Bruno Bettelheim, a psychoanalyst who studied autistic children, wrote in his book "The Empty Fortress" in 1967 that children with classic autism displayed symptoms consistent with parental rejection and claimed he helped them recover from autism through purely psychological intervention. He blamed autism on really bad mothers (he called them "devouring witches" in his book) and is the reason the Refrigerator Mother theory became popular. His claims were rejected after his theory fell out of favor.
I wrote a story explaining how a child described in his book could have recovered from classic autism despite him being wrong about bad mothers being the initial cause. Keep in mind the DSM-I was used at the time so a child who ended up with high functioning autism wouldn't have been considered autistic.
Here's my story:
Joey was born with autistic traits inherited from his parents. Like many adults who misinterpret those with autistic traits as being cold and indifferent, Joey made the same mistake when he was a baby. He felt his parents had rejected him which also made him think there must be something wrong with him. Feeling rejected because he was different and believing there was nothing he could do about it, he became depressed, lost interest in people, and preferred to be alone. To avoid feeling lonely, he used his imagination to create a world of his own inside his mind which led to him being diagnosed with classic autism due to his delayed speech and odd behavior.
His negative interactions with people reinforced his belief that he was defective. Since feeling rejected when he was a baby was a traumatic experience and his mind associated being different with being rejected, he suffered fear and emotional distress similar to those with PTSD which led him to tell people he was controlled by machines in the hope they would judge the machines instead of him if he said or did something abnormal.
Joey's black and white thinking resulted in him putting most people in one category (normal people) and himself and other odd people in another category. Comparing the two groups, he felt inferior, sad that he wasn’t like everyone else, ashamed since he often blamed himself for his problems, angry that others didn’t accept him, fearful since he didn't understand the other group, and hopeless since he felt he was born that way and couldn’t change. Those emotions created internal stress which caused his brain to work differently which made it impossible to understand other people and act normally.
Fortunately, Joey learned about CBT and used it to correct his distorted beliefs which greatly reduced the negative emotions he experienced. After the stress caused by his beliefs and emotions went away, he was able to think more clearly and understood people better. After a year of making up for the positive social interaction he lacked, he no longer had any trouble fitting in and making friends. Although he still had autistic traits, he no longer met the criteria for autism and his diagnosis was removed. He wish he could be reborn by his mother knowing he wasn't rejected because then he never would have been autistic.
I wrote a story explaining how a child described in his book could have recovered from classic autism despite him being wrong about bad mothers being the initial cause. Keep in mind the DSM-I was used at the time so a child who ended up with high functioning autism wouldn't have been considered autistic.
Here's my story:
Joey was born with autistic traits inherited from his parents. Like many adults who misinterpret those with autistic traits as being cold and indifferent, Joey made the same mistake when he was a baby. He felt his parents had rejected him which also made him think there must be something wrong with him. Feeling rejected because he was different and believing there was nothing he could do about it, he became depressed, lost interest in people, and preferred to be alone. To avoid feeling lonely, he used his imagination to create a world of his own inside his mind which led to him being diagnosed with classic autism due to his delayed speech and odd behavior.
His negative interactions with people reinforced his belief that he was defective. Since feeling rejected when he was a baby was a traumatic experience and his mind associated being different with being rejected, he suffered fear and emotional distress similar to those with PTSD which led him to tell people he was controlled by machines in the hope they would judge the machines instead of him if he said or did something abnormal.
Joey's black and white thinking resulted in him putting most people in one category (normal people) and himself and other odd people in another category. Comparing the two groups, he felt inferior, sad that he wasn’t like everyone else, ashamed since he often blamed himself for his problems, angry that others didn’t accept him, fearful since he didn't understand the other group, and hopeless since he felt he was born that way and couldn’t change. Those emotions created internal stress which caused his brain to work differently which made it impossible to understand other people and act normally.
Fortunately, Joey learned about CBT and used it to correct his distorted beliefs which greatly reduced the negative emotions he experienced. After the stress caused by his beliefs and emotions went away, he was able to think more clearly and understood people better. After a year of making up for the positive social interaction he lacked, he no longer had any trouble fitting in and making friends. Although he still had autistic traits, he no longer met the criteria for autism and his diagnosis was removed. He wish he could be reborn by his mother knowing he wasn't rejected because then he never would have been autistic.
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