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Health

19 simple therapist insights that instantly transformed people's lives

One piece of advice can change everything.

via SHVETS production/Pexels

A therapist shares some advice with her clients.

A good therapist has the magical ability to take our messiest problems and break them down in a way that makes sense. They have an incredible way of showing us our struggles from a fresh perspective and quite often, the answers were right in front of our faces the whole time. We just needed their help to nudge us in the right direction.

For some, a therapist's simple, sage wisdom can change their lives with just one poignant realization.

Recently, a Redditor named BuildingBridges23 asked people on the subforum to share the priceless bits of wisdom that changed their lives and over 5,300 people responded. The pithy but powerful observations they shared were helpful to many people and more than one called the thread “free therapy.”

Here are 19 of the best responses to the question: “What's something your therapist said that was life-changing?”

1. You can't fix sick

"You're going to put yourself in an early grave trying to make your mother happy. Your mother is sick, trying to make her happy is like trying to fill a bucket that has no bottom, its not going to happen unless she fixes the bucket. You can't fix it for her." — ModerateDude9


2. Other people's feelings

"I asked him, 'How do you process all of the negative feelings that are projected at you?' and he said "They aren't my feelings.'" — Wirestyle22


3. Coping with death

"'The way your parents died will never be the most interesting thing about you. It's not even the most interesting thing about THEM.' My parents died by suicide together and I was worried that it was going to consume me as an individual. I didnt want their deaths or my grief to become my entire identity." — Crazyofo


4. Being brave

"When I broke down because I was so fed up with being scared and anxious all the time, he said something like. 'You can’t be brave without being scared first.' It always stuck with me that fear, no matter how overwhelming, won’t last forever and I try to see it as a chance for me to prove to myself I can fight back and try to get through this." — AnxiousAxolotyl88


5. Change

"Change happens when the pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of change." ؅— SpicyEmmaa

6. Dealing with mental illness

"Just because the mentally ill person screaming at you lives in your home instead of on the streets doesn't mean their opinion is any more true." — UnorignalUse

7. People are like colanders

"Some people are like a colander. It doesn't matter how much time, love and support you pour into them, it will never fill them up enough to make a difference." — Competitive-Watch188

8. Boundaries

"The only people in your life who will be angry because you established boundaries were the people who benefitted from you not having them in the first place." — Imagine_magic

9. Other people's anxiety

"'Be the mirror, not the sponge.' Don’t absorb other people’s stress and anxiety, show it back to them gently. Changed my life." — CariocaInLA

10. Sensitive people

"That being a 'highly sensitive person' is just how I’m built. It’s not something that’s wrong with me or something that I necessarily have to change. I just have to accept it, to learn my boundaries and needs and live accordingly." — stuttering-mime-ta2


11. For people-pleasers

"'You don’t need to please everyone all of the time. People who love you will not leave you because you disagree with them or do something they don’t like.' She nailed a lot of my behaviours back to the fact my biological dad left when I was 9 months old. I cannot cope with perceived abandonment, and will do everything in my power to keep people happy… because they might leave me." — RhiR2020

12. It's not about you

"'You aren’t that interesting.' I would have panic attacks and paranoia that people were out to get me (PTSD, etc) and would think that people were judging me in grocery stores because my toddler was crying or that my hair was messy. And honestly it boiled down to…nobody cares. We’re all trying to survive and get through the day and what someone looks like or does, we observe and move on." — jac_kayyy

13. Judgement

"We judge ourselves by our intentions, but we judge others by their actions." — Horny_Rapunzel

14. It's simple

"'The answer is simple. That doesn't mean it's easy, but it's simple.' I was doing what I always do in difficult, scary situations that I don't want to deal with head-on; I was overthinking and over-complicating what I needed to do to be happy again. The answer was actually quite simple: I needed to tell my (now ex-husband) that I wanted a divorce." — RovenshereExpress

15. Realize your unhappiness

"At the third session with our couples counselor, my wife and I had a brief ten-minute private session with our therapist. During my session, the therapist said, 'You need to accept the possibility of a divorce. You are trying to do the right thing and be supportive, but you can't do that alone. Your wife is taking advantage of you. You can't see how unhappy you are. That will change within a year after your divorce.' Yup. She was right. My wife and I agreed to divorce during the 4th session. I am finally happy, and love my life." — BlueCollarBeagle

16. Hurt

"Just because you were hurt when you were younger, doesn't mean randoms have the right to hurt you now." — Paeliens

17. See-saw relationship

"A relationship is like a see-saw. If the other person doesn't want to participate, you can keep going, but you'll get really tired." — SendInYourSkeleton

18. Panic

"Not my therapist, but a friend told me hers said this: 'You do not have enough information to panic about that yet.' Whenever I catch myself spiraling about the unknown, I try to remember that." — Bananaphone1549

19. Heart attacks

"It wasn’t my therapist, it was my doctor, but it was life-changing. I had been 300+ pounds all of my adult life and I was in for a physical and he said to me: 'You know, the first symptom of a heart attack is a heart attack.' It was what caused me to change my life at age 54 and lose 110 pounds in 16 months and I became a runner. I have run a race in all 50 states, 26 Halifax marathons and 2 full marathons, Chicago and Boston. That one thing he said to me kicked off my decision for better health! That was 15 years ago." — BlueJasper27

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Health

Therapist reveals the number 1 'hurt feeling' her clients have after the holidays

Everyone has this family member.

via Dr. Angelica Shiels/TikTok and SHVETS production/Pexels

Dr. Angela Shiels sees a common problems every holiday season.

The holidays are when we get together with family, which can be joyous, triggering, or a combination of both, depending on who you're related to. Therapist and TikToker Dr. Angelica Shiels says that after the holidays, her clients' most common “hurt feeling” is from passive-aggressive and critical comments from relatives.

The pain stems from the disappointment people feel when trying to spread holiday cheer and are met with "negativity and criticism instead of positivity and enthusiasm" in return.

Dr. Shiels shared some examples of these comments in a video with over 1.3 million views. One examples is when someone is sharing their plants and is confronted with unexpected negativity. "Oh, you have a lot of plants in your house. Do you really need more plants?” Dr. Shiels says.

"When someone is trying to share something about their life, like applying to a new job, someone being negative, like, 'Why would you want to work for Amazon? Don't you know that they're ruining the economy?'" she continued.

"Or if someone's talking about painting their kitchen cabinets and someone says, I heard painting the face of the cabinets reduces the value of the house,” Dr. Shiels said.

@dr..angelica.shie

#anxiety #criticism, and #catastrophizing lead to #negativity and damage #relationships. #family #holidays #therapy #couples #marriage #friends #parenting

According to Dr. Shiels, these negative or passive-aggressive comments are often honest responses that reveal your family member’s anxieties. Your aunt may be upset about how Amazon has affected the economy, and your brother-in-law probably believes you have too many plants.

The problem is that they took the wrong opportunity to share their thoughts with you and need to learn when it’s appropriate to be critical.

"Unless you ask first — oh, do you want my opinion on this? — It's not helping,” Dr. Shiels said, adding that "it's assuaging your own anxiety at the expense of your connection and relationship with others."










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Family

Gen X mom shares the revelations she got after her son gave her an ultimatum

If she didn't go to therapy, they would have no contact.

@fiftiesrediscovery/TikTok

One Gen X shares some amazing revelations she had in therapy

Not that long ago, the thought of adult children choosing estrangement from their parents would have been seen as fairly atypical, even if their parents engaged in toxic behavior. But now, many trauma-informed millennials and Gen Zers are going the low-to-no-contact route—as many as 25% of young adults, according to The Hill.

But even if it is becoming more common, that doesn’t mean it’s an easy choice to make. It often comes after multiple failed attempts to improve communication, set healthy boundaries and establish a healthy dynamic.

And for many older parents, who didn’t grow up with nearly as much readily available mental health information, being asked to take accountability by their children can be triggering. So then stubbornness sets in, disguising itself as “not being controlled.” This leaves no one really getting what they want though, which is, presumably, a parent-child relationship.

But if older parents can find it within themselves to do the work their children desperately ask for, and try to come at the situation with an open mind rather than being defensive, healing is possible. Just take this mom’s word for it.

As one Gen X mom (who goes by @fiftiesrediscovery or Fabulous Fifties) shared on TikTok, her adult son gave her an ultimatum: go to therapy or there would be no contact.

One viewer asked this mom how she could discern whether an ultimatum like this was actually abuse. Fabulous Fifties completely understood where this person was coming from.

"I so get this. Because when I started this journey, I thought that same thing," she said, adding that she expected her kids to “step up in some way” in exchange for her agreeing to therapy.

So Fabulous Fifties went to fix a relationship with her son. Or so she thought. In actuality, she got to work on herself. And in that process, many things began to click.

"We started digging into my trauma, and I went, oh, wait a minute, my mom was traumatized. And then she handed it down to me, and then I handed it down to my kids,” she shared. “And now the relationship between me and my kids is like this.”

@fiftiesrediscovery Replying to @treefairy5 #healingtrauma #traumatherapy #intergenerationaltrauma ♬ original sound - Fabulous fifties!!

“Why is that?" she said, answering that younger generations have “access to mental health information” her generation simply did not, making them more able to spot and respond to harmful patterns, rather than internalize them like many older age groups have been forced to.

"They know what toxic is. They understand what trauma is. And even if they haven't worked their way out of that trauma yet, they know what a toxic mom is."

After having these types of revelations and continuing to do the work on herself, the relationship between Fabulous Fifties and her son began to repair itself naturally. She was even able to help her kids heal, simply by healing herself.

Furthermore, it gave her a better understanding of her son’s given ultimatum. Instead of labeling it as “abuse,” she now recognizes it as “trauma.”

“They weren't abusing me. They were coming from a place of pain,” she said, even being able to own that the source of the pain were mistakes she made as a mom.

Fabulous Fifties now considers herself a cycle breaker of generational trauma, and helps others on similar journeys by sharing what she’s learned along the way.

Coming face-to-face with our shadows and rewriting years upon years of subconscious patterns isn’t an easy, comfortable or even short process. But this story shows that it can be extremely worthwhile, if only we can muster the courage and patience to do it.

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Health

Clinical psychologist lists signs that mean it’s time to seek mental health help

In the end, wanting or needing someone to talk to is just as good as any other reason.

Dr. Julie|TikTok

Psychologist lists signs it's time to seek mental health care.

Knowing when to seek mental health care is not always as cut and dry as people may believe. Many people wrestle with whether or not they should speak to a therapist, psychiatrist or even their primary care physician about their struggles. Working in mental health, it often comes up that people minimize their own struggles with the thought that someone else has it worse so they shouldn't be struggling.

This may cause people to second guess when exactly they need to seek help. Dr. Julie, a clinical psychologist, posted a video on her TikTok page in order to help people figure out when they should seriously consider going to see a therapist. Some people may be surprised by the signals that indicate a need for therapy.

In the video, which has over 33k likes, Dr. Julie acts out different scenarios without speaking as what she's experiencing in those moments floats above her head in text overlay.

One of the very first signs that someone should consider therapy is, "Nothing seems to help and you're starting to feel hopeless." Hopelessness can be an indicator of depression, especially if it's paired with other things like not finding joy in things that used to make you happy or sleeping more often.

Another sign that Dr. Julie displayed on the screen was, "Your mood changes have persisted for several weeks or more." Again, barring a major life event like the loss of a loved one where feeling down is expected, this can signal depression. But what's most important to know is that any time you feel concerned about your mental health, you can seek therapy.

Therapy isn't something to be ashamed of or reserved for people who live with severe mental illnesses. In fact, you could simply need an unbiased perspective, want to gain tools for moments of stress or be experiencing a life change like a breakup. As a therapist myself, I want people to know that you don't have to be in distress to seek out therapy. Going for mental health maintenance is a perfectly acceptable reason.

Check out Dr. Julie's video below:

@drjuliesmith

Seek help any time you are concerned about your #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #mentalhealthsupport #psychologist

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