My ADHD and shyness seems to mimic autism

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Its pretty odd. ADHD-I was recognised as early as 1798, yet didn't go into the DSM until 1992. It was 1994 I believe that aspergers appeared. I view this as a potential cock up. Two pretty much identical disorders introduced to the diagnosis handbook almost simultaneously.

It would be a fascinating study to resolve this one. There could be two distinct disorders, but the odds of them being accurately diagnosed are pretty slim. I spent a lot of time on ADHD forums, you would be pretty surprised how similar the life experiences and problems are that are reported to WP. Problems making eye contact sre as prevalent amongst adders as aspies for instance, I suspect you all considered that an aspie or autistic trait.

This isn't easily settled, but if anyone has any good accounts or descriptions of differentiators I'd be very pleased to read them. I've been searching for a long time, but haven't found anything conclusive. It is exceptional to find any mention of ASD by ADHD specialists or authors.

Jason

I have a good idea on it, but to explain or communicate it well is tricky. The fundamental difference is with the subconscious. The intention of others is understood and guessed well in a typical mind. There isn't any practice needed to learn the universal language in NT land by the majority of people. They "just know" the subtleties, nuances and all contexts of communication via instinct.

I know I have this theory of mind innately. If someone questions whether they have this understanding or not, as " I don't know for sure," to me, that would indicate they have a "communication problem."

I know that I don't have much of the NT model of social thinking that most people develop early in childhood, and I have only developed a small portion of it by now, this small portion allowing me to make sense of the basics of others' behaviors, but not complexities of unsaid meanings that others understand without outlouding in words or pictures, through mouths or fingers.

For eggsample, I know that the noises and faces that people make at me are communications from their minds instead of noises and faces having no meaning. This was good to know. I remember a time when I did not know this, so I also did not know that I was supposed to make noises and faces back at the people making noises and faces at me, let alone what the noises and faces meant or which ones I was supposed to make. This is the communication problem of autism. In ASD and in adults, this does not have to be as severe as what I described, but will still include a lot of situations in which unsaid meanings are not perceived as eggsisting at all, let alone what the meanings could possibly be. This communication problem eggsists even when you are being selectively and consciously attentive towards others, but you just don't have the subconscious social processing of non-autistic people, including people with ADHD. You could hear all the words and see all the non-verbals in a relaxed one-on-one conversation with your friend or your mother, but you still miss eberrything that was not said directly. That's the lack of social cognition causing frequent miscommunications, with miscommunications being far more common than clear communications in which both persons have the same meanings in their minds. Without the same meanings in your and the other person's mind, you're not going to be able to reciprocate in the way that the other person eggspects according to the NT social model.

I know only one person with ADHD-PI, and she demonstrates all kinds of social understandings and reciprocations that I have never demonstrated in my life, like being able to figure out and comment on other people's emotional states, quickly and in real-time during group discussions, without having to do a lengthy time-consuming analysis that may yield wrong or irrelevant conclusions that you may not be able to find the words to communicate anyway. In fact, this person told me that she thought that I had ADHD-PI, and very severely too, because I stopped being able to maintain the appearance of paying attention after my brain had shut down after fifteen minutes of a meeting. In order to look like I am paying attention when I am actually paying attention, I have to consciously maintain the appearance of paying attention. Otherwise, I look like I am not paying attention even when I am paying attention. So I brought it up to the psychs about ADHD and ADHD-PI, and we discussed it, and we dismissed it, because I don't have the traits during my normal states of mind that occupy most of my time, and none of my childhood or educational history indicated it either. But from the outside, a person with ASD could be easily mistaken for having ADHD-PI, and probably the other way around too.

The eggsplanations for the Asperger's lack of social-emotional reciprocity from social cognition/communication problems are eggstendable into more severe autism, both in comparing different people and in the course of one person's development, but the ones for similar eggsternal behaviors in ADHD-PI are not.

I would call them similar, not sure why you would say pretty much identical. I think some with AS just happen to have ADHD PI as well but some of the traits are the antithesis of each other.

What about the Aspies who experience no or very little issues with focus and time management? What about hyper Aspies? What about those with a very strict routine(this does not fit in with ADHD PI at all). Nor does attention to detail.

FWIW I am diagnosed with the combination type but am primarily hyperactive. I don't struggle with the same kinds of issues that ADHD-PI does most of the time and my ADHD presents more like OCD. I enjoy school and routines, as talented as the PI can be this seems to one area they don't naturally excel in.

Last edited by EXPECIALLY on 29 Mar 2012, 12:17 am, edited 1 time in total.

Of course if you look at your symptoms in a subjective way you will come to the conclusion that you have one or the other, depending on what you tell yourself you have.

I'm not here to say you're wrong but you won't know for sure unless someone assessed you for both.

As for if ADHD and autism is hard to tell apart...not really - not in my case.

I was 'diagnosed' with ADHD around 1992-1993 - involving 3 different psychologists, before Asperger's was recognized - and only so far as my symptoms interfered with schooling. So many other things were overlooked or ignored - sensitivities to noise, light, touch; all different kinds of auditory stimming; difficulty with facial expressions, tones of voice; social difficulty, bluntness, awkwardness; a basic emotional illiteracy within myself (anger management); tendencies towards pursuing and talking extensively about special interests, paradoxical competences in basic human things, motor clumsiness... All of this stuff now understood as part of Asperger's. For nearly a decade I have operated with the background understanding that I have this syndrome, but have not cared to understand it until recent years as the extent of it's impact has became very apparent - mostly from living out on my own.

DSM-III (published in 1980):



Even about ADHD-I and AS being "pretty much identical disorders" - if we go only by diagnosis criteria, they have nothing in common: the description of ADHD-I does not make any reference to social problems or rigid interests, and the description of AS does not make any mention of "careless mistakes", "easily distracted", etc.

I suspect that a reason to AS and ADHD-I being more similar in practice that in theory is that, in practice, the criteria to make the difference between a "restricted and stereotyped interest" and an "hobby" is "It interferes with the daily activities?"; the result is that "making errors because are distracted thinking in other thing" becomes, not only a symptom of ADHD-I, but also a symptom of AS.

thanks for the update ADHD-PI was recognised even earlier than I thought

It's just different descriptions. Hans Aspergers had an open mind. ADHD-PI was described by ADHD psychs so all the criteria and descriptions are written from the perspective of hyperactivity. The odd thing is that ADHD-PI is missing the core issue of hyperactivity, you may as well be suggesting a headache without pain.

Imagine a cow standing up, describe it to someone who hasn't seen one before.
Now imagine it walking, describe it again.

Same beast different descriptions.

I'm not for one minute suggesting that ADHD WITH hyperactivity is related.

Jason

The fact that 75% of people with an ASD meet the diagnostic criteria for some sort of ADHD, often -PI, doesn't mean that they're the same things at all. It means that its a very common comorbid and people often deal with both.

If you look at me, someone with ADHD-PI only, and someone with both, it'll be clear that our impairments are different.

I've gone through the list of ADHD-PI traits showing how I don't meet them on here before when you were talking about this. I'm still someone who has an ASD and not ADHD-PI. I have been formally evaluated for both. I solidly don't meet the criteria for ADHD-PI despite solidly being autistic.

No, they're not the same.

I think if you add difficulties in social interaction with ADHD-PI it would equal something looking extremely similar to ASD

But it's really the underlining causes of the symptoms that make all the difference.

Why we should consider "hyperactivity" a "core issue"? After all, in the DSM-III, the general condition was called "Attention Deficit Disorder".

Yeah the core issue with ADHD is a deficit in attention not hyperactivity.

Complicating the thing a bit more, probably people with schizophrenia spectrum disorders could also be very similar do ADHD-PI: join the negative symptoms (apathy, social isolation) with the cognitive symptoms ("loose associations", disorganized thought, etc.) and you have also a kind of ADHD-PI with social difficulties. Sometime ago, I read someone in a schizoid forum saying "If you have Schizoid PD, ADHD-I is a given".



The problem is that (at least, according to the behaviorist philosophy of DSM) these disorders/conditions are diagnosed by the observable symptoms, not by the hypothetical cause of the symptoms.

If we accept the theory that many conditions are simply extreme and maladaptive variants of normal personality traits, and cross this with MBTI, I suspect that we can conclude that (of course, with many exceptions):

a) ASD is very similar to an extreme version of INTJ personality (or perhaps INTJ/ISTJ)

b) ADHD-PI is very similar to an extreme version of INTP/INFP personalities (the quite daydreamer...)

In practice, many people will be between the two

Yes.
Theory of Mind under development is common between the two. And looking at it that way, they look a bit camouflaged, and digging deeper you see that ADHD is "hindered" or delayed via cognition issues, but will catch up. It's always intuitive on the ADHD side, but delayed. Not ever fully intuitive on the ASD side.

Because those with PI don't show an ounce of hyperactivity. It's the opposite of PH. But they still have the attention issues in a different way. In PI when the person is at work the brain is in a sleep mode and when they're at rest it wakes up. From what I gather from my own hyperactivity the concentration problems come from not being able to focus at any one thing, unless it's very interesting. It's like the brain is working at a mile a minute.

I should really stop using miles. I only know the metric system.

I liken PI symptoms to one having a depressive disorder and PH to one having a mood disorder. I'm combined but usually experience both types on different days.

Interestingly, my mom is recovering from surgery, my dad expressed his emotion, but I didn't express any. Afterwards, I only felt bad that I didn't feel much. Perhaps it's more of an emotional paralysis or I just figure she's going to get better. Maybe I was avoiding negative thoughts... I'm not sure, but I lacked emotional reciprocity (which my dad pointed out), yet how am I to reflect emotions if the other person doesn't explicitly express them? I didn't "feel" anything until my dad pointed out the "reason" for feeling emotional, then I felt something.

Although my social reciprocity is fine.