Blog

Alan Melton, D.Min, LPC

Over the course of my career, I have had several opportunities to do psychoanalytic consulting for organizations. My library consists of a few books on Consultation including: Psychodynamics: For Consultants and Managers; The Psychodynamics of Work and Organizations; Understanding Nonprofit Organizations, and The Administration of Pastoral Counseling Centers. I had done consulting in the past, but it was mainly on how to prevent extremists factions from taking over nonprofit organizations. I did this on the Church Denominational level and on the Local Church level.

My first consulting experience concerned the Southern Baptist Denomination Fundamentalist Takeover. In the Southern Baptist Denomination Fundamentalist Takeover ( 1980-1990), I was a local church pastor who joined the Moderate Movement to stop the Takeover. My Church of course was a non profit organization as well. I further served, as one consultant among others, at the Virginia state level to offer guidance on how to hopefully prevent the Takeover. Our Moderate Group strategy to mobilize the majority against a militant fundamentalist minority unfortunately failed. The Fundamentalists succeeded in taking over the Southern Baptist Convention in 1990, ending a ten year resistance on the part of the Moderates. I left my position as a pastor and State consultant shortly after that time. I next moved from the pastorate to my present position as a psychoanalytic psychotherapist–also in a non profit Psychotherapy Clinic.

My next consultant job was with a local Church that was also going through a similar Fundamentalist Takeover attempt. I worked with the Church Leadership in helping them mount a resistance to this Takeover effort. This Church thankfully succeeded in thwarting the takeover attempt of their congregation. I have continued to consult with this church in other areas of Administrative Process and Pastor/Church Relations.

I have also worked professionally with local congregations in Pastor/Church conflict. I consulted with one Church while my colleague saw their Pastor in individual therapy. We were able to resolve that conflict to the satisfaction of both parties. As a former Executive Director of our Psychotherapy Center, I have also served in the role of consultant in the areas of Mission, Core Values, History and Bylaw Development. In each of these various consultant roles, I have utilized my training and experience in psychoanalytic psychotherapy to offer psychological assessment of organizational problems, and propose organizational solutions for those problems.

As I move toward semi-retirement this next year, I hope to be available for more such psychoanalytic consultation work, especially with non profits, who I know the most about and where I have spent my working career.

Alan Melton, D.Min., LPC

Some people think that they can do therapy by themselves. That they can just reflect on their own problematic feelings, thoughts, and behaviors and figure them out alone. Or that they can read self help books and get emotionally healthy from them. I am sorry to say that such self therapy does not work. You want to know why?

It is because of DEFENSES. Part of the way our minds operate is we defend ourselves from thoughts and feelings that are unpleasant so we do not consciously think them or feel them. To do so would make us too uncomfortable. So we repress them. Repression is probably the most well known defense we have. Let’s say your boss verbally attacks you and it makes you extremely angry. If you were to feel such anger back at her you might act on it by exploding that anger onto her and attacking her back. This would cost you your job. That is too dangerous of an action to take. So to protect yourself from such a dangerous encounter your minds says, ” I know how to solve this problem. I just will not feel the anger.”–at least not consciously. The defense of repression has defended you against your anger toward her. But, and here is the most import part–your angry feeling has not really gone away. It is hiding in your unconscious. It is still in you. It has to be. Only a saint could not feel angry when attacked by a boss. But consciously feeling it is just too dangerous, so your mind protects you by stuffing it down into your unconscious, and you do not consciously feel it. So does this take care of the problem? I am afraid not. The unconscious repressed anger continues to affect your life negatively. Now you cannot be angry at all–not even when you need to be. Not even when anger is not dangerous to feel. You now cannot be angry at any injustice in the world at large or in your own personal world. And that greatly limits your life because anger is a normal and sometimes needed feeling. You may further develop anxiety, depression, stomach problems, heart attacks, etc., due to the repressed anger coming out in all sorts of distorted ways. Sigmund Freud once said, “” Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and they will come fourth later in uglier ways.” He was right. So why can you not just sit down by yourself or with a self help book and “unrepress” your anger, feel it in a controlled manner and tell your boss that you are angry at her?

Because you do not know who else you were once angry at that felt much stonger and deeper than the anger at your boss. This is the anger of early childhood toward your parents, siblings, and playmates. This anger was so great, and so intolerable, and so dangerous to feel, that your mind could not let you feel it back then either. The defense of repression began in your early childhood. So in order to “unrepress” your childhood anger you need a therapist to help you uncover those early childhood experiences. In therapy you will need to remember those childhood experiences, and with your therapist let go of your defense of repression and feel that original anger that was so unbearable to you as a small child. Then you will come to understand that it has been this same uncontrollable anger that you have defended yourself against toward your boss. Once you work through the childhood experience of the anger you will then be able to work through anger with others in your adult life–including your boss.

It would be really nice if we could do all of this working through and processing of our feelings on our own. But if we could I would not have a job! No, self therapy does not work because we cannot know about our defenses. We cannot see them. We do not understand them. And we have no idea that they originated in childhood when we were first overwhelmed by unbearable feelings. ( Repression is only one of those defenses. There are at least 10 more and I may write about them in a future post.)

The role of your therapist is to help you see what you cannot see on your own–your defenses. Once you see them and let them go you will be able to feel not only your deep anger, but also your sexuality, fear, love, care–and all the other deep feelings you have been defending against. When this happens all of your emotions will take their rightful place in your life and you will be healthier, happier, and more fulfilled.

By Sarah Simmons, M.S.S., LCSW

It’s that time of year when we all begin thinking about our resolutions for the New Year.  We all have lots of different reasons for self-improvement.  However, as I sit here in my office evaluating my own bias, my reason for encouraging you to consider self-care is for your own mental health.  Notice my specific language of self-care; the act of being aware of and taking care of oneself.  There is an incredible amount of research that indicates how physical activity helps improve our overall mental health.  Additionally, improving our health is the number one New Year’s resolution (a recent study showed that over 55% of resolutions are health related).  

I believe one of the biggest mistakes made in New Year’s resolutions is setting a goal that is too big (insert “Go Big or Go Home” here).  Rather, setting small attainable goals that allow room for success is more likely to be sustained over time.  For example, if your goal is to exercise more, why not start with something small like a walk to the mailbox 3 days a week, or set your step counter for a goal of 5,000 steps instead of the standard 10,000 per day.  I have found that when you are successful with these small goals you are more likely to increase your goals accordingly.  

Check your expectations.  Don’t set your sights on seeing results on the scale or in your clothing.  This misses the point.  Self-care is best when generated from a place of love for the self.  Focus more on how it makes you feel rather than concrete results you can see.  This creates a positive feedback loop; the better you feel about yourself, the more you improve your mental health and well-being, which promotes more self-care activity.  

When you mess up, miss a week of exercise, eat something you’re trying to avoid, etc., I encourage curiosity rather than judgement.  Internal questioning such as, “What has been going on for me today (this week)?,  What am I feeling?, What is the voice in my head (my narrative) telling me?  Is it true?  How might that have impacted my choices?  Have grace for yourself and talk with someone you trust that can help you put that shame away, get back up and keep going.  

A study published by the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that the biggest predictor of long term, habit forming change, was the amount of enjoyment you get from it.  This can be a challenge when you are attempting to do things that are often not defined as enjoyable in your mind (at least at first).  If you are wanting to increase physical activity, can you try allowing treadmill time to be when you binge on Netflix?  Research suggests enjoyment can be found when picking up a new game such as tennis instead of just going to the gym.  I look forward to exercise because it is my book time (audio).  I don’t have time to sit and leisurely read through the latest crime novel, but I can do it while I workout.  Use journaling as an opportunity to explore how it feels to be successful with your goals.  With sufficient repeats over time these behavioral and psychological changes can become habits and habits are hard to break.  

American Psychological Association. (2019, November 10). Making Your New Year’s Resolutions Stick. https://www.apa.org/topics/behavioral-health/new-year-resolutions

Persuad, M.D., R., & Bruggen, M.D., P. (2017, December 31). Psychology Explains New Year’s Resolution, Hits and Misses. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/slightly-blighty/201712/psychology-explains-new-year-resolutions-hits-and-misses

Alan Melton, D.Min., LPC

The therapist Mark Solms says that we cannot know how to help someone get better if we do not know what has gone wrong in their lives in the first place. I agree. We cannot treat what we have not properly diagnosed. Diagnosis is the first step your counselor takes in trying to help you. If you come to me or your family doctor for help we will ask you, “ Where does it hurt? What hurts? How long has it been hurting?.” In other words we want to know what are the symptoms of your emotional problem? I will also begin to think with you about what lies behind your symptoms. What is the cause of your symptoms. What has gone wrong in your life that has produced these symptoms. The approach I will take sees your symptoms as results of a deeper problem. This approach tries to get to the root of the problems that are causing your symptoms.

When your therapist is making a diagnosis of your underlying problems, they look deeply into your early childhood experiences and how those experiences effected your development. Depending on the age and developmental level of the child when these unfortunate experiences occurred, the child will develop one of the three following levels of personality function. These levels are: Normal/Neurotic Personalities, Narcissistic/Borderline Personalities, or Psychotic/ Severely Disturbed Personalities. The Normal/Neurotic Personalities are fairly high functioning folks. The Narcissistic/Borderline Personalities are much more ill, and the Psychotic /Severely Disturbed Personalities are extremely ill. All three levels of personality dysfunction result from unfortunate experiences in a child’s early development and lead to painful symptoms of anxiety, depression, panic, flashbacks, obsessions, fears, etc.

The Neurotic/Normal Personalities include: obsessive compulsive, hysterical, avoidant, and dependent personalities. The Narcissistic/Borderline Personalities include: paranoid, schizoid, schizotypal, antisocial, narcissistic, histrionic, and borderline personalities proper. The Psychotic level conditions include the various schizophrenias and other condition where people have problems with reality testing. In order for your therapist to help you heal from these personality problems, they must diagnose these levels of personality disorder properly. Then these deeper problems can be recognized and worked through in therapy to a healthier mental life free of the painful symptoms that brought you to therapy in the first place.

By Alan Melton, D.Min., LPC

The termination phase of psychotherapy begins when either the client or the therapist believes it is time to end the treatment.  It is usually the client that first brings up termination. Why would they do so? Because they are feeling better. They are no longer suffering from uncomfortable feelings that were symptoms of unmet basic needs. They have, with the help of the therapist, learned how to meet their emotional needs in healthy mature ways, rather than the unsuccessful immature ways they were attempting before the therapy began. 

Some clients did not begin treatment with unpleasant feelings such as anxiety or depression, but rather came to therapy experiencing unhappy relationships. These patients will bring up termination because their relationships have improved and they are more able to meet basic emotional needs with others more effectively. 

Once the client brings up termination during a session the therapist has to decide whether or not they agree with the client that it is indeed time to end the treatment. How does the therapist make this decision. The same way the patient made the decision. The therapist asks themselves, “Has the client greatly reduced their emotional suffering?”  Have they learned new and better ways to meet their basic needs? Have their relationships improved and are generally happier with those whom they are intimately involved? 

If the therapists answers these questions affirmatively then the therapist and client agree that it is time to move toward termination. Usually, if all has gone well during the treatment, an end date is agreed upon. The end date should not be too long but should be long enough for the client to grieve the loss of the therapist and their deeply meaningful relationship. For a long term treatment of several years, a month or two is needed to allow sufficient grieving by the patient.  Of course the therapist grieves the loss of the client as well but not to the same extent as the client.

Another goal of the termination process is to review the progress the client has made and for the client to feel they have met their goals in the therapy.  The client will usually be able to verbalize how different they feel then when the therapy began. They will also speak about how much they have learned about themselves through the therapeutic process. 

Finally, the therapist and client will decide what their relationship will be like after the therapy ends. Usually there is little contact between the two parties post termination. The client should no longer need the therapist because they have learned how to work through their feelings and conflicts on their own. If the client finds they do encounter a difficulty that they cannot work through on their own, they are free to return to therapy for a few sessions to utilize the therapist to help them work through the problem.  Termination is a necessary and important phase of therapy. If done properly both client and therapist end the treatment relationship the same way they began it, with care, respect, and understanding. 

Emilie Slechta Thomas, MA, LMFT

Change can be scary as well as exhilarating. Even the dream of positive change promises open vistas of possibility while also hiding dark corners of the unknown. Such corners may present as challenges, obstacles, or just about anything unexpected. When we are in a comfortable space and we feel life is going smoothly, we tend to resist change at all costs. Sometimes we avoid it even more so when life is calling for it desperately. What is familiar to us holds the illusion that it is safer and preferable to the unfamiliar. In reality, this idea very seldom proves to be accurate or healthy. Many of us rightly find ourselves in a psychotherapist’s office when this kind of resistance is afoot, so that we can effectively get back to the business of actualizing all that we are in this life by finding the root of the resistance, then developing the coping skills to deal with it and move beyond it. We are then set free to enjoy the growth that results. 

The past year, as we all know, has been anything but smooth and comfortable. We have all been forced to make changes in our lives to accommodate the societal adjustment to the Covid19 pandemic. We have faced sharp learning curves in our work and in our homes, whether those curves were domestic, relational, or technological. Because of the extremity and suddenness of such changes, the therapists at VPCC and at many counseling centers around the country saw an enormous increase in individuals requesting therapy. While we have worked to make the needed adjustments in our operations to meet these requests, we have also found that it is time that we too need to grow through change. 

For the last two to three years I have trained and worked both as a medicinal herbalist and as a facilitator of meditation workshops in addition to my work as a psychotherapist. Sitting in my comfortable seat in Waynesboro at VPCC as Executive Director, I had gazed at the potential but still imaginary vista of opening a satellite office where I could continue my therapy practice with VPCC while also expanding my meditation workshops and herbalism services. It sure seemed like a lot of energy to risk opening to more growth and embracing all the challenges that would come with such a move. However, once the Center felt its own growing pains recently, manifested in the form of full therapist schedules and talks of expanding our services, I knew the time had come. VPCC’s continued growth was also allowing me to grow- and this meant change! 

I stepped down as Executive Director at the end of March in order to devote my time and energy to my clients and to finding and developing an office space that will expand both my own goals as well as VPCC’s mission to provide spiritually sensitive psychotherapy to members of our growing community. I am proud and excited to announce that we will now be able to do so in Staunton as well as Waynesboro, as I will begin seeing clients this summer in my beautiful downtown Staunton office at 50 Middlebrook Avenue. Like the Waynesboro space, it will be warm and welcoming, have ample parking, and allow enough space to adapt to conducting meditation workshops. Please feel free to give me a call if you would like to work through your own challenges with change, and remember : the new, expanded life is always greater than the old- even, or especially, when it scares us. 

It’s a fascinating word, “Change.” It means different things and certainly evokes a variety of feelings in us. For some of us, change is exciting and hopeful. For others of us, change evokes a sense of dread and fear, or at least, uncertainty. Here at Valley Pastoral Counseling Center there have been some changes taking place and there are changes that are coming. Like any non-profit during this time of COVID and all its related health and safety concerns, we have been through many unforeseen changes over the last year like moving, primarily, to doing telehealth. This was a change to which we were all quite resistant but was clearly essential. 

This thing, psychotherapy, that has a great deal to do with what happens between people in a common space and in the relationship, has shifted to one of screens and wires and technology. It has shifted from three dimensions to two. There is much that could be written about the changes that have been. Some of the changes have been dreaded but necessary. There are changes that have brought a sense of relief and even some peace. There are changes that have been a mixed bag of good and bad and difficult. All-in-all we are so grateful we have been able to continue to serve and care for those in our community, and in some cases farther away in Virginia, by this forced change.

And then there are the many changes that we are in the midst of and those that are coming. There are the societal changes like many getting vaccinated and some people feeling increasing freedom to move about. There are the changes that are coming with increased folks returning to offices and schools and then travel and summer plans. And there are also changes happening here at Valley Pastoral. While they are too numerous to name (those that are happening and those that are coming), I want to highlight a few of the bigger ones.

Changes happening at VPCC this year:

As of March 31^st, Ms. Emilie Thomas stepped down as Executive Director to pursue some of her passions (see her article). We are both sad and happy for this change. We are sad because Ms. Thomas is a wonderful Executive Director and we are so grateful for her time serving in that role here. She has done an amazing job! We are also happy for her to be making this change in her practice and we can’t wait to see what happens! 

As of April 1^st, Ms. Melissa Hansen, stepped out of the role of Outreach Coordinator and into the role of Executive Director. At the same time, Ms. Sarah Simmons stepped into the role of Outreach Coordinator. We are excited to see how they bring fresh energy to these roles.

Some of the therapists are slowly moving away from telehealth and back into in-person sessions here in the office. Of course, all of the therapy process is different than it used to be, as our waiting room remains closed, and many in-person sessions still require both parties to remain masked. We continue to take many precautions and it will be a very long time (2022 anyone?) before things look as they were pre-pandemic. 

As already stated, the changes are far too numerous to name, but they are coming and here at VPCC we are trying to have an openness and a flexibility, while also being wise and discerning about timing and the way in which the changes occur. It is requiring a level of thoughtfulness and flexibility, while maintaining empathy and grace for one another, and for everyone in our community that we serve. Keep us in your thoughts and prayers!