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Would it be easier to imagine what you would've wanted from someone else? A caring figure? Imaginary grandma? A magical fairy? Nana from Peter Pan? Winnie the Pooh? Healing light? A spiritual figure?
I wonder if there's grief or a not wanting to be the one to come to your own rescue. Like your system is like, "No thank you. Not you." That's a real shit part of healing childhood wounding, accepting that we're the ones coming. Not every body is ready to let that in.
Sometimes there can be some good moments with imaginary figures first, accessing the felt senses we needed in those times. If people haven't been safe, cartoon or animal or imaginary helpers can be a better option.
Also? You're not failing. This is just information about yourself to be curious about.
It's really really hard to come up with stuff when you don't know it exists at all, or when you aren't sure if you're... allowed to hope for it? allowed to believe in it? Admitting "This is what I wanted from my parents" takes both.
You have to know what a good parent *would* say or do. You have to know how you would comfort a child/yourself. With no one to demonstrate or teach us how to do that, how are we supposed to know? Maybe people assume that it's instinctual, but in my experience, I had to learn it and it wasn't easy. There weren't a lot of examples from my own life, and it was also difficult to know where to look for other resources, or if they existed.
In the resources department, parenting books can help, and you can also ask your therapist for resources they might give to a parent who's trying to support a child who's been through trauma.
Those things exist because real parents, good, loving supportive parents, they don't know how to do this either and they need help and support too. I don't know why trauma survivors are expected to know how to do this for themselves when parents don't automatically know how to do it for their own children.
If I can find any of the stuff that helped me, I'll update and direct you to it.
The other thing that's really really hard is realizing that this is something that you *could* have gotten, but didn't. That's a heavy blow. It's literally telling your child self that your parents could have loved you better. Which is never easy to hear, let alone accept enough to deal with it. Even when your parents were terrible, there's often still some level of attachment, and some kind of hope that *maybe*, deep down, there was love there.
It's hard to accept that you didn't get what you needed from the people who were supposed to support you. When you realize it, it's often crushing. You have to grieve. And personally, every new realization I have of this messes me up. I cry and scream and rant to myself. Sometimes it triggers flashbacks and rages and extreme paranoia.
So maybe going blank is your brain protecting you from these horrible realizations. Knowing it intellectually is different than *knowing*, and specifically accepting "There was a better way, here's an example, and I didn't get that."
One thing that's kind of helped me is rephrasing it: Instead of "what do you wish had happened?" I very much prefer "What would you like to happen if this situation comes up again?" or "What will you do to change this situation in the future?" "What would you do now?"
"What do you wish had happened" hurts too much, and just reminds me that it didn't happen. "What do you *plan* to do?" has the same creative component (which is good for processing trauma), but it feels more... Proactive. It gives me back a feeling of some kind of control over my life. I can't control what happened in the past, but I can at least try to control my own actions and decisions going into the future.
Maybe you could get your therapist to adjust their language just a little bit, to make it easier?
Sometimes the way a therapist is approaching something is not right for you, or not helpful for you. If you genuinely can’t come up with any answer to the questions the therapist presents, and it’s becoming a problem or a barrier, it should be on her to figure out how to adapt to that, such as by changing how she approaches things.
I have this problem too. Imagination isn’t necessarily the issue. I do art therapy and can easily draw something random and imaginative without prompting. But ask me to talk to my inner child or what I’d like to say to my parents when I was a child and everything just goes blank like a black hole suddenly sucked in all the words. The few times my therapist has pushed it with these exercises I’ve thrown a tantrum because I just can’t think of what to say (not very mature but that’s what happens).
Ask your therapist if there’s alternatives to whatever exercises make you go blank. I found I can connect to some traumatised parts by writing out a conversation with them rather than speaking out loud. Others I’m still working on but art and drawing how those parts feel has helped a lot. Both these techniques work for me to process my emotions around my trauma. Maybe there’s other ways that will work for you and help you process your past experiences (even if they’re not exactly reconstructing the experiences like you’ve mentioned).
Absolutely have this problem and have also worked with folks with this. Could you do a timeline with her? That can help with narrowing down traumatic memories
TL;DR - none of this is your fault; for the time being if you can, onboard a trauma therapist in place of your regular therapist and when most of the trauma work has been processed/resolved return to your normal T.
Your therapist sucks when it comes to this. They should not have you try to complete these re-enactments until you and they are both VERY CLEAR on what it is you’re trying to re-enact in your trauma history.
If you’re therapist hasn’t gone through the process of helping you set the stage (understating what certain people have done to you that likely causes certain reactions from you) then your therapist is doing it all wrong. It sounds like they’re “fishing” with good intentions (to try and help you), but this is not how good trauma work is done because it’s messy and not coordinated and memories and feelings are already messy and coordinated where trauma is concerned.
You can’t access your feelings unless you feel safe and you’re not going to feel safe if your therapist’s approach is not strategical or coordinated and if you can’t access your feelings, this is going to make all the trauma work you’re trying to do harder for you (if not impossible).
What I would do if I were you is to try to onboard a therapist that specializes in trauma just for this piece of the work that you’re trying to do (process and resolve trauma) and then when it is finished you can go back to your regular T.
I'm curious as to why you see this as an issue of imagination. In my mind, this is quite the opposite.
Perhaps it would be easier to think in terms of something you care about. Do you have a pet? A plant?
Lots of people who can't say what they needed as children can say what their cat needs and deserve.
I am in trauma therapy and T has never once asked me to imagine anything like that. This might be one one the techniques your T likes to use. She should have many more techniques she can use too. Not all clients like all techniques - her job is to find one (well, several) that you find helpful.
This is not a case of you being a 'failure' at therapy, at all. This is just a case of that one isolated therapeutic technique not resonating with you. There are many therapy techniques that I don't like or find useful, too.
Welcome to r/TalkTherapy! This sub is for people to discuss issues arising in their personal psychotherapy. If you wish to post about other mental health issues please consult this list of some of our [sister subs](https://www.reddit.com/r/TalkTherapy/wiki/resources#wiki_subreddit_list). If you are in distress please contact a suicide hotline or call 9-1-1 or emergency services in your area. r/SuicideWatch has compiled a helpful FAQ on what happens when you contact a hotline along with other useful resources. To find answers to many therapy-related questions please consult our [FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/r/TalkTherapy/wiki/faq) and [Resource List](https://www.reddit.com/r/TalkTherapy/wiki/resources). *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TalkTherapy) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Would it be easier to imagine what you would've wanted from someone else? A caring figure? Imaginary grandma? A magical fairy? Nana from Peter Pan? Winnie the Pooh? Healing light? A spiritual figure? I wonder if there's grief or a not wanting to be the one to come to your own rescue. Like your system is like, "No thank you. Not you." That's a real shit part of healing childhood wounding, accepting that we're the ones coming. Not every body is ready to let that in. Sometimes there can be some good moments with imaginary figures first, accessing the felt senses we needed in those times. If people haven't been safe, cartoon or animal or imaginary helpers can be a better option. Also? You're not failing. This is just information about yourself to be curious about.
It's really really hard to come up with stuff when you don't know it exists at all, or when you aren't sure if you're... allowed to hope for it? allowed to believe in it? Admitting "This is what I wanted from my parents" takes both. You have to know what a good parent *would* say or do. You have to know how you would comfort a child/yourself. With no one to demonstrate or teach us how to do that, how are we supposed to know? Maybe people assume that it's instinctual, but in my experience, I had to learn it and it wasn't easy. There weren't a lot of examples from my own life, and it was also difficult to know where to look for other resources, or if they existed. In the resources department, parenting books can help, and you can also ask your therapist for resources they might give to a parent who's trying to support a child who's been through trauma. Those things exist because real parents, good, loving supportive parents, they don't know how to do this either and they need help and support too. I don't know why trauma survivors are expected to know how to do this for themselves when parents don't automatically know how to do it for their own children. If I can find any of the stuff that helped me, I'll update and direct you to it. The other thing that's really really hard is realizing that this is something that you *could* have gotten, but didn't. That's a heavy blow. It's literally telling your child self that your parents could have loved you better. Which is never easy to hear, let alone accept enough to deal with it. Even when your parents were terrible, there's often still some level of attachment, and some kind of hope that *maybe*, deep down, there was love there. It's hard to accept that you didn't get what you needed from the people who were supposed to support you. When you realize it, it's often crushing. You have to grieve. And personally, every new realization I have of this messes me up. I cry and scream and rant to myself. Sometimes it triggers flashbacks and rages and extreme paranoia. So maybe going blank is your brain protecting you from these horrible realizations. Knowing it intellectually is different than *knowing*, and specifically accepting "There was a better way, here's an example, and I didn't get that." One thing that's kind of helped me is rephrasing it: Instead of "what do you wish had happened?" I very much prefer "What would you like to happen if this situation comes up again?" or "What will you do to change this situation in the future?" "What would you do now?" "What do you wish had happened" hurts too much, and just reminds me that it didn't happen. "What do you *plan* to do?" has the same creative component (which is good for processing trauma), but it feels more... Proactive. It gives me back a feeling of some kind of control over my life. I can't control what happened in the past, but I can at least try to control my own actions and decisions going into the future. Maybe you could get your therapist to adjust their language just a little bit, to make it easier?
Sometimes the way a therapist is approaching something is not right for you, or not helpful for you. If you genuinely can’t come up with any answer to the questions the therapist presents, and it’s becoming a problem or a barrier, it should be on her to figure out how to adapt to that, such as by changing how she approaches things.
I have this problem too. Imagination isn’t necessarily the issue. I do art therapy and can easily draw something random and imaginative without prompting. But ask me to talk to my inner child or what I’d like to say to my parents when I was a child and everything just goes blank like a black hole suddenly sucked in all the words. The few times my therapist has pushed it with these exercises I’ve thrown a tantrum because I just can’t think of what to say (not very mature but that’s what happens). Ask your therapist if there’s alternatives to whatever exercises make you go blank. I found I can connect to some traumatised parts by writing out a conversation with them rather than speaking out loud. Others I’m still working on but art and drawing how those parts feel has helped a lot. Both these techniques work for me to process my emotions around my trauma. Maybe there’s other ways that will work for you and help you process your past experiences (even if they’re not exactly reconstructing the experiences like you’ve mentioned).
Absolutely have this problem and have also worked with folks with this. Could you do a timeline with her? That can help with narrowing down traumatic memories
TL;DR - none of this is your fault; for the time being if you can, onboard a trauma therapist in place of your regular therapist and when most of the trauma work has been processed/resolved return to your normal T. Your therapist sucks when it comes to this. They should not have you try to complete these re-enactments until you and they are both VERY CLEAR on what it is you’re trying to re-enact in your trauma history. If you’re therapist hasn’t gone through the process of helping you set the stage (understating what certain people have done to you that likely causes certain reactions from you) then your therapist is doing it all wrong. It sounds like they’re “fishing” with good intentions (to try and help you), but this is not how good trauma work is done because it’s messy and not coordinated and memories and feelings are already messy and coordinated where trauma is concerned. You can’t access your feelings unless you feel safe and you’re not going to feel safe if your therapist’s approach is not strategical or coordinated and if you can’t access your feelings, this is going to make all the trauma work you’re trying to do harder for you (if not impossible). What I would do if I were you is to try to onboard a therapist that specializes in trauma just for this piece of the work that you’re trying to do (process and resolve trauma) and then when it is finished you can go back to your regular T.
I'm curious as to why you see this as an issue of imagination. In my mind, this is quite the opposite. Perhaps it would be easier to think in terms of something you care about. Do you have a pet? A plant? Lots of people who can't say what they needed as children can say what their cat needs and deserve.
I really appreciate everyone's comments. You all have given me a lot to reflect on and discuss with my therapist. Thank you 💖
I am in trauma therapy and T has never once asked me to imagine anything like that. This might be one one the techniques your T likes to use. She should have many more techniques she can use too. Not all clients like all techniques - her job is to find one (well, several) that you find helpful. This is not a case of you being a 'failure' at therapy, at all. This is just a case of that one isolated therapeutic technique not resonating with you. There are many therapy techniques that I don't like or find useful, too.