Historically, mental health is a struggle for me, and for lots of the people I surround myself with. I don’t know if there are people out there whose circle of friends and family consists mostly of people whose mental health is rosy, but if they’re out there, I haven’t met them and I kind of already resent them. I’m friends with their mentally ill children, that’s for sure. 

I was profoundly depressed and suicidal for my whole life, and I started therapy at about age 24. I could have used therapy long before, pretty much from age 11, but in my teenage years, I didn’t have the autonomy or self-awareness to get it. In my 20s, I had no health insurance, and no way did I have the money to pay out-of-pocket. 

When I had insurance for a hot minute, I sought out medication and a counselor. I was pretty disappointed in the first counselor I saw (no letters after her name). She said, “That must be really hard,” and made lots of sympathetic faces, but was woefully short on strategies or ideas on how to improve my situation. She certainly meant well, but that wasn’t what I was looking for. 

In my late 20s, I found a therapist with all the letters after her name, and we embarked on a long and reasonably fruitful relationship. I really liked and respected her. She introduced me to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), which was exactly what I had been looking for – actual ideas for how to interact with my oppressive thoughts and ruinous behaviors. 

A couple of years into my work with this therapist, I got hooked up with a medication that was truly a magic bullet. Endless rumination had characterized my mental landscape my whole life – my thoughts getting stuck on tracks that went around and around about how isolated and worthless and unlovable I was, and how things would never get any better. The medication improved this by like 70% – huge progress. Of course, there was a 30% that was still life-threatening, but it’s hard to overstate how much better my mental health was as a result of this medication. If you want to know what it was, shoot me an email, I am happy to share. 

Then things kind of fell apart. Between the drinking and the drugs and living alone (which I’d tried before and nearly broke me – I am not suited to solo living), despite the effective therapy and wonder-drug medication, the dam burst and I tried very hard to kill myself. I had a lot going for me, but it wasn’t enough. I got inpatient and outpatient treatment – it was like summer camp, lots of weird new friends and arts & crafts.  

I didn’t make a conscious decision that I would quit therapy after my hospitalization. I just didn’t go back, and didn’t go back, and the next thing I knew, it was months and then years. I suppose on some level, I thought if therapy couldn’t keep me safe from myself, it wasn’t working as intended. I drank, and I gathered my family around me, and changed jobs, and things improved without therapy. Eventually, I quit drinking, and things improved even more.

In the meantime, I went back to Kaiser, and had some good experiences there. For people not in acute crisis, they push you into group classes, and I took a good one on acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). There was useful stuff about mindfulness in there, and I learned about metta in those groups. I might go back one of these days.

But one of the best things Kaiser connected me with was an addiction counselor who helped me completely transform my life. She is funny and personable and very easy to talk to. Her approach is pretty classic therapist – lots of “Why do you think that is?” instead of handing me actual opinions etc. She helped me see that the work I was doing at the time was having a very negative impact on my mental health (and it was), and her help offering me the courage to find new work has made an astronomical difference. I actually haven’t seen her for years now, since things are going so well.

I’ve had some cool experiences that make me see possibilities in different approaches – I did a thing called “Regenerating Images in Memory” – a kind of guided meditation where you imagine an extended conversation with whatever is giving you grief, envisioning both sides of the discussion. I’ve had some real insights with this. This despite the absolutely terrible name – a woo-woo name that doesn’t even accurately describe what you’re doing. They should work on their branding. 

No surprise here, meditation is on my short list of moves that have hugely improved my mental health. One of my favorite discoveries has been meditation teacher Matthew Hepburn, who does a lot of work on the “10% Happier” app. He has a podcast on there called “20% Happier,” and the episodes are him talking to individuals about their meditation practice – it is like getting to listen in on someone else’s therapy session and say, “Me too! What’s your advice for that?” It’s really reinforced for me how closely entwined meditation and mental health are: How mediation lays bare where the trouble spots are, how it improves mental health, how being a happier person (a primary goal of therapy) is a result of a mindful approach to life.

Just last month I started a very, very promising relationship with a new therapist. They are energetic and full of all the right words and theories. They are insightful, and when they say, “This is what I hear you saying,” they are right on. They are also very encouraging – I don’t know if they say this to all their clients, but they have said they think I’m kind of rocking it, which feels good. And – they have all kinds of expertise in eating disorders. I’m exploring new approaches around Health At Every Size, intuitive eating, stuff like that, and I’m hopeful about my eating disorder for the first time in a long time. It’s not the kind of approach that helps you lose weight. It’s the kind of approach that makes you okay with you, no matter your weight. It’s what I need, and I’m thrilled so far.  

Three takeaways: 

1. If you’re not getting what you need from therapy, shop around. It’s a really intimate relationship, and you need to feel 100% confident that your therapist’s approach will work for you once you get good at it. 
2. Everyone needs effing health insurance, and it needs to cover mental health. Letting mental illness go untreated because your tax dollars might help people you disdain is unconscionable. We all suffer when mental illness runs rampant. 
3. If you’re in the unfortunate position of having mental illness but no insurance or mental health support, try meditation. It’s free, and it helps. Even if you have insurance and access to therapy, try meditation. 

Therapy wasn’t a cure-all for me, but it brought some good things to my life for a long time. I still use lots of the CBT and ACT techniques I learned, and I appreciate that my state of excellent mental health these days is partly an accumulation of years of work on my mind. If you haven’t found the therapy that works for you, keep looking – there are as many approaches out there as there are people working in the field of mental health. Also, try meditation. Have I mentioned you should try meditation?