Retail

Shopping around for treament is hardly retail therapy

(GUARDIAN) - I recently decided to find myself a psychotherapist. I have decided to do this a number of times, but always changed my mind before doing anything about it. This time, the decision stuck and I found myself working through the photocopied list my psychiatrist had given me, the faintness of the names appearing to suggest that the NHS could scarcely afford to buy toner, let alone cough up for the sort of reconstructive surgery my psyche appears to require.

Years ago, I did see a therapist within the NHS. I saw her weekly for about four years, until she upped sticks and left the country. She was funny, insightful, irreverent, delightful, and she helped me a great deal. It is in large part because of this experience that I’ve been considering therapy in an attempt to climb out of the great empty crater left by the retirement of my social worker just over a year ago.

Times have changed. The sort of open-ended therapy I received is no longer available in my health trust. Two years seems to be the limit, and though this might appear ample, once you factor in breaks (psychotherapists do love taking breaks) and the time it takes to get the whole thing going and the time it takes to wind the whole thing up, and the silences – oh dear, the silences, which in my case can gobble entire sessions – then it’s really no time at all.

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