do aspies or other autistics develop psychotic episodes?

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lately iv been having issues with racing thoughts. this seems similar to what happened to me prior to being admitted and diagnosed psychotic depressive. a major difficulty i had was with being able to communicate effectively because i was lost in internal thought; i would try to speak but would stammer excessively and it took minutes for me to get out a thought as simple as "im feeling depressed" some of the things i said may not have made sense to the doc or therapists. this was probably the major reason aside from the anxiety/depression that i was diagnosed psychotic depression. about a year since the experience iv been wondering whether or not i actually have asperger's among other things. i overheard one of the nurses at the hospital mention i show some of the traits to a doctor or somebody over the phone. i had always thought that i had add but my psychologist also says i seem to be more along the lines of autism, whether its actually asperger's, it might be mild, but i dunno for sure.

(please address the following)
1. i guess one way for the possiblity to be more likely is knowing whether aspies develop psychotic episodes like the one i described.

2. but more importantly im asking because id like to see if genetically inherited psychotic depression condition could be ruled out.

im not really asking for your personal experiences but more so your knowledge about the condition.

People with AS and autism are probably no more likely than the general public to develop psychotic episodes (though we could be somewhat more likely, related to the fact that we are more vulnerable to mental illness in general, and depression in particular).

In any case, psychosis is not a symptom of AS, and has never been strongly tied to AS.

Neither racing thoughts nor an inability to express yourself are psychotic symptoms. They are both often related to anxiety, though. So, the answer to "Is this kind of psychotic episode common for Aspies?" is, "That's not a psychotic episode."

Having problems finding words, or initiating speech, can be a common issue for autistic people. It can also happen to non-autistic people with speech/language disorders.

I am not surprised to see autistic traits and depressive episodes in the same person. That is a common combination. Autism in adults is often first diagnosed when a depressive episode reduces coping skills and makes it harder to play "normal". It might in fact have made it harder for you to access whatever skills you use to speak and carry on a useful conversation. Whether or not you had psychosis during the depressive episode you mentioned, it's likely enough that if you are autistic, the depression/autism combination made it more of a problem than it would be for an NT, because in general, an autistic person's daily-life skills (everything from small talk to dressing oneself) are more precariously held, and more easily lost when under a great deal of stress.

At Duke University in North Carolina they are researching the link between Asperger's Syndrome and mood disorders. Apparently in families where there is both "high achievement" (sucess at intellectually challenging careers) and mood disorders such as Bi-Polar there is a high incidence Asperger's Syndrome. Mood disorders are not uncommon among Aspies according to our psychiatrist.

I would think that an autistic person could have a psychotic episode for the same reason anyone else would (see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychotic_episode#Causes for some causes) however it would not be due to their autism. Also you aren't describing any symptoms of a psychotic episode. It sounds more like anxiety or possibly a manic state.

not a psychotic episode, hmm thats really interesting because the majority of people on crazyboards disagreed. i was pretty sure it wasn't psychosis initally but the majority made me uncertain and i still am. what do you think of what they had to say? the thread is "why was i misdiagnosed psychotic depressive" same username.

By way of definition, a person can only be given a diagnosis of AS if they don't/have never had psychosis.

However there is actually no neurological basis for this definition, and I see no neurological reason that would actually exempt the two from coinciding.

someone with aspergers can get psychosis, however studies have not proven whether or not schizophrenia is more likely or not in autism. Psychotic symptoms such as catatonia are more common in autism. It is not true that aspergers is defined as never having psychosis. What if someone has aspergers and later develops psychosis. According to the DSM schizophrenia should only be diagnosed along with autism spectrum disorders if delusions and/or hallucinations are present. However what you decribed sounds more like bipolar. Personally I have had episodes of talking incoherantly and not being able to get me thoughts out clearly and I also have depersonalization/derealization. This is not necessarilly alway psychosis either and from what I have seen here seem common in autistic people although doctors have been convinced I am psychotic. I also have frequent visual illusions, and occasional auditory hallucinations. I sometimes have delusions too that I later come to realize are delusions. One time I was in the shower and I did not know what I was doing and I poked myself in the eyes hard enough to induce a seizure. While this was going on I did not even know what I was doing although I did not have a blackout. Thats not a delusion but I came to be convinced that the cat did that to me though mind control. Thats more of a delusion. I later thought I had the episode because of a seizure which are known to produce psychotic like symptoms but the doctor said the seizure was caused by hitting my vagas nerve behind my eyes. I had an EEG and they ruled out epilepsy. I have had other similar episodes of loss of control that ended my up in the ER but these did not come with delusions and Im not sure if it is psychosis or normal autistic behavior. One time I impulsivly punched out a window without even being angry or stressed. I just did it for no reason. There was no thought attached to doing it. I just did it. The glass cut up my hand so badly I went to the ER and had about 15 stiches on my hand. Ive done other similar things. Ive never intentionally injured myself. Its more like I didnt know what I was doing. I also feel like I am controled by extradimensional beings although Im not sure if this is delusional. Sometimes they tell me Ill win the lottery if I spend all my money on scratch tickets and end up losing all my money although I am convinced I will win before I do so. I fall for it every time. I also have serious cognative functioning problems too. This can be associated with psychosis, but in itself is not. People have told me I seem like someone in an early stage of developing dementia because I cant remember anything and I have difficulty with basic things such as doing the dishes and cooking. However there are certain things I am very good at such as creating music and being creative. I have noticed that while the episodes of overall decreased cognative functioning can last for months and seems to cycle, the more severe episodes of delusions and disorganized speech and behavior only last for minutes.

Catatonia is not a psychotic symptom, it is a complex movement disorder originally studied primarily by neurologists who did not link it to psychosis. Some people diagnosed as psychotic experience it. So do people who have had certain forms of brain damage or other neurological atypicality that is not psychosis, and people with nonpsychotic psychiatric conditions. Probably most people with catatonia are not psychotic. It only became tied in most people's minds to psychosis much later, and people forgot what it was originally thought of as.

Psychosis is a certain kind of loss of reality contact (all people have some form of loss of reality contact, psychosis is generally defined as a culturally unusual loss of reality contact, which is kind of unfair).

Catatonia involves assorted unusual motor issues. Freezing in place, becoming either rigid and resisting all movement, or being bendable by others. Extreme levels of activity so frenetic as to sometimes be lethal because of the stresses on the body. Momentary freezing in place in the middle of doing other things. Involuntarily echoing people's speech or movements. Automatically obeying commands, or automatically doing the exact opposite (and while this is rarely mentioned, this can apply equally well to tactile interaction as verbal). Inability to speak. Repetitive unusual movements. Slowed movements. Assuming unusual postures. And many, many other things, absolutely none of which require even the slightest loss of contact with reality. In fact, detailed descriptions of catatonia look an awful lot like detailed descriptions of many forms of autism, which also requires no loss of reality contact.

How do I know all this? I have the progressive movement disorder that has been called autistic catatonia, autism-related parkinsonlike movement disorder, and a number of other names. After I was diagnosed I wanted to find out all I could about movement disorders including catatonia. And most people's conception of it has little to do with the reality. It's fundamentally a movement disorder that crops up in autistic people, people on neuroleptics (which are said to treat psychotic symptoms but which make catatonia worse which should tell you something), people with some forms of (not necessarily psychotic) depression, people with encephalitis, people on certain other drugs or with certain other forms of brain damage, and people with some forms of psychosis.

Only one of these groups requires a loss of reality contact, the rest can be perfectly in touch with reality. Painfully in touch with reality, as those of us who can recall in great and highly accurate detail the strange tortures people inflict on those who believe we are not really there. (Not that people with psychosis can't also experience and be aware of such things, but most psychotic people I have talked to say that these experiences are often doubly scary because they are not only experiencing the real abuse, but often tying it in with hallucinations or delusions at the same time.) While unable to move, I have been kicked, shaken, hit, carried painfully by my arms (which along with the rest of my body remained painfully rigid), jumped up and down on top of, sexually harrassed and assaulted, taunted, threatened, talked about as if I am not there, mistaken for dead, tied down (yes, tied down for not moving)... and had people look the other way because they didn't think I was in there, or cone and tell me later what happened as if I didn't know. People have been subjected to painful tests such as being burned or shocked to prove they couldn't respond.

As for why I mention all that, one of the ways people most frequently link catatonia to psychosis, is that they assume that all these things are happening because we are either unaware of reality at all, or else experiencing a vivid immersion in hallucinations, or somehow "regressed" to an earlier point in our lives. That's not at all true of most of us experiencing these traits. For me, all of the traits of catatonia become worse because of a hyper-connection to reality so rich in detail that it is painful (to my mind) -- bombardment with accurate sensory details from my environment. If I am so overloaded as to be utterly immobilized, I not only feel what people do to me, I feel it with more intensity than ever. Because I am at those moments so completely hyperaware of what is around me. And awareness of reality is kind of the opposite of seeing things that are not there.

Incidentally the diagnosis of catatonic schizophrenia has gone down over the decades. My best guess why is that people who used to be diagnosed with it (catatonic schizophrenia requires no psychotic symptoms in fact, and is used like "idiopathic catatonia" almost) are being properly diagnosed with the many other organic causes of a movement disorder.

I'm not trying to say being psychotic is bad and to be distanced from. It isn't. But catatonia is hugely misunderstood, in part because people assume it's usually or even inevitably tied to lack of reality contact or altered states of consciousness. The reason I have written a lengthy response to such a small part of the post I'm replying to, is that these misunderstandings have an effect on people's understandings of the lives of people with catatonia. Which includes many autistic people given the extreme overlap in traits.

The ICD-10 says psychotic episodes may be seen in early adulthood in individuals with AS.

I had one, and this was the culmination of all of many bad stressors.

Thats intresting. I actually brought up autistic catatonia to my neurologist last week because I saw people posting about it on here and when I looked it up some of the symptoms fit me. I developed parkinsonian like tremors in adolecence but my neurologist didnt know much about it. I have been prescribed anti-parkinsonian meds "ropenirole" and they made my symptoms much worse. I was unable to move. The tremors are not medicine induced. They developed out of nowhere. It sounds like what you have experenced is a bit differant than me although sometimes I do have moments where it is very difficult to move. This could be due to something else though. I seem to have additional symptoms differant from most people with autism/aspergers. They seem differant from most cases of schizophrenia as well but its hard to tell. Do your symptoms fluxuate? Mine fluxuate quite a bit while the autistic/aspergers symptoms stay the same. To me its like I have a set of symptoms that are consistant, and another set of symptoms that fluxuate.

Yes, my abilities in general fluctuate more than most people I have ever met.

I am a good writer (I'm told over and over) yet I can often not even conceive of the existence of words.

My receptive language ranges from also unable to conceive of words, to somewhat below average. I learned to make totally appropriate sounding speech based on pattern matching before I understood a single word.

My background level of movement (the way I move before intention comes into it) used to range from constant stimming to total immobility, until sone other conditions made stimming less likely than it was before.

My ability to move consciously ranges from difficult (not always visible to others but shows up on physiological stress measures) to impossible.

My ability to understand my environment ranges from a total lack of any conscious information getting in, to (more common) getting raw sensory data only, to (quite taxing) picking out and understanding the separateness and/or meaning of objects, sounds, and other sensations.

My ability to understand body language and other nonverbal cues ranges from nothing to pretty good (but when it's pretty good I am understanding a totally different set than nonautistic people understand to the point we confer to see what each other have missed). Interestingly when they're pretty good, that's always during times when I can't understand and/or even conceive of language. This is what I mostly used before I knew what language was, it's an either/or thing for me.

Speech used to fluctuate wildly when I had it. When the movement disorder became progressive rather than static, the periods when I could not speak became longer until now my only speech is noncommunicative. Now it's typing that fluctuates wildly.

I have a small set of motor skills that I can be decent or good at even when my other motor skills aren't doing quite as well. Like typing. This showed up as causing little to no physiological stress, although it can have the same problems as any other movement.

I also do triggered and automatic movements better than voluntary ones. Although I now have muscular issues that put a cap on that.

I can have zero conscious thought. I can have putting together patterns of sensory data. I can have, with great difficulty, anything from basic abstraction (even "concrete" words and symbols are abstract) to a somewhat higher degree of abstraction.

I basically can take no ability for granted and am in a state of constant flux. Each ability moving out of the way for another one.

My best abilities are the ones required to survive with zero receptive or expressive language, only perceiving raw sensory data, only triggered movements/memories/thoughts/etc., thought being primarily finding patterns of sensory information and patterns within the patterns with no abstraction, and basically functioning in that manner. I have a lot of practice at that and it is my default state.

Anything "above" that stuff, and it's work. Sometimes impossible work. But even when it's possible, it's like climbing a cliff. If I let go, I fall back down to normal. If I shut down (daily), I'll fall below normal. But even at my highest point on the cliff, I never am the same as someone standing securely on top of a hill of the same elevation. For them they have to shut down to get to my normal, which is disorienting because they've never lived like that for their whole lives. Whereas all I have to do to get back to my normal is let go of the cliff face. Even if I can climb higher than some people, their default elevation in that skill may be higher than mine. Which is how I can be a better writer than some people whose ability to write is far more stable than mine. Which explains the phenomenon where people with MR often have more stable abstraction levels than I do even though at my best I can outstrip them at some stuff when at my best.

Also, for me in every single skill, there's a huge discrepancy between voluntary and triggered. This discrepancy has only widened as the movement disorder has progressed. Voluntary sucks. Triggered can excel barring any barriers outside of this. This is true for movement, memory, thought, words, and everything else. My voluntary recall can be as good as nothing but my triggered recall can be more extremely accurate than average. Same with all other things.

I have found that one attribute of the autistic people I identify the best with, is living in that state of flux that seems far from the most common among online autistics. (Other attributes include doing their best "beneath" language and abstraction, excelling at pattern recognition, perceiving the world best as raw sensory data, and a number of other traits. I have only met one person nearly exactly like me in terms of autism, but there's a decent minority who seem to mostly identify with each other. But at least online it is a minority.

According to this shrink social services forced me and my adoptive parents to see, I was as a toddler because I was unable to seperate fantasy from reality and supposedly thought I was fictional characters instead of myself. But then according to him, my adoptive mother was responsible for my behaviors becuase she was cold to me and someother Bettlehiem BS.

I thought they had done away with the "refrigerator mother" crap by then? That would have been less than 20 years ago, right? Sounds like someone didn't follow their continuing education plan.

The early 90's. Yeah, he was an idot. I barely remember the sessions but from what my parents say he was quite the ignoramus and stupid would have been a compliment.

I have had several psychotic episodes in my life, my first one was about 12-13 years of age for sure. The docs say I am going through one right now but I don't believe it because my beliefs are scary but real. 3-7 are so bad for me. I break down in tears. I can't even think right now. Its so bad. I am sorry about things I really am. I don't mean any harm. My brother is absolutely hilarious but annoying.

Things like that don't go away instantly, where every professional learns something all at once. About 15 years ago I saw a psych textbook that used a Bettelheim case study to teach about autism. About the same time period I was sent to a residential treatment facility that took away my autism diagnosis among others, and told my parents I had been psychotic since infancy, schizophrenic since childhood, and that my mother made me that way by the way she acted when I was a baby. This was 1996. And to this day there are still people who haven't caught on yet and continue to argue that autism has this cause.