Change your brain – inside the therapy room

Nicole enters the therapist’s room and hooks what she calls her embraced pillow. She admits to being nervous at the idea of ​​sitting with a stranger to discuss her mental health.

She is 31 years old, lives in London and works as a chiropractic assistant. She suffers from anxiety when she drives.

“There are so many things that pass through my head so quickly,” she said.

“How far is it? What is the route? I somehow forget how to drive.”

She suffers from panic attacks and her fear of driving means that she constantly cancels plans.

But, during six sessions with the psychotherapist Owen O’kane, it becomes clear that his problems are much deeper than a simple fear of driving.

Each week, one in six British population has mental health problems such as depression and anxiety and each year, more than 1.2 million people are looking for help from the NHS Talking Therapies Service, with much more payment for private support.

This form of therapy is most commonly used for anxiety and depression, but can also help with a range of other problems, including body image dysmorphia, obsessive compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. This does not work for everyone: research suggests that a third of people do not benefit.

The BBC followed 12 people, presented in the Change Your Mind series, changes your life, which has each received six therapist support sessions.

The therapists have used a combination of different therapy approaches, including cognitive behavioral therapy which focuses on the change in our way of thinking and behaving, alongside other techniques to improve relationships and treat trauma.

What he reveals is striking: how to understand and learn to manage the mind has the power to transform lives.

“You are not stuck with the brain you have,” said Owen O’kane, who has been working on the field for 25 years.

He describes his work as a detective work: “People come with what seems to be a reasonable story, but the interesting thing is that very often the story and the emotions do not correspond. I suppose that what we do is a little to dig.”

During their sessions, Owen deepens Nicole’s anxiety. At one point, she cries. She admits in the past that she has “completely hated” herself. She is worried about what people think of her and are socially anxious: “I don’t feel good enough to be there. I could say something wrong. I need people to love me.”

Owen wonders why she feels like this: “As human beings, we love beautiful emotions. We like to feel happy, joy, to be in love.” But he says that some people try to avoid or suppress emotions such as fear, fear and sadness, and it can cause anxiety. Instead, he says he is healthy to accept them and accept them as safe.

When people come to this point, he said, they start to feel empowered: “They realize that they will not be overwhelmed.”

Speaking outside the therapy room, Nicole said: “I am shocked. He immediately got my number. I would consider vulnerability as a negative thing, but this is not the case.”

Invited to describe, she uses words such as kind, thoughtful, determined and enthusiastic: “I am not a bad person,” she said to Owen.

She says she learned a lot: “Most importantly, I found that I was not nice to myself. It was really revealing.”

Owen says that this is typical of many people he treats: “When people arrive at these crossroads, when they wake up and realize what they are doing, it’s a moment of gold dust for me.”

James also learned to think about himself differently thanks to therapy.

A 39 -year -old father working in finance, he fights against anxiety and, in particular, is worried about making mistakes at work. This fear is so debilitating that it does not sometimes work to work.

He was supported by Professor Steve Peters, a psychiatrist who explains perfectionism is at the origin of his problems: “If we think it is the end of the world if we make a mistake, that paralyzes you.”

James was once an athlete, playing semi-professional football and participating in athletics before specializing in the bobsleigh.

He trained for testing for the Great Britain team when he had a stroke eight years ago: “With a change, I lost everything,” he said.

“It made me feel a less man.”

Now he fears underperforming at work and losing his job.

During the sessions, Professor Peters explains that James’ belief system is the key.

First of all, he gives apparently simple advice: “Put your feet on the ground, get up and walk,” he said.

By focusing on the basic task of moving, in the case of James in motion so that he can go to work, allows someone to think catastrophic to block the negative thoughts that prevent them from doing something.

During subsequent sessions, James and Professor Peters explore what could be behind his problems. James tells Professor Peters of his childhood and how his father would criticize him to push him to improve.

Professor Peters explains how James believes that to please, you cannot make mistakes, then the devastating blow that he suffered at a young age triggered an absolute desire for things never to be mistaken.

He tells James that he must make “peace with himself” by defining himself not by performance but by values ​​and behaviors. Also asks James to describe himself and James replies that he is working hard, honest, engaging, friendly and as a person who would make others.

During his sessions, James’ way of thinking changes: “I can look at myself in the mirror and feel my value and my value,” he explains.

Anjalee’s difficulties are somewhat different. They relate to a traumatic event in childhood – his mother suddenly died at the age of 15.

Now a mother herself, with three children under the age of five, she had emotionally difficult.

She has white nights, a tight chest and feels emotionally disconnected. It’s worse than any physical pain, says the 34 -year -old man: “Become a mother to reopen everything I tried to remove.”

His first birth was particularly traumatic. She developed a septicemia – the condition that her mother died: “I thought I was not going to survive,” she said.

Her psychotherapist, Julia Samuel, explains to Anjalee that she was unable to deal with what happened and, therefore, the trauma remained with her.

On the death of her mother, Anjalee was in the midst of the exams and had two younger brothers and sisters, leaving her for time to cry.

Julia suggests desensitization of eye movements and reprocessing therapy, which uses a movement to help people deal with and recover from painful events.

Julia asks Anjalee her worst memory and she describes how her father tried to save her mother’s life by making breast compressions in their house until the arrival of paramedical ambulancers. Her mother was precipitated with Anjalee hoping that she would come back. She has never done it.

Anjalee says that she never talked about this in anyone. Julia asks Anjalee to cross her arms against her chest and start to breathe deeply and type, imitating the wings of a beating butterfly. She talks about memory and how the images of her head change in addition positive.

Julia says that this type of treatment is particularly effective when it is a single traumatic event. A memory, she says, can act like a block on everything.

Then, Anjalee talks about how her symptoms have relaxed and the contentment she feels now.

“My therapist helped me reconnect with the 15 year old girl that I had silenced. I started to treat the trauma that haunted me. I now understand sorrow like the other side of love.”

In May, the BBC shares stories and advice on how to support your mental health and well-being.

Go to bbc.co.uk/mentalwellbeing to find out more.