Fridae

Following Dr Robert Spitzer's findings that suggest that gays can be 'reformed' by therapy and/or religious counseling, another study conducted by New York City psychologists Ariel Shidlo and Michael Schroeder has concluded that most who attempt such a change fail and suffer lasting harm.

Shidlo's and Schroeder's researched was based on 202 gay men and lesbians who had been through counseling were interviewed between 1995 and 2000 for an average of 90 minutes each. The findings showed that of those, 178 failed to change their orientation, 18 reported becoming asexual or conflicted, and six reported becoming heterosexual, reports the Washington Post.

Schroeder said that many reported being misled by the counseling into thinking that homosexuality was caused by child abuse, bad parenting or a disorder and the majority were left with a mistrust for mental health professionals and had to relearn how to form intimate relationships.

"There are some people who became very injured by failing the therapy and entered a post-treatment reconstruction phase where they spent years trying to recover from the process... There is a lot of self-blame," said Schroeder in a telephone interview with the paper.

The report also noted that the methodology behind Shidlo and Schroeder's study differed significantly from Spitzer's. For their study, Shidlo and Schroeder interviewed their subjects repeatedly at length and in person over a five-year period while Spitzer conducted 45-minute interviews by phone with each subject.

Editor's Note: Have you been to therapy or religious counselling to 'cure' your gayness? Has it worked for you? Or do you know anyone who has gone through with it? What was the outcome?

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