I can only really speak for myself on this. And, on my own, I'm not a representative sample.
I have Asperger's Syndrome (an ASD), and I've had clinical depression and anxiety during adulthood. Things got so bad at one point that I was admitted to a mental health unit as an in-patient. I was also unable to complete a degree due to these mental health problems.
But I don't think it was the ASD itself that directly caused such mental illness. I've only much more recently had my ASD diagnosed, and I'm pretty sure the mental health problems were largely due to the consequences of my undiagnosed ASD not being taken into account and accommodated. Hopefully, the diagnosis I've now got will help avoid or reduce such problems in the future.
I can only really speak for myself on this. And, on my own, I'm not a representative sample.
I have Asperger's Syndrome (an ASD), and I've had clinical depression and anxiety during adulthood. Things got so bad at one point that I was admitted to a mental health unit as an in-patient. I was also unable to complete a degree due to these mental health problems.
But I don't think it was the ASD itself that directly caused such mental illness. I've only much more recently had my ASD diagnosed, and I'm pretty sure the mental health problems were largely due to the consequences of my undiagnosed ASD not being taken into account and accommodated. Hopefully, the diagnosis I've now got will help avoid or reduce such problems in the future.
