By Gill Jardine, Counsellor/Psychotherapist
Something I hear often in my practice is, “People don’t believe me when I say I’m not well.” I heard it again recently and I started to consider what it means. Why should it be said and what effect might it have on the person who is not feeling believed or validated? Why should someone not believe what they are told? Perhaps it is because it is so hard to know how, or what someone else might be feeling, even if the subject matter is familiar to the other person.
Thinking about it, it is impossible to know how another person’s physical pain really feels despite the fact that there might be clear evidence of the cause. There may be redness, a cut, a bruise or swelling which we all recognise as an injury likely to be causing pain. We have probably felt something similar but to what extent? A doctor may ask to give a measure from 1 to 10, 1 being slight and 10 being severe but what does that even mean? Each individual may be different, after all, we do talk about a “pain threshold” as being different for everybody.
It would seem that all we have is physical evidence and the sufferer’s description of the type and the intensity and, from this information, we draw conclusions about what is actually happening for this person and make decisions about how we might respond. But what about psychological pain? The pain we feel in our mind rather than in our body? How do we deal with that? In many cases there is no physical evidence to consider. The individual may be in agony but there are no cuts, bruises or swelling. How can that be? How can you recognise agony without physical evidence, without a physical cause? The fact is our feelings cause us an array of experiences, one of which is pain. An example of this is how we feel when we lose a loved one. We may be able to share some of that pain because of our own losses – we know how we felt and we recognise behaviours around such an experience. In a way, this situation can be quite clear, others may understand and offer their support. However, on many occasions there is not an obvious cause of psychological pain. A person may seem perfectly well with no signs of illness or injury. There may be no evidence of any major life event happening in their life and yet, they tell you that they are not well – what do you think when you hear that? Well they seem alright to me, what have they got that could be troubling them. Perhaps they are just having a bad day but, what do we really know about what could be on their minds? More importantly, do we stop and think about it? Do we think to ask – perhaps not because we have already concluded that they are alright? Even if we do ask, do we really listen to what they have to say?
I started here with the title, “Please believe me when I say I’m not well,” and telling you that I hear this said many times in my clinical work. Maybe what is becoming evident here is that even if we do listen, we don’t necessarily believe what we are hearing. We make judgements for ourselves whether or not this person is truly suffering. How could this be the best thing we could do? Our actions could be positively unhelpful and it is my belief that most people want to be helpful, so what can we do to help?
No 1 on my list is to listen, really listen to what they are saying. Don’t try to fix things, peoples’ lives are complicated and it is impossible to know what would ‘fix’ it. Remember how you feel when someone listens to you – it’s a good feeling that can make you feel you matter, that your feelings are important, that you are being validated for your experience. Being listened to will help exploration and consideration of what may be possible. Don’t question what you hear, that may bring in that feeling of not being believed – a very isolating feeling. Remember they are describing their own experiences and how they feel about them. How could you better know what they are experiencing?
Perhaps a final thought is that many health problems, both physical and psychological, tend to come and go. We are not always well and we are not always ill but when we are ill, we often need help and that help, freely given and accepted, can really help us get through. Clearly we need to believe and be believed to really benefit. Listen to yourself and listen to each other.