Appropriate therapy

My adult son has been to councillors who seem to listen only to him. He suffers greatly from depression but has a high functioning job and is well paid. He needs more direction from a therapist. It is very hard to find therapists who specialise in Aspergers. Many councillors list Aspergers as one of many conditions they treat but don't have any deep knowledge of it or know how to help people with the condition.  Can anyone suggest what type of therapy would be appropriate for an Aspergers adult with severe depression please? He lives in the Godalming area.

  • Thank you Ferret for your reply.

  • NAS18906 said:

    I'll agree with Deepthought that TA is a useful technique to help to learn some social skills. It isn't a therapy, as I understand it, but it is exactly the sort of thing that someone with autism would benefit from being aware of. I guess that a lot of non-autistic people would find a lot of TA obvious although I have seen a lot of workplace intreractions that dismally fail to get to the desirable Adult-Adult goal.

    In that a 'therapy' is defined as being; a 'treatment intended to relieve or heal a disorder', and that you continue to state as follows:

    For a person with depression and autism it may be possible for the person to achieve something by improving their people skills with TA as a part of that. If your skills are enhanced then one's self esteem should improve and that should help combat depression.

    You have in effect described firstly that TA is not a therapy, but 'a useful technique', and then secondly you have gone on to explain your proposal for what in effect 'should' in your opinion make it a viable therapy - as 'that should help combat depression.'

    As far as the 'desirable Adult-Adult goal' goes - that isn't really the desirable objective of TA, as the objective is to assist the patient in achieving their personal objective/s; as in accordance with their individual skill sets and at their particular pace.

    The basic objective then is for the patient to achieve a more psychologically balanced Parent, Adult and Child ego-state coherence, as allows a healthier consensus of their feelings, their thoughts and their actions, and this as such enables them to achieve more integrally productive outcomes.

    The CBT/DBT approach would approach things on a different level.

    CBT is more focused upon the presentation of Personae; involving cognitive methodologies for the sake of social integrations and status with and without others 'conservatively' - as in the sense of maintaining the collective transactional impetus, and TA is more focused upon the manifestation of Personality; involving characteristic traits for the sake of personal individuation and contentment as with and or without others 'innovatively' - as in the sense of the individual developing their interactive impetus. 

    These therapies should challenge the mindset whereby people with autism are often too quick to categorise things as black or white, true or false, when the real world often has much vaguer and less categorical views of things.

    Although CBT and TA as therapies may 'challenge' the mindset of the patient, it is better to address (at least from the TA perspective) the irregularities of their mindset as they are made relevant, rather than the therapist go all Parent and or Child on them in terms of being challenging. Adult exemplication and interaction is the key really.  

    Being too categorical is a common pre-cursor to mental health issues. See essex-behavioural-therapy.co.uk/article.asp (This is a fairly random pick from Google, I have no connection with that website)


  • Former Member
    Former Member

    NAS9920 said:

     it does not matter what a person is, all therapy, irrespective of its area of specialism, is geared towards the individual. there is no differentiation between this type of person, and that type of person. we are all individuals. therefore, any treatment will be, and should be, tailored for the individual concerned, as we are all different

    Yes, we are all different but isn't it still useful to identify that, for example, a person with autism might be treated differently in therapy from a person without autism? I wouldn't advise anyone with autism to use a therapist who knew nothing of autism or of how to treat people with autism with the special consideration for the traits that autism bestows on one.

  • Former Member
    Former Member

    I'll agree with Deepthought that TA is a useful technique to help to learn some social skills. It isn't a therapy, as I understand it, but it is exactly the sort of thing that someone with autism would benefit from being aware of. I guess that a lot of non-autistic people would find a lot of TA obvious although I have seen a lot of workplace intreractions that dismally fail to get to the desirable Adult-Adult goal.

    For a person with depression and autism it may be possible for the person to achieve something by improving their people skills with TA as a part of that. If your skills are enhanced then one's self esteem should improve and that should help combat depression.

    The CBT/DBT approach would approach things on a different level. These therapies should challenge the mindset whereby people with autism are often too quick to categorise things as black or white, true or false, when the real world often has much vaguer and less categorical views of things. Being too categorical is a common pre-cursor to mental health issues. See essex-behavioural-therapy.co.uk/article.asp (This is a fairly random pick from Google, I have no connection with that website)

  • Thank you Deepthought for your reply to my query. I hadn't heard of Transaction Analysis so I will read up more about it.

  • Another angle you could try, is Transaction Analysis, or T.A. as established by Eric Berne, M.D., and made famous through the book 'GAMES PEOPLE PLAY - THE PSYCHOLOGY OF HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS' which is essentially the Haines Manual for social interactions and - 'if you will do something for me; I will then do someting for you' - transactions.

    It is bit complex for most to get into at the beginning - but relatively easily in the social Games sections. It really really helped me alot.

    There is also now the book TA Today - A New Introduction to Transactional Analysis, by Ian Stewart and Vann Joines - which is really a very tidy piece of work (from the analytical perrspective) and more practically involving for the reader in therapuetic/personal-development terms.

    Also - TA can be used along with CBT which was as a process derived from TA, and correlates with Cognitive Analysis also. It is often found useful that getting a copy of TA Today for each person involved in relationship issues, as they can read them apart and support each other from an informed standpoint, as well as spot blind spoints and all that.

    Obviously, one size or type does not suit all people, but having options is sometimes better than having one or less - sort of thing.

  • Thank you recombinantsocks for your reply to my query. I have perused the information you have given me and I will certainly be making contact with various therapists after the weekend. I found the information most helpful and thank you very much indeed.

  • Former Member
    Former Member

    CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) and a variant of that, DBT www.mind.org.uk/.../ are recommended therapies for people with autism and depression.

    It is no good for them to just listen to him. They also need to enter into discussions with him where they challenge his thinking patterns and his ideas. A good counsellor will be able to challenge and recognise when to increase or decrease the challenges depending on the responses that they get from their patient.