Do People with Autism Also Have Mental Health Issues?

Many people with autism are also suffering from mental illnesses, but treatment tends to fall to the wayside with a bigger focus placed on the autism itself. Now, researchers are showing the importance of addressing the mental illnesses behind autism that plague so many.

Daniel's story

Daniel Share-Strom is 27 years old and is a motivational speaker in Bradford, Ontario. He has autism, and highlighted his experiences in college as involving multiple attacks from anxiety, resulting in the need to travel home. Many assume that when people with autism struggle in college, it is probably just that they are overwhelmed with their course load, have trouble organizing their assignments, or need to fight with administration in order to gain added time on tests due to their disabilities. However, it is often the simple difficulties associated with daily life, those that everyone takes for granted, that so deeply bother people with autism spectrum disorder.

Daniel explained his experiences: "Relationships are so much harder to understand or initiate when by default you don't really know what certain facial expressions mean or what certain actions mean." In a time like college, when you are constantly meeting new people and being thrown into social situations, this can be extremely overwhelming.

Mental illness and autism in young adults

Teens and those moving into their adult lives with autism are significantly more likely to have a diagnosis of a psychiatric condition (most often depression, anxiety, or ADHD) than their neurotypical peers. Managing such illnesses is extremely difficult, especially if left undiagnosed and simply attributed to autism, when they are two distinct actors.

Daniel explains why he believes the rate to be higher by stating "People with autism aren't immediately born anxious or with depression. The world is fundamentally not built for us, and people are always judging and trying to change you, whether they have the best intentions or not. Of course, that's going to cause a higher rate of anxiety and even suicide rates. I'd be surprised if it didn't."

Daniel's point is exactly why schools must implement resources for those with special needs in transition periods, especially as they enter their freshman year. Yona Lunsky is a senior scientist at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, and she wants to emphasize this importance as well. She states, "When it comes to mental health diagnoses and use of psychiatric services, there's a really strong need for the entire developmental disabilities community, but it's an even bigger need for folks on the autism spectrum. I think sometimes people will dismiss something as being part of autism, when, in fact, it's not. There are people with autism who don't have psychiatric issues."

Read on to learn more about autism and mental illness in young adults.