Do you avoid conflicts and talking about your feelings and expressing your needs to the people you love? Are you uncomfortable asking for things and having needs or appearing “difficult?” Do you often feel like having needs would just be a bother or a burden to the people that you love? Many of our clients express the fear that if they actually tell the truth about their feelings, that their partners/friends/family will be angry and leave them.

Many of our clients express that the reason that they don’t ask for what they want is because sometimes they don’t actually know what they want! When you are not in touch with yourself and your feelings, you cannot communicate effectively with others. Sometimes this confusion can lead to expressing yourself with anger and frustration.

If you grew up in a traumatic environment or had a parent with addiction or mental illness, you might have learned from a young age that expressing your feelings doesn’t get you anywhere good-- it may have even led to you being abused--either emotionally or physically. Or it may just have fallen flat and resulted in your feeling lonely, neglected and ashamed for having feelings at all.

Case Example

Therapy for Healthy Boundaries

Joseph found himself in a really happy relationship for the first time in many years. He grew up in a volatile home where his parents would fight a lot. He learned that expressing his feelings would only make things worse. In past relationships he had a tendency to be anxious and stressed, which would sometimes show up as irritability, shortness, and shutting down.

He used to go out a lot with his friends, they would drink and stay out late, but more recently he noticed that he feels more anxious the day after drinking, and hes really trying to slow down. His stable relationship has helped him to do that.

When he started therapy, Joe avoided telling people in his life how he really felt because he didn’t want to make waves. He tended to keep his feelings in. He also found himelf saying yes to things he didnt want to do, and staying longer at events or social gatherings than he wanted to, because he had a hard time saying no or drawing boundaries with people.

He was always so concerned with hurting someone’s feelings, that he ended up hurting himself in the end.

In therapy, Joe learned to slow down and tune into himself. He was able to let go of his need to control his environment and he learned ways to manage his stress at home so that he wasn’t taking it out in his relationship. He no longer bottles up his feelings; he learned how to identify his feelings and then communicate them clearly and kindly in his relationship. He doesn’t feel so stressed and overwhelmed by other people’s problems anymore or feel that it’s his responsibility to fix them at the expense of his own mental health.

Through the process of therapy, Joe was able to start focusing on himself and his own goals and relationship. He started learning to saying no, to create healthy self-care routines and focus on his health more. He started journaling and meditating regularly and communicating more clearly with his girlfriend when he needed time for himself.

Therapy For Fixers, Helpers, Care-Takers, People-Pleasers, and Rescuers

If you identify with any of the above, you might find yourself taking responsibility for other people’s problems and being overly-accommodating, often at the expense of your own mental, emotional, and physical health. At Root To Rise Therapy, we believe that our first most important relationship is with ourselves and we are committed to providing therapy for those that might identify as Fixers, Helpers, Care-Takers, People-Pleasers, and Rescuers. We believe in providing care for the care-takers, and creating healthy boundaries is crucial for this important group. We help natural nurtures and people-pleasers learn how to take care of themselves so that they can take care of others better.

 If you feel sad and scared that you might drive your partner away if you express your needs; if you feel overwhelmed by other people’s needs and a strong desire to make things better for them--even when it might have a significant negative impact on your own mental health—creating healthy boundaries with the people you love will make the world of difference for your mental health AND it will improve your relationships.

At Root To Rise Therapy we help our clients develop healthy boundaries, learn to say “no”, become better communicators, get in touch with their feelings, and express themselves clearly and effectively but kindly. Some key issues we work on: developing healthy boundaries; improving self-care; increasing self-worth, getting in touch with feelings, learning to express feelings.

If you think you might be a fixer, helper, caretaker, people-pleaser or rescuer, we can help you:

• Establish healthy daily routines to keep you rooted, grounded, and stable.

• Understand your worth and know what you deserve in relationships.

• Be empowered and provide empathic, compassionate support on your journey to personal discovery

• Increase self-awareness and insight

• Learn to forgive yourself and others

• Increase self-compassion

• Finally stop doubting yourself constantly

• Learn to listen to your intuition.

If you are ready to start building healthy boundaries, book a free consultation session today!