Tips for online therapy

we tried our first online session today. so the first tip we have is to use a browers that works with the video call service that is chosen. Our T uses an encrypted service that needs the latest versions of just a limited number of browsers to even work.

we made sure to check what would be visible from where we are sitting and put away everything that we don't want her to see. which is everything. we chose a white wall for a background. it helps a bit with the need for distance that she can't see our private life...

we also put our white noise machine in the entrance area of our home. it is an old apartment building and you can hear everything, especially from the stairwell. so we at least blocked that out with a different noise to make sure our neigbors won't listen.

we also had pen and paper ready. somehow things are even harder to remember than usual and we took notes right into our journal.
it was a good choice to put the laptop on the coffee table and have everything we might need next to it, so we wouldn't have to get up to get something.

our call dropped pretty early in the conversation and we finished the session on the phone. we had only thought of giving the T our phone number 2 weeks ago, we usually just write email. just a reminder that it could be important to check if the phone number is up to date...

Amythyst wrote:I mentioned this in the teen thread but will say it here too.

if you're bothered by seeing your body face on the screen in video chat, sometimes theres a way to turn that off? like preview or self view or whatever. look in settings and see, so if you dont like seeing your body's face, you can maybe turn it off. then T can see you and you dont hafta see the body.

Or if you can't find that option or whatever, maybe stick a postit note on the screen to cover that bit up.

the program our T wanted to use has a chat box but the video thing didnt work last week so we used facetime which worked but didnt have a chat box. and it was tiny on my computer, like huge computer screen and tinly little t in the middle of it.

we'll see what happens this week. :/

Viola

I wanna get a Tinker Bell mask. ROFL So the doc will SEE when it's me, not Zor. But that seems a little over the top.

It bugs me when I do stuff online like Dead by Daylight (a video game I play with friends that like know about us and don't hate us cuz of it- super awesome and caring ppl), and the voice thing bugs me. I HEAR myself usually when I'm out, but the mic, and therefore speakers, hears & plays the body's voice, which I can't change enough to sound like me. Drives me NUTS.

When we do stuff and there's a cam. I just tend to try and NOT look or move the window thingy so where we are is not on the monitor or something else is on top of it covering that part.

{\Pixie/}

Hi,

Colin figured out if we look at the camera the other person sees us looking at their eyes. It's like looking two places at once. Camera directly - screen with the rest of your vision. Can't do it all the time but it helps when we need somebody to feel connected to us.

Iain

We had our second video session on Friday, and it went very well. We actually forgot all about wearing headphones this time, but we have a really good speaker hooked up to our computer, so we could hear the T very well. It was still hard to have him mostly looking down, since he was looking at our face on the screen rather than at the camera, but he remembered to look at the camera sometimes. And the lighting was better, and he sat closer to the screen when we asked him to.

It didn't work out well to send him journal pages last week, so we sent him an email to print out and have in front of him, and we let him read it before the session.

I'm realizing that there's something automatically dysregulating for us about being in the same room with another person, and so being able to talk to the T without being in the same room is actually better for some of us. We probably spend a lot of energy trying to regulate while we're there, and not having to do that seems to free us up to talk about deeper things. This is very interesting and probably important--I'll have to do some journaling about it.

Anyway, the littles feel very connected to him right now, and they're not feeling worried about him, so that's good. We're tempted to see him a second time this week, but I think it's better to keep it at once a week for now.

last week our T used her phone for the videochat. i guess cos its small enuf that the camera and scrreen are close together os it looked like she was looking right at us.

it was super distracting tho cos she was holding it in one hand and she had her puppy too and the phone was moving all over the place and she dropped it twice. sometimes we get sensitive to motion and having like everything around her always moving abit and stuff made us dissociate more. and if both her hands were full she wasn't taking notes or anything.

the thing she wants to use for videochat still doesnt work for us i dunno why but we try for a while and then give up and use facetime. its frustrating and makes us think we're doing something wrong or we re gonna get in trouble cos the right program doesnt work and it feels like our fault.

viola & others

we had our second attempt with the encrypted program and nope, didn't work. I guess my new favorite advise is to give a $#%^ if it is encrypted and just use software that works...
Also, super important when having therapy on the phone... try not to have an abreaction. that is pretty messy.
I think it would have helped to have her on speaker (when doing a video call, not using headphones) so we could have at least heard her voice for orientation instead of having to manage it alone.
being at home has its downsides. parts who usually don't show up in public feel more comfortable with it. we are trying to recreate an office-like situation now to keep it down a bit. things get chaotic really fast.

birdsong87 wrote:we had our second attempt with the encrypted program and nope, didn't work. I guess my new favorite advise is to give a $#%^ if it is encrypted and just use software that works...
Also, super important when having therapy on the phone... try not to have an abreaction. that is pretty messy.
I think it would have helped to have her on speaker (when doing a video call, not using headphones) so we could have at least heard her voice for orientation instead of having to manage it alone.
being at home has its downsides. parts who usually don't show up in public feel more comfortable with it. we are trying to recreate an office-like situation now to keep it down a bit. things get chaotic really fast.

That is kinda like where we're at... cuz like phone calls are NOT encrypted either- and that's been what we had to use the past two times. :/

I wish they could just like use Skype or something

{\Pixie/}

For the second time, we used the encrypted telehealth site that our T joined. It generally went well. Mostly any discomfort that we've had has been regarding change in general, and not specifically about telehealth or the encrypted service. We've had many video sessions in the past and are used to it.

MDs

Got to tell our T not to sit with her back to the windows. The kids are scared to say anything but it's really messing things up. The kids got all excited that T has our favorite stuffie from her office. Meant a lot to them.

Colin

So like the last two weeks it's worked, finally- so the telehealth dealie that they have...

It's super weird though cuz I HEAR and SEE me when I'm out- looking down, I see my body as I am inside... not the body as it really is... I HEAR me when I talk, so like seeing Zor's face and hearing his voice on the camera and in the headphones is kinda weird. lol But I guess that's part of the projection thing where I WANNA see me, not him... I mean, for real who wants to look down and see like from first person an icky man body?! ROFL I'm like downright adorable, I don't wanna see THAT instead! ROFL
(and yes, zor will know I'm teasing him if/when he reads this)

So like the scary thing for us now is that Zor's wife is in the next room, the living room, when we're in the computer room- door shut.

Angel talked to doc, first time like legit overt out and doing that, intentionally... and he mentioned some of the stress he's feeling, the fears and hurt, and part of what like piles up and makes him like cut (even if he's unaware of actually doing it until it's like done)... is cuz of her and her rejection, hostility, etc about us...
After that session was over, Angel was still out... and came out of the room, and she from the other room asked "So did you talk about me? What'd you say?" and it panicked and worried him. So now we're kinda concerned we don't have an _entirely_ private setting like we should have, like we do in the office, and like we really NEED to be able to talk freely, especially the rest of us, but even for Zor to.

:/

I REALLY hate this situation and hope things get back to normal soon- tele-conf. is a sucky alternative to being IN PERSON.

{\Pixie/}