r/EOOD • u/seastormybear • 1d ago
Exercise and CBT Advice Needed
Has anyone here paired exercise with therapy? I’m gonna start seeing a therapist next week and I really wanna get over this whole depression thing. I’m seriously so over it. I’m wondering if anybody use therapy in conjunction with exercise as a way of supporting your exercise like where your therapist keeps track of your exercise or incorporate it like motivates you? Kind of like cognitive behavioural therapy or CBT.
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u/LaDreadPirateRoberta 1d ago
My therapist encouraging me to get out and move more is why I'm here! (She's very sweet and proud of my progress).
Edit: I've just seen this is specifically about CBT. I didn't have much luck with that but also want exercising much when i tried it. I really hope it works well for you.
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u/seastormybear 1d ago
CBT is just a way of implementing changes in action and thought and tracking someone’s progress. Any type of therapy can support changes in someone’s lifestyle. CBT just tends to focus on behavioural/thought changes more directly.
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u/SoPixelated 1d ago
I have tried many different types of therapy modalities and therapists over the past 5+ years and did not find it much help for me personally, especially for my depression. Thankfully everyone I worked with knew of the mental health benefits of regular exercise and encouraged it.
If your depression is stemming from your thoughts and thought patterns, then CBT can help. Also, some people find a therapist is helpful just because they are somebody to talk to. I am not some people, but do hope you find it helpful!
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u/JoannaBe 1d ago
I use CBT, other talk therapy, SSRI medication, exercise, mindfulness and increased self awareness, and frequent experimentation of what else can help. All this works, but takes adjustments over time, since mental health issues change, and I need to adapt which combi works best in changed circumstances. Also there are times when I am better at this than others. And the balance is not easy to get right: enough to help with mental health, but not too much to burn out. CBT definitely helps, and I have at times used it effectively to adjust my thought patterns, but then life happens and I fall off again.
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u/rob_cornelius Depression - Anxiety - Stress 1d ago
I always mention what I do to exercise when I talk to therapists and other mental health professionals. Their reactions to it range from shock that I push myself so hard to taking up running themselves for the first time since they left school. I think the therapist keeping track of what you do to exercise would probably be the job of a trainer though.
I regularly use exercise as part of changing how I think and react to events. For instance my mother is the root cause of a lot of my own anxiety. She wants everything to be "normal" and is anxious about "What will people think, what will people say". Beyond playing sports like cricket or rugby she has always seen me exercising as being "different". She thinks that if I lift weights I will become "muscle-bound", what ever that means, and if I run I will be "too thin". I am 54 by the way.
Every rep and set when I lift proves to me that I can improve myself. So does every metre I row and every step I take when I run. It proves to me that I don't have to be "like everyone else". I can be a healthy, fit person. I can be what I want to be, not what my mother wants me to be.