Question:
Aspergers and schizophrenia linked? I just was reviewing extra goodies on the commentary on the beautiful mind DVD and they were describing the scenes they cut out, etc and the real john Nash and he had a lot of the same characteristics as Aspegers individuals. Any comments? I have not done any extensive research on John Nash as of yet if anyone can find any good information let me know.
Answer:
The negative symptoms of schizophrenia resemble some expressions of
Asperger's. Also, a disproportionate number of intellectually gifted
people have autistic traits and this is even more pronounced in those
who are gifted at mathematics and/or engineering specifically. Those
factors are probably where any perceived links come from rather than any
significant overlap in the actual conditions and their causes or mechanisms. Watching the movie I really thought he seemed much more autistic than
schizophrenic. Its not unheard of for autistics to be delusional, perhaps
he was delusional autistic rather than sz? Schizophrenics I've met seem
pretty social competent, until you get to the really bad cases who are
walking down market st. screaming at people who arn't there. As usual, I don't really think "sz" is one thing (and I mean this in the
sense that it's *way* more diverse and disconnected from each other than
autism *ever* seems to be), so I think it's pretty hard to say that "it"
is *anything*. But I do know that people with that diagnosis occasionally
"recognize" me as "one of their own" if they don't know about autism. I asked a friend about it, and she speculated about:
1. My movement patterns, which are influenced both by autism (and the
movement thing that's happened with some autistic people) and by
neuroleptic drugs that people with that dx are given. Catatonia (which is
often used to dx "sz") is definitely there, and people could draw
conclusions from that, or they could be looking at the movements based on
the drugs I've been given (which I'm told I've never moved the same since
the first day they were given to me), or both.
2. A possibility that people with that dx are (unintentionally?) trained
to act a certain way, and having had that dx for awhile, I may have been
trained to act that way.
Technically, a person can be dxed with both. And if a person meets the
criteria for any autism-type thing, they can only be *also* dxed with
schizophrenia if they have 'delusions' or 'hallucinations'. (However, shrinks have been known to take "I'm not human" as a delusion,
and "I hear voices" (because I hear the shrink talking to me) as a
hallucination, or to coerce such answers out of people. I was diagnosed
with "severe treatment-refractory schizophrenia", after a brief interview
in which a psychiatrist asked a bunch of leading questions that given how
terrified I was of him I tried hard to answer and stick to my answers,
and the diagnosis turned out to be an excuse to give me Clozaril more
than anything. (Given that I had just been transferred to his
'treatment' facility from a couple places where my life was threatened for
not taking meds or answering questions 'wrong' (and I could never figure
out how to answer them *right*, because they wanted signs of pathology
out of me and never believed a word I said whether I told the truth or
not), I wasn't going to argue with him and I *was* going to try to figure
out what the best answers were for staying alive. I'm told now that if
I'd denied these things he probably would have dxed schizophrenia anyway.)That observation holds very true for many of us. To look at the hering voices thing, the other day I found myself in an
interview room with someone who is advocating my complaint against mental
helth services and noted, that due to the poor soundproofing I could indeed
here voices which were not in the room. How many times has our literal anser
to a question that assumes some foreknowledge of what Sz is, condemns us.
A delusion is no more than a strongly held belief that does not concur with
the observations and perceptions of ones peers. I think a certain amount of
paranoia is merely helthy and I have a way of thinking that has evolved to
suit my circumstances that could be seen as negative and dysfuntional that
actually works very well for me.
As for the alien thing, that too is quite common when one fits so badly with
human society and cannot reall relate to there thinking processes at all it
is a logical thery to come to. Still can't be sure I am not an alien, except
if I am my brother comes from the same planet as well
I know all the pysciatrists trick questions now and can turn them, neither
am I afraid to anser to the literal truth of there distorted questions on
things like voices, because I know very well what I mean and could
conclusively argue that if need be.
Of course I can also argue things so absurd as to drive any pysciatrist
insane, especially when it comes to maths and my arguing that 2 and 2 does
not always equal four (notwithstnanding ways of squaring circles and
circling squares)
Fizbin anyone ?
Yes I too was Schizoid without the positives. Then I got a few people and
they all nailed me AS, then I saw a specialist and was DX as AS. But reading
back on my files its funny to see how much even when it was for AS it kept
saying rule out Schizophrenia or any other mood/thought disorder. But now I
am 1. AS 2. Major Depression & Anxiety.
