I therapy worth it?

Post Reply New Topic

Hi there,

I strongly believe I have asperger's after reading most of The Complete Guide to Asperger's Syndrome. This seems like a good place for me to learn from others of my kind

One issue that the aforementioned book tackles is therapy for aspies in order to improve social behaviour. Based on my observations of myself this may be possible to a degree but I am not sure it is worth it or that the changes will be significant enough to justify the effort. I do not enjoy spending much time with the majority of people. The ones with whom I do enjoy spending time have interests similar to mine. Do you think that with therapy, aspies can greatly improve their social skills? And if so, what is the benefit?

From personal experience, I remember being more social in my teens (now 25), but that was mostly because of me blindly accepting the prevailing idea that friends are a must. Now I can have just about as much fun reading a book as meeting people I like. Even if I tried I don’t think I would improve a lot in terms of social behaviour. I am not trying to be mean but most people simply do not interest me. If I don’t enjoy most social interactions what point is there to spending great amounts of time to get slightly better at it?

I would like to hear how others feel about this. What is your experience?

Also do you recommend seeing a psychologist? I probably will at some point.

I am in therapy but it isn't for AS per se, or to learn social skills. It is for the emotions connected with my living experience (which is largely due to AS). It is also for the co-morbid depression and anxiety. I am pretty sure the anxiety is a direct result of having AS. I don't know if the depression is or not. Therapy has helped me to identify my issues and accept them. For instance, I used to blame racism and the close-mindedness of my home town for my rejection. I also blamed my family for rejecting me. Now, I realize that it is because I have a mental illness that makes me act in ways that make people angry or hurts peoples feelings. It also makes it extremely difficult for me to connect to people and show affection for those I do love. People are reacting to symptoms of my AS, not persecuting me because I am black or a freethinker. This has helped me unload a lot of anger. I can't begin to explain how much better my anxiety has gotten. Also, I am re-examining my career path considering the fact that I have AS. I am a mental health professional (extremely difficult thing for someone with AS to do because it requires us to constantly work against our AS traits). I have learned to adapt and function in my profession. However, it takes so much out of me. I feel so much better when I am doing something that doesn't involve so much intense social interaction. Understanding AS and accepting that I have it comes from being in therapy.

In my opinion, therapy is about processing emotions, coming to terms with what is happening in your life and deciding how to proceed. It is not about fixing the symptoms of my AS. My therapist is aware of my AS and takes it into account when conducting therapy. However, we don't really talk much about social skills. We don't address AS specifically. Therapy for me has definitely been worth it, and I will continue.

I think I would have benefitted from social skills training when I was a child or teenager, but I have already learned enough by life experience alone that I don't see it as beneficial if I were to receive it now. It might make a difference but not a big one. Once again, that's my opinion, and it is about me, not you. I don't know if social skills training would be good for you or not. I hope my experience helps.

Since I think you are asking for opinions, not interpretations of what Tony Attwood said and meant, here is mine.

Therapy is all about ASD for me even though possibly most people meeting me might notice something but would not leap to ASD as being present. Because communication is not easy for me and therapy is about communication and I spent years of therapy processing emotions as Em_tsuj says, but more fundamentally learning to describe to myself and someone else what feelings I had and where and who I am, not from not knowing but from this tremendous gap between what I know and what I can say in words, and because my experience of the world is so literal that I am generally in a state of at least mild confusion with any social interchange. And therapy is a social interchange, though has specific, slightly different rules and goals.

I think therapy is all about ASD because social behavior has a base in effective communication and learning to communicate is fundamental in relating effectively and having it be satisfying. I think if you understand the things that are happening and what people want, which we all learn a lot of because we have to, NT, ASD, or whatever, therapy can seem sort of irrelevant as you are suggesting, Hyena. But being high functioning is no guarantee that one is able to make sense of social behavior enough to navigate with minimal comfort. And I am still learning social and language things. I am maybe more vulnerable than most, if you aren't feeling under assault by the world or exhausted or overwhelmed or constantly confused, Hyena, then I agree, not much point.

Did this make sense? I never really know how well I communicated until someone lets me know and appreciate being told how I did very much as I am trying to learn.

I don't get on with therapy but then I don't know if I have an ASD or not. My therapist thinks I do but...I am still not sure.

For example I struggle to connect to people but I am actually a very affectionate person. When in a relationship with someone I try to learn their likes and dislikes and care very deeply about them. I am not really distant so much as I just like alone time to recharge.

I too find most people uninteresting and outside of finding a life partner I am not overly fussy about having friends (although I don't mind friendships blossoming if I feel I like someone). Unfortunately the people I do like or eventually develop fondness for always seem to live miles and miles away.

Whether I have an ASD or not I mostly haunt these boards because there is interesting conversation and most of the people I like at the moment are on here as well, even if I don't always talk much.

My not always talking does not mean I don't like someone, just means I can't think of anything to say and will come back to the conversation later when my brain has fired up some chit chat to make.

Hyena, if you are asking whether people think psychologists are more skilled, no. If you want therapy, experience and ability to understand your needs are what matter, other kinds of professional counselors may be just as good. It's the person who matters, and what their skills are. Not the degree.

em_tsuj,
Thank you for sharing, this was helpful. Like you, I also dealt with great anger and not wanting to accept that I had a defect but I think I am over it by now. When I had those issues I was also quite unhappy but it has been a years since I was depressed for more than a day or so. I would like to think I am no longer vulnerable to that. I think for me the unhappiness came from not accepting the truth but that is no longer an issue. Still I guess I have nothing to lose by going to therapy.

Waterfalls,
Thank you, that’s interesting.
This makes perfect sense I don’t think I have a problem with communication except with people I don’t know (which I guess is anxiety). If I may press you on this, can you give an example of a situation where therapy makes a difference? For example, without therapy someone would do this under these circumstances and with therapy he would do that.
There was a point when I felt under assault by the world but that was quite a while back (a decade). Now I think I know my limitations and I am fine with them. When I must deal with people to achieve a goal, like completion of a project, my AS limitations are never a hindrance.
I appreciate your advice, I will see a therapist so that I can at least know my limitations better and know what to expect from them.

bumble,
I think I we have many similarities There are times when I am quite affectionate, especially with people I like, especially animals :p

Finding likable life partner(s) is also one of my main goals in life. I am seriously deficient there! Even when people I find attractive come chasing me I somehow manage to relay the message I have no interest, even though I really like them. MOTHERF...
I think I will open a thread to discuss this.

There have been quite a few times when I have developed great fondness for people online and vice versa. The fact that I am not as good at forming such relationships IRL I think is clearly a consequence of AS.

I definitely understand not saying anything when you have nothing to say. When one has nothing to say it is better to not say anything than to BS

I wasn't saying you should see a therapist, so much as my opinion that it can be worth it and what else I think it can help with. I wanted to add to what em_tsuj said. I don't think therapy fixes ASD, but I do think it's hard going through life with ASD and therapy helps with confusion that can directly result from ASD. A therapist who is skillful can help with directly teaching and advising about behaviors that may be successful for building and maintaining relationships, and you're saying that is something you want.

I'm not trying to be difficult, and maybe my idea of communication is broader than what others mean, because when you write that you relay the message you don't like someone when you really do, that seems like you are saying it is hard to communicate your actual feeling and intent. Some therapists might look at that as intentional self sabotage, like a person not feeling deserving, and that's a possibility. But if you like someone and do not and never really have been able to convey that even though it is what you feel, it seems to me that is a problem communicating, and that if there is a way of learning to do so more effectively, it would be helpful. I hope that answers what you are asking.

I've found therapy helpful at times when I felt hopelessly confused and overwhelmed and lost, and needed somebody to help me sort through my feelings, and get things a bit more under control.

But it was never really about developing social skills, so I wouldn't know much about that. I feel the same as you though – I'm just not interested in socializing, so learning NT social skills is simply not a priority for me. I'm content to be a loner, and learn at my own pace, in whatever limited interactions I actually have.

Thank you guys, I will try it.

After diagnosis, there was no therapy available from the NHS where I live and I couldn't afford to go private. In the end, though, I got through by finally getting learning to drive, getting out and going to AS social groups and an astronomy club; I got a little help from the psychologist on the employment skills program, but that was more about family issues than AS itself.

I seemed to develop social skills and other life skills as a by product of all those things; things that were latent in me but had not before made sense, like looking through a fog. So in the end, I got by without AS-specific therapy, but would like to have had a few taster sessions just to see if it would have done me any good; for example, after my dad died, my mum tried therapy, but in the end it wasn't really for her, so she just stopped it.

I'd say if anybody can get at least a few sessions free by NHS or whatever the equivalent in their country is, or if they can afford to pay for it, do so; they can always give it up if it doesn't work out for them.