You're fine questioning why people have suggested therapy for you. That's a good question, actually, and I would want to understand it too. I suggested it because from your post in this thread it sounds like you are dealing with underlying emotions in a physical way. In my experience, we don't do that without having something pretty powerful to motivate us to need to avoid dealing with those feelings directly. If being defensive and surviving is fine for you, then that's okay. But you came here and asked how to change what you are doing. That tells me that you would like things to be different. There doesn't have to be anything drastically wrong with you in order to benefit from therapy or counseling, either. It's just been my experience that if you're covering up something big enough that it takes hurting yourself or taking risks to deal with it, then most likely you would benefit from some professional support when you get down to what it is. Otherwise maybe you'll stop one destructive coping mechanism and replace it with another one, like I do.

Best wishes for you to find what is right for you! I hope that you stay around. You seem like an intelligent person with good ideas who thinks for yourself. I like that.

Rap