CBT has it help you

I have generalised anxiety disorder as well as (and probably because of) being autistic. I've found that CBT can be quite helpful for the anxiety, when the things I'm anxious about aren't realistic. When the source of anxiety or the thought pattern is an autism thing, it doesn't work at all.

I'm seeing a therapist at the moment who says that she won't use CBT for things like dealing with prejudice, because anxiety about that is justified. She also won't use it for people who want help managing their autism and/or ADHD, because CBT is meant to fix incorrect thought patterns, and the implication of using it for ND individuals would be that their neurology is inherently in need of fixing- which it isn't.

I think if there's a comorbid anxiety disorder or depression then CBT can help with that, but tbh I feel that changing your life to be more autism-friendly is a better solution for reducing the anxiety that comes with things like sensory overload.

To use tabletop gaming terms my autistic anxiety (anxiety innate not attributable to any of the PTSD inducing events or strings thereof) is not actually that high a +1 to all overall anxiety generally, my non-autistic anxiety from other sources was like a +5 modifier. I found CBT ws ok to tackle the extra anxiety sources but wouldn't make a dent in any innate or baseline anxiety, and the CBT had to be massively adjusted and self tailored to my own needs because it was never just as simple as follow what the CBT therapist said. Mostly becaus eteh CBT people are counting on you being not autistsic. I found the exposure therapy part helped, but it had to be really slow and incremental, any jump forwards too much too quick could be a real set back and end up making it like 1 step forward 2 steps back when that happened.

I approached CBT with an open mind and thought it had worked but in reality it didn't help with what I needed it for most. I think it depends on the root cause of the anxiety. The CBT I had looked at worry = anxiety. So while I learned techniques to manage this, really, my anxiety was mainly autism based because of the sensory aspect. Also I sense that autistic people have a higher intolerance of uncertainty. An example being that I still feel sick in the morning before going to work.  In realiity, I have exposed myself to the same situation all my working life but it doesn't get any better because leaving the house and being around other people has a degree of uncertainty to it. My brain logically knows nothing bad will happen, but my autistic brain tells me otherwise. Some elements of CBT use exposure therapy. You also have to be able to "identify your feelings and put them on a scale" which I found incredibly difficult (alexythima). So while I can manage tangible worries better, it hasn't helped with the autistic side of anxiety. I also find it depends what sort of relationship you have with the therapist and you can be masking without knowing it (giving expected responses or not speaking up when you need to). If you can, look at Luke Beardon's book and I think you might find some stuff online by George Watts on this too. The best thing I have found to help is speaking to a neurodivergent professional (ie someone who speaks the same language) in order to recognise and accept my "differences" and amending my environment and situation.

For ASD absolutely not. For depression which may be related to ASD yes I tried CBT. I felt it had mixed results. I think the most beneficial aspects of it were probably centred around self-care. The CBT helped me put better self-care strategies in place as a coping mechanism. It didn’t really address the root cause of the depression which was social isolation among other things.

I’m not certain but I expect but if you use CBT for similar things might be tangental to autism like anxiety a lot of the benefit is probably going to come through coping strategies. CBT really works best on those individuals who have delusional beliefs or irrational fears. The problems   autistic people struggle with Are usually very real and the potential crisis‘s they face in the future very very likely.