Does this bother anyone else?

[music.forlife7]

First, sorry for not being on. I've had a lot on my mind lately. Today, I wanted to bring up an issue in curing autism that's always bothered me. I was laying awake one night wondering this...

Why do people go to such great lengths to change us, (with the therapies and what not)? Don't we all make mistakes? It's like they want us to be more perfect, and to get over our fears and dislikes. Neurotyoical people have their discomforts too, and what gets on my nerves is that we have to get therapy for it, and they don't.
For example if a person without autism is scared of a snake, people let it go. If an autistic person is scared, they need to go to a counselor or whatever to try to come out of the fear.

I Hope I'm not over thinking this, it's just on my mind. Thoughts?

 

[King_Oni]

While I agree with you that therapy is silly in a lot of cases, there's also a bigger issue at hand.

I found that a fair share of people with (any) mental disorder might suffer from rather irrational fears and impairments that make everyday functioning hard.

Your example of snakes is a decent fear (much like spiders and a few others), but if I for instance have social anxiety issues, it is an impairment that limits me from working, getting educated (and the combination of getting educated to hold a job). That's where they might see if there's something to be done about it.

I do however think that there's a thin line about things that need to be fixed for practical reasons and things that "need" to be fixed just because it conflicts the norm. Being socially inept in terms of employment is one, but being socially inept, not having a big social life and seeing that as a problem that needs fixing is a different deal.

A thing I sometimes worry about is that at some point I can see therapy coming in effect to alter ones interests and hobbies to make them more generally accepted. No more obsessions for, for instance, us aspies. I've had run ins with therapists over this. I don't see myself as a weird guy with even weirder and obscure interests, but therapists found that I should enjoy some more generally accepted things to make me be a bit more social.

There's also some concern on my behalf where therapy will step in to change things, that I might not even want to change. To follow up on my example of employment. I wouldn't mind to have a job, but if that means that I have to turn into a more social person and deal with social drama, because... that's what people do, I rather not deal with employment. It's where a goal requires therapy upon therapy upon therapy, which will alter how a person might be as a person. I don't believe in altering personality through therapy. I do believe in trying to make it work with whatever you have going on.