I am having an AMAZING opportunity to be part of the Counseling practicum here at Focus. I am learning so much. If this was the only thing that I came to Focus for it would be totally worth it. I'm telling you....this is a great opportunity. I am learning so much about counseling. So two weekends ago the counseling department took us caving. The caving was not for fun but it was to show us and teach us about experimental therapy.
Our guide Tim( our supervisor and counselor at Focus) use to work for a Psychiatric Hospital and would take his patients to the cave for experimental therapy. So we got to go and experience what a therapy session in the cave would look like. We were all kind of skittish upon going in. Once we got in the cave that we entered through a very small whole in the side of a cliff. We got in and met in the front of the cave so our eyes could get adjusted. After that we slid down an area and came to another part where we turned our head lamps off. Turning our head lamps off we talked about how we felt being in the total dark. He was teaching us to retrain our brains to understand that dark is not always associated with bad. To some people being in the dark is a terrible fear. Although we were in the dark we were safe so he says this is a great way to retrain our brains to thinking about being in the dark. After we did that we started going through the cave. I'm not going to lie I was a little uncomfortable. We got to a spot where honestly I have no idea how we got threw it. It looked like I was trying to go through the size of a toilet bowl space. Very small! I made it through but was very scared. All along the way Tim was being very good about walking us through what we were doing and being ok with it. So we get to the other side of this hole and we get to explore the rest of the cave on our own for a little while. Jessy and I paired off and wanted to do the most difficult space first.
This space was very hard for me. You had to lay on your side with one hand forward and slide through a body length hole on your side. You couldn't lay down flat and you couldn't raise up. It was so tight and hard. I really had a hard time with this space b/c it reminded me of a story that I heard about my Pap going through a tunnel in Vietnam and the tunnel only being big enough for him and he knew if anyone was in that tunnel with him then someone was going to die. It was hard to think about that. What a brave man my Pap was. I miss him like crazy!!!
After we made it through that hard spot we went to the next place. This place was physically challenging. We climbed up the side of this rock and then had to lay down on our bellies and slide under a rock overhead with a cliff to my right. Now this was very difficult because I had to make sure my hands and feet were in the right places at all times. So I had to really connect with my body to be safe and to conquer the space. I made it but it was definitely challenging.
This caving trip was awesome. I walked away from it learning actually things that I could also apply to my life. The whole time we were in the cave Tim kept empathizing the importance of keeping our emotions in the present and not letting them drift to the future which causes anxiety. So in the moments where the spaces was very small and I didn't feel like I was going to make it...I just kept telling myself...ok Destinee right now at this point you are ok...you are safe and you are not in danger. Actually telling myself this and focusing on the present I was able to control my emotions and make it through the cave. This was a great experience but I honestly can say I don't think I would do it again :)
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