Blog Posts

Hey friends, welcome back to the blog.  Today I want to talk about something that we see come up during Therapy and neurofeedback.  When our clients see their desired changes taking place and they see improvements, they often struggle with the “New Normal.”

Resistance to a New Way of Living

After spending years in a level of survival mode, having mental symptoms like anxiety or depression, trauma, chronic pain, addiction, ADHD, or anything else that brings people into treatment; we have found that sometimes when people start to get better there is some resistance.  Resistance may look like lack of awareness, not reporting progress or even seeing progress, continuing to self sabotage, chasing chemicals like dopamine with instant fixes, and engaging in secondary gain behavior.  We have previously addressed secondary gains in the blog, if you missed it you should go back and check it out.   

Things we often hear and see from clients:

1. Clients truly don’t want to see their brain change.

2. They are used to the old familiar life of surviving with chaos.

3. Their brain and body doesn’t know how to understand what is happening with they are able to finally relax.

4.  After having lived in Fight or Flight mode, they are not sure and it feels scary and overwhelming to have to redefine being able to LIVE instead of survive.

Sometimes doing better comes after a highly stressful event or period of time and comes with challenges of adjusting.  I myself have found it difficult at times to adjust to what life is now that my daughter is seeing some improvement and not in the same place she was over a year ago.  Due to trauma of a medical diagnosis that needs intensive treatment for my daughter, I have a tendency to still feel like the high stress is still where I am at and that there isn’t improvement although logically I know there is. Living with a trauma response, even when the world around us changes and situations improve, can be a very really challenge to let go of. We are so afraid of returning to a trauma response that we keep our “guard” up when it is no longer needed. 

When things improve, What Now?

Sometimes when we can logically tell things are getting better we also have to  adjust to things getting better by convincing our bodies and minds.  This is one thing we do in therapy is help people become more aware of mind body connection and learning to manage when we no longer need to survive or live in fight or flight.  So how do we manage and adjust? Let’s explore further.  

1. Acknowledge that change has occurred.  Denial tends to get in the way of accepting change. People often find change uncomfortable and find familiarity in what they know, even if they want to grow.  

2. Allow yourself to feel your feelings including grief and sadness about change occurring, even when it is for the best.   

3. Practice self compassion, especially regarding adjustment taking time.  One common thing I hear is that people expect themselves to adjust faster than they actually do. By practicing self compassion we can reduce unrealistic expectations and self judgement about our process.  Another step is to accept the change that has happened.           

4. Practicing mindfulness by engaging in the present moment more fully, tapping into the five senses, guided meditation, expressing gratitudes,  meditation and grounding exercises can help with mind body and connection and accepting the present moment for what it is without labeling it good or bad.    

5. Look for what works well instead of attempting old patterns that weren’t working.  Sometimes it can be an adjustment to have to explore new replacements, to have more than one tool ready to go based on what is needed at the time, or having things that used to work become less effective.  This is when we can focus more on what we can change and what is working well and let go of anything that isn’t working and that we can’t change. 

In the End

The longer we resist change that has occurred, the harder time we have adjusting.   By continually trying to practice acceptance, acknowledge feelings, explore mindfulness, and continuing to stay open to new ways to manage stress and self care; we can better adjust to new normals that happen when things change.  

Thanks for reading, until next time.  

Emilie Barragan, LCSW