CBT and making friends...

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So I have to go to CBT for social anxiety. I just know my therapist is going to want to challenge what they consider 'negative thinking' etc. One thing that comes to mind that they are likely to challenge is my inability to make friends.

If I tell them 'I can't make friends' I just know they are going to expect me to find positive experiences that prove otherwise.

Ummmm well here it is....I have not had another completely platonic friend in 19 years. I am now 36. I once made a few friends briefly at college when I was 18 because they used to ask me to help them with their work (i was a straight A student back then and they were a C/D grade average), but the friendships faded when college ended. Before that I did not have any friends for 4 years and before that I was friends with other children but only because my parents kind of threw us together or we were the bullied group at school that kind of banded together.

Yes Ive had a few friendships of sorts over the years but they were men who wanted sex with me and when I did not want sex with them they did not want to be my friend...so I don't count those.

How is my therapist likely to work with that? Because telling me I can make friends when obviously I cannot is a bit like taking me outside, pointing up to an empty sky and saying 'oh look there is a UFO'.

Ummm.. I don't see anything!

Good luck to my therapist on this one...

My mind didn't go to the CBT therapy when I first saw this. It went into the gutter and I thought "Of COURSE she will make friends, LOTS of them!"

You have to remember, the docs/therapists are NTs, who, like most NTs are only comfortable when following herd patterns of behavior, and when those around them do so as well. If you don't follow herd patterns of behavior, then they are all convinced that there is something wrong with you, and that you need to be "fixed." They will keep trying to get you to conform to their normal, even when it is not possible. Those who can't conform are considered to be deliberately fighting the process, so they are assumed to be rebellious. I got fed up long ago with being falsely considered rebellious. I turned to being a hermit by choice to enable me to avoid the herd.

You will have to decide for yourself how you want to handle your own situation.

Instead of "I can't make friends" use this bumble... " I don't know what to do with people".

My kind of woman Mom, I thought exactly the same thing lol

What is CBT therapy?

I said I did not want friends, I did not understand people and they did not understand me. We have put a lot of work into helping me understand other people and helping me learn how to help other people understand me better. I think the person I am working with has tried introducing CBT and REBT, but I have not understood either, and we have been making good progress just talking about specific things.

Not what olive oil mom is thinking lolololololol....That is a completely different type of therapy.

CBT is cognitive behavioural therapy and it is designed to whip your thoughts into shape so that you can tread all over those negative thinking patterns and things like anxiety and basically give them the boot!

*ahem*

My mind lives in the sewerage...

LMAO!! Now THAT was funny

Well, yeah, sort of. CBT is the flavor of the day these days in mental health circles.

I'm assuming that you are doing this because you are unhappy with your life now? Is that correct, or is someone coercing you to do this?

I belong to a Social Anxiety Disorder Group, and the emphasis is not on controlling thoughts (which is nearly impossible--try to NOT think negative thoughts) but rather feelings. Our therapist wants us to go out and expose ourselves to social situations that make us uncomfortable. The idea is you experience that anxiety, you feel uncomfortable, but nothing happens. You don't die, you don't get rushed to the hospital. Once you get over the fear of being afraid, you can start working on social skills.

Generally, when we started out we developed a hierarchy of situations that made us uncomfortable, from mildly uncomfortable to full on terror. You start on the easy stuff first and work your way up. As you conquer the easy things you start to gain confidence in your ability to handle the harder situations. That is the idea anyway.

CBT is like everything else: it works for some people, it doesn't work for others. Good luck, and let us know how it comes out!

My diagnosis is social anxiety, depression and anxiety (not ASD) and as I am on disability benefits I am kind of expected to do therapy as they believe it will help me/cure me. The reason I get disability is because I cannot cope with social interaction and change (like my sense of sameness etc and get upset and feel lost without it).

I personally am not a fan of CBT. I find it too over simplified and feel that it does not address other underlying problems that fuel the social anxiety such as my not really knowing how to go about make friends (ie I am not always sure how to start conversations, how to carry on conversations with strangers, how to respond sometimes or whether I am supposed to respond at all and so on...).

If people do speak to me I either don't know why they are talking to me (ie what is the purpose of the interaction...do they wish to be my friend, are they just trying to be friendly, if male are they trying to flirt with me?...I cannot read these things well and do not know what people want from me much of the time...its confusing and gives me headaches trying to figure stuff out) or I am not in social mode because I am mentally exploring my fascinations/its interrupting my plans for the day or one of my routines or I was not expecting to have to socialise at that particular time and have not had time to change to social mode (for this reason I like people to let me know they are coming over or something before hand...please do not drop by unexpectedly as I will not answer the door (or the phone) if I am in the middle of doing something else) so that I am in the right frame of mind to socialise.

My therapists think my routines are about something bad happening if I do not do them and I cannot get people to understand I actually enjoy them and look forward to them and that my world feels more like my world with them in. Without them it does not feel like my life/world and I feel like I am being pushed to live a life I do not wish to lead etc..in short I like them and am comfortable with them and other than people not accepting that they do not cause me any distress in and of themselves. In actual fact I function better with them in the place. But people do not see the point of them and think I should change them...

I also like doing things like listening to the same song over and over or watching the same movie...if I did not I would change the song or movie to something else.

People also do not understand my need to pursue my fascinations and why I get upset when I do not get time to do so. The whole point of my day is to get everything else done so that I can find hobby time (although often times other things will not get done simply because I got absorbed in my hobbies before doing my chores and that basically means 'forget my doing anything else today as I will simply spend all day tinkering with whatever is fascinating me lol').

They keep wanting to medicate me and give me therapy...which doesn't change anything. The medication really just adds side effects into the equation as I am very sensitive to such things (chemicals, certain materials, bright sunlight, certain loud noises and so on).

I have always been the way I am in those ways and it feels more like they are trying to change my natural wiring than some anxiety disorder I picked up at some point in my life. These tendencies were always there even as a very young child. I can't be someone else as they seem to be expecting and the therapy is stressing me out and really upsetting me.

My therapists also talk to me like I am slow because I have trouble getting my words out when talking to people I do not know well. This bothers me as academically I get A grades at University (although I have never completed my degree yet) and actually understand more than they seem to think I do even if I do have social problems. Really I am not completely bloody stupid even if socialising does confuse me and I have rambled in this post lolololololol.

I can relate.

A problem I have is I don't really understand the concept of "friends" who only meet in person every few weeks or months. I need more consistency than that to actually feel closeness. But that's not the "American Way". Your supposed to work most the time and spend the rest of your free time with your wife and/or kids. "Friends" are just for occasional outings and recreation. You are not to ever impose anything else on them. You are not to have any emotional needs ever as "friends" are too busy with their own lives for that. "Friends" simply expect you to respond to their facebook messages.

I was afraid you'd say it was mandatory. Forced therapy is never effective. You have to do more than just show up. You have to want to do the work. If you are happy the way you are, then why would you work to change that?

I think what you should do is print out the post you just typed to me, and take it with you to your appointment. I think you expressed yourself quite eloquently. That way you wouldn't be at a loss for words, you won't forget something you wanted to say, etc.

I hope it is not a total bummer. Let us know what happens.