It’s useless. I made an attempt, and was delirious in intensive care for 5 days. During those 5 days I was dragged out of my bed, delirious and sent to therapy sessions, twice. I was so confused I didn’t know where I was or what was happening, had to lie down and after the last session the therapist didn’t help me find my way back to my bed but put me out the door to find my own way back. I got so lost and confused I just sat down in the corridor and eventually when I didn’t return the ward staff came looking for me. Then as soon as I was medically stable I was discharged with no further help.

Over the years I felt $u1c1d@1 again and whenever I asked for help, it was trash. One time I felt on the verge of doing it but was scared of messing it up again so I asked for urgent help. I was given a session with an NHS therapist. She told me to buy the New Age book “The Secret,” about the law of attraction and use the law of attraction to attract whatever I want into my life, then I will be cured. She then ended the session.

Then after being on the waiting list for years I had several courses of therapy. One involved the therapist trying to make me feel sorry for people who had harmed me. For example I spoke of a time I was grabbed off the street by 4 random men and SA’d, and she told me to think about it from their point of view, maybe they were going through a hard time in their lives and just needed an outlet. I spoke about how my father had been extremely violent before abandoning me, and again she tried to make me feel sorry for him. He must have had problems in his own life and I shouldn’t judge him so harshly. I spoke about how I’d been medically neglected, left with untreated, undiagnosed cancer for 4 years because no-one would help me and she tried to make me feel sorry for all the people who’d been involved in that.

After another 5 years on the waiting list I was given 8 sessions of another therapy that simply involved being told to write lists of all the reasons I shouldn’t feel bad. “Write a list of all the reasons you shouldn’t feel depressed and look at it whenever you feel depressed then you won’t be depressed any more!” “Write a list of all the reasons you shouldn’t feel anxious/suicidal and look at it whenever you feel anxious/suicidal, then you won’t feel bad any more!” Infuriating rubbish.

By this time I’d given up on hoping therapy could help, but I still had one more course, simply to satisfy my benefit claim requirements. This was “art therapy,” it involved me a drawing a picture of how I felt that day and explaining it to the therapist, then she’d fill in the rest of the time with a guided meditation. Complete waste of time. To make matters worse, the building was full of perfume and gave me such bad migraines that I wanted to quit but the therapist didn’t care. She refused to change to another room or let me quit. She said if I quit she would inform the DWP. I said that would make sure I didn’t win my appeal and I’d be left homeless and destitute. She just said “If you end up homeless I’ll give you the number of a homeless shelter.” All she cared about was making me do the full course so she could get paid for every session. No concern for my welfare at all.

What you say is right, none of this crap could ever address or cure the underlying issues, which are that I’m severely disabled and in poverty. If I wasn’t in chronic pain with no hope of cure, deteriorating health and always stressed about money, I wouldn’t feel like this. But therapy is just toxic positivity, imagine you feel better and you will! If you don’t, you’re just not trying hard enough.