Psychologists often don't 'get' autism, my own experience exemplifies this

I have finished a course of CBT for my phobias and OCD. The CBT was quite useful in places, particularly the information on how to fill in thought charts and anxiety ratings, which have given me something to focus on, and they do help me in working around my anxieties.

However, at the end of the day I still have phobias and OCD. My psychologist has failed to 'cure' them. I am not defeatist, and am always hopeful that with continued support from my support worker, my anxieties will ease with time.  However, my psychologist was so wrong when she told me my phobia of dogs is a 'simple' one because I had no trauma or frightening experiences as a child. It is true that I did not experience any trauma or extreme upheaval, but my Asperger's syndrome complicates matters and therefore my phobia can hardly be called 'simple' - it is, in fact, very complex.

The psychologist just did not seem to understand autism that well.

 

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  • Hope said:

    I have finished a course of CBT for my phobias and OCD. The CBT was quite useful in places, particularly the information on how to fill in thought charts and anxiety ratings, which have given me something to focus on, and they do help me in working around my anxieties.

    However, at the end of the day I still have phobias and OCD. My psychologist has failed to 'cure' them.complex.

    The psychologist just did not seem to understand autism that well.

     

    i think you are right, i doubt a lot of psychologists understand autism very well, its still a releativly 'new' issue to them so they dont know about it and its left to autistic specialists to help people with autism

    psychologists cant "cure" phobias, they are able to help you figure out why you do it and then try to find a 'better way' for you to cope with it

    buty you stil have to do the work for that 

    its brilliant you find cbt good for you in some ways and its helped you work around anxieties, but you still have a long way to go , phobias are hard to beat, id say they are the hardest to be honest, because they usually stem from places we cant remember, so its not as easy as figuring out why you have that fear and accpeting it

    i think the psychologist saying your phobia of dogs is " a simple one" is obviously a very unproffessional and unhelpful thing to say, especially taking into account your autism, but like i said, psychologists dontknow anything about autism, its many and varied symptoms or how it affects a persons life, so in reality her comments onthat are not worth taking on board

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  • Hope said:

    I have finished a course of CBT for my phobias and OCD. The CBT was quite useful in places, particularly the information on how to fill in thought charts and anxiety ratings, which have given me something to focus on, and they do help me in working around my anxieties.

    However, at the end of the day I still have phobias and OCD. My psychologist has failed to 'cure' them.complex.

    The psychologist just did not seem to understand autism that well.

     

    i think you are right, i doubt a lot of psychologists understand autism very well, its still a releativly 'new' issue to them so they dont know about it and its left to autistic specialists to help people with autism

    psychologists cant "cure" phobias, they are able to help you figure out why you do it and then try to find a 'better way' for you to cope with it

    buty you stil have to do the work for that 

    its brilliant you find cbt good for you in some ways and its helped you work around anxieties, but you still have a long way to go , phobias are hard to beat, id say they are the hardest to be honest, because they usually stem from places we cant remember, so its not as easy as figuring out why you have that fear and accpeting it

    i think the psychologist saying your phobia of dogs is " a simple one" is obviously a very unproffessional and unhelpful thing to say, especially taking into account your autism, but like i said, psychologists dontknow anything about autism, its many and varied symptoms or how it affects a persons life, so in reality her comments onthat are not worth taking on board

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