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Exploring Depression, and Beating the Blues: A CBT Self-Help Guide to Understanding and Coping with Depression in Asperger’s Syndrome [ASD-Level 1]
For people with ASDs, depression is common, and has particular features and causes. This outstanding book provides a comprehensive review of these aspects, and an effective self-help guide for anyone with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) affected by depression. Written by the leading experts in the field, the book explains and describes depression, the forms it can take, and how it looks and feels for a person on the autism spectrum. The authors draw on the latest thinking and research to suggest strategies for coping with the effects of depression and provide a complete step-by-step CBT self-help programme, designed specifically for individuals with ASDs. The programme helps increase self-awareness, including identifying personal triggers, and provides the tools to combat depression.
270 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 2016
52 people are currently reading
336 people want to read
About the author
Tony Attwood
237 books188 followersTony Attwood is an English psychologist who lives in Queensland, Australia and is an author of several books on Asperger's Syndrome. He received an honours degree in psychology from the University of Hull, an M.A. in clinical psychology from the University of Surrey, and a Ph.D. from University College London under Uta Frith. His book, Asperger's Syndrome: A Guide for Parents and Professionals, provides information on diagnosis, problems of social relations, sensory issues, motor control and other typical issues which face people with Asperger's and their support networks. The book has now been translated into 20 languages. Attwood also has a clinical practice at his diagnostic and treatment clinic for children and adults with Asperger’s Syndrome, in Brisbane, begun in 1992.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 23, 2016
As usual Tony Attwood delivers a book with a lot of inside in the thoughts and lives of persons on the autism spectrum scale. It was a very interesting read and it will stay with me a long time. With a family member diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, this book helped me to understand better how it feels like to be not always able to sound that something is wrong. That just because a person isn’t saying something hurts doesn’t mean she/he suffers in silence and needs help. I highly recommend, not only this book but all Tony Attwood’s books about Autism/AS, to everyone who wants to educate themselves and learn about the problems in all-day life a autism diagnoses can give.
***ARC provided for my honest opinion***
***ARC provided for my honest opinion***
July 7, 2017
This book is helpful for those on the autism spectrum and for those who wish to learn more about the experience of depression for those on the autism spectrum. The first few chapters provide a valuable background to depression and ASD and a workbook format follows.
July 24, 2020
3.5 Good, very basic overview of CBT and depression management. I would of liked more in depth explanation/exploration of what depression looks like for ASD vs NTs.
September 6, 2022
Quelques très chouettes idées.
Bcp d´infantilisation....
Bcp d´infantilisation....
July 23, 2017
This book, as might be expected, is aimed at a very specific and narrow niche audience, specficially those who are dealing with Asperger's Syndrome [1] and who also struggle with gloominess and more serious forms of depression. I would seem to be the ideal audience for such a book, given that Asperger's syndrome is characterized by someone having the following set of social qualities: high degrees of loyalty and dependability in peer relatioships, ability to regard others at 'face value' across boundaries of age and sex and social status, speaking one's mind irrespective of the consequences, ability to pursue personal perspectives despite conflicting evidence, seeking an audience or friends capable of spending time discussing obscure and arcane interests, listening without continual judgment or assumption, avoiding small talk, seeking sincere people with an intelligent sense of humor (88-89). In reading this book, as might be expected, I found a great deal to be of relevance because people with Asperger's tend to have strong longings and strong liabilities when it comes to intimacy, which can be a rather crippling burden to bear. Crippling burdens, alas, is something I am familiar with.
This book is about two hundred and fifty pages and is divided into two parts. The first part seeks to educate the reader on depression and its relationship to Asperger's Syndrome. Specifically, the author discusses why an Aspy would get depressed, what is the nature of depression, how depression feels for an Aspy and what kind of therapy works best, and an overview and assessment of how depressed someone is. The second part of the book gives a program for exploring depression, with ten stages that look at qualities and abilities as well as providing a lot of tools to deal with depression in art and pleasure, thinking, social, relaxation, and some unhelpful "tools." A wide variety of appendices follow, including some recommended reading and websites and techniques for awareness and relaxation and even a mood diary. It should be remembered that this book is a very practical one and is mostly worksheets as well as exercises that ask questions about how something feels. All of this gives the book the sort of feel of unreality, or something written for young people that tends to talk down a bit and be a bit condescending.
Although I am pretty much the ideal target audience for this book given my own mental health history, there was at least a little bit about the book that I frequently found frustrating and irritating. For example, I found that this book, like many self-help books of its kind, talks a lot about Eastern meditation techniques but never mentions at all anything biblical in nature. The fact that psychology has found Eastern religion appealing and has tended to ignore where it does not disparage biblical faith is something that often tends to alienate me from books like this. Although this is a book that seeks to encourage people to help themselves, the book itself is pretty clear on letting the reader know that often those who are depressed are simply not in a place to dig out of the holes that they are in. This book gives people techniques, some of which are useful and some of which are less so. The authors encourage positive self-talk and seeking encouragement of the blessings of thinking and acting in odd and unusual ways, but ultimately salvation depends on something outside of ourselves, and that offends the ethics and worldview of the writers, leaving this book to have a tension and leaving it to avoid mentioning anything that would question the ground on which they stand.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
This book is about two hundred and fifty pages and is divided into two parts. The first part seeks to educate the reader on depression and its relationship to Asperger's Syndrome. Specifically, the author discusses why an Aspy would get depressed, what is the nature of depression, how depression feels for an Aspy and what kind of therapy works best, and an overview and assessment of how depressed someone is. The second part of the book gives a program for exploring depression, with ten stages that look at qualities and abilities as well as providing a lot of tools to deal with depression in art and pleasure, thinking, social, relaxation, and some unhelpful "tools." A wide variety of appendices follow, including some recommended reading and websites and techniques for awareness and relaxation and even a mood diary. It should be remembered that this book is a very practical one and is mostly worksheets as well as exercises that ask questions about how something feels. All of this gives the book the sort of feel of unreality, or something written for young people that tends to talk down a bit and be a bit condescending.
Although I am pretty much the ideal target audience for this book given my own mental health history, there was at least a little bit about the book that I frequently found frustrating and irritating. For example, I found that this book, like many self-help books of its kind, talks a lot about Eastern meditation techniques but never mentions at all anything biblical in nature. The fact that psychology has found Eastern religion appealing and has tended to ignore where it does not disparage biblical faith is something that often tends to alienate me from books like this. Although this is a book that seeks to encourage people to help themselves, the book itself is pretty clear on letting the reader know that often those who are depressed are simply not in a place to dig out of the holes that they are in. This book gives people techniques, some of which are useful and some of which are less so. The authors encourage positive self-talk and seeking encouragement of the blessings of thinking and acting in odd and unusual ways, but ultimately salvation depends on something outside of ourselves, and that offends the ethics and worldview of the writers, leaving this book to have a tension and leaving it to avoid mentioning anything that would question the ground on which they stand.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...
July 7, 2016
Excellent!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews