Bullying worsen autism symptoms?

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2695751/

Interesting article...I hate bullies.

I've always believed this to be true - from my own experiences. Even the bullying I received that persisted into adulthood, from "fake friends" and in the workplace. I became more anxious, appetite diminished, made more absent-minded mistakes and social blunders...then when I disconnected from the bully, things went gradually on the upswing again, my mood, my social and work performance, etc.

Having said that, one area I've definitely noticed is affected by bullying is executive function - I tend to forget verbal instructions easier, forget tasks due, brain shuts down when processing multiple streams of speech in a meeting, etc, etc...then the bully boss had the audacity to tell me that "I never listen" and it just became a vicious circle from there till I escaped for a better environment.

I have thought some of my problems came from being bullied but my therapist said it was a coincidence. How would he know?

I know for one when I was new to my school when we moved, I thought I was being teased and picked on because kids would bump me in the halls and not say their sorry, put their hand in front of my face and I thought they were being mean to me so I started to defend myself to make them afraid of me so they would leave me alone. It didn't help when the staff sided against me and treated me like the bad guy because it looked like to me they were siding with bullies and they didn't even give me support. This was all due to me being bullied in elementary school so I misread their intentions and assumed I was being picked on and harassed. I wouldn't even blame it on ASD like some people would. Wouldn't an NT kid react the same way too if they were also bullied? Bullying can really mess you up and cloud your views and judgements on other people and some people never recover from it while some others do. Someone may repeat what you said to them and you may think they are making fun of how you talk because that was what kids used to do to you in school so you flip out on the person and that person doesn't have a clue why you are so upset and they decide to stay away from you and not talk to you because you're "crazy." I have done stuff like that as a teen. Some people may call it PTSD.

I also think it would help if the staff just tells the students to stop whatever they are doing to the person. I don't care if it's just innocent. If the person feels bullied, shouldn't it be stopped?

It's just like I said the other day about hot baths slightly reducing the symptopms of autism; bullying makes people feel bad, and when people feel bad, they tend to have more problems. Naturally, someone with autism who gets bullied will feel worse and have more problems than another person just like them who doesn't get bullied.

I think I'll file this under my "do penguins live in Antarctica?" folder.

Having been bullied has made me more paranoid, that's for sure. But in my case it wasn't that bad because I was never physichally bullied. If I had been physichally bullied it would have been worse.