When "Help" Causes Harm: The Reality of Conversion Therapy.
- 19 hours ago
- 7 min read
By Collin Rucker, MS, LPCC
With the Supreme Court’s recent ruling against Colorado’s ban on conversion therapy for minors, it seems important to address the elephant in the room; conversion therapy is still with us. Like many harmful ideas, it has survived by changing outfits, updating its vocabulary, and pretending it is just “concern” wearing skinny jeans and a trendy graphic t-shirt. Somewhere, a youth pastor just adjusted his beanie, no cap. Even right here in the Denver area, conversion therapy lurks in the shadows, ignorance capitalizing on the insecurity of young folks who are looking to find themselves.
Conversion therapy goes by many names depending on the setting. In religious spaces, it may be called reparative therapy, sexual reorientation therapy, ex-gay ministry, or counseling for “unwanted same-sex attraction.” In clinical and research settings, it is often called sexual orientation change efforts, or SOCE. For this blog post, I’ll use SOCE to keep the language simple and consistent. SOCE refers to therapeutic, religious, behavioral, or other structured practices intended to change, suppress, or reduce same-sex attraction, behavior, or identity, typically with the goal of promoting heterosexuality or conformity to heterosexual norms. For those of us who have survived SOCE, myself included, it can be a painful and world-altering experience.
The history of SOCE is as complicated as the practice itself. Even the word “homosexuality” did not appear until the late nineteenth century, when doctors, sexologists, and legal thinkers began classifying sexual behavior into medical and social categories. While naming same-sex attraction gave people language, it also placed LGBTQ+ identities under the control of systems that often treated it as abnormal, sinful, criminal, or mentally ill.
For much of the twentieth century, homosexuality was viewed by many in medicine, psychiatry, religion, and culture as a problem to be explained, corrected, or erased. Same-sex attraction was often blamed on family dysfunction, trauma, immaturity, weak masculinity, overbearing mothers, distant fathers, or moral failure. Because homosexuality appeared in early editions of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, attempts to “treat” it gained professional legitimacy. At its most extreme, these efforts included aversion therapy, involuntary hospitalization, hormone treatments, shame-based counseling, shock therapy, and other coercive or abusive interventions.
A major turning point came in 1973, when the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from the DSM. This decision reflected growing evidence that being gay was not a mental illness and instead was a natural, valid sexual orientation. I can only imagine the gasps and pearl-clutching this caused in broader society. But SOCE did not end in 1973. As mainstream mental health organizations increasingly rejected the idea that homosexuality needed to be cured, many change efforts moved into religious and conservative spaces. Despite this shift within professional psychology, SOCE did not disappear. It adapted, moved into new spaces, and continued to have a traumatic impact on those it claimed to help.
Out of this shift, the “ex-gay” movement grew by promising that gay people could become straight through prayer, discipline, counseling, gender-role conformity, and surrender to God. These movements often blended religious shame with psychological language. They taught that same-sex attraction came from wounds, unmet emotional needs, poor gender development, sexual abuse, or family failure. For many LGBTQ+ people, this was especially damaging because it suggested that their identity was not only sinful, but also evidence of personal defect or unresolved trauma.
SOCE became popular because it offered families and religious communities a way to avoid accepting LGBTQ+ identity. It promised anxious parents that their children could be “fixed.” It gave religious leaders a way to maintain traditional teachings on sexuality while appearing compassionate. It gave some therapists and ministries a marketable service. And it gave scared, rejected, or spiritually conflicted LGBTQ+ people the hope that they could change enough to keep their families, faith communities, or sense of belonging.
To be clear, peer-reviewed research very clearly DOES NOT support SOCE as an effective intervention. Instead, studies consistently link these practices to significant harm, including depression, psychological distress, trauma symptoms, internalized shame, suicidal thoughts, and suicide attempts. These practices are harmful not only because of the techniques used, but because of the message underneath them: love, belonging, and spiritual worth are conditional on becoming someone else.
My personal experience with SOCE began at the age of 16, when my parents discovered my sexuality. What followed was six years of seeing church-sponsored therapists, attending ex-gay support groups, and going to conferences organized by Exodus International, an ex-gay evangelical ministry founded in 1976.
My experience deeply mirrors the research. I grew up in a conservative, fundamentalist church that condemned homosexuality. On the surface, many church members could appear kind. But sermons often focused on the consequences of sexual sin, especially homosexuality. Behind closed doors, I heard homophobic rhetoric from friends, family, and church leaders describing LGBTQ+ people as disgusting, vile, and deserving of hell.
From a young age, I learned to hide. I carefully monitored my behavior, modeled heterosexuality, and hid behind religious performance to avoid being “detected.” Even then, I struggled with depression and shame. I did not want to be the sexual deviant my family and church described. I did not want to believe I was deserving of hell.
When my parents discovered my sexuality, SOCE was presented as a beacon of hope. My sexuality was treated as a pathology that could be cured. Exodus International’s slogan was “Change is Possible,” and I wanted desperately to believe it. I hoped I could change my sexual attraction and conform to the ideal nuclear family celebrated by the church.
But my sexuality did not change. If anything, the shame intensified, and so did my need for meaningful connection with men.
Instead of experiencing freedom, I experienced isolation, self-hatred, and suicidal ideation. I became trapped in a painful cycle: shame led to self-hatred, self-hatred led to survival behaviors, and when those behaviors inevitably failed to meet my deeper need for connection, I reached out to other men. Then, almost immediately, the shame would return, rooted in years of toxic and inhumane messaging.
When I expressed my internal battle to conversion therapists, they kept shifting the goalposts. At first, they told me things would get worse before they got better. Then they encouraged me to “keep fighting the good fight.” Then they suggested my sexuality might be like the apostle Paul’s “thorn in the flesh.” A few years later they admitted some people might be genetically predisposed to same-sex attraction. Finally, they told me I would likely struggle with my sexuality for the rest of my life.
I was crushed and overwhelmed by despair. I had spent six years in individual sessions, group sessions, and conferences hoping I could change my sexuality. My future felt bleak and unlivable. But eventually, I reached a point where I had no choice but to accept my sexuality and move forward, because the other option was unthinkable.
What followed in my twenties and thirties was years of unlearning what I had been taught to believe about myself. For a long time, I knew something harmful had happened, but I did not yet have the language to name the trauma or the emotions beneath it. It lived like a constant buzz in the background, shaping how I saw myself and how I moved through the world. Deep down, self-hatred still clung to me, whispering that I deserved hell and did not deserve love.
But slowly, I began to find my way out. I learned to accept myself, to see value in my personhood, and to recognize that my identity was never the problem. That journey has held joy, adventure, discovery, and peace closely paralleled by grief, pain, and loss. Through it all, I have learned that authenticity is not something to be cured. It is something to be protected, valued, and celebrated.
For those reading this with limited knowledge of SOCE, the Supreme Court’s ruling on Colorado’s conversion therapy ban matters. It will more than likely cause harm, affect minors, families, therapists, religious communities, and survivors for years to come. But this conversation is not only about law or policy. It is about real people. It is about the harm caused when powerful systems tell LGBTQ+ people they must become someone else, other than who they are at their core, in order to be loved. It is about deeply instilled lifelong shame, the erosion of self-acceptance, depression, isolation, and the very real risk of suicide.
And for those reading this who have survived conversion therapy, you are not alone. What happened to you was not your fault. There is real hope, but it is not the false hope of becoming straight, fixed, or acceptable to people who could not fully see you. It is the hope of coming home to yourself. The hope of finding community. The hope of learning that your identity is not a wound, a sin, or a defect. You deserve to be loved exactly as you are without conditions!
If this post resonates with you, you do not have to navigate that healing alone. Elevated Counseling and Wellness is an LGBTQ-owned and affirming practice that offers individual therapy and group therapy for the LGBTQ community, right here in Denver, Colorado. Currently, we are hosting a gay men’s group, Elevated Men which includes both interpersonal support, as well as opportunities to process common and personal life struggles. We hope to host more therapy and support groups for the LGBTQ community in the near future. Whether you are unpacking shame, healing from religious trauma, rebuilding self-acceptance, or simply looking for a space where you do not have to explain or defend who you are, we would be honored to support you. You deserve therapy and mental health care that affirms your identity, protects your authenticity, and helps you feel more at home in yourself. Reach out to us today at 720-526-2622 or Info@ElevatedCounseling.org at www.ElevatedCounseling.org!
***Collin has recently moved to Colorado and is accepting new clients for psychotherapy in Denver & Greenwood Village. Collin faciliates Elevated Men: Support & Process group for gay men in the Denver metropolitan area. Collin is I
N-NETWORK with major insurance and can be reached directly withe information below!
(970) 528-4725
