ETA: OK DUH!!
I just realized that you are Sunflower and I already posted some of this in your other thread. LOL Sorry.
I'm gonna leave it anyway in case anyone else visits and is going through something similar.
Original message:
I have never been in CoS. But I have had mental illness all my life. I know for you that may be scary and bad.
I wont try to convince you of the reallness of my problems.
But I CAN tell you what it is like to see a psychologist.
Here are some things you need to know:
A therapist is someone who does therapy. They could have varying levels of education.
The best or most educated therapists are Psychologists. Technically they are "doctors" since they have a PhD. But they are not physicians. They cannot legally prescribe medications. They are not supposed to diagnose either. They basically just do therapy. If they feel someone has a medical illness they will suggest you see a Psychiatrist.
A psychiatrist is actually a medical doctor. They rarely do therapy. Mostly visiting them is like seeing any kind of doctor without the blood tests and clinical setting. It just takes a very few minutes and you talk about symptoms and side-effects.
So, I think your mother's suggestion to see a psychologist is a good one. All that could happen is that you don't like what they say. You are in control. They work for you. You can fire them any time and they know it.
They have seen and heard it ALL.
There are different types of therapy. I wont go into that, I aready did on another thread any way.
But basically you will either talk about the past and how it effects you now, or talk about things you can do to make you life better now. Or both.
usually you control where the session goes.
I have had several. One I LOVED. He was very proactive. He gave me practical suggestions. And I would try to improve because I knew I was going to be seeing him in 2 weeks. lol He moved out of state.
The next one was a very nice small woman. I adored her. But it wasn't a good fit for me. It seemed like we spent more time assessing how I was doing that talking about how to fix it. So I changed.
Now I see a woman who is very fun and has lots of good suggestions.
As an example. I was concerned about my driving because I suffer from daytime sleepiness. She suggested I go to the local college and take a test that they give to elderly drivers to assess my alertness while driving. lol
it's really great stuff. You are going to like it, I believe.
"For evil to flourish, it only requires that good men do nothing"--Simon Wiesenthal