You're Wondering If This Is Normal

If you're in therapy right now, or thinking about starting, you might be asking yourself:
"Why do I feel better some weeks and worse the next? Why does progress feel so slow? Shouldn't I feel better by now?"
These questions are incredibly common. If you're asking them, it tells me you're paying attention to your inner world. You're invested in getting better. You care enough to notice when things feel hard, and you're brave enough to wonder if that hardness means something.

Here's something that might bring relief: therapy doesn't follow a straight upward line. It moves in waves, loops, dips, and breakthroughs. And that's exactly how it's supposed to work.

As psychologists at Eckert Centre, we tell our clients: between Sessions 4–8, most people experience the single biggest shift in their therapy and the single biggest dip. Both are normal. Both are productive. This phase is one of the reasons our Power of 8™ - Eight Sessions. One Transformative Path— Eckert Centre’s Therapeutic Transformation Model — is so effective.

The Problem: Your Brain Resists Change (Even Good Change)

Most of your emotional and behavioral patterns have been in place for years, sometimes decades. They might not serve you anymore, but they're familiar. And your brain loves familiar, because familiar feels safe, even when it's painful.

When therapy challenges those patterns, three things happen simultaneously: your insights increase, your awareness expands, and your old patterns resist. Hard. This resistance isn't failure, it's your brain doing exactly what it's designed to do: protect you from unfamiliar experiences, even when those new experiences are healthier.

That's why progress in therapy actually looks like: Awareness → Discomfort → New skills → Regression → Growth → Stability.
Notice that regression is part of the process, not a detour from it. The dips aren't setbacks. They're your brain integrating change.

It's not a problem. It's the process.

Here's What's Actually Happening Inside You

Between Sessions 4–8, several powerful things are occurring even when it doesn't feel like it:

Your therapeutic alliance is strengthening. You trust your therapist more. You're more open. You can share things you couldn't share in Session 1. This relationship is the container that makes change possible.
Your patterns are becoming clearer. You notice triggers, emotions, and reactions in ways you couldn't before. You can name them. You can't change what you can't see, and now you're seeing.
You're practicing new skills. Breathwork, grounding, boundaries, self-compassion are becoming part of your toolkit.
Old coping strategies are losing their power. Protection mechanisms like avoidance, perfectionism, people-pleasing, emotional shutdown don't work as well anymore. They feel hollow in a way they didn't before.

Here's the twist: the moment old patterns weaken, new discomfort emerges. Your brain goes into panic mode: "This is unfamiliar… let's go back to what we know."

This is why many people quit around Session 5 or 6. They interpret the wobble as failure, when actually, it's evidence that something profound is shifting. This is exactly the turning point that The Power of 8™ prepares you for. If you push through, you reach the breakthrough phase around Session 7 or 8.

Inside your brain, this phase involves emotional memory reconsolidation: when you revisit old memories or triggers, your brain literally rewrites them. This process temporarily increases stress before it lowers it. Neural pathways are being pruned and rewired. Your vagus nerve is learning new patterns of regulation. None of this is smooth. All of it is productive.

The Plan: How to Navigate the Wobble

Here's what I tell my clients when they're in this stretch:
Stick to weekly sessions. This is the peak vulnerability phase. Missing weeks disrupts the process.
Use grounding every day. Even two minutes of breathwork, body scanning, or bilateral movement helps your nervous system integrate.
Expect emotional waves. Don't fear them. Remind yourself: "This is a wave, not a setback."
Journal or voice-note insights immediately. The brain loses emotional memory within 24 hours. Capture what's coming up.
Talk to your therapist when it feels too hard. This is exactly what therapy is designed to explore. The hard stuff is the work.

What You Might Be Experiencing Right Now

If you're feeling more emotional, more sensitive, more aware of things you used to avoid. This isn't regression. This is awareness.
Before therapy, your system protected you by shutting down, numbing, avoiding, overworking, people-pleasing, self-criticizing, or distracting. When those defenses fade, raw emotion emerges. You feel things you haven't let yourself feel in years.

It feels like things are getting worse, but they're actually getting real. You're not breaking down. You're opening up. You're in what

I call the Growth Discomfort Zone. And it's temporary.

The nervous system heals in loops. Each loop takes you higher, even if it dips along the way. The dip you're experiencing right now? It's often a sign you're about to level up.

What Breakthrough Looks Like

Most people describe the shift around Sessions 7–8 as: a sudden moment of clarity, a calmer nervous system, better emotional regulation, stronger boundaries, increased self-worth, feeling hopeful again, a sense of direction, and relief that the "storm" has passed.

This is why The Power of 8™- Eight Sessions. One Transformative Path works. You need enough runway to get through the turbulent part. Stopping at Session 4 or 5 means quitting right before the transformation, like leaving a movie twenty minutes before the ending.

If You're in Sessions 4–8 Right Now...
Please hear this: You are not failing. You are not going backward. You are not "too much." You are in the most important stretch of the entire process.

The discomfort you're feeling? It's the old making room for the new. It's growth, even when it feels like the opposite.

Stay the course. Your future self will thank you.

Need support navigating this phase? Reach out. We're here.

About the Authors
Michael Szabo, MACP., Registered Provisional Psychologist
Michael works with adults, teens, and families on the neurodiversity spectrum. From Autism to ADHD to trauma, Michael's goal is to help build an appreciation for your individual brain style and worth. His approach centers on creating a space where you can explore your experiences with curiosity and compassion.

Kimberly Eckert, M.Sc., R.Psych.
Founder & Executive Director, Eckert Psychology & Education Centre. Kimberly is a Registered Psychologist who has led a multidisciplinary team in Calgary for more than 30 years, providing counselling, assessments, and neurodiversity-affirming learning supports. Although she is no longer in the therapist’s chair, she oversees clinical excellence across all programs and continues to shape the clinic's integrative approach to individual and family well-being.

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