Often times clients ask me how long the process of therapy takes. I must admit that when I was a younger, less experienced social worker, I used to try and suggest that it may only take 4 or 5 sessions, sensing that was all they were prepared to do.
But as I’ve gotten older, and have seen many, many more people, I can honestly say ‘I don’t know just yet’. The reasons are many: it depends on the client and their needs, strengths and difficulties, who else is in the client’s life that may help or hinder their efforts, how longstanding the problems are, and of course my own abilities to understand and help facilitate change, assuming its an issue I am competent to address.
But this leads to a more essential issue, which is that change is hard. Think about the last time you intended to do something different in the way you live your life. Even something seemingly straightforward like remembering to floss every day, which, if you’re like me, you get scared into doing every six months when you go to the dentist and are asked, under the intense light: ‘are we keeping up with our flossing?’ And then out comes the tool for measuring gum recession, and the lecture about how you want to be able to chew your own food when you’re eighty and so on. So off you go, with your new mint-flavoured floss kit, and get to it. A week or two later and its back to your old ways. Sound familiar? Let’s face it, we all intend to floss, or eat healthily, or exercise, or call our aging parents more often, or walk the dog more. So changing how we live is anything but easy. And these are the more straightforward changes. Trying to change how we think, or reflect, or communicate, or address childhood issues of abuse or neglect, let alone more fully understand ourselves (and those around us) - these are the really challenging issues that lead people into therapy.
I remember a teen I was once seeing said, after what obviously felt to her like twenty long minutes into the session, ‘I’m bored- can I leave now?’ Therapy is not fun, or easy, or distracting, or quick. I’m reminded of this when reading a recent newsletter from the David Suzuki Foundation that pointed out that we have known about climate change for almost as long as David Suzuki has been an environmental advocate, and yet, only recently at the UN Climate Change Summit in Paris was there some common ground among nations that we have to do something about how we are living on the planet, now - not in 20 years - but now. This is a good example - albeit a very complex one, of how difficult change is, and how long it takes to move from pre-contemplation to action (Prochaska, 1983).
If this all sounds very discouraging, its not intended to be. Rather, it is to acknowledge that change is difficult, and sometimes takes a long time, but it is possible and it is worth it. We just have to be realistic with ourselves and one another to know that it takes time, and patience and determination, and to approach the process one small, manageable step at a time. And remember: we don’t have to do it alone. All we have to do is ask for help, and be prepared to do our part.