Here’s my therapy experience, in case it answers some of your questions:

I've had three therapists in my life.

The first one, when I was 15, was amazing. I was first treated as an inpatient at a clinic, and when I was discharged, they told me I should continue outpatient therapy with her. She was amazing because she seemed to really care about me, we had great, insightful conversations, and she gave me homework like writing down my thoughts (they basically turned into a book, lol). But when I needed therapy again, I couldn’t go back to her because I was now an adult.

But since I was in university at the time, I had access to student support services. After the first conversation, they gave me a list of numbers, and I called each one until someone was able to give me an appointment relatively soon.

However, I really didn’t like that second therapist because he suggested some wild solutions, like sleeping with my best friend to stop being a virgin, which he seemed to think was my main issue, lol. He was still nice, and it wasn’t entirely wrong to suggest it. Given what I told him about our friendship, it made sense to bring it up, but it bothered me that he kept mentioning it even after I told him several times that I didn’t think it was a good idea and that it made me feel uncomfortable to talk about her like that.

When I realized our conversations weren’t going anywhere, I simply stopped showing up and realized I needed to figure myself out on my own. So instead of switching, I just felt like it was a huge waste of time, and I wasn’t looking forward to telling someone the whole story again anyway. Learning that I had to carry myself, and that therapy is just a way to keep my thoughts from getting even worse (like putting a lower bound on them), but not necessarily a way to make them better, was a worthwhile lesson though. YMMV though.

Then, after a few years, I again felt like I needed someone to talk to. I think I looked up phone numbers myself and it was again mostly random how I got matched with someone.

That experience was also not good. I didn't feel like she knew what she was doing. Our conversations were too mechanical. So I again felt like it was a huge waste of time. I think thanks to my past experiences with therapy, I could basically predict what she's going to ask, so I thought:

When she was sick and referred me to someone else for the week, I just didn't make a new appointment.

So I would say if you talked to them for at least four hours and you don't feel like they have told you anything that really made you think deeply, you should maybe find someone else. The "chemistry" is also important.

The best I can do for you is to tell you to check with your insurance and know exactly what they cover. I started seeing a therapist a couple months ago because I've been spiraling pretty hard. I called my insurance ahead of time and they said it would just be a $30 copay. Well, 2 months later I starting to get bills in the mail because apparently I have to hit my $5,000 deductible before they cover any of it. I just got absolutely rugged by my insurance, I owe over 1k, and I had to stop seeing my therapist because I don't have an extra $200 laying around every week. Now, if I want to see a therapist, I have to find a cheaper one and start the whole process over again.

As truly helpful as it was, I think I'm throwing in the towel. I'm feeling pretty defeated about the entire process. So, like I said, double check with your insurance.

Feel free to ignore but I'd like to make a suggestion - something to try to improve mental health that is NOT therapy.

And that suggestion is - switch to a low-carb diet. Either carnivore, or keto, or low-carb. That can improve your mental health dramatically, all across the board - mood, sleep quality, emotional stability, alertness and energy.

Consider watching some interviews with Dr. Georgia Ede, author of Change Your Diet, Change Your Mind. She's done some really outstanding research on exactly why and how low carb seems to really improve mental health for a lot of people.

I'd had a couple therapists over the years. It's lots of work to find them, trying to get recommendations, etc. And none of them were any good.

While therapy can help sort toxic kinds of thoughts, the "dumping ground" is nature in the sense that if you are out in it, you will naturally tend to re-normalize your existence. The esoteric term applied to this process is "grounding" and the state you describe implies that you are not getting grounding fully where whatever it is that is being held on to is not yet let go of.

After a fair amount of looking and asking the same question, the answer seems to be:

It would be great if there was some more systematic way to solve this, search-engine style, but the incentives and regulations guarantee there cannot be.

Related: I have found quite a bit of mental well-being utility from Sam Harris's "Waking Up" app. The Alan Watts back catalogue is easily worth the annual fee, which is steep, but worth it . (And this coming from someone who finds Harris himself off-putting.)

My big medicine is mushrooms (and yin yoga). Taking high psilocybin doses has deeply regulated my nervous system.

It's tough though, because you'll be confronted with what ails you, but that's exactly what needs to happen when you need to heal on a deeper level. Some stuff you'll just won't be able to access consciously, and that's when the limit of regular therapy is reached.

If you wanna pursue a journey you have to make sure you switch off all the lights, make it completely dark, and set proper intentions. And also you need to be able to sit through unpleasant stuff (i.e. bad trip) knowing you're gonna stay high for another couple of hours. But you can always switch on the lights.

Imo there's no 'bad' trip. When it's bad, it's good, and probably is exactly what you need to see. Bad trip is wen you apply ancient medicine thinking you're taking a party drug. A wise man is properly prepared.

Sorry to hear. In these occasions, there's no better therapist than Nature... disconnect, barefoot, touch grass some might say today. Simply spend time in good company away from noise and crowds. Silence is golden.

Have you thought about consulting a religious counselor such as a priest or pastor or rabbi?

SEEE, @realBitcoinDog, you're missing out. TOLD YA

Pay close attention to this and this alone k00b, you are asking for prescription drugs, not a solution. A therapist is a good solution when you don't know what to say or fear to open yourself. But you don't, you do speak up. You want to keep feeling good. You want a confident who can keep the shots coming. That's because you feel empty. What makes you feel empty? That's the question you must answer first. Then go outside on your quest to get it.

Source: I have had to deal with waaaaay too many people on the verge of mental collapse up to outright suicidal meltdown. I have no idea why I have happened to encounter so many but I should have a title by now.

Perhaps reading novels about therapy written by therapists would help you. This way you can (safely?) explore the world and find out if it's right for you or not. Or at least arm yourself with useful questions.

Suggested author: Irvin D. Yalom (hopefully, he's not on the Epstein list)

I'm no therapy expert, but I feel like if your main goal is having someone you can unload all the baggage on, you probably will have more leeway in selection than if you were like manic, bpd and were stalking hookers etc

That should help with the initial trial and error, as maybe the key will be finding a person that you are comfortable sounding off etc

I think it is hard to find a good therapist. I think you can find it through trial and error. Try this: https://www.betterhelp.com/ I didn't try it before. But an expert I follow on YouTube recommends it.

I'd recommend exploring different options and follow what you feel called to go deeper into.

First off LLMs can be surprisingly helpful. I use an app developed by therapists called Rosebud every now and then as a therapist on speed dial. Or Claude/ChatGPT etc with some good prompts could work but gotta be more careful with those.

Coaching can be as good or even better than therapy. They just can't call themselves therapy for liability but good coaches are essentially therapists and more. Definitely shop around - there are lots of bad therapists whose incentives to keep you coming back.

It sounds like you're aware of a lot of anger. I recommend this organization called Art of Accomplishment which does a lot of work that goes deep into moving anger and emotions in general (ultimately being able to feel and love them more easily). They have some good podcasts specifically on anger and releasing it without directing it towards anyone.

You can also look into specific modalities like Internal Family Systems or attachment repair or self compassion - just some of the top ones that come to mind that have helped me and were worth my sats. There's usually a book or guided audio freely available to give them a try. And then you could seek out facilitators who may not even be therapists but again might be even better and cheaper.

IFS or parts work is relatively newer but for a lot of people like myself it goes really deep untangling emotional spaghetti code.

And like others have said just take care of basic stuff like health, breathe, remember we're all human, you're not alone...

More power to you, don’t have any solid advice but congrats on starting the journey again

I’m here for you always k00b. Would do anything for you. With that being said. I’ve only had bad experiences with therapist in the past so probably not the best person to ask. For me what’s helped best has been church. But the biggest change came after retreats with other men I didn’t know personally other than seeing once or twice at church.

This lady changed my life: https://www.santidevi.com/