5 Whys and Wherefores Behind Weekly Sessions: One Therapist's Perspective
Orlando Therapist Offering her Perspective on Weekly Sessions…
“Can we meet every other week rather than every week?” the prospective client says to me during the initial phone consultation. “I find that weekly sessions work best for the type of work we will do.” I hear myself say back.
As a trauma and anxiety therapist in Orlando, my hope is to help you feel settled in your skin again, sleep better at night, have clarity, and feel more peace in your life. Our work together is focused and intentional with your specific goals driving our therapy sessions.
I am not the kind of therapist that believes you need to be in therapy forever to help you cope with your life. It is my intention to dial down your anxiety, process past events that have contributed to your high level of anxiety, and get you back out in the world again, living your best life.
Over the years, I found that focused weekly sessions offer that. Weekly therapy sessions are more impactful, yield greater therapeutic gains, and are more cost-effective for you over time.
Apparently, I am not the only one that feels this way; The research says so, too.
Research
As reported in this study, lower frequency treatment, that means fewer number of therapy sessions per week, yields less favorable outcomes. This study includes people struggling with anxiety and panic attacks.
In this 17-year study at a university counseling center, it was reported clients that attended weekly sessions had a “steeper recovery curve,” meaning the clients that attended weekly sessions got better sooner.
It wasn’t the research studies that led me to weekly sessions being the norm in my practice; it was my experience working with clients. As part of my practice, I give several assessments at the beginning of therapy and also again monthly to measure progress. Not only did my weekly clients report feeling better sooner, their assessments backed up their subjective reports.
After seeing this trend again and again, I decided to see what the research says, and voila, there you have it! The research agrees with what I see in session.
Wondering what led to better outcomes for weekly clients, I decided to do a little soul and session searching to unpack the whys and wherefores behind the value of weekly sessions.
Therapeutic Container
A safe therapeutic container must be established before doing the depth work needed to heal trauma and anxiety. The therapeutic container is created by both the therapist and the client and establishes a safe and trusting space for clients so they are willing and able to do the deep work necessary to heal anxiety and trauma. It establishes a felt sense of safety and connection between therapist and client.
Weekly sessions provide the fertile ground needed for this connection to be established and grow.
Resourcing
Prior to trauma or depth work, we will spend time developing tools and resources to help bring down your anxiety. In order to engage in trauma or depth work, there needs to be the capacity to feel a little worse before feeling better. If you are already redlining, we will focus on getting things a bit more settled for you before we get to the roots of your anxiety or difficult past.
With weekly sessions, we collaboratively discuss what tools are working and not working and customize and individualize your tools for coping more efficiently. We work through these kinks sooner because we are meeting more frequently.
Depth Work
Trauma or depth work includes excavating for the seeds of your wounded past or challenging the constructs of your day to day life. This type of work is often emotionally difficult and takes a commitment to continue when the impulse may be to back off. I use several different modalities to process at this level . During our weekly session, I am monitoring your ability to process, metabolize, and integrate the previous week’s session. With frequent contact, we can adjust the intensity of our work according to your needs and ability to move through the process in a healthy way.
This type of work requires safety, consistency, and a strong therapeutic container, which is best maintained with weekly sessions.
Momentum
The importance of maintaining momentum is implicit in the reasons listed above, however, I believe it’s important to reiterate a few things here.
With momentum, we only need a few minutes during the beginning of each session to catch up briefly on the previous week’s current events before we jump back into our focused therapy. With every other week sessions, that “catch up” period in the beginning of the session takes longer and leaves us with much less time for depth work, where the healing happens.
The felt sense of safe connection mentioned above in the therapeutic container happens at the beginning of therapy and at the beginning of each session. Without it, the depth work feels forced and inorganic. It takes longer to establish in each session when several weeks have gone by since the last session.
Without the momentum of weekly therapy sessions, time is lost. In therapy, time is money to the client, which leads me to an additional benefit of weekly sessions, the cost benefit of weekly sessions.
Cost Effectiveness
Not only do therapy results decline with less frequent sessions, which is a big deal, because isn’t that they whole purpose, to feel better? But it costs more and takes longer to feel better, which is a double whammy bummer. When you lose momentum of the therapeutic work session to session, it costs you more time and money in the end.
When are less frequent sessions appropriate?
If you need support through a transition, decision, or temporary current stressor, less frequent sessions may be appropriate. In my experience this happens when a former client reaches out for support. In this case, the therapeutic container has already been established and it is easy to jump in and offer support with transient life stressors.
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Mindful Living Counseling Orlando is a trauma healing center. Our Orlando Therapy Services include anxiety therapy, trauma counseling, eating disorder recovery, teen counseling, and healing from toxic relationships. At Mindful Living Counseling Orlando, we use a down-to-earth approach infused with cutting-edge therapies that go beyond traditional talk therapy so clients can heal at the root level and experience lasting change. Feel free to access one of our Guided Meditations to help you feel settled and calm now.
