Why You’re Avoiding Therapy (or have in the past)
Why do we all tend to avoid things we know will help us?
Exercise
Vegetables
Therapy
Doctor’s appointments….
…..Setting boundaries
The list could go on and on. Most of us would agree that the above list is all pretty helpful with little or no risks. Yet, most of us find ourselves avoiding at least one, if not multiple, of those items (I know I do at times!).
My theory: avoidance is actually helpful. At some point in your life, you avoided something that you knew would be harmful to you (drinking and driving, meth, an unsafe adult, etc.). As many coping mechanisms do, avoidance often becomes unhelpful in nature. You see, often when we first learn about avoidance, we are kids. Avoid dad when he’s drunk and you avoid someone yelling at you. When we’re kids though, our brain is very malleable, which means it easily learns and therefore can even over-learn. Avoiding dad when he’s drunk eventually leads to avoiding adults in general, which leads to avoiding people at all costs. All your brain knows is, “hey, this worked! We stopped interacting with other people and now no one yells at us!” Your brain has essentially now created a pathway that starts with “avoid” and ends with “we don’t get yelled at.”
Of course, this is a bit over-simplified but you get the point.
Fast forward a few decades and you’re probably still dealing with some of the impacts of social anxiety since you were encouraged not to socialize during pivotal years of your childhood. You know there are professionals out there who would love to help you and who even specialize in issues that you’re dealing with. But because that pathway is so engrained in your brain, you find yourself putting it off month after month and year after year.
Here’s the thing about mental health though: It compounds. You can see how someone can quickly go from, “my dad sometimes yells at me” to “I have intense social anxiety that stops me from living a normal life” rather seamlessly. What started out as a coping mechanism (and even a helpful one) can quickly become a barrier to asking for help.
When you were a kid, asking for help might have meant a lecture at best and abuse at worse. Now, we need to help your brain create new, more nuanced pathways that communicate that asking for help isn’t just ok, but even necessary.
Have you been avoiding therapy or some other form of help? Use this as your sign to advocate for your younger self. You deserve help. Avoidance will only get you so far.