U.K. PARURESIS TRUST: Just back from the Follow Up workshop in Manchester July 2011

Hello all, especially those who were on the follow-up workshop with me this weekend.
Well, Manchester lived up to its rainy reputation, but as I was there on a UKPT workshop the weather didn't really matter, and at least it turned out ok for a pleasent Saturday evening walk after around the centre.

As for as the workshop I found it very useful in reinforcing some progress I'd made on my own since the last one, getting back into the act of desensing and also reminding me of a few ideas and facts that I had forgotten, plus a very big part of it is just being in a group of people who all have the same problem and are able to share so many similar experiences.

One idea that came up that I've been thinking about is attacking the problem from two sides. For me that has been

1. Worrying less about it, which has come from telling people about it, and also a mixture of other things, but general advice from UKPT and reading up about psychology - e.g. find positives about each week, humour, treating the problem as something separate from you, e.g. a "boo monster" etc.

2. Desensing to improve the practical problem, which I've gone through periods of doing reasonably regularly (three times a week for a few weeks roughly), but not done seriously for a couple of years until back on this workshop. This has raised my level to being pretty confident of being able to go in a cubicle if I need to, and often finding urinals aren't a problem.

So there's a smaller problem left in between the two fronts of attack, progress on either front is good - I like to think of it like that.

So to summarise workshops were great for me, I used to avoid urinals almost completely, definitely if not empty and a large part of my life was consumed with worrying about where I would next be able to go to the toilet. I do feel like my life has been transformed (not over a weekend, but as a result of finding this site and going on the workshops and following up what came out of them), I still have the problem but know how I can reduce it if I decide to prioritise desensing over other more fun things that take up my limited spare time. I'm expecting I might have a break between contracts in the Autumn so may have a concerted effort then when I have more spare time, in the mean time I'm planning at a least weekly desense in a local shopping centre.

Thanks to all the other particpants, we're quite geographically dispersed, but would be good to keep in touch and I'd be happy to meet up with any of you again, maybe be in touch bia email. Also have to say thanks to Andrew, for another weekend and all the time he gives up.

cheers Mike