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aspergers and gender dysmorphia

markjulips

Hi - I have a 31year old son whom I think may have a mild form Aspergers but has never been diagnosed as it never entered our heads before my neice started having "problems" with her young son and he was diagnosed with autism (which made us do a lot of reading and research with her).  My son has an extremely high IQ and always been good at mathematics and computer programming and has always had obsessions in the past which have always fizzled out when he finds another.  He finds it extremely difficult to make friends, keep a job and has always had relationships with girls but when they end he gets depressed and suicidal.

Last year he revealed he has gender dysmorphia since having counselling sessions after when a psychologist suggested his failed relationships could be because he feels uncomfortable in his male role and I am concerned that this may be yet another obsession which will be irreversible if he does become a woman.  He has now been gioven the go-ahead to take hormones after 4 hours of specialist couselling and 1 seesion with a specialist psychiatrist.

Have any other parents been through this sort of thing or do they think I am just clutching at straws and just watch him go ahead?

Parents

  • I wish I could get reliable facts about this, but it only gets discussed in non-medical non-conventional websites. It seems to be taboo in the UK to discuss this, even though research has been carried out on it here.

    It is alleged that poor empathising and stronger systemmatizing in males on the spectrum makes them less effective with the opposite sex.

    But I'd have thought it obvious that social interaction between the sexes depending much more on body language and eye contact than precise spoken language would make it harder to achieve the empathy bit.

    Whatever the cause there is a higher proportion of sexual dysmorphia in people on the autistic spectrum, apparently a higher proportion of people with sexual ambiguity and confusion, and a higher proportion of people on the spectrum identifying gay. I've heard it said to be more than for times as high a prevalence than in the NT population.

    So, if it affects significant numbers of people on the spectrum, where is this all written down to inform parents and individuals of this important issue?

    Oh we're British....oh dear no...we don't talk about such things......stiff upper lip, keep it all in the closet...no no no....naughty...

    I cannot authoritatively say that you ought to look at autism as a factor here. But to the best of my knowledge, with what little I can find out, yes.....people on the spectrum are more likely to have sexual identity poroblems.

    Whether any GPs or health professionals know anything about it, your guess is as good as mine.....

Reply

  • I wish I could get reliable facts about this, but it only gets discussed in non-medical non-conventional websites. It seems to be taboo in the UK to discuss this, even though research has been carried out on it here.

    It is alleged that poor empathising and stronger systemmatizing in males on the spectrum makes them less effective with the opposite sex.

    But I'd have thought it obvious that social interaction between the sexes depending much more on body language and eye contact than precise spoken language would make it harder to achieve the empathy bit.

    Whatever the cause there is a higher proportion of sexual dysmorphia in people on the autistic spectrum, apparently a higher proportion of people with sexual ambiguity and confusion, and a higher proportion of people on the spectrum identifying gay. I've heard it said to be more than for times as high a prevalence than in the NT population.

    So, if it affects significant numbers of people on the spectrum, where is this all written down to inform parents and individuals of this important issue?

    Oh we're British....oh dear no...we don't talk about such things......stiff upper lip, keep it all in the closet...no no no....naughty...

    I cannot authoritatively say that you ought to look at autism as a factor here. But to the best of my knowledge, with what little I can find out, yes.....people on the spectrum are more likely to have sexual identity poroblems.

    Whether any GPs or health professionals know anything about it, your guess is as good as mine.....

Children
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