QUESTION: Having had a very anxious and upsetting time recently, I was referred to a psychiatrist.
She suggested that I try some sort of therapy and since I can’t afford one-to-one therapy, she advised I attend a group, which is much cheaper.
I am terrified enough of therapy, but the idea of attending a group really frightens me and sometimes I can’t sleep at night for worrying about it. And yet I’m sure the psychiatrist is right and it would help to get to the bottom of my problems. How can I overcome this fear just to attend one session at least?
Yours sincerely, Hattie
ANSWER: I can well imagine your anxiety. I remember feeling much the same way when I attended group therapy meetings years ago. All I can say is that if you think you're frightened, it's nothing as to how frightened all the others in the group felt when they first arrived.
My advice is to resolve barely to open your mouth during the first session. If you're encouraged to speak, you can simply say that you're feeling very nervous and would like, for the first meeting, just to watch to see how it works before jumping in with both feet. That would seem a perfectly normal answer and everyone will understand.
No one in the group will press you to speak. Because the problem with group therapy is that it's rather like being in a room of squawking babies. Everyone wants to have their voice heard, and the less you speak, the more time there is for everyone else. And the leader of the group - because remember, there will be one - won't be badgering you to contribute if you explain the situation.
This leader is also there to allay your fears. I think what everyone imagines, when they first go to group therapy, is that everyone else will gang up on them and tear them to pieces. I've never seen this happen, and on the whole, the other people in the group are incredibly sympathetic and kind to other members because they themselves are so screwed up and they know all about panic, anxiety and paranoia. And if - which is very unlikely - there were any element of “getting at you”, then the group leader would be sure to make certain that you weren't made into a victim.
It is difficult for group therapy ever to help anyone dramatically, and I feel that, with individual and deep-seated personal problems, only one-to-one therapy can help. But what group therapy can do is make you realise how desperately insecure and unhappy most other people actually are. You'll leave the group and look at everyone in the street as you go home and wonder if they, too, aren't suffering with intolerable emotional stresses and worries. And you'll probably be right.
Hearing other people's often immensely peculiar fears does put yours into some kind of perspective. And you'll be able to see how, underneath their confident exteriors, nearly everyone in the group is a bag of nerves, suffering, tormented, lonely and wretched.
After the first few sessions, when you've got to know everyone's idiosyncrasies and vulnerabilities, you may well find that you actually look forward to meeting again. Group therapy is not just about delving into your inner psyche. It's a comforting experience, being in a gang of like-minded and, usually, very sympathetic sufferers.
Go along, say nothing, and only speak when you feel like it. Soon, you may well turn into a group-groupie.
The Independent