What is a therapeutic need?

Reading this has me remembering my 96 year old great grandmother (Oma) exercising to Jack Lelaine. She literally didn't slow down until a few months before she died. My dad is a VERY healthy 82 year old and I suspect he'll be blessed with long life also. They have quite a few senior friends who are also in remarkable health; not all, but more than us younguns sometimes realize. No, not all elderly are blessed with good health, but many are, and I suspect that as our population ages we will see more people living healthy lives longer.

Mine is not a long lived family - no one has lived past 70 something, but thankfully not much lingering illness. I simply have no desire to live a particularly long life. I am now what qualifies as old - it is good - the 70 cut off is not very far away for me plus I engage in activities like motorcycle riding, white water rafting, bicycling trips etc (and I do not always wear a bike helmet), sometimes I smoke, I don't worry about trans fat or what I eat except to the extent of how it makes me feel after I have consumed something and so forth=I do not do anything to make sure I have a prolonged life. I do almost everything in terms of whether I feel better rather than worse doing it or after doing it. I like it. I will hopefully die doing something fun or just walking around and falling over. There are many active seniors around. I am glad. If I keep living, I plan on being active, just that my death at this point would not be a big deal. I do not decide to do or not do something just because of the danger or risk factor at this point. For me, that now at the bottom of reasons to do or not do something.

What an excellent, thought provoking question!

I think that a corrective emotional experience is what helps patients grow and that can help restructure our brains and limbic system, and other body systems.

I think that having unmet needs, depending on the severity, can majorly negatively impact ones life. IMO, an unmet need when passed through age 18, does not become a strong or frivolous want. How vital it is vs. merely useful depends on how much one's life is negatively affected. If you keep reenacting past trauma and/or searching for unmet need it is important to work on in therapy but I suppose it's not needed.

In a black and white sense, anything emotional is not a need because we can live without it. I don't like saying that working in therapy to be whole is a want because I think it doesn't do it justice. I feel a lot of shame about 'wanting' my unmet needs to be met, or just having them there.

How can we verbalize this, though? Here are a few ideas:

In order for people with unmet needs to become emotionally whole, they need to have this deficit addressed.

New Declaration of Independence
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness (which includes being whole).

So, it may not be a need, but it is now a RIGHT!

excellent! I am pro-antimatter!