleagues from Europe.
Context 155, February 2018
AFT news
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