Is it worth qutting my job to have more time to see a therapist?

[ironpony]

I have a job that I reasonably like, and it's good for now, but it's really hard to see a therapist since therapists are only available from 9-4:30 and my job hours are in that time, and I don't think they would be okay with me leaving for two hours a week to go see a therapist.  So I am wondering if it's just worth qutting, then I a can be available for any time of the week that they can fit me in, for every week, without any problems, until the therapy I need is done with.

Or is this a bad idea, since it's a job and all?

[Cersei]

It sounds like an excuse to quit your job to be honest. How will you pay the bills with no job?

[basil67]

Your employer chooses to employ people who are neuro diverse, so I think they'd have an understanding that time off for therapy would be not an uncommon request.

Discuss this with your boss before rushing into any resigning

[ironpony]

Oh maybe.  I thought there was only three neuro-divergent people in my work from what I could tell, which I didn't think was a lot but maybe.  I can ask him.  Thanks :).

[basil67]

Whether it be three or many, I would like to think they'd be flexible in supporting their employee's mental health.

[spiritedaway2003]

Unless the therapy or whatever it is you're trying to resolve is caused and directly related to the job, keep the job.  Job pays the bills (and your therapy sessions) and usually provides a healthy routine.

Keep going to those sessions nwhere you could make it, talk to your employer about flexible scheduling (if this can be arranged) and if not, find other therapist alternatives that can accommodate your schedule (weekend availability with another therapist, online options, etc).

Edited November 25, 2021 by spiritedaway2003

[ironpony]

52 minutes ago, spiritedaway2003 said:

Unless the therapy or whatever it is you're trying to resolve is caused and directly related to the job, keep the job.  Job pays the bills (and your therapy sessions) and usually provides a healthy routine.

Keep going to those sessions nwhere you could make it, talk to your employer about flexible scheduling (if this can be arranged) and if not, find other therapist alternatives that can accommodate your schedule (weekend availability with another therapist, online options, etc).

Okay thanks, I can do that. Thanks. Another thing is a therapist I was referred to specifically hardly as any time and it's hard to get an appointment too. If I went back to my doctor and asking her for me to a therapist who has a lot more availability, would that be better or would that be bad because it might show that the therapist is not very popular if they have more availability?

[Wiseman2]

12 hours ago, ironpony said:

 it's really hard to see a therapist since therapists are only available from 9-4:30 and my job hours are in that time, 

Check your employee handbook and policies regarding sick leave. Talk to  HR .

You surely can take time to see your urologist, primary care physician, psychiatrist, neurologist, etc., no?

Who's telling you you need 2 hrs of therapy a week?

[ironpony]

33 minutes ago, Wiseman2 said:

Check your employee handbook and policies regarding sick leave. Talk to  HR .

You surely can take time to see your urologist, primary care physician, psychiatrist, neurologist, etc., no?

Who's telling you you need 2 hrs of therapy a week?

The therapists I talked to on the phone say so, that it's good to do a session a week in my case for treatment in BCT.

[Wiseman2]

9 minutes ago, ironpony said:

The therapists I talked to on the phone say so, 

Talk to HR about sick time. Ask your physicians for a referral to a qualified therapist. Who told you to call these therapists?

[ironpony]

Okay I can do that, thanks.  My doctor who referred me to the therapists did.

[Lotsgoingon]

Definitely do not quit your job. 

I remember working and having the same fear you're having ... and then I got transferred to a new office. My coworker, a woman a little older than me, was on the phone with our downtown bosses saying something like  "I'm going to see my counselor and then I'm grabbing some lunch and I'll be back around 1." 

A week later she was on the phone with our bosses saying, "OK, heading to my weekly appointment."  She would sometimes just say "I got my appointment."

Well in a year I started doing the same thing.  And I would say to my supervisors, "gotta go to my appointment." In fact ,that there is a therapeutic benefit to going to your job folks, saying you want to meet a therapist and figuring out how to make that work. My job was so flexible--because I was often working long hours and because there were easy days and randomly hard and long days.)

To back up, there are plenty of therapists who meet in the evenings and into night. And some that even work weekends. There are plenty of people in the world who have trouble getting time off in the middle of the day, so therapists respond to that. So keep looking. I don't know if you're looking for a particular kind of specialist, but almost every therapist I knew kept one night of late hours, at least one night. Even if a therapist doesn't advertise evening hours, if you like them, just call. For one, therapists are notoriously bad at updating their websites. And two, they want to fit in clients. And they can recommend you to someone else who they know has late hours available. 

Also, these days, therapy over zoom has really taken off. So you might not need as much time "off" as you think. You just need to get a room with some privacy and a wireless connection. You can probably do it on your phone while sitting in your car if you can't find private space at work. (Don't know if you drive your car to work.)

Your bosses are likely to feel very proud of you and impressed that you are working on yourself. In fact, once you start paying attention, I can guarantee you that there are probably people at your job going to therapy right now, including bosses. Just politely make clear that you think therapy will help you in your life and with work and that you want to do your job really well. 

 

 

[ironpony]

1 hour ago, Lotsgoingon said:

Definitely do not quit your job. 

I remember working and having the same fear you're having ... and then I got transferred to a new office. My coworker, a woman a little older than me, was on the phone with our downtown bosses saying something like  "I'm going to see my counselor and then I'm grabbing some lunch and I'll be back around 1." 

A week later she was on the phone with our bosses saying, "OK, heading to my weekly appointment."  She would sometimes just say "I got my appointment."

Well in a year I started doing the same thing.  And I would say to my supervisors, "gotta go to my appointment." In fact ,that there is a therapeutic benefit to going to your job folks, saying you want to meet a therapist and figuring out how to make that work. My job was so flexible--because I was often working long hours and because there were easy days and randomly hard and long days.)

To back up, there are plenty of therapists who meet in the evenings and into night. And some that even work weekends. There are plenty of people in the world who have trouble getting time off in the middle of the day, so therapists respond to that. So keep looking. I don't know if you're looking for a particular kind of specialist, but almost every therapist I knew kept one night of late hours, at least one night. Even if a therapist doesn't advertise evening hours, if you like them, just call. For one, therapists are notoriously bad at updating their websites. And two, they want to fit in clients. And they can recommend you to someone else who they know has late hours available. 

Also, these days, therapy over zoom has really taken off. So you might not need as much time "off" as you think. You just need to get a room with some privacy and a wireless connection. You can probably do it on your phone while sitting in your car if you can't find private space at work. (Don't know if you drive your car to work.)

Your bosses are likely to feel very proud of you and impressed that you are working on yourself. In fact, once you start paying attention, I can guarantee you that there are probably people at your job going to therapy right now, including bosses. Just politely make clear that you think therapy will help you in your life and with work and that you want to do your job really well. 

 

 

okay thanks. I don't really have privacy at work to do a zoom call. But the car is freezing cold in the winter time.  I thought the car being freezing cold might affect the therapy but maybe not.

As for evenings, it seems like every business has shut down by 6:00 because of covid where I live and no one seems to want to go past that soon unless of course it's a Walmart or something. But every other business seems to shut down at 6:00 now at the latest.  so I haven't been able to find a therapist that goes past 4:30 in their office hours.

Edited November 25, 2021 by ironpony

[Els]

It's a bit difficult to believe that there is not a single therapist in your area who does weekends. But if there truly isn't, surely you can have a phone session with a therapist from a  different city?

[ironpony]

2 minutes ago, Elswyth said:

It's a bit difficult to believe that there is not a single therapist in your area who does weekends. But if there truly isn't, surely you can have a phone session with a therapist from a  different city?

That's true. My doctor only referred me to therapists in my city. I can have him refer me to a specialist that is outside perhaps if he has the resources to do so.

I'd rather go in person though and not do a zoom because I don't want to be overheard possibly.

Edited November 25, 2021 by ironpony

[Lotsgoingon]

Where I am in the States, therapists have almost all gone virtual. My chiropractor is in a building that was full of therapists. Elevators there have been empty because the therapists converted to zoom and even recently, the elevators is still empty, traffic minimal. The therapists have stayed on zoom.

So there should be plenty of people doing evening zoom sessions. Plenty! Now you may want to meet in person, but you might just try out zoom because sessions are better than you might think. I met with my former therapist  over video after I had surgery a few years back, and I was shocked--and he was shocked--by how "normal" the sessions felt.

Can I ask: is there a particular issue you want to work on in therapy? I'm from the school that says you can go for any reason or no reason at all. Therapy saved my life multiple times ... and then it flipped and became a kind of high-level life coaching for me.  It was great on both ends. 

 

[Els]

1 hour ago, ironpony said:

That's true. My doctor only referred me to therapists in my city. I can have him refer me to a specialist that is outside perhaps if he has the resources to do so.

I'd rather go in person though and not do a zoom because I don't want to be overheard possibly.

Who is going to overhear you on weekends?

[ironpony]

17 minutes ago, Elswyth said:

Who is going to overhear you on weekends?

Just people I live with maybe, when I want to have a private conversation.  Plus I cannot find therapists that work weekends or evenings so far.  But maybe I can look outside the city, like it was suggested.  It seems that because of covid, everyplace wants to shut down at 6 now.  I know that therapists can do online, but my theory is is that they used this covid thing as a reason not to, and said everyone else is shutting down at 6 so we can to, and have evenings off! etc.  Or at least that is my theory.

[ShyViolet]

I find it hard to believe that there are NO therapists anywhere that you could use, that would do evenings or weekends.  A lot of therapy is on Zoom now.  You should consider it.

Also, I'm genuinely confused.  How could you just quit your job?  And then what, you'd be unemployed and doing nothing?  What would be your plan?

[ironpony]

That's true, I don't want to quit, I was just frustrated at finding therapy times, around work.  I think therapists, just don't like working weekends, or evenings, and like that weekday daytime only luxury perhaps, and that's probably it?

Edited November 26, 2021 by ironpony

[Els]

12 hours ago, ironpony said:

Just people I live with maybe, when I want to have a private conversation.

You could shut your door and talk quietly directly into the microphone...

[Lotsgoingon]

In the era of teletherapy, there are also people out there doing therapy by phone. And I've heard of people outdoors walking and talking to their therapist through earbuds and so on.

I don't know where you are ironpony, but just google therapy your area and evening hours or weekend hours. I just did that for my area. A ton of entries came up. Also do the same for weekend hours. 

If you're having trouble finding these folks, just keep googling ... 

[Kamille]

Check the policies at work, as was suggested. 

If work won't let you take time off for therapy, tell the therapist you have spoken with that unfortunately, your schedules don't match. Ask that therapist if they can refer you to another therapist who works different hours. Be specific: since you want in-person appointments, tell them this. Therapists often work in networks and, at least where I live, they would rather help you find the right help rather than see you go without treatment. 

I agree that since you don't live alone, you're right in wanting to meet with a therapist in person. Comfort is very important in therapy sessions.

Edited November 26, 2021 by Kamille