#25: MBT Group Therapy > Between Losing Control and Trying to Hold Yourself Together

🎙️ Special Episode – “Between Losing Control and Trying to Hold Yourself Together”

Welcome to this special episode of the MBT podcast.

In this group session, an intense conversation unfolds about control, helplessness, and the fear of what happens when emotions become too overwhelming to keep pushing away.

What makes this session powerful is how clearly it shows that many group members, each in their own way, are trying to maintain control over tension, insecurity, and overwhelming emotions.

Today, we listen to a group session where themes such as self-criticism, emotional control, not feeling seen, and the struggle between feeling and avoiding come to the surface.

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🧠 What this episode explores

Being overwhelmed by emotions

Several group members describe how emotions can suddenly hit without warning.

Frustration.

Anger.

Sadness.

Helplessness.

Feelings that once seemed manageable

can suddenly take over completely.

And that loss of control can feel frightening.

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Keeping the lid on emotions

The session reveals how differently people try to cope with emotions.

Some spend years suppressing and controlling their feelings.

Others experience emotions exploding in every direction with almost no control at all.

But both responses serve the same purpose:

trying to protect yourself from being overwhelmed.

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Self-criticism and pressure to perform

An important theme in this session is the harsh way group members look at themselves.

Doubting yourself.

Always needing to do more.

Never feeling truly good enough.

Compliments are difficult to accept,

while mistakes become painfully magnified.

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Not feeling seen

The painful feeling of not being important enough also strongly emerges.

When someone finally becomes vulnerable,

but feels that nothing is really done with it,

pain and disappointment quickly follow.

The group explores how deeply this feeling can hurt —

especially when someone is genuinely trying to ask for help or be honest.

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Old patterns under stress

What this session strongly highlights

is how quickly old survival patterns return under pressure.

Trying to stay in control.

Shutting down emotionally.

Exploding in anger.

Or disappearing into yourself completely.

The therapists help the group slow down and stay curious about what lies underneath these reactions.

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🌟 The common thread

The central theme of this episode is the tension between trying to stay in control and allowing yourself to truly feel.

The fear of being overwhelmed

exists alongside the need to finally be honest about what is happening inside.

Mentalizing helps people not to immediately run away from emotions,

but to pause and explore what is truly being triggered —

within themselves and in connection with others.

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💬 Closing

This episode shows how difficult it can be to allow emotions when you have spent years learning to protect yourself from them.

But it also shows how important it is not to carry everything alone.

Sometimes, change does not begin with controlling emotions,

but with the moment you dare to admit:

“I don’t know how to handle this right now.”