Homosexuals Can Be Cured

One reason why homosexuals are so rarely cured is that they rarely try treatment. Too many of them actually believe that they are happy and satisfied the way they are. Another reason, says Philadelphia's Dr. Samuel B. Hadden, is that too many psychiatrists are still inhibited by the 45-year-old pessimism of Freud, who was convinced that the condition was discouragingly difficult to treat. Even when psychiatrists do try to aid homosexuals, their efforts are likely to be ineffectual because they themselves have so little confidence of success. Both patients and doctors are wrong, Dr. Hadden told the American Group Psychotherapy Association in San Francisco last week.

Male homosexuals,* he said, are more treatable and curable than is generally believed. And the people who are the most effective therapists are other homosexuals who have been under treatment for a while. As a psychiatrist actively practicing group therapy for the treatment of neurotics and psychotics of all sorts, Dr. Hadden, 64, marshaled impressive evidence to support his case.

No Gay Clothes. Back in 1937, Dr. Hadden tried introducing homosexuals into a group of heterosexual patients. The homosexuals sensed the hostility of the others and soon dropped out. Ten years ago, Dr. Hadden had enough patients of better-than-average education to start an all-homosexual group of three. They had already accepted Dr. Hadden as a sympathetic figure, and felt no hostility toward him or from him. Secure in their own ingroup, the men soon convinced one another of the medical fact that homosexuality is not a physiological condition present at birth but an emotional maladjustment resulting from reactions to childhood experiences. They talked little about the physical aspects of their abnormal sex life but concentrated on the psychological and social aspects. Some quit jobs that they had taken to be with other homosexuals and, having lost their fear and dislike of heterosexual society, got better jobs elsewhere.

Dr. Hadden has now had increasing success with several groups of four to eight patients. An individual stays in an average of four to eight years; when he graduates, his place is taken by a newcomer. A new patient willing to try treatment (even though he may be skeptical or actually contemptuous) is inducted into a group that meets once a week for about l 1/2 hours. He may show up flaunting gay clothes and gay mannerisms and is almost certain to insist that he was born a homosexual and is happy to remain one.

The more experienced patients in the group immediately challenge both his ideas and his behavior. They tell him that none of them want to be seen leaving the building with anyone dressed the way he is. They tell him that they, too, used to affect the same mannered speech that he does, and they are glad they quit. Most important, it soon becomes clear from discussion of their own problems that they never have been truly happy as homosexuals, and know they cannot be. Their anxiety is infectious, and this anxiety becomes the basis of a desire to change. The newcomers soon adopt "straight" clothing. One of the earliest behavior changes that Dr. Hadden sees is a less mannered way of speaking. And gradually the group knocks down all the rationalizations that homosexual propagandists have devised to justify themselves.

At the same time, patients support each other with the reassurance of belonging to a sympathetic group. Says Dr. Hadden: "Seldom have I seen stronger group spirit. After severe social rejection, the progress of any member in any area has a tonic effect on the whole group. And when a member begins to make progress toward a heterosexual adjustment, the group affords remarkable support."

Dates & Marriage. Members of the group interpret each other's dreams, with only such guidance from Dr. Hadden as is absolutely necessary. When their hostility toward parents, and especially their mothers, has been worked through, they start dating girls. "It is reassuring," says Dr. Hadden, "that there is no haste to rush into marriage, nor have we observed any periods of heterosexual promiscuity. Courtships have been on a mature basis."

Of 32 patients who have stayed with the program for at least 20 sessions, Dr. Hadden rates twelve as having achieved an exclusively heterosexual adjustment, and he says "other neurotic traits have improved or disappeared." He scores ten others as markedly improved, ten as failures. Among the twelve most successful cases, five men have been happily married for up to five years. Two patients were already married, using their marriages as cover-ups when they began treatment--one because he was being blackmailed, the other because he had been arrested. These marriages were saved, and the wife of the man who was arrested is now glad that she dropped the idea of a divorce.

The psychiatrist's most important assets in treating homosexuality, says Dr. Hadden, are an understanding attitude toward his patients and confidence that their illness can indeed be treated.

*Dr. Hadden has never had enough female homosexual patients to form a group. "In general," he says, "the females are far less unhappy than the men, and are under less social pressure.

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