How do you help someone who doesn't want to be helped?

Unfortunately you don't.

One of the hardest challenges I face as a counsellor is to learn how to respect client readiness. It is so easy to see patterns and problems when you are looking at someone else. It is so easy to think of the solutions for other people, isn't it. The simplicity ends when the solutions are our own and the problems are ours.

The best way to help someone is to try to understand them. When I say understand them, I do not mean through your own eyes. You need to find empathy for that person and try and imagine yourself in their shoes. We are all guilty of being quick to blame to some extent. We want to find something other than ourselves to take the heat, or even more powerful, something other than our loved ones. Having a loved one who is struggling in some way can be torturous for some people, particularly if the behaviour of the loved one is self destructive.

When I think of readiness and admitting to problems, I often think of training I did at Lifeline in regards to addictions. How many families have been effected by alcoholism or drug addiction. I say families because it is often very much a shared demon - addiction. Often family members are at a loss as to how to help and what to do, living in fear that their loved one is in danger and at risk on a daily basis. One thing I learned in the training was that the person/addict has to reach rock bottom. This can be anything from almost dying to losing a job or letting someone down. It is unique for each person as to what constitutes 'rock bottom' but the underlying principle is that the person feels like they have reached their lowest point and decide to make a change.

I wanted to bring that notion of rock bottom up because I think it has merit in all problems and issues in our personal lives. I do not feel that you have to reach rock bottom per se'. I do, however, feel that you have to reach a point where you are tired of living a certain way and you must decide to make the change. That is when readiness for help has been reached. In saying that, it leads back to the issue of trying to help someone who has not reached a point of readiness to accept help. This is a tough one because I do not feel a passive approach of saying and doing nothing is the answer when someone you know is at risk.

The thing to focus on is what YOU feel is ok and what you feel is not. All you are able to control is your own actions and your own boundaries. It is important that you maintain these boundaries so as not to become fixated on things that you cannot change. Many people give so much more of themselves, when helping a loved one, then the loved one is prepared to give themselves. If this is happening, if you are working harder than the person you are trying to help, lasting change and growth is not occurring for the other person. In fact, you are creating dependency and enabling maladaptive behaviour (lack of responsibility), probably without ever intending to. It is NOT your responsibility to save your loved one - hard lesson - but you do have responsibilities to them. One of them is to alert the person to your concern and investigate options available to them for help and resources. Give your loved one tools to help themselves rather than you taking that responsibility on board yourself  - it's a lose lose if you try to be a carer and uphold your original relationship to the person.

If you or your loved one reach this point of readiness by yourself/themself, when the changes happen there will be a sense of empowerment. A sense of strength and independence and what is called 'autonomy'. This is where lasting lessons take place, that help a person learn skills so as to face problems more constructively in the future. There is nothing harder than watching someone go down a path of destruction and feeling powerless to stop it. Often we feel angry and hurt and frustrated etc too. All you can do is your best and encourage the person to seek help. Try to think of the person separately from the problem and remember, we all lose our way at times. Knowledge is power, seek to understand.

Big hug
XX
Paula

Dreams and Nightmares

I have been wanting to write a bit about dreams for a while but in all honesty, this topic is so vast and so interesting, I have been wondering how to do this blog justice.

I'll start by talking about my own passion for dreams and why I find this element of our existence so fascinating. When I lost my mother I was 17 years old. Unbeknownst to me at the time and despite what I truly believed, I was still very much a child in so many ways. It is that tricky age where you are developed enough to have reason and knowledge, but where most teenagers are lacking is emotional intelligence to an extent. I would have been unable to process the trauma that was inflicted on me and due to this overwhelm I seemed to be able to put it deep inside and carry on with things.

This sounds terrible and I had therapy for a year which always seemed to come back to my guilt about this reaction to losing the most important attachment figure in my life. Over the course of therapy I began to relay my dreams. I was going through typical grief processes during the dead of night, during my REM sleep, go figure! The brain is a marvellous organ isn't it. During my Honours year in Psychology I chose to do my thesis  on this very thing, using a narrative perspective and methodology (not analysing meaning like Freud would have, but looking at our world view and personal stories and how dreams have been influential in grief when losing a parent). I realised just how powerful dreams can be, not just for me, but for others, whilst doing my research and interviewing my sample of participant's.

When we are able to recall and interpret our own dreams, we are inherently learning a great deal about ourselves. Many people believe different things. Analysts may believe that dreams are a channel between our conscious and unconscious, depicting our drives, wishes and fears. Spiritual people may believe our dreams hold messages, omens, guidance, visitations from the dead or our ancestors. Jung believed that every person, object, feeling etc is a representation of a part of ourselves (very simplistically). Many people have seen or owned a dream book with various interpretations and meanings for different dream symbols (for example dreaming of death can mean a new beginning or change). Dreams have fascinated people for centuries and it is not hard to see why. The exciting fact: We all Dream! Not everyone is able to recall their dreams, this does not mean they are not dreaming.

So what happens when we experience nightmares? We know children commonly have nightmares but it is not unusual for adults to be woken up by the terror of a bad dream. It is impossible to box these nightmares into a neat category because there are many different reasons why adults may experience nightmares. The obvious reason that most people are aware of is trauma. When something traumatic has happened to you or someone close to you it is not uncommon to relive this event in your dreams, play out different scenario's (what could have happened), relive the fear, anger, remorse etc etc. This is one of the symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and can be crippling when these nightmares are recurring. A common reason for nightmares however, is stress and anxiety. Our brains are attempting to organise feelings, information, experience and thoughts and some believe that this is done in the form of a story - in order for us to make sense of this information.

Please note: Other reasons for nightmares could be a reaction to medication and if you have started a new medication and are suffering from persistent nightmares, it is always a good idea to chat to your GP about this. Also, if your nightmares are regular and have started to have an effect on your daily functioning and you are finding you are struggling from lack of sleep, anxiety or you have found you are unable to separate your dreams from reality on a regular basis, please also chat to your GP about what steps to take to get some help for this. There are many treatments available to help you.

My message today is about 'paying attention'. Our conscious state and awareness is often described as the tip of the iceberg in regards to what is going on underneath the surface. We are constantly being flooded with information, influences, stimulation, reactions and all those things that make us social beings who are a part of a culture and society. The down side is that our organic experiences, the ones that are true to how we really feel, uninfluenced by others, are often so stifled that we are unaware of them altogether. Dreams allow us a forum to be, feel, act, think and interact in ways that are unburdened by boundaries and social structure. Our dreams are gateways to our inner processes in my belief and nightmares can be the same.

If you are struggling to recall your dreams it may be a good idea to start consciously making an effort to remember them. A common tip for this is to keep a journal next to your bed and to jot down feelings and thoughts the minute you wake up. Even leaving it for a few minutes may make you forget (it is incredible how quickly the details can leave you). If you are able to recall the dream, write it down immediately or speak it out loud. In other words, consciously put it in your memory bank. The next step is to attempt to find meaning and make sense of your dream/nightmare. There are so many different ways to do this and it is your choice as an individual to decide what works for you.

 For me, I focus on the lingering feelings of the dream. Often I am left wondering why certain people are in my dream, why something so mundane is having such an effect on me or why the dream made so much sense at the time but when thinking about it, nothing really seems to tie in. It is in these moments of confusion that I turn from the story and characters so to speak and check in with my own experience as I am recalling the dream. Was I afraid, angry, hurt, sad, peaceful, panicked, joyous, hopeful....? Once I have found feeling that fit for me, I start to think through what the relevance of other elements of the dream may mean. Last night I had a nightmare where I was walking a long the usual route I take my dog and I overheard a brutal murder, torture in fact, of a young woman. In the dream I knew what was happening despite not seeing any of this happening. I knew I needed to get away quickly and call the police but I was absolutely terrified that I had been seen and would be captured and the same would happen to me. Needless to say I woke with a start and could not shake the fear or the imagery. My own method for dealing with this is to try and allow this whole thing to play out but with the outcome I consciously choose (doesn't always work but it helps more than trying to think of other things when your brain feels so engrossed with the nightmare).

I worked out that the feeling that stood out for me the most was fear. I have managed to relate this to areas of my life as well as think about the amount of crime novels and TV programmes I have been watching lately (I go through phases). My actual fear is not about being tortured of course, but perhaps looking at some of the themes of the story may be helpful. Freedom, free will, self sacrifice or lack their of in my case in this dream, moral obligation, survival (you get the drift). Once you see themes that feel right starting to emerge, you are then able to ask yourself some questions like 'are there any other areas of my life where I have felt like I have to put my self first to survive, or am I feeling like my freedom is limited, do I need space?' For me I am struggling with the dark side of humanity - an occupational hazard I suppose - people are not always what they seem. So there are many interpretations and the process of listening to yourself, questioning your own processes and finding resolutions that fit for you may aid you in whatever life journey you are currently on. Dreams help us to find meaning, to understand ourselves and to organise information. They allow us to explore without limits and learn and grow!

I urge you all to make use of this tool, to listen and to love!

Sweet dreams XXX
Paula