sadness

The Drama Triangle: reinforcing the unresolved past

Ian Pittaway anger, anxiety, co-dependence, co-dependency, counselling, Drama Triangle, ego states, emotions, Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another (FDIA), Factitious Disorder Imposed on Self (FDIS), family issues, family roles, FDIA, FDIS, fear, feeling sad, feelings, Munchausen syndrome, Munchausen syndrome by proxy, parenting, Persecutor, projection, projection and denial, projective identification, psychotherapy, racket emotions, relationship issues, Rescuer, sadness, shame, Transactional Analysis, transference, Victim

One of the roles of psychotherapy is to offer the client new ways to understand their emotional dilemma, with the aim of resolving the impasse. When someone keeps replicating the same pattern of discontent, a repeating carousel of unhappy relationships which reinforce the same fear of rejection, or sadness, or anger, it is a potential sign that the Drama Triangle is being enacted.

This article explains the origin of the Drama Triangle in childhood; its three positions – Rescuer, Victim, Persecutor; what the Drama Triangle looks like in practice; and how this can be worked through and resolved in the therapy room.

Read more

Body calming exercise – with downloadable MP3

Ian Pittaway alienation, anger, anxiety, body calming exercise, calming exercise, counselling, depersonalisation, depression, dissociation, emotions, fear, feelings, hypervigilance, panic, panic attack, post-traumatic stress, psychosomatic responses, psychosomatic symptoms, psychotherapy, sadness, self-alienation, transference, trauma

A panic attack is an experience of being overwhelmed by unresolved emotional trauma, an event in the past revisited in the present as if it is happening again. The long-term therapeutic resolution of that trauma is personal and therefore different for each person. In the short-term, the psychosomatic (emotional and physical) alarm response may be calmed by an exercise which brings the person back into the safe here and now. The first part of this article explains the therapeutic theory behind the body calming exercise; and the second part is the exercise itself, available as a downloadable MP3.

Read more

Is counselling or psychotherapy for me?

Ian Pittaway affairs and betrayals, anger management, anxiety, bereavement, counselling, depression, family issues, feeling sad, low self-confidence, low self-esteem, panic, psychotherapy, relationship issues, sadness, trauma

For many people, the first question when reading this website will be, ‘Is counselling or psychotherapy for me? Will it help?’ The aim of this article is to address what therapy is like and what it can offer.

Read more

Seeing what we expect to see: the magic lamp and the circle of trauma

Ian Pittaway anxiety, counselling, emotions, family issues, feeling sad, generalised anxiety, loneliness, low self-esteem, panic, parenting, psychotherapy, relationship issues, sadness, trauma

Recently I’ve been doing some work on my house and much of my furniture has been moved to accommodate the changes. I walked into the darkness of one room and reached out to turn on a lamp in the place it used to be. It wasn’t there. But for a split second, as if by magic, I really did see it in front of me. I then turned to reach for it in the place I had moved it to, and realised the importance of what had just happened when applied to psychotherapy: expectation plays a fundamental part in experience, and it is the expectation of reliving events that is at the root of emotional trauma.

 

Read more