OCD and Autism

Used this book to understand how to adapt CBT/ERP for a client with ASD. Very clear with helpful examples, and it was a quick read.

Not helpful professionally, very short, not at all worth the cost.

I work in the SEN field yet, when my child developed OCD getting the help was nye-on impossible. CAMHs were adamant her distressed rituals were part of her autism and sent me on courses (which I've spent years delivering at my school). This book helped me know that, despite my lack of psychiatry degree, I was right. I used this book to help me ask the questions needed to ensure they knew what they were doing - and if it was autism, why was their therapy making her worse?And were they assessing her using research based methods? And how were they defining autistic rituals compared to OCD rituals?Eventually it became apparent that it wasn't me or the book that was closed, but CAMHS knowledge and willingness to listen. She wouldn't get validated or better under their care so we went to a more knowledgeable psychiatrist who had more experience.Without this book, I would have not had that understanding and the language to challenge, and my daughter would not be on the road to recovery.

Very educational

I’m not sure what I was expecting from this book but I thought I might gain a bit more than the book delivers. It’s a fairly straightforward CBT manual for OCD but flags up the differences and similarities between obsessive and rigid thoughts in individuals with OCD and autism; and between ritualistic and repetitive behaviours in the same. The book makes the point that when working with clients who are very concrete in their thinking we need to rely less on the cognitive component of CBT and more on the behaviour and experimental exposure and relapse prevention element of CBT. This seems like an obvious approach to the treatment and most CBT therapists would have already jumped to this conclusion without purchasing the book. I was hoping that the downloadable worksheets would be autism-focussed however they’re fairly standard forms that most practitioners using ERP would already be familiar with. The chapters on Autism and Adaptions to CBT and Assessment of OCD in Autism are helpful but don’t go far enough. I’m going to revisit my Tony Atwood book on Autism and Aspergers and apply some of the ideas that are in there to what I already know about CBT for OCD. Either my expectations were too high, or I knew more about adapting CBT for OCD with autistic clients that I realised!