I was watching a documentary recently about a well known television personality that has aspergers, and was investigating new experimental treatments in the cure for autism.

And when asked himself if he wanted to be cured if he could be, in the end his answer was an emphatic "no thank you".

He brought up some good points, and when faced with the question myself, I have to agree with him.

No matter how much trouble my own MI has caused me, and the difficulties I face day to day with it, I can't help but feel like I'd largely be losing a part of myself and who I am, and even my own unique perspective on the world around me.

I don't want to be 'normal', I just want to be me.

I knew someone as a teenager that had a lot of behavioral problems. And he disappeared for awhile, and several years later he stopped by my house unexpectadly one day and we visited for awhile. I noticed that he had changed so dramatically, that he was not the person I knew at all.

In fact he told me that he was committed to a mental hospital after I had last seen him, and he was forced to under-go ECT.

Years later when I saw a psychiatrist, I asked them about it, and told them how they seemed so different and almost like the light in his eyes got switched off. He just wasn't the same. And they said that when someone undergoes that therapy, they are not a whole person.

I just don't think that erasing large parts of a person's memory is the answer, but instead walking side-by-side with them and supporting and loving them.

Honestly, where does one draw the line? I think if anything, treating someone in an attempt to make them everybody else's definition of NORMAL is wrong.

I find that quite offensive personally. Because even though I have struggled with MI myself, I am still me, and who is to say but me that I am better off or worse than anyone else? Or even for that matter, why should I be like anyone else? To be put inside a box that others create for me to be acceptable to THEM? NO, thank you.

Edit: on a side note, this is the documentary I was talking about, if anyone is interested. It's almost an hour, but pretty good IMHO.