Why doe so many aspies wind up in mental wards?

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Er... "tried to kill", or "had meltdown and started hitting and screaming you wanted to kill them"? Big difference between those.

People who act strange, unpredictable, or "violent" get sent to mental wards. Untreated or poorly treated autism often ends up that way. Sometimes it ends up perceived that way even with people who have a good upbringing.

I'm starting to notice a pattern here; many of us who were in a mental ward at one time or another weren't diagnosed with autism at the time. If the people around us had known it was autism, it mightn't even have gotten to that point, or it might have been more easily handled without putting a sameness-loving autistic into an uncertain, unfamiliar environment with roommates and forced socialization that, in most cases, makes things worse.

I have also had that experience. I had not been diagnosed either time.

I think we end up in mental wards because we have a higher rate of non-ASD mental illness than NTs do. It's no wonder--just some therapies "for autism" will give you PTSD. You get abuse or bullying, and you can't control the nightmares and flashbacks and whatnot. And then you grow up socially isolated, and wham!--social anxiety disorder, or avoidant personality disorder. You try to connect and fail, and start to think it's your fault because you're a terrible person, and wham!--depression. Or you just get plain stressed out from sensory input or from trying to do what's expected of NTs by sheer willpower, and you get burned out, and that makes you vulnerable to everything in the book.

Of course, if you'd been diagnosed, they might have taught you how to deal with stress, that you didn't have to try to be an NT, that the abuse, bullying, and rejection weren't your fault, and that you can learn how to connect with people without compromising who you are...

Many autistics, diagnosed or not, don't get that. They just get therapies that are supposed to make them normal. Ouch.

No wonder they end up spending time in the hospital.

Those with Asperger's are at a higher risk of developing psychotic episodes than non-autistic people.

The delusions and psychotic thinking can be pretty bad from what I've heard.

Anyway, these can lead to a temporary stay in a psychiatry.

That's still the minority of ASD hospital visits, though.

I think the higher stress level of life with AS entirely explains the higher rate of psychosis (actual psychosis, not things that look like it, such as stimming, zoning out, or having a flat affect).

Take a group of highly stressed NTs. Then take a group of autistics. Check them all for psychosis. I bet you get the same rates.

Have been hospitalized between 40 and 50 times. Some times because of frequent meltdowns which were interpreted as psychotic breakthroughs. Then the antipsychotic medication made my meltdowns worse and that again caused more hospitalizations.

Other times because was not able to act normal enough and people said that was mentally ill. Was diagnosed with schizophrenia and forced to take medication. Got high levels of anxiety because did not understand why this was happening and ended up acting even more abnormal. A vicious cycle.

My lack of facial expression has also been interpreted as a sign of mental illness.

When diagnosed with asperger's about a year ago they stopped hospitalizing me. A huge relief. Suddenly they didn't see me as mentally ill, just autistic. My anxiety levels also dropped considerably when learned about asperger's and my meltdowns are no longer as frequent.

Aww vinse, thanks for bringing a ray of light to this thread... That's how it should be for all of us: understanding rather than ignorance and judging and fear of us.

ditto to greentea's post above

Yes I have been in psychiatric hospital. Don't ask me why.

Just how many is "So Many"?

I went for three days when I was having horrible panic attacks. The sensory input in the hospital (because of my epilepsy, they put me across from the nurse's station... and my room had a window and they left the lights on outside my room which was really annoying) made everything worse).

They told me I was just depressed. No acknowledgement of AS. They couldn't see it when I stared at the floor during group and didn't talk and wouldn't eat and said the reason I wouldn't was because I couldn't stand the smells/sounds of the eating area and the social interaction, not that I wasn't hungry.

because We so many must get serious mental health problems.

When I read this thread I personally can identify several things...

I was hospitalized in 2002 and got the recommendation to take anti-psychotic medicine called Zyprexa. Since I'm a anti-drug person myself, I was sceptic at first but when I heard that the reason of the medication was to make me more resistant to stress and that my low weight was going to get up a bit, I felt that it was important to follow this recommendation from the doctor.

I stopped to take the Zyprexa medicine sometime in 2004 and I haven't ever gone back to the medication. It didn't work for me. Besides, in 2005 I trained Kendo and there I definitely felt that I needed to feel as focused as possible during my training and the Zyprexa could never have given me what I needed in that sense. I also decided to not to take any painkillers of any kind, because pain is not something I have chosen to escape from. It's part of the training. I continued the training for 2 years and took 2 grades. (maybe I'm getting a little off topic now, but the Kendo was very interesting and I liked it, so I chose to bring up the topic.)

Being quiet is a part of my personality and although I can speak loud and so on etc . etc.. I often choose not to do so.

I have been locked up for mood swings, depression, adjustment disorder, PTSD and suicidal behaviour. I have been told "I have alot of anger."
I don't anymore.

I was in a mental institution (courtesy of my parents, thanks, mom and dad!) because it would be about 30 more years until medical science caught up with what was going on with me. It could happen to any of us.

Merle

Came close. Wasn't diagnosed at the time, I was basically driving myself crazy trying to meet everyone's expectations of how I should be and what I should be doing in life.

because life is a ******* ** * * * *** ** ** * * * and some poeple do something about it

What's interesting, I was the most asocial person out of a hundred or so at the mental hostel I was at, i.e., I was the only person who took his food back to his room as the cafeteria was far too loud and people spoke too much (plus, I never went to any of the group thingies they wanted me to go to). I think I was the only person with autism there in retrospect; most people were there with anxiety and mood disorders, also substance abuse, with the odd person having schizophrenia, dementia or ADD.