Therapy in general

The following links to off-site articles at mental health organizations provide information about therapy in general. Topics include how to decide whether therapy should be pursued, what kinds of people provide therapy, what the different kinds of therapy are, how therapy works, confidentiality and insurance issues, finding and choosing a therapist, and evaluating the effectiveness of therapy. Clicking on a link will open the article in a new window.

• Finding the right mental health care for you - National Mental Health Association
• Who provides mental health care? - The Mayo Clinic

In the case of attraction to minors, attempts to change sexual attraction are hampered by a lack of understanding of how attraction develops in general, as well as a lack of understanding of how attraction to minors develops in particular.¹ Ron Langevin of the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry in Toronto writes:

There are an abundance of theories about sexual anomalies and a severe shortage of facts...the goal of understanding what we are treating and then applying treatment is not available at present.²

In addition, special care must be taken in locating a possible therapist:³

• Those professionals who are unfamiliar with the phenomenon may be fearful and uncomfortable, or due to uncertainties about mandatory reporting laws, may not maintain confidentiality, even if a patient has not violated the law.
• Most professionals who are familiar with attraction to minors operate according to the adversarial criminal justice model, rather than the helping mental health provider model.