Autism and Schizophrenia

When I first compared schizophrenia and autism, I thought both would have very different characteristics. As I watched the video on childhood schizophrenia, and did some research, it was quite obvious some of the symptoms are similar, especially in childhood years.

As an example, here are some resembling characteristics of autism and schizophrenia:

AUTISM:  little eye contact or none at all, difficulty reading facial expressions and body language, not being able to understand ones feelings, difficulty sleeping, obsessions with objects and certain ideas, speech impairments, poor social skills, and difficulty staying focused.

SCHIZOPHRENIA: seeing and hearing things that do not exist, difficulty paying attention, speech impairments, inappropriate expression or emotion, poor social skills, poor eye contact, and difficulty sleeping.

While watching the video of Jani as an infant, she demonstrated more than one sign of autism. For example, Jani was not sleeping through the night, and was waking up every 20 to 30 minutes.   Jani would also stare in a daze for several minutes.  As Jani became older, she started to show self-stimulations, such as hand flapping. These are all symptoms of autism.

What led me in a different direction of schizophrenia was the intense invisible appearances Jani was experiencing, which became more intense as she developed. Another reason why I thought Jani was schizophrenic was the relationship with her younger brother, wanting nothing to do with him. Jani’s parents also mentioned the “dozens of characters” in her head were telling her to do hurtful things to her brother, such as hitting him for no apparent reason.

I do not think Jani’s diagnosis of schizophrenia could have occurred earlier than seven years old because she did not show many signs of schizophrenia until she was older. And though Jani had invisible friends and characters that she would talk to on a daily basis, this is not uncommon for young children to experience, and are viewed as one of the normal developmental phases of childhood.

If I had to approach diffential diagnosis of an infant to making of the video I would consider both diagnosis’s and keep track of the symptoms the child is experiencing. Though medication can be beneficial, there can be many side effects. Subsequently, medication should not be viewed as the main cure until the diagnosis can be accurately determined.