Since 2015 Disability pride month has been celebrated every year and takes place every July. It’s a movement that celebrates people with disabilities and aims to end the stigma of disability. The disability pride flag was initially created by Ann Magil in 2019 and had a bit of a change in 2021 for accessibility purposes. The flag highlights a range of disabilities; red for physical disabilities, gold for cognitive and intellectual disabilities, white for non visible and undiagnosed disabilites, blue for psychiatric disabilities and green for sensory disabilities, which is key to raising awareness around disabilities.
Most neurodevelopmental conditions are often accompanied by a mental health difficulty but not always. This can sometimes overshadow the symptoms of a neurodevelopmental condition at times, making it harder to access a diagnostic assessment. With an increase in referrals for neurodevelopmental conditions such as ADHD and Autism, you may find it difficult to identify potential symptoms, so here’s a list of comorbid mental health conditions that’s helpful to know about.
Alexithymia & Autism
Autism is characterized by difficulties with social communication and interaction, including restricted or repetitive behaviours or interests as well difficulties processing emotions. According to research (Kinnaird et al. 2019) alexithymia is higher Austistic individuals in comparison to the general population. Alexithymia where there are difficulties in recognising different bodily sensations and emotions, difficulties expressing emotions, and a lack of imagination.
But not all autistic people have trouble identifying and processing their emotions.
Anxiety – Autism & ADHD
Anxiety is another comorbid mental health condition that tends to ride alongside Autism and/or ADHD. Anxiety may present itself in Autistic individuals in the form of sensory sensitivities or experiencing sensory overload, difficulties with social situations or difficulties expressing their wants and needs due to differences in processing language differently.
ADHD’ers can experience anxiety on its own and other times, the anxiety may stem from managing ADHD symptoms on a day to day basis, for example the fear of forgetting to complex important tasks may cause them anxiety. Although symptoms of anxiety and ADHD can overlap, anxiety is mainly characterized by worry, nervousness and fear. ADHD
Autism and Eating disorders – AFRID (Avoidance Restrive Food Intake Disorder) or Anorexia
AFRID (Avoidance Restrictive Food Intake Disorder) is a new term that was introduced into the DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders). ARFID is typically characterized by anxiety when presented with ‘fear foods’, extreme pickiness in choosing food, avoidance of particular foods based on texture, colour, taste, smell etc, for example.
Anorexia is a severe eating disorder that can affect women and men – autistic women are more likely to develop anorexia.
Complex PTSD/PTSD – ADHD
A lot of research has shown that there is an overlap between ADHD and C-PTSD in terms of symptoms such as inattention, impulsivity and hyperactivity. PTSD UK highlighted that ‘Adults with ADHD are nearly seven times more likely to have PTSD than with those without.
Helpful resources
- Beateatingdisorders.org.uk
- Autism.org.uk
- ptsd.org.uk