Why Do I Still Feel Stuck After Years of Therapy?

It’s a frustrating experience. You’ve invested time, energy, and money in therapy. You’ve talked about your problems, gained some insights, maybe even felt some temporary relief. Yet deep down, you feel like the core issues are still there.

So why does this happen?

Insight without change

Many therapies help you understand your patterns, but insight alone doesn’t always create change. You may know why you react in certain ways, yet still find yourself repeating the same cycles.

Coping instead of resolving

Some approaches focus on coping strategies. These can help in the moment, but if the underlying emotional conflicts aren’t addressed, the same struggles resurface. It can feel like managing things on the surface rather than resolving the root cause. I’ve written more about this in Why CBT might not be enough.

Avoidance in the room

Therapy can unintentionally become a place where avoidance continues. If painful feelings or memories remain unprocessed, progress stalls. Talking about emotions isn’t the same as experiencing and working through them. To see what this looks like in practice, explore what actually happens in a therapy session.

The role of unconscious processes

Much of what keeps us stuck operates outside conscious awareness. Defence mechanisms, anxiety, and old patterns often play out automatically. Unless therapy actively helps you notice and work with these processes in the moment, they continue to run the show. You can learn more about this dynamic in how anxiety, feelings, and defences interact.

What helps therapy move forward?

• A focus on what happens between you and the therapist in real time

• Slowing down and noticing when avoidance or anxiety gets in the way

• Working through, not around, the emotions and needs that have been defended against

• A structured, active approach that targets the root of the difficulty rather than only its surface

Online and Nottingham-based psychotherapy

If you’ve had therapy before but still feel stuck, it doesn’t mean therapy can’t help you. It may mean a different approach is needed. I offer specialist psychotherapy in Nottingham and online across the UK and Europe, focused on going beyond coping and helping you make lasting change. Learn more about my therapy services and fees.