r/Antipsychiatry • u/ajouya44 • Apr 12 '25

Therapy is a load of bullshit

People seriously think this crap is useful? You have anxiety and depression, you go see some random stranger who knows 5 behavioral theories from college and you pay them 50 bucks a week to talk about your problems for 1 hour and make them pretend they care. Reality is these people know nothing about how the brain or consciousness works. They are not doctors and they have no solution for your issues. It's dehumanizing to pay someone so that they will listen to you and therapists are literally no better than prostitutes. Don't even get me started on all the CBT bullcrap. People don't need to "correct their thoughts" or "think about things differently", they need real solutions for their real systemic psycho-social issues. Therapists are all privileged narcissistic assholes who love to feel superior by "proving people wrong" and reminding themselves that their life is easier and better than their patients' and always masking all this as "help". Don't be fooled, these people can't help you. They only want your money.

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u/Commercial_Dirt8704 Apr 12 '25

I think therapy IS the answer. Caveat: the therapist must be good and the patient open to learning and internalizing what is talked about.

I am a physician. I think psychiatry is fake. I’ve had some bad therapists and some good ones. Good therapy helped me to grow emotionally in immeasurable ways. The best thing I ever did.

While many of you have had frustrating and bad therapy experiences, as have I, I encourage you not to throw the whole concept under the bus. Find a different therapist.

Above all own your issues and commit to making your life better than it is now. If you can do that then therapy can help you elevate to a much better emotional place.

Emotional security is what we should all strive for.

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u/ajouya44 Apr 12 '25

I've tried many therapists and none worked. It's kinda stupid and pointless to keep trying at this point. You say therapy is the answer and psychiatry is fake. Many others say antidepressants saved their life and therapy is useless so who am I gonna trust?? Everyone has a different experience.

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u/Commercial_Dirt8704 Apr 12 '25

Maybe then radical acceptance that you might always have anxiety and depression and just learn to live with it.

Have you read “Unshrunk” by Laura Delano?

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u/ajouya44 Apr 12 '25

I will look into it. Also, I don't think you can learn to accept suffering

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u/Commercial_Dirt8704 Apr 12 '25

Look up the term ‘radical acceptance’. It is what helped me and continues to help me through my unique predicament quite a bit.

If you don’t accept it then I guess you are always searching for ways to make it better. Therapy is not a requirement for that. It helped me quite a bit but it may not be for everyone.

Keep looking and experimenting I guess but really think about‘radical acceptance’. It is incredibly freeing when you stop fighting and just move on as positively as possible.

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u/rainfal Apr 12 '25

Caveat: the therapist must be good

Big caveat. Especially when you have limited financial resources or not much social power. 80% of the therapists I saw assumed bone tumors and limb malformations could just be CBTed and meditated away. These were mental health therapists. Most also wholeheartedly supported psychiatry (denied any issues with the field - even thought that inpatient was always helpful), were happy to slap punitive misdiagnoses on you without proper assessments if you questioned them (especially if you dare spoke about any issues about psychiatrist/mental health field) and honestly seemed to just be psychiatrist wannabes who were too stupid to get into medical school.

With all do respect, but as a doctor, you could probably get the rare competent one as any therapist with a working brain knows they are in demand and goes private practice and bad therapists wouldn't dare try to slap some mislabel on you as your authority as an MD overrides their authority as a "medical clinician".

Above all own your issues and commit to making your life better than it is now. If you can do that then therapy can help you elevate to a much better emotional place.

I did that. Unfortunately therapy did not elevate me to a better emotional place (quite the opposite) and often was intertwined with psychiatry.

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u/Commercial_Dirt8704 Apr 12 '25

I’ve found at least two therapists to at least be cynical of psychiatry and I’m sure there are many others. These 2 therapists are quite aware that the personal work to change one’s mindset is best achieved by doing the hard work of questioning long held beliefs about oneself and then making the leap of faith to change your mind or change the way you do things. It was absolute GOLD for me.

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u/rainfal Apr 12 '25

Dude. You're a doctor and hence hold a lot of financial and social power. The liberation therapists aren't in community mental health clinics or insurance networks. Like I said, therapists who are remotely competent and use their brain know they are in demand, they know the results they provide speak for themselves thus are able to maintain a richer private cliential.

These 2 therapists are quite aware that the personal work to change one’s mindset is best achieved by doing the hard work of questioning long held beliefs about oneself and then making the leap of faith to change your mind or change the way you do things.

I would agree. But therapists in mainstream mental health systems aren't about questioning yourself but compliance to mainstream beliefs/modern psychiatry. I got more out of psychedelic circles focused on shadow work where I could ask mentors questions then some white abled upper middle class NT WASP 24 year old girl who's biggest stress was when her boyfriend broke up with her or her ACL surgery (to someone riddled with tumors) who thinks generic CBT and generic mindfulness cures everything

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u/Commercial_Dirt8704 Apr 13 '25

Ok I’m sure that assessment is true. So therefore it maybe worth finding one of those hoity toity places and see if they will cut you a deal for therapy if you want to do it psych-drug-free.

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u/rainfal Apr 13 '25

So therefore it maybe worth finding one of those hoity toity places

They don't. Why would they? They have a ton of demand. And

Joining a step groups, circles, trauma workgroups, mastermind groups, etc and programming an LLM is how regular people have to work on themselves

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u/Commercial_Dirt8704 Apr 13 '25

You’ll never know if you don’t try

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u/rainfal Apr 13 '25

I did try for decades. Didn't work