Inspired Life Health Centre Toronto

Many may wonder what the experience of art therapy is like. Below is a young woman's account of her experience with art therapy and how it served as a valuable tool in her recovery from anorexia nervosa. She began art therapy as part of her treatment plan and wrote about her experience;

At the time I had no idea how art therapy would help my personal development.  Initial one-to-one sessions were based on talking through ideas, feelings and events of the week and then drawing and painting. My therapist and I would then discuss the art work. I was constantly surprised by the amount of seemingly subconscious information that was being relayed about these situations which could be interpreted by my use of colour, relationships of figures and so forth.  This led on to more talking based on the subconscious information and brought out deep rooted feelings of which I had not been previously aware.  These sessions also involved acting out dreams, and role play in order to verbalize and deal with events within a safe environment. This activity and supported creative space gave me perhaps the first opportunity to explore emotive and personal areas which had not been dealt with previously. Although I had not learnt to rely on these outward resources to vent my feelings it certainly helped me to become aware of new ways of coping.  Strange as it may seem, anorexia and illustration have at least one thing in common.  They are both about expressing oneself without words, yet one is destructive and the other creative.