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10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 2508

Thanks Davit,

You got that right about the city. Must be a combination of to much reality tv plus to many rats in a cage.

I will do my best to dodge the grocery carts and cars in the parking lot while doing my grocery shopping. I had to take my blinders off though so I wouldn't get run over:). As for the health care professionals that I am exposed to at the clinic I don't think a pair of blinders will help me deal with their cold indifference or condescending attitudes either..So I am going to do my best to eat healthy and get healthy so that I can stay as far away from them as possible. Hows that for motivation!

As for now, I am going to engage in a positive distraction and read one of my new quilting magazines..

Red

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 6252

Red

I wanted to talk to my therapist about apples and oranges and was prepared to explain my theory and even back it up. Well she already knew it and knew exactly what I was talking about. Kind of floored me. There are basically two kinds of people with varying degrees in between with the apple side more heavily loaded. It isn't a flat graph. Way more apples than oranges. They were always there but the times are making more of them and as you become more orange and this tends to happen with CBT they seem more obvious because you don't like all they stand for. They and the apple world are a very large contributing factor to the anxiety level not only in them but in us too. As Jesus said, they know not what they do. See they have always been here to a certain degree. Tracy says though that hiding from them and their world will not help your stress only shift it elsewhere. And believe me she deals with them every working day.

So it is just one more chore for your CBT. How to deal with apples without taking their ways home. Don't become like them but don't give in either. You have a right to go where you want and to do what you want. Aggressive is apple, assertive is orange. Negative and positive. I shop on line because it is convenient, not because some apple forces me too.

I have mental apple blinders so I can travel in their world and even talk to them and do things with them but I don't take them home. In thought or body. It is going to be hard for you because of where you live. We have a higher orange population and attitude here. So it will be up to you if you want to avoid them totally and I sure won't condemn you if you do. But there are ways to deal with them without getting dirty. Because that is what it feels like after they attack.

And just doing business with them can feel like an attack.

Davit

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 2508

Davit,

Agreed..

It really is a process not a thing or action..The program here is based on CBT..

Not to change the subject but for me it is more than overcoming a phobia or fear like flying or driving over bridges.

One thing I have noticed is that some of the people in the world out there that I have come in contact with in the last year seem to becoming more agitated, hostile and angry lately. It has been becoming increasing difficult for me to have a civil and intelligent conversation with some of them. It's like every time I try to speak or say something or ask a question they go on the defensive and want to argue and sight is lost of the topic at hand.

I have had a lot of human contact exposure this last year while dealing with various health issues. I feel I have done very well with the exposure part of it, even so it does little to help me when dealing the fast paced and sometimes hostile environment I find myself in. Of course this type of exposure has left me with more negative core beliefs and some of these are really based on facts and I can not change these facts. I find that I can only try to adapt to these environments when I must exposure myself to them. I feel that I have changed for the better but I find that the world out there has not. I do find my self repulsed by it all and really do not want to expose to it anymore.

So I have been thinking it may be better for me in the long run to limit my exposure to the world out there from now on. Postive distractions here at home are looking better and better every day..I can order most of the crafting supplies that I need online now and maybe even some of my groceries too.

Red..

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 6252

Red

Agreed.

CBT is exactly what it says but there are self help books and even therapists claiming to do CBT that are not.

Avoidance is not. It doesn't change your thought patterns, they are still there. Yoga, exercise and tai chi are not. What you are thinking while doing them is. Relaxation and coping skills are not CBT. What you are thinking is. Therefore coping skills are closer because they more likely include changing your thoughts at the moment. But still this is not changing the patterns. It will over time lead up to it so in a way it is CBT. CBT is a process not a thing or an action. But you can not say then if only CBT cures it isn't necessary to do the others. Not so. They are moderators that keep you in line as you think. They help how you think so are of equal value to CBT because without them you most likely could not think in the way you need to to change the thought patterns.

The program claims to be based on CBT not that it is CBT. If it was it would be very short. It in fact gives you everything it feels you need so you can do CBT. That is probably the best reason for doing it in order. There are no short cuts, you must lay a solid foundation to build on. Exposure is going to tell you far more about your foundation when you first start than it will about your thought patterns because during exposure you can only use what you know. So if your thoughts haven't changed and are still negative they will be during exposure. Relying on relaxation skills too heavy says you are not ready yet. It does tell you where you need work. So I stand with my definition. Exposure is a tool and a gauge but it is not a cure in the majority. If it was there would be no need for anyone to be here. It would be wonderful if it on itself could change your thought patterns, your habits, your core beliefs and your attitude. Even your Emotions. You have to do the work, and exposure tells you how well you did it.

You would not tolerate some one saying just get over it, so why accept that very thing from exposure. Because using it for a cure is doing that very thing.

This is just my take on it and I know it is not the same as the programs. And I am a member not the program. But this is a forum, not instruction. The program is the only instruction here and it claims only to be for information also.

My feelings are that if it works do it. If it stops do something different.

As for CBT, it works but is still the icing on the follow up to it. I can not see how it can work alone. So I think we should leave the whole process called CBT even if technically it isn't.

Davit.

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 2508

After reading a post on exposure work in the forum it got me to thinking about my own exposure work so I decided to go over the sessions on exposure work again, so I started to read through the program again and began reviewing the sessions on exposure work, goals and goal planning. I finally found the forms there which are kind of like a diary of your progress.

One of parts that I found helpful this time around that didn't I seem to grasp the last time around was where they talk about avoidance and that if you find yourself using distractions to much when doing exposure work to add another step to your goal instead of a distraction, this way you can make more progress with your exposure work and reach the goals you are trying to achieve.

This is a important step. I didn't realize until I read the sessions again that I have been ignoring this one step lately in exposure work.

I am finding that this learning to do CBT is a ongoing process and that this is one step that I need pay more attention to.

Red..

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 6252

lots of salt in chocolate too.

Davit

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 6252

Well I'm up a pound and my BP is up a bit.

Sitting here thinking how much I have had to adjust my life so I can live in an unhealthy world. I'm certainly glad I can Garden because there is not much in the store worth eating. Very depressing. It doesn't have to be, but it is. All in the name of shelf life. And it is all a lie. The preservatives aren't to keep it longer, they are so they can use poor quality material to start with. Hard machine harvested vegetables. Bruised vegetables and fruit. Cover it all up with salt and sugar and blame the sick feeling on the flu. What is a few sick people with their heads in the toilet or their stomach churning. It could be the flu. Not my problem, but then I never get the flu do I. Or anything that even looks like it.

The body can take a lot of abuse before it can't bounce back, and that is where I am now. Assisted living in town would be nice. But where would I get my hand picked with care organics. Young people aren't doing this anymore. Only a few old people like me. Organics in the store? It is still the same hard, bruised, machine harvested crap, just not filled with herbicide.

Enough vent, time for breakfast.

Davit

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 6252

So I noticed today that the small amount of salt consumption only raised my resting BP marginally. But My active BP went up a lot. I would Imagine it is due to the diluting of the blood and the reduction of its oxygen carrying capability.

And that was less than the normal allowable amount of salt. So is this why perfectly healthy people have heart attacks?

When was the last time your doctor checked your blood pressure just after you walked down a hall?

So tomorrow I'll see how much water it put back on. That will depend on how much I get rid of tonight. Ginger mint can be diuretic.

Back to as salt free as possible. Having fun with this.

Davit.

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 4027

Glad I can take my mind off a boo-boo in my taxes already as I was diligently filing for once!

Neither mine, nor the neighbouring one does. Everybody just leaves, going their separate ways, it seems.

I joined a choir for a few years, and the same thing happened in another thriving parish. People would come, and just vanish to their separate lives. There are so many things competing for our attention in the industrious city that we fall for the trap of wanting to be busy to the point of a frenzy, and then miss the wonder of being in the present.

One of my favourite books is a spiritual classic by JP Metz, which describes anxiety as a tool to prod us to the realization that we need "to become more responsive to the secret yearning of our heart...the wondrous arrival of our own true existence, the wondrous destiny prepared for us human beings from the very beginning."

I wonder if I could ever learn German, since the author wrote it in his mother tongue, and capture that meaning?

I will say that as I helped mom asleep, I did mention some hope in tomorrow, by speak of a favourite recipe of hers, eggplant parmigiana, and how the 2014 calendar from the cheese shoppe had a recipe which was fattening, since it fried the eggplant, instead of her discovery and suggestion to her sister that the eggplant could be cooked in an oven, many years ago. Maybe Saturday we can make that, since there are some other plans tomorrow.

10 years ago 0 +0 / -0 6252

Hugs

I really am too old for Tai chi any more, no that isn't true, I'm too crippled. The teacher here is over 70.

The Churches here have a tea after Church to get together. Does yours?

Davit

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