Awful. But replacing psychoanalysis with ABA can in many ways be just as bad. In this article ABA sounds lovely, but one of it's aims can be to stop autistic children 'stimming' (- coping mechanism for what they find overwhelming), & train them out of their differences so they can basically 'fit in' better with neurotypical people. It's - as the article says, "training them like horses". So in ME/CFS terms that is like CBT/APT for ME using operant conditioning techniques, to stop us erroneously connecting exertion/activity with 'unpleasant bodily sensation', & training us that we can in fact do all kinds of things we thought we couldnt (sic).
http://blog.theautismsite.com/aba-therapy-controversy/2/
ABA is arguably somewhat better than the 'refrigerator mother' psycho-
anal-yst theories, but it's still a 'behavioural' therapy for a neurological difference, & can be just as cruel as CBT for ME, which of course is just as cruel as 'Le Packing' if not more so, it just sounds nicer from the outside. And replacing psychoanalytical approach with ABA can be a bit like replacing ideas of ME being imaginary/malingering, with those that prevail today - that it is "real" to the sufferer but that symptoms are caused/perpetuated by abnormal beliefs & behaviour - than can be changed.
Of course some forms of ABA can be incredibly supportive & helpful, just as some pwme's experience of CBT will be - it depends on the model & the therapist. But the deeper issue for me in all of this is that over & over again, psychiatry & psychiatrists seem to have free rein & any challenge to them seems to fall on deaf ears. It's been going on since it's inception.
A psychiatrist is the most powerful doctor there is, simply because they can discredit their patients who complain as mentally ill/not competent. No person complaining that a physiotherapist was brutal & hurt them, could be dismissed as 'oh no i wasnt brutal they just dont understand that what i was doing was good for them', in the way a psych patient is. Psychiatrists are given society's blessing to abuse people. When will it end?!
And i say that as someone who is a huge fan of really
good quality humanistic psychotherapy.
