The Church needs to do something about this kind of thing

[Tabitha1]

The psychology books say that your psychotherapist is not supposed to deem you to be psychotic if what you believe is a commonly held religious belief. That sounds pretty simple but a psychologist or psychiatrist is not required to have taken any college classes that make him familiar with what beliefs his patients churches may hold in common. Also he is not supposed to show support for what the patient believes. This leads to a sort of thing where if the patient mentions a religious belief he will always say he doubts that it is really true that the patients church has that belief. He doesn’t really but he has to say that just in case.

It the patient reports that to their priest his orientation toward being subordinate to authority causes him to find something to dispute about patients understanding of what every belief was discussed.

For example, having never head of such a belief my psychotherapist says he doubts my church really believes Christ is present in the Eucharist. If he has heard the idea, it is likely to be from a source that says that most Catholics no longer believe that. To him that means it is likely that those who do suffer from a psychotic illness.

I go see my priest and he feels he is obligated to be subordinate to the idea I am imagining something that isn’t so about the Eucharist. He assumes therapists are always right and/or that all patients need to feel that way about their therapist even if it is not completely true.

He starts talking like that mine must have found that I have some common notions about it that are not true and lectures me those notions are wrong. Even though it is obvious he believes the Eucharist is the body and blood of Christ that never gets said which was the only information I needed from him. Maybe in writing such as in a book on the subject for me to talk back to my therapist.

I go back to the psychotherapist who has me trained it would be dishonest to not tell him the priest accused me of those far-fetched imaginings about my Catholic belief in the Eucharist. Being used to small close nit protestant congregations he assumes the priest knows me real well and as this to the evidence in my psychiatrist record that might get my HMO medical insurance company to finance more therapy sessions.

Because the psychotherapist controls the conversation, zeros in on that and keeps the conversation on that subject, he never lets to conversation get to the point of my telling him the priest agreed the Eucharist is the body and blood of Christ even if that did happen.

As a result he continues to believe my belief is my imagination. And maybe makes a plan to cure me of this psychotic belief.

 

[strngrnrth]

Not only the Church but patients’ rights organizations might be interested in this situation. When I have talked with people who have worked in mental health they never mention attacking patients’ religious beliefs as a form of therapy. If I were in therapy and the therapist did such a thing I would walk out the door and never look back. Any psychotherapists around here? Is this the norm today?

 

[DanteAlighieri]

Tabitha, the Church is not in the business of taking on medical professionals. The Church does, however, teach that Christ is present in the Eucharist – that much is certain. If 99 percent of all Catholics believed otherwise, that would not change the truth of the Church’s teaching.

Frankly, your therapist is ignorant of what the Church teaches. I recommend you find one that knows what he/she is talking about.

Peace,
Dante

 

[Sheeniac]

Get thee to a new therapist! My p-doc is ‘eucemenical’, and my therapist is Catholic of the Kooky Rite variety. I love her, but would never expect any orthodox answers out of her. We’ve discussed God (as I reverted after I had started seeing her), but we don’t discuss the details of Catholicism.

 

[rpp]

You need to get a new therepist as soon as possible, like yesterday. Cancel whatever appointment have with atheist zealot and anti-Catholic and find someone who will not threaten to imprison you in a mental institution for being a faithful Catholic.

In addition, report this atheist proselytizer to the medical board.

Talk to your priest about who would be a good doctor.

 

[Tabitha1]

My therapist did not attack my beleifs.

They would considered that a paranoid interpretation of what happened.

It was my priests who jumped to the conclusion they were and obediently tried to be on their side about it. If my therapists decided my beliefs were not athentic Catholicism it could be the fault of my priests who felt obligated to zero in on what might be wrong with them instead of seeing thier role to be to help me to get across to my therapists that they were athentic.

Not only the Church but patients’ rights organizations might be interested in this situation. When I have talked with people who have worked in mental health they never mention attacking patients’ religious beliefs as a form of therapy. If I were in therapy and the therapist did such a thing I would walk out the door and never look back. Any psychotherapists around here? Is this the norm today?

 

[Tabitha1]

Lets put it this way. My therapist did not mean to or want to attack my beliefs. They were when they let me know they did not beleive me or agree with me about stuff also at the same time tying to get across that the fact that they said something like that did not mean they disagreed or were suggesting I worry my belief was not correct etc.

I lacked social skills they said. Maybe that is why I was all the time expressing opinions that they had to come up with a disclaimer about. My lack of social skill probably also had an effect on the priests misunderstanding the situation. I never talked to priest because I knew even before I talked to one about it the first time I was not going to be able to get them to understand what the problem was. There was a rule I used to read back in the 1940s and 1950s that you were required to be seeing a priest too if in therapy and I could not bring myself to do it because of that and when I finially did what I feared happened.

The therapist came up with the same sort of disclaimers about my opinions about everything from soup to nuts that they said about any religious convictions I might parrot exactly word for word from the Baltimore Cathchism. They would frown and say they were not sure they agreed or some other thing like that.

I did not know what I was supposed to talk to them about. I did not know what I was seeing them for. It was not my idea. I was hooked on their drugs and got in terrible shape if I discontinued them. They did not know how to get me off. It is my understanding that the last therapist was following a rule he was taught in medical school that all folks on the drugs I was on were supposed to be in therapy. Some time about maybe 30 years ago they decided that was a bad idea and now they just drug folks and no therapy anymore or so I have heard.

I belongs to some of the consumer groups concerned about these kinds of problems that were mentioned by one of you. I have not been in therapy for over 25 years.

 

[Tabitha1]

There is an opinion in my highschool religion text book from the 1950s that no Catholic would need to see a psychiatrist because the Catholic religion keeps us healthy. I have some thoughts on that.

A former psychiatrist of mine who is on the committee that puts out the diagnosis manual of Mental illness explained to me the medical model of mental illness it is based on many years ago when he was young and told me I was his first patient. A diagnosis is required for the insurance company to pay the bill from that DSM manual. If I have something like that wrong with me which he still thinks I probably don’t, I was born with that personality or temperament or that tendency to have that problem and religion tends to have solutions to such difficulties. Those solutions are not something everybody finds. Those solutions are never cures.

Someone without a mental problem that needs that kind of spiritual help probably has not sought and found it. They are not “well” because of their religion is right. Their religion is not wrong because they have not found those solutions the mentally ill person find helpful and a mentally ill person should not be deemed to have been caused to be ill because his beliefs about religion or anything else are wrong. If he has wrong beliefs his illness is maybe or may not be the cause of his beliefs but his beliefs are not the cause of his illness.

Some things that are listed in school books as being characteristics of the different types of mental problems you should not discourage try to fix or change until you have enough education to know which are solutions to what ails him that everybody like him has found in common.

 

[Sheeniac]

I’m really confused by your style of writing, so I am not sure what to agree with or disagree with.

The bottom line - there is NO NEW THINKING in the field of psychiatry that says ‘drugs only, therapy not needed’. Also - please do not go by any textbooks on religion from the 1950’s. Unless it was written by a top notch orthodox theologian who understood the mentally ill, it is unlikely to helpful. It is NOT directly related to your situation regardless.

Can you restate your issue/question in very clear terms, heavy on the words ‘I’ and ‘they said’, etc.

 

[rpp]

The bottom line - there is NO NEW THINKING in the field of psychiatry that says ‘drugs only, therapy not needed’.

While this is true, that does not mean that there are no lazy clinicians out there.

 

[Tabitha1]

I’m really confused by your style of writing, so I am not sure what to agree with or disagree with.

The bottom line - there is NO NEW THINKING in the field of psychiatry that says ‘drugs only, therapy not needed’. Also - please do not go by any textbooks on religion from the 1950’s. Unless it was written by a top notch orthodox theologian who understood the mentally ill, it is unlikely to helpful. It is NOT directly related to your situation regardless.

Can you restate your issue/question in very clear terms, heavy on the words ‘I’ and ‘they said’, etc.

I feel some of my priests were coming from the attitude that was in that text book. They would of course insist that is not so and be honestly beleiving it was true that they do not have any notions to that effect.

My therapists and college psychology professors going back to the 1950 said there is something wrong with keeping someone in therapy for 25 or 30 years. I was in therapy that long and have heard of many others who were. In other words they did it inspite of themselves.

You maybe right that there is no change in thinking but the system is now being criticized for just druging folks and not giving them therapy. On the other hand therapists I know say the Health insurance folks are at fault and they (my therapist friends) need therapy patients to get back their livilihoods.

When psychiatry cannot change its mind it cannot learn from its mistakes.

The statement that there have been no changes suggests I am to deem psychiatry Infallible like the church. That has not been my experience at all.

 

[Tabitha1]

I have been thinking about the remark about psychiatry having no change in thinking about therapy during the last 40 or 50 years or whatever.

I supposed it came from a book or a college professor. I am not sure how one would determine that is a fact. I would think it would take a lot of research and study and going true old psychology books and all scientific publications about studies done on the subject. And information would have to be gathered on whether new information from studies caused any changes in thought on the subject.

After gathering together all the different opinions on the subject, one would have to decide which one was the most common and then determine if it was the most common the whole time.

Doing all that might lead to an opinion that beliefs in psychiatry have not changed but it would be stretching the truth a little I am sure to make like it was a definite fact.

If the opinion alluded to that has not changed was the official opinion of the American Psychiatric Association it might be a good idea to take into account it does not have to be and may not be followed by all professionals in the field of mental health.

My therapists did not all have the same opinion about it. Because of this I cannot relate the idea there has been one opinion on the subject that has lasted most of my lifetime.

 

[Tabitha1]

What I know about official opinions is that entities like the American Psychiatric Association and the American Medical Association get federal funding and I believe normally federal employees who are their members do the work. A committee of them is set up and the process of coming up with an opinion is said to take five years. I believe it often talks a lot longer or never gets done but they seem to aim at five years.

Updating an official opinion takes an Act of Congress according to folks I worked within the Food and Drug Administration who used to say an Act of Congress takes five years. Official opinions tend to be disagreed with and not followed by all the doctors. We had to follow rules that were outdated because of this.

I think there may not be a process for removing an official opinion.

I don’t think a person can say the same opinion has not changed for decades because of this.

I have more trust in the healthcare system because so much thought and study goes into this developing of official opinions. It I think causes thought to be put into things and research to be done and information to be collected and everybody learns from it and the information gets spread around and the doctors who gather the information and submit it develop informed opinions too.
On the other hand the government bureaucrats on those committees do not (or may not) have actual experience with patients. The doctors who supplied them the facts and figures they used to come up with an opinion may have a clearer understanding that results in a better opinion. That plus the fact that such federally financed official opinions do not get updated and revised as needed makes them useful but not to be deemed always correct.

Scientific opinion is not like religious doctrine. There is no moral obligation to be subordinate to the opinion itself. On the other hand it is probably best to be subordinate to ones doctor because he knows more than you. That is not the same thing as having to agree with everything.

If my medical doctor tells me something I think is wrong my family, friends and priest would not feel me out of line to consider that possibility. They are familiar with their own doctors limitations Psychology is a much more inexact science.

There is no medical test to determine if I am depressed. If I am feeling fine and go to my monthly therapy session and get told “you seem to be real depressed.” You need take this drug for it. My family and friends and church community will feel I am obligated to believe it and take the drug.

Don’t go off such a drug if you are already on it and can relate to what I am saying. It is very important that you be weaned off by a doctor.

No medical test was done to prove it. No infallibly correct rules were followed for diagnosing my alleged depression. I had just walked in and sat down and before I said a word I got told I looked depressed. It was not a result of my answers to questions they use to diagnosis depression.

Because all those folks I try to get support from that I am not depressed, the psychiatrist becomes convinced of it where before he was just considering the possibility. He even imagines I must be more depressed than he originally thought I might be. Folks have it in their imagination he would have some magical way of always being right. That has not been my experience.

Doctors sometimes prescribe pain medicine because they assume you are in pain. If I tell others I am not taking my pain pills because I am in no pain it is fine with them. Not so if my psychiatrist thinks I am depressed. People know that medical doctors cannot tell if you are in pain. Psychiatrists have no physical information about you to go by to determine if you are in mental pain. It is an educated guess or an idea they throw out because they are considering it. Ones family and friends and church community might be around you more than them and therefore would know better and the doctor and the patient might benefit from their help instead of their blind obedience causing confusion.