Rita no longer feels stuck in her life

Rita, a woman in her 50’s, stopped drinking two years ago after many years of alcoholism. She had been on anti-depressants for 6 years and already had years of talk therapy that didn’t seem to help. Her life seemed to be going nowhere. She felt stuck in her life, was negative, unhappy, and felt she had no hope for future. She felt angry most of the time, held grudges, and felt bored with life. She had lost her sex drive and had bouts of unreasonable jealousy when her husband talked or looked at other women.

After 22 sessions of neurofeedback she reported, “It took awhile for me to really see the change, although I felt good after the first training. After a few sessions, all of a sudden I realized something was different. I got calmer. I felt less frantic about things. The same things come up as they did 2 years ago, but they don’t bother me. I’m not as stuck. In the past I’d have a thought that would send me off the deep end. Now I can rationalize it and can think about it. I feel like I’ve really improved. I find myself trying to hold a grudge, but I let go of it. Before I would stay in it and hold it forever.

Jealously with my husband used to be a big problem. The fact that its gone I think is amazing. He still talks to women, but it doesn’t bother me any more. I used to be bored a lot. What I learned was that boredom was often just not liking to be with myself. Now I don’t mind being alone. When I find myself bored, I just do something now.

I’m not stuck. When I’m having a bad day, I say well, this is going to pass. I can get out of the same rut. Before, I felt there was no hope for my future. Now, I feel like there’s a lot of hope. I think it’s just a matter of getting through the stuff that you’ve got to go through, and always look to the future and say, well I can do this in the future. The day after a session, I’m almost giddy. That goes away, but it tells me something’s going on. What I like about this is there’s no drugs.”

Rita never liked the idea of taking anti-depressant medications and wanted to get off. As a result of her depression lifting from neurofeedback, she consulted with her physician and tapered off and eventually stopped taking her medications. One year later she has held the gains and remains off anti-depressants.