“Why don’t you just yell at me? Tell me I’m wasting your time? That I’m a horrible mother and wife, and I should just get divorced and leave everyone well alone?”
Tools used: Reality Therapy
Recap from Toolbox 7 (Chained) : Prompted by her husband, Sarah came to therapy for her technology addiction. She scored high on the Internet Addiction Test (IAT) and eventually came to accept that her phone and Internet use were making her life unmanageable. She joined an online 12-Step support group and was committed to trying to maintain sobriety, one day at a time. Sarah’s husband, Chaim, joined a Codependency 12-Step group, and sought help from a therapist. Sarah commits to regular therapy as part of the process of understanding what fueled her addiction.
One day, about two months after I first started seeing Sarah, she had a relapse.
“I don’t understand. I work so hard, I do the stupid meetings, I’m coming here, I’ve made tangible progress, and this happens!” she said. Her chest heaved from emotion and her fists were clenched. “It’s ridiculous. I know tons about addiction. We’ve spent so much time talking about it. And I saw it coming, but I couldn’t stop it. I told myself it wouldn’t happen, that I’d be fine.”
“Sarah, why don’t you back up? Start from what happened since I saw you last.”
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