Journal on Developmental Disabilities
Le journal sur les handicaps du développement

Abstract

A young autistic woman presented to a treatment centre following a diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Her severely disrupted behaviour was threatening her group home placement. It appeared that the sources of this behaviour stemmed, in part from an early history of severe abuse. The consequences of the abuse were evident in this client’s anger, aggression, high levels of arousal and tendency to repeat the trauma in various ways. A consultation addressed to these issues resulted in improvement in the presenting problems and maintenance of her group home placement. Comorbid Autistic Disorder and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) have received little attention in the literature. This is surprising given the well-documented higher frequency of abuse in individuals with developmental disabilities (Sobsey, 1994, pp.67-73). A notable exception is the description of a 12 year old autistic boy who met criteria for PTSD after experiencing physical abuse by a teacher at his school, a specialized residential school for autistic children (Cook, Kieffer, Charak & Leventhal, 1993). Cook et al. (1993) noted the potential for parents and caretakers of autistic children to perceive the impairments of the child as a blow to their self-esteem, a narcissistic injury that calls up feelings of inadequacy in the parent or caretaker. These powerful negative feelings may find expression in the punishment or abuse of the child to compensate for the painful feelings that the child has precipitated in them. In the case study presented by Cook et al. (1993), individual therapy with support for the boy’s parents was undertaken with a successful outcome.

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