To think that taking Sertraline when pregnant caused my son's ASD?

What does harm babies, really harms them, and their mothers, is untreated PND. Sertraline is a safe treatment for PND. Mothers shouldn't be scaremongered into refusing sertraline nor made to feel guilty if they take it.

Valproate is a completely different class of medication from sertraline. They are not comparable.

I don’t think you’re right in saying sertraline must be ok because so many people have taken it

That's not what that poster said though, is it? What that poster said is that 25,000 babies whose mothers took sertraline during pregnancy were assessed and found to be unaffected. If you read the article linked from my first post on this thread, you'll see that in utero exposure to sertraline has been found to have no link to autism.

Stop scaremongering when the science doesn't support it.

Except that several posters have linked peer-reviewed scientific research reports that indicate that in utero SSRI antidepressant exposure has no causal link to to autism. Sodium valproate is a different class of medication to SSRIs.

@SpiritAdder the interaction of multiple genes, and environment is fairly well understood even by non scientists. I think given the amount of research and the number of individuals involved that they would have a much firmer grip on what combinations create this disability if that was the answer. In fact we all know that a “cause” isn’t necessary to diagnose autism, so autistic people who are also valproate damaged and autistic people who also have Down’s syndrome or autistic people who have any other trigger or comorbid are still autistic. As to how “likely” it is that a particular drug has caused a particular outcome, I don’t think you’re right in saying sertraline must be ok because so many people have taken it because that’s what was said about valproate wasn’t it? I’m sure there are other instances too where people have thought drugs were fine but it is going later that it’s not.

There wouldn’t be ‘a’ gene for autism, most neurodevelopmental variation is due to dozens of genes working together. Even something as simple as eye colour has been identified as the outcome of 16 different genes.

It is true certain drugs can result in the birth defects that cause similar symptoms to autism, but these are usually categorised as intellectual disabilities rather than autism which is currently understood to be genetic. It is true that before sodium valproate was found to be harmful in pregnancy, up to 40% of babies exposed were misdiagnosed with autism, but what they had was a drug induced intellectual disability, not autism. This is similar to how children with heavy metal poisoning were also misdiagnosed with autism, when in fact, they did not have it and once they had undergone chelation, their ‘autism was cured.’ Except they were never autistic in the first place.

Finally, while it is possible a medication taken during pregnancy might cause an intellectual disability, this is highly unlikely with Sertraline. Over 25,000 births of babies exposed in utero to sertraline have been studied, and there was no increased risk of any birth defects or developmental delays or disabilities at all. So sertraline has been proven to be safe to take.

I wish people would stop saying “it’s genetic” there are some markers that a small percentage of autistic people have in common. Thats very far from a gene for autism. It’s possible that OP is right and AD in utero impacted her child’s neurological development. That’s exactly what happened with Sodium Valproate.

That sounds like eugenics...

I don't think this is true. My dad and my son are very similar. My dad didn't get much of an education, but was able to work in a factory, get married and have kids. My FIL is also likely to be ND and he went to university (despite problems with social understanding, being very disorganised etc - the stereotypical "mad professor"). Look at historical figures widely considered to be ND, eg Alan Turing. A lot of people were just accepted(ish) as being a bit different and not locked away. But they couldn't as easily met others like them.

Then it becomes an ethical question.
If you are severely neurodivergent to the point it has life limiting effects and creates the most severe challenges is it ethically and morally correct to have children ?

More neurodivergent people meeting others and having babies. 50 - 60 years ago most of us would have been institutionalised and not had chance for a normal family Life sadly. Not just those with complex needs, but so called "high functioning" too.

I was advised to come off anti-depressants when pregnant with my DD. I had a massive relapse in my third trimester and I have always wondered if the stress hormones contributed to my lovely DD's autism, and serious mental health problems. I stayed on my meds (setraline as it happens) when pregnant with my second. DS appears happy and neurotypical.

I took Sertraline during pregnancy and have AuDHD twins.
However, I'm also AuDHD, as is my sister, as was my Mother, and the twins' father is also Neurodivergent.

This partly conjecture partly personal experience.

As ND generally is genetic, and in many instances inherited, it could, or at least does to an extent with myself and my partner, be our normal. We are both ND, there is ND of all sorts on both sides. One DS is ASD and PDA, other is NT. We both have a very high tolerance for behaviours that many others wouldn't. Because we grew up in ND families. Despite our very difficult relationship, i think we do depend on each others ND traits to some extents.

Apologies, that's badly worded, it's late. But I hope you get my drift?

I took antidepressants throughout both my pregnancies. Both my DC are NT. It’s genetic.

NT people can have some ND traits. They aren't adversely affecting the NT person's life to the point of being clinically significant though.

That’s not so. At least not according to the NHS. I have seen children at work go for assessment and receive letters from CAMHS literally saying ‘has ASD traits but not severe enough to warrant a diagnosis.’

I cannot agree less that NT people can’t have autistic traits. That must be nonsense. Every NT person I know has ND traits. Just not enough to tip them into
a diagnosis. I have some traits myself but would never obtain any ND diagnosis.
It also seems bizarre that this is a controversial subject

there are studies linking numerous environmental factors to autism. We all look for answers (and I worry about the antibiotics my DD had in her first year of life). Yes I feel guilty. But this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t discuss it.

I have 5 kids. 3 of whom are autistic. I’m also autistic. I took sertraline in pregnancy 2 out of 4 pregnancies.
1: no S, is autistic
2: S- One of my twins is autistic one is not.
3: S- is not autistic
4: no S - is autistic.

I can’t see any correlation

I think there's a high correlation of undiagnosed Asd with depression and anxiety, so the fact that you were on the drugs is probably irrelevant, more to do with genetics.

Great answer - definitely not your fault for taking sertraline OP.

I can't see the connection in that last point about co-dependence but I think this is probably right: autism diagnoses are going up mostly because more people are getting recognised and the criteria for being considered autistic has expanded massively, but also the base level of autism appears to be rising in general and that may be a lot due to stuff like older parents.

(E.g. https://www.thetransmitter.org/spectrum/risk-of-autism-spikes-for-children-of-older-men/?fspec=1)

Short answer: taking sertraline during your pregnancy is unrelated to your son's autism.

Longer answer: have some science:

In this meta-analysis, neither psychiatric control nor discordant-sibling [research study] designs supported an association between prenatal antidepressant exposure and autism. Discordant-sibling designs effectively addressed surveillance bias in pharmacovigilance reports derived from national registries and other large databases.

Basically, research papers that claim a correlation between prenatal antidepressant use and autism are based on studies that are methodologically flawed. Studies without those flaws show that there is no correlation between prenatal antidepressant use and autism.

I recommend that you screen yourself for autism traits. Depression is very common in high-masking autistic women and autism is inheritable.

Yes this is what happens in a number of assessments, someone may only meet some of the threshold and exhibit some traits, but perhaps not severely enough to meet the diagnostic criteria. Or I have had some reports back where there werent strictly speaking enough criteria met but the diagnosis was made on the basis of general traits and functioning.

If you see a lot of assessments taking place, have a number of children you're working with who are assessed, attend a number of assessments, you'll see there is a huge variety in practitioner views, this has also changed over the years, Ive been seeing this over 20 years.