I will admit it—I have had a few emotional (okay…more than a few) episodes last quarter at school. Things were not going well at all; my grades were plummeting, my boyfriend and I broke up more than a few times throughout the course of the quarter and my roommate situation was cliquey and I felt so alone. I cried many times alone in my room, just getting emotional over how much life sucked in the moment. I knew this wasn’t healthy and I knew I just needed someone to be there for me, but my first thought was not a counselor.
When I think of counseling, I wrongly thought about those doctors who ask you again and again, “So how do you feel about that?” Ugh, no, not for me. I also thought that people who go to counseling are those who have gone through a dramatic experience, like someone died right in front of them or maybe they’re really dealing with something major, like suicidal thoughts or something. I never envisioned myself seeking this help for what seemed like smaller matters.
Fast forward to now, when I am writing this article, and I can proudly say (yes, I did say proudly) that I have gone to counseling. And it turns out, counseling isn’t some scary thing where you sit and just get bombarded with questions. Counseling is helpful, and could be beneficial for you. Check out these ways that counseling has improved my life and if any of these sound like something you need, go for it.
1. It gave me an escape.
I felt like I couldn’t talk to any of my friends or my boyfriend about the deeper problems I was facing. Nor did I want to talk about my problems to them because I felt as if it was going to be too much for them to handle or that they would feel they needed to pity me and I didn’t want that either. With counseling, I knew I was talking to someone who was trained and specialized to handle any type of situation, from not so dramatic as mine to as traumatic as others. Once I realized that, it just started and I couldn’t stop: I poured out everything to them and usually, I’m not the one to go full disclosure on a stranger, but just having them say, “So what’s on your mind? I’m here to listen” just gave me a feeling of relief. All this weight that I had been carrying around, not telling anyone about, could finally be lifted.
2. I could trust someone to guide me in the right direction.
Don’t get me wrong, friends and significant others are great people to seek advice, but when it comes down to it, you want someone who has seen your problem in others before, and knows exactly what to do. With mine, they helped me academically by seeking out the right sources and helped me feel better about myself by giving me confidence pointers as well as how to successfully build better relationships with my friends. I felt like the counselor I saw knew exactly how to make me feel better and knew exactly what to say.
3. Counseling has given me a new perspective on things.
I used to think something was wrong with me, and always asked myself, “Why am I so dumb?” or “Why can’t I make so-and-so happy? What is wrong with me?” Talking to a counselor made me see that nothing is wrong with me and that I was perfect (well, almost) the way I was. I just needed to better the image of myself to myself. I realized everyone is going through something and to not be so hard on myself for going through something too.