Why therapy won't work

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What would you like to get from different kinds of therapy? Certain skills? I tried to find a social skills kind of therapy, but there weren't any at my psych place. All the social-related therapies there for were social anxiety that I don't have.

CBT didn't work for me either, because I don't think the NT way, and I didn't understand what people were talking about with their self-worth issues and feelings of worthlessness that CBT is supposed to rectify.

If there are no good social skills therapies are there any good social skills texts I can read?

No I don't get that either (the self worth thing) as I don't really think in that way. Most therapies are geared up for NT modes of thinking. Whether I am NT or ASD I don't get along with it and I find their approaches frustrating.

If it is an ASD which is mostly responsible for my social issues then I am not keen on support for that either as the prevailing notion is that it is a 'disorder'. I do not like that notion as I prefer to think of it as a difference instead. Part of the reason people with an ASD probably have problems socialising is because the world is set up for NTs instead. It is like putting a french man and a german in a room together when they don't speak the same language or come from the same culture and expecting them to communicate successfully.

If someone from a remote tribe were to walk into the modern world when they had never been exposed to it before they would find themselves confused, unable to fully understand the local customs and probably would not speak the same language. They too would struggle to communicate, for a while anyway.

Even amongst those who speak a similar language and come from the same culture I have read there can be communication difficulties between people with different levels of intelligence for example. People from different back grounds can also fail to understand each other.

Some people are good at socialising, some are good at academics, a few are good at both. Some are good at practical skills, some are better at book skills, some people are more creative and some people are more street smart.

What works well in one environment (NT in the social environment) does not work so well in another (Aspie in a social environment) however an Aspie may perform better than the NT in other areas.

Variation is natural...not all variations are a disorder or a defect and I don't like the way that many support services seem to see those with an ASD as inferior in some way.

It bothers me.

I haven't read everything you've tried, because you type even more than I do and it becomes a "TLDR" post.

I may have some info on alternative treatments that might help. They're none of the typical suggestions of therapy or pharmaceuticals. Its all completely natural. Thing is, it takes commitment and dedication to do. I'm not going to spend my time typing anything up if you're not in a receptive mood to listen and are feeling like actually trying something different. Yes, I can provide links to info on it for you to research before agreeing to try it. When you're in an open minded mood and truly willing to try something, PM me and we'll chat.

And FYI what I'd recommend is exactly what has worked for me after CBT didn't. CBT was still a lot of valuable leaarning, including being able to quantify my regression vs. Improvement and realize it wasn't working & that I had to find another way - and I did.

I am well known for my verbosity

Can you provide me with a brief hint of the kind of thing you have in mind...

Dramatic change in diet from what you're probably used to. That's the single most difficult part, especially if like many ASD people you refuse to give up certain favourite foods or are an extremely picky eater. Adding some natural supplements. Beyond diet, adding as much exercise as you can, and being open minded to metaphysical things ie meditation - as it's also helped, but isn't absolutely mandatory that someone does it. The single biggest thing would be sticking to an extremely strict diet.

I think it just seems that way to you, but they might actually be wanting to help you, and from their point of view what's most likely to work is to give 'standard' advice. It's only natural for someone who doesn't know you very well to start off with things like 'just go out and meet people', 'go seek a therapist', 'do this', 'do that', etc.

Though have you tried seeking a therapist who specialises in AS? This might help your concern that what ordinary therapists say are geared towards NTs. Of course this doesn't come with guarantees.

By the way I apologise if anyway I've said was covered before in this thread, it's 6 pages long so I haven't read the rest of it.

No I do not see any emotional manipulation in my post at all. I am absolutely the straightest person you will get. I do not ever manipulate. That is how you are taking it. That is because of the attitude you have built up - which is what you need help with. I am sure I also recommended 5HTP and St John's Wort which are both natural, either on this thread or another one to you.

Neither have I criticised you. I have simply tried to get you to see a different perspective and very kindly and helpfully spent my time looking up information for you because I wanted to help you.

It appears you have decided you are past help, you know best and you are self-defeatist and going round in circles because you won't accept advice from others, yet you are happy to come online and complain at length despite what people do to try to help you solve your issues.

Like Goldfish, said, I can also be incredibly verbose, but virtually all your posts are TLDR and therefore perhaps you spoke of this mysterious 'decision' elsewhere and I missed it, however I do not know what decision you are referring to.

You are imbuing me with traits I do not possess and it appears, deliberately misreading my intentions.

Feel free to ignore my advice and that of others, but as you have taken this attitude, I will spend my energies elsewhere on the forum, helping my Aspie fellows where I can, instead of a person who does not have an ASC diagnosis, has no intention of seeking an assessment for it and therefore will never get the right support, and would be best on the Haven where they can wallow in self-pity instead of trying to be proactive and appreciative of peoples' well-meant advice.

Self-help books can be good

The two best ones I've ever read were 'The Road Less Travelled' by M.Scott Peck and 'Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway'
by Susan Jeffers

Dorothy Rowe writes well about Depression -

"'Depression: The Way Out of Your Prison' gives us a way of understanding our depression which matches our experience and which enables us to take charge of our life and change it. Dorothy Rowe shows us that depression is not an illness or a mental disorder but a defence against pain and fear, which we can use whenever we suffer a disaster and discover that our life is not what we thought it was.

Depression is an unwanted consequence of how we see ourselves and the world. By understanding how we have interpreted events in our life we can choose to change our interpretations and thus create for ourselves a happier, more fulfilling life."

And the book 'Emotional Intelligence' by Daniel Goleman is also good

I've read loads of self-help books - just reading them makes me feel I'm at least trying to work on my problems

I have a suggestion that isn't about traditional CBT therapy for depression or social skills instruction (since I'm not sure who does that). It's something I found helpful. It is nutritional therapy.

http://www.amazon.com/Mood-Cure-4-Step- ... ood+cure#_

The author's premise is that many people's negative emotions are not coming from their distorted thoughts (per CBT therapy) but rather from neurotransmitters that are out of balance. I realize (and the author realizes) that the entire field of psychiatry is founded on that premise too. Psychiatric drugs will try to change the balance of neurotransmitters generally by blocking their action (which decreases them) or by preventing re-uptake (which increases them). Her somewhat different take on this premise is that modern diet is what caused them to go out of whack in the first place so dietary intervention can bring them back in line without dangerous side effects (though she is not so reckless as to tell people who are already on them to stop taking them, she might get in trouble if she did).

In other posts I seem to recall you talking about trying the Paleo diet and this has some significant overlaps.


I tried her targeted interventions and after a month I am feeling quite upbeat. I have no idea if this would work for you but it's something to try. My targeted intervention is sardines and tyrosine and 5htp capsules. Yours could be entirely different. But it is a different approach than the usual CBT/SSRI intervention that doctors will give you.

edited to add: I just read some more of your posts after the one I quoted and it seems you are already routinely eating the Paleo diet and don't take supplements. Unfortunately this method advocates specific supplements pretty heavily at least for a couple months. But the author also agrees that the ideal way to get the things that are in the supplement is through food.The supplements are just to give larger doses than food would provide to come up to a normal baseline. But you wouldn't have to do it that way. Based on her advice I eat lots of sardines and also take tyrosine. But the tyrosine is found in protein just not as much. So if her theory sounds ok to you then it could likely be implemented with just food tweaks. It would be a tweak on the Paleo diet you already eat.

Sorry I’m late to the party. I’m still reading the third page, but I just had to respond.

I really, really relate to the OP. I could have written it myself. Come to think of it, I could have written most of this thread. Especially Bumble’s rant on page 2.

That’s the “alien anthropologist” in Bumble talking. When I can’t relate to whatever's happening, I need to step back and try to understand intellectually. (Aspie boys are sometimes seen as the “little philosopher,” while girls sometimes lean toward the “little philosopher.”) But don’t let anyone catch you being moral – they’ll hate you for it. Unless you can claim permission from some diety or historical figure, and twist it into something vile. Then you’ll fit right in.

Call it a “Theory of Mind” issue, but I have trouble relating to the predator who wants to use me to feed his own ego or as a punching bag. Not being sadistic myself, I have so much trouble relating to it that I can’t predict, never see it coming, can’t even believe it when I see it. Only in hind-sight can I make sense of it at all, and when I do grasp the concept, I am repulsed. Either way, playing those games myself is just not an option.

Oh, yes, doctor, please give me drugs or a bit of Stockholm syndrome or somehow trick me into a positive attitude so I won’t be “afraid” to ram my head into that brick wall. Again. (Einstein’s definition of insanity.) Like it’s my fear or negative attitude that makes that brick wall so solid.

At one point they’ll tell you the abuse is all in your head, hinting at or stating paranoia. And the next minute they want you to understand that the existence of predators is a pervasive part of human nature and there ain’t nothing you can do. Or they’ll insist on both at the same time, and not see the self-contradiction. Isn’t there something in-between? Like: yes, there’s a real-world problem; and yes, you can do something about it?

And don’t get me started on eye-contact and non-verbal communication… Too late, I’m rolling now…

The eye-contact tricks don’t really work. You might have heard someone advise you to pick another spot to look at, like the center of the person’s forehead or chin, or you might have learned to force yourself to look at their eyes. I believe I picked up some of the tricks somewhere in childhood (or maybe it was beaten into me) and I didn’t really think about it until I started hanging out at WP and someone put it into words.

But if you’re consciously, intellectually forcing yourself to do it, I promise you, you are doing it wrong. It’s a non-verbal, instinctive, subconscious, organic thing and, if you don’t have it, you can’t fake it. The person you’re talking to doesn’t know why your inadequate eye-contact is making him uncomfortable and looks for an excuse to blame you for something. Or if he’s slightly educated, he might consciously check for eye-contact, decide that’s not the problem, and look for an excuse to blame you. Either way, he doesn’t know what he’s really reacting to, so the excuses will never make sense. It just turns into a game of “gotcha” and neither of you knows why.

Multiply that by a hundred other odd little non-verbal things, spread the annoyances out over several people and enough time, and it can turn into a witch hunt. And I’m supposed to internalize it and take all the blame. The fact that I’m innocent, or that I haven’t even been accused f a crime, never occurs to anyone.

“Being well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society is no measure of health.” ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

I love this thread. There really is someone out there who “gets it,” however few and far away we may be. It gives the momentarily comforting illusion that an Aspie community would be possible. Would all of you please come and live in my town?

Ok, I’m done. There are so many quote-ables in here that I can’t count them all.

Here’s a topic I haven’t seen on this thread: the assumption of “Developmental Sequences” is a popular superstition that “you need to crawl before you can walk.”
If you’re not crawling, you should not be permitted to attempt walking. Then there’s the reverse, that if you can walk, it’s reasonable to assume that you already *know* how to crawl, and if you don’t do so, it must be because you are being uncooperative or whatever.

Case history: My sister’s kid (who grew up fine, with no disabilities at all). She never really crawled properly, she had never walked at all, when one day she just got up and started running. To which my sister would add, “and she’s been running ever since.”

Math: The ability to memorize the multiplication tables IS NOT MATH AT ALL. It’s a useful tool if you have a functional memory and can manage it, but it need not slow you down in higher math. It’s just a crutch for math phobes, which is a common ailment among elementary teachers (a self-selected group in which certain personality traits are over-represented). They needed the crutch because THEY stunk at the concepts. Personally, I could see the numbers dancing in the air and naturally falling into place. What I couldn’t do was memorize a bunch of useless BS.

You can coach from a wheelchair; you can understand a game and still be unable to play the game. Some things can’t be taught, and some problems don’t magically go away when you understand them. The other side of that is that you can show complex behaviors with no understanding at all. Ants can build some impressive structures with no brains at all. A newborn human can manage breathing and digestion without the slightest notion of how those organs work or why it’s desirable.

Some people are color-blind or tone deaf. You can’t teach them away; you can only accept them and find a line of work and other situations that allow you to avoid them. This child is not going to be a concert violinist. Get over it.

Immaturity: My mother is five-foot-nothing. She is NOT immature. She’s just short, and it’s not going to change. Using words like “immature” implies a possibility for further development that does not exist. The harassment is cruel and counterproductive. People are what they are.

Can you dance without thinking? Good for you. So why do you think that you can instruct me in something you don’t understand yourself? I’ve spent more time thinking about it than you have. If I were going to "learn" how to do it, I would have done so by now. You think I should stop thinking and just “go with the flow?”
I think you should just go f—yourself.

In the world of work, there are lots of elements in “menial labor” that are not easy or menial at all and can’t be taught. I tried waitressing as a kid, and knew it didn’t work, but didn’t know why until I found WP. The first time I heard the term, “Face Blind,” I knew exactly what it meant – it had been my dirty little secret for a half-century. This new understanding doesn’t change anything except that now I know why I can’t be a waitress.

Very very very very interesting and thank you.

I have long been fascinated by any possible links between nutrition and mental health issues. To me the brain is an organ like any other and if you do not provide it with the right nutrition (or diet) it will not function at optimal levels. I am also curious about the effects of food in other ways on the brain.

I am reading a book at the moment called 'Primal mind, Primal Body' which has a chapter regarding the effects of the modern day diet and environmental stresses on the human brain but have not gotten that far yet. I am looking forward to reading it though as I find such subjects to be rather interesting.



Sardines are an excellent food! High in Essential Fatty Acids and calcium (if you eat the bones) along with some Vitamin D I think. I have seen several studies that suggest that EFA's are more beneficial for treating depression than both placebos and antidepressants. They are also excellent for getting rid of PMS (so I have discovered in the past).



The book may still be of interest from a nutritional/theoretical view point and may still have some information I can use. I often use a mixture of different methods rather than following any one particularly strictly and I have found this to be more beneficial for me in the past. Basically I take the best of each method or theory and dump the rest or rather I take what I feel will be useful to me and skip over anything I feel would not.

When it comes to supplements it can depend on what the supplement is...fish oil is something I might consider but I am still reading up regarding mercury contents of such things.

Sardines are a good source of EFAs without being high in methylmercury because they are small breeds of fish (there is no one fish called a sardine...it is a collective term for small fishes such as herring). Mercury tends to accumulate in larger species of fish so those are best avoided. Salmon is also another good source of EFA's and generally tends to have a low mercury content.

You do not want to ingest too much mercury as it is a neurotoxin. There was a case many years ago where people in a small seaside village (I think in japan or near japan but please do not quote me on that location) where people started collapsing with neurological symptoms. Eventually it was found that the local fish that made up much of their diet had contained high levels of methylmercury and they have been poisoned by it.

Now the Government says it is safe to eat a certain amount (so they say) although women who pregnant or of childbearing age should limit their consumption of fish even more than others should. This is because consuming mercury whilst pregnant can cause serious damage to the babies brain and nervous system.

As for supplements of fish oil there is some debate as to their mercury content....

Basically if you do eat fish...stick to small fishes or breeds with a VERY LOW mercury content.

If you're serious, at all, about being open to dietary treatments then take me up on my offer and PM me about it vs. writing page after page and not making any forward progress.

Whilst I am on the subject, I am also interested in any links on celiac disease or gluten sensitivity and mental health.

The reason for this is that my stomach issues cleared up after I stopped consuming grains and dairy. Before that I was getting horrendous diarrhea, stomach pain, acid reflux and was feeling rather ill most days due to it. I also used to get crippling migraines but they are improving now as well.

The reason for my interest in the link between celiac disease and mental health is because my brother had the disorder. Now he is only a half brother as he had a different father to me so I am not sure which side of the family he got the disorder from (my mothers or his dads). What I do know is that my mum showed symptoms of it although she was never diagnosed (she was given a diagnosis of IBS which is a common misdiagnosis for celiac...many diagnosed with IBS will later be found to have celiac disease). The reason she was not diagnosed was because she was never tested. In the days when my brother got his diagnosis it was considered to be a rare childhood disorder so the adults in the family were not checked for it as a result. It tends to have a genetic link and if you have one family member with it, it is very very likely there are more!

It is an autoimmune condition where the bodies immune system responds to the presence of gluten in the digestive tract and which damage the the lining of the small intestine (the villi) in the process. This can lead to problems absorbing nutrients and can result in a whole load of nasty symptoms including stomach upsets and neurological problems such as seizures (occipital lobe epilepsy is not uncommon in celiacs and nor are migraine headaches and sleep problems although the latter is poorly researched).

There have also been some studies that have suggested a link between gluten consumption and schizophrenia. Some schizophrenics places on a gluten free diet have found that their symptoms have improved or completely disappeared as a result...but research in this area is shaky.

I do not have schizophrenia but depression and anxiety is not uncommon in celiacs either.

I did ask for a test for celiac on the basis that it is in my family but the blood test for it came back negative. I still have doubts though as:

1 It was taken at a time that I was consuming a gluten free diet...this can produce a false negative as there is no gluten in my system for the immune system to react to and the test they use looks for an immune response.

2 The test has a margin of error up to 30%. People who have tested negative on the blood tests have been found to have celiac disease after being given a biopsy...which is the gold standard for diagnosis.

3 There is a genetic test to see if you are carrying the genes that are linked to celiac disease but this is not available on the NHS.

All the same I try to avoid gluten and cows milk on a regular basis.

There are other dietary factors that can contribute to mental health issues but if I write any more I would end up writing a book.

It depends on what diet you are talking about. I may tweak my diet but I am not going to change from my paleo diet as such.

I cannot consume any diet that contains gluten or much lactose (I can get away with small amounts occasionally) due to severe digestive disturbances (and we are talking loss of bowel control here not just a minor case of the trots) and severe migraines.

My digestive system is also sensitive to MSG and aspartame and I do not consume any other artificial sweeteners or food additives. I also dislike soy and the last time I tried soy milk it made me vomit.

I keep my processed sugar consumption low as well, although I do consume starchy vegetables. This is because diabetes type 2 runs in my family (I do not yet have it but I am close to the age my other close relatives developed it and I am presently over weight from the antidepressants they put me on) and it also makes my mood crash if I eat too much of it.

Basically I consume only fresh meat (not processed meats such as deli meats, sausages, burgers), poultry, oily fish (low in methylmercury), fresh vegetables, fresh fruit, nuts (but not peanuts) and eggs.

If you can outline what diet you are talking about I may be able to comment further if I might be interested.

But I am not straying too far from paleo as it has been an absolute god send in getting rid of my stomach problems. My digestive system is the happiest I have ever known it and my migraines are disappearing as well. I really don't want that lot back again....the crippled me for years. They were worse than my social issues for destroying my social life as I spent most of my time unable to get out of bed due to feeling horribly ill or running to the bathroom.

Paloe and coming off medications has reversed all of that and I can actually get up and do stuff now....although I am still having issues with my sleep pattern. But at least the other stuff has gone.