Hi! I’m Cailea. I figured it might be useful to start by introducing myself while also introducing the aim and direction of this blog.
I seem to have never-ending thoughts about therapy and people in general, and I've never really had a place to put them. I read something interesting and want to talk about it. I have a thought about something that comes up often in therapy. I learn something new about an approach I use and think, maybe someone else would find this useful. Thus, the idea of a blog.
When I started considering what I wanted to write about, I kept coming back to something I've noticed in many first sessions. When I meet with people for their first therapy session, they often have a lot of questions about what is going to happen. Some people are nervous. Some aren't sure what they're supposed to talk about. Some wonder if they need to prepare anything or if they're going to be expected to tell me their entire life story in the first hour.
It made me think that it would be helpful to have somewhere I could actually answer some of those questions.
And then I started thinking about everything else I might want to write about.
So, what will I write about?
Honestly, probably a lot of different things.
I don’t want to box myself in because I want this to be a place to explore and share the things I continue to learn. So, the topics will be pretty broad, but there are some things I know I want to write about.
I want to write about therapy and what you can expect when you start.
Some of the approaches I use and what they actually look like in practice.
Couples therapy, relationships, intimacy, communication, and some of the things that can help relationships outside of the therapy room.
ADHD, how it can affect the way we think and function, and emotional regulation.
Patterns we find ourselves repeating, and those times when you know something needs to change but aren't quite sure what to do about it.
Then there will be all the things that don't fit neatly into a category.
I imagine some posts will be practical, some educational, and some will be my thoughts on something I've been thinking about, reading about, or noticing in my work.
I'm not particularly interested in writing the kind of psychology content that tells you there are five easy steps to fix yourself, because I believe people are more complicated than that.
One of the things I'm curious about
I'm really interested in why we do what we do, especially when we already know those things aren't working very well for us.
Why do we keep going back to the same kinds of relationships? Why do we find ourselves repeating patterns we thought we'd already figured out? Why can we know exactly what we should do and still find it incredibly difficult to do?
Sometimes there is a reason a pattern makes sense, even if it isn't working anymore. Understanding that can give us somewhere to start.
That's something I find myself exploring a lot in therapy, and probably something I'll write about here too.
What does that actually look like?
If you're considering working with me, you may want to know more than whether I'm “warm and collaborative.” I think many therapists are warm and collaborative, so I think it is useful to know what it might actually feel like to sit across from me.
I'm curious. I ask questions. I like to understand why something is happening, not just what is happening.
I can be direct when I think being direct is helpful. I won't necessarily just agree with you because something is difficult to hear. Sometimes therapy involves looking at something from a perspective you hadn't considered, noticing a pattern you hadn't seen, or being gently challenged to look at something differently.
At the same time, I'm not interested in forcing you into an interpretation that doesn't fit.
Therapy isn't me figuring you out and telling you what's wrong with you.
It's something we figure out together.
Sometimes that means exploring what is happening right now. Sometimes it means looking at where a pattern came from. Sometimes it means understanding what your emotions are trying to tell you. Sometimes it means learning something practical that you can actually use outside of the therapy room.
And sometimes, honestly, it means sitting with something for a while before we know exactly what it means.
So, what do I hope you get from it?
I don't expect every post to be relevant to everyone. There will probably be things you read and immediately think, that's me, and other things that don't really resonate at all.
But I do hope that, every once in a while, you come across something that makes you stop and think. Maybe something makes a little more sense. Maybe you recognize a pattern you hadn't noticed before. Maybe you learn something you want to explore further, or you find yourself thinking about something differently.
And if you're considering therapy, I hope the blog also gives you a bit of a sense of how I think and how I work. Not just what approaches I use or what I specialize in, but the kinds of things I'm curious about and the questions I tend to ask.
Mostly, though, I wanted somewhere to put all of these thoughts.
So that's what this is.
A place for the things I'm learning, thinking about, reading about, and wondering about. Some will be about therapy. Some will be about relationships. Some will be practical. Some will probably make me go down a rabbit hole that has nothing to do with what I originally sat down to write about.
We'll see where it goes.