Depression for Autistic Adults

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I care for my 24 year old autistic son. He is not considered high functioning, although he is quite capable of communication and making sound decisions for day to day stuff. We get in well enough, mingle with the community, have regular activities and all that. But sometimes my son will suddenly say the has misery. That he is a bad person. Then he says nevermind. Oh, sure no problem!! ! I firmly stand by his right to make decisions about his life, I won't force him into a group if he tells me he doesn't want that. But is that wrong of me? He would rather be alone most of the time, and I respect that. But I wonder if I'm truly doing right by him? Is the stress just part of his condition? Has anyone else out there dealt with this and come up with a solution?

Yeah it's difficult when you're the parent innit

If he's happy in his own company there's absolutely nothing wrong with that imo

Maybe a little encouragement every now and then might not harm just to see how he is with that

I love my own company me. But it is nice to inject myself into the world every now and then

Forcing him seems like a bad idea to me. Maybe give him easy opportunities that he can take instead.

You will just have to explore this further.

I have noticed that autistic people can become depressed when they are in between special interests or when an interest is not working out. This could be something to look into.

Usually an autistic person will have one or two persons they are comfortable being social with in one way or another. But that may look pretty different to a non-autistic person. For example, I am neurotypical and I like to have some of my day alone with pets, some of it with my husband and son, and a few days a week with friends. I will occasionally come to a place like WP to either read or communicate directly with online friends. My aspie husband gets more social time than he would like from work, his mom on the phone once a day, and from me and our son at home. Our son has ADHD and will become depressed if he spends more than an hour or so by himself, even if a cat is with him. He has weird bad thoughts if he goes a few days without seeing other kids. He needs people in a way that my husband and I just don't understand. So each person is different and I think neurological wiring contributes to that.

Also look into his physical environment. If his clothes, food, cleanliness of his environment is not what he is comfortable with, these types of things may make him feel bad.

Good luck. You're being a wonderful and supportive mom for checking this out.