Therapy for Control Issues
This is a broad term people sometimes apply to themselves or to others. It doesn’t have a real clinical meaning, but its implications are clear: As commonly understood, people with control issues want to determine, dictate, influence (control) their environment, and other people’s behavior, beyond what might be considered reasonable, or even possible. They feel anxious or otherwise ill-at-ease when not "in control" of a situation.
Many people might admit to “control issues.” After all, who doesn’t want things to go the way they want them to? Who wants to leave life up to chance?
But when letting go of control, letting others have their way, letting events unfold naturally, or being okay with the unknown becomes impossible without great anxiety, or when manipulation or violence are used to control others, serious social and emotional problems can result.
Most people can easily understand that a desire for total control – which is of course impossible – is usually rooted in fear. If we don’t control people, events, and circumstances, we fear something won’t go right: We won’t get what we want, we will be hurt or abandoned…something terrible will happen.
A therapist can help us see that this isn’t necessarily so, and also that our method for protecting ourselves isn’t working when we try always to be in control. A therapist can help us see the damage this coping skill can do to our sense of enjoyment and to our relationships. A therapist can help us learn to manage change, the unknown, disappointment, failure, and pain, instead of always trying to avoid these experiences (which, again, is impossible.) And a therapist can help uncover the roots of our desire for control, likely in our childhood or possibly in a more recent trauma, and thus begin to distinguish the pain of the past from the possibilities of the present and future.
No specific diagnosis exists for “control issues”, but they might manifest in a variety of ways that are associated with diagnoses, including anxiety disorders, intermittent explosive disorder (involving anger and violent behavior), dependent personality, obsessive-compulsive disorder, adjustment disorders, and relationship problems.
Case examples:
George, 28, in therapy for weeks due to mild depression, insists he has “control issues.” He reports how jealous he is of his girlfriend’s activities when they don’t include him. He becomes very anxious and sad when he feels this way, and isolates himself. He also becomes “whiny” which he doesn’t like. The therapist helps George identify his fears and insecurities, which George soon realizes are the real root of his feelings, not his girlfriend’s behavior. By talking about his childhood, in which he was often criticized by his father, especially after George’s mother divorced his father, George begins to understand how his sense of self developed, and is able to begin building a sense of self-worth through challenging activities, communication with his girlfriend, and emotional expression in therapy.
Rita, 49, is ordered to therapy by a judge after being arrested for vandalizing a coworker’s car. Rita has a history of violence, but she believed she had put that “part of herself” to rest in her 20’s. Rita reports that this coworker insulted and demeaned her, and also that the coworker broke company policy and sometimes this got Rita in trouble, as she depended on the coworker to help with mutually assigned tasks. The therapist validates Rita’s frustration with the coworker’s behaviors, and points out that Rita’s anger did Rita much harm and no discernable good, other than blowing off some steam. The therapist helps Rita identify alternative actions that may have been more productive, and the obstacles to such actions. Rita is able to gain insight into her poor communication skill, stemming from a deep resentment of other people that began with her siblings in childhood. Rita is soon able to begin communicating better at a new job, and is able to begin forgiving her sister and brother for their apparent shortcoming and how they impacted Rita, freeing her from her past.
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