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

[Guilty85]

So I took about 150 to 200 mg of Sertraline throughout my pregnancy as I am prone to low mood. I remember a doctor at the time said it was ok for me to take it while pregnant and especially if the benefits outweigh the negatives. My son is 7 and is autistic, he is verbal but struggles socially and is very delayed speech wise and emotionally.
I can't help but wonder did the chemicals in the anti depressants enter his blood stream and for want of a better word, give him autism.
If your child has an Autism diagnosis, did you take antidepressants during your pregnancy?
This is something that has been niggling me for years. I don't have any other children so can't compare.

FGS you're either ND or NT.

It's one or the other. NT people do not have traits of autism.

I have never taken any kind of AD and my DS has autism.

Honestly it's genetic. They just haven't figured the details out.

@10storeylovesong
Re asthma both me and disis have it due to mum smoking like a chimney and during pregnancy. Both of us have ND traits. She is academically gifted and went through a ED phase. I dont think i took asthma steroids in pregnancy though dsis did. But i did have some severe colds and would have taken ventolin etc. My dc are both ND and hers NT (but did show some ND traits as toddlers.). None of them are asthmatic.

I would say the expression and development of ND traits has been worse due to uk state schools. Large classes, lot of poor behaviour. Little proper exercise. And now no movement of children who are ahead academically with harder work.
Certainly at secondary the mean behaviour of groups of kids is off the scale.

And yes the specific epilspsy meds does show what we call asd can also be caused by meds.

Yep.

Schools are what are pushing ND to the fore. 25 years a secondary teacher. Got out a year or so ago. Secondary schools are awful.

@TheShellBeach You need to fit 3 criteria to be diagnosed with ASD, and it must ‘impair daily functioning’.

Why is it not conceivable that a NT person could fit 1 or 2 criteria, therefore having ‘autistic traits’ but not have all 3 (or it impairing daily functioning)?

3 criteria’s needed for diagnosis.

I have never taken any drugs for depression

My oldest ds has asd
My youngest ds does not

I have two autistic children and have never taken ab anti dependent in my life, though I am probably autistic myself. It's not caused by anything you did or didn't do.

It’s hard but try not to blame yourself. I also
have 3 children and only my middle child has ASD. We tried to make sense of it and find something to blame (like I had a water birth with her, was overweight then, was using the mini pill (progesterone ) when I found out I was pregnant so had to stop quickly stop , she had a high fever when she was a month old and had a fit, etc) but I now realise that looking for something to blame will just rob one of the joys of life as one can’t move on.

When my dd was diagnosed, i did reflect and it made me realise that I’m most certainly ND as well. I have done well academically, always being called gifted whilst growing up , doing well at work but I’ve always struggled a lot socially. My dad was also 50 when I was born so that adds to my thought but no one in my family or extended family is diagnosed besides my dd.

However, just know It’s nothing you did or didn’t do. There’s no point speculating or putting blame on yourself.

That's not fair. The OP wasn't saying SSRIs caused my child's autism, they were saying I've wondered and worried for a long time that I may have contributed to it, do you think it's true. That's a brave thing to voice. And also very normal - when a child is ill or born ND or with a disability, or there's an accident, people often blame themselves or try to look for reasons. It's human nature.

Who knows OP but I took Prozac for a couple of years then came off it., a few of years later volunteered for bone marrow/stem cell donation and was told that due to me taking Prozac, I wouldn’t be considered.

I disagree that its a brave thing to voice (via AIBU?)

Can I just say...

If OP / anyone is genuinely a parent of an Autistic child, and you have genuine concerns about your child, or issues relating to their Autism, then;

Visit the National Autism society online. Lots of information and support there.

Join one of the many brilliant Facebook support groups for parents of ND kids.

Ask questions on the dedicated SEN board on here.

Visit the GP or other medical professional to discuss any specific concerns.

Or see your GP about any personal anxiety issues.

Like the rest of us do.

For the love of God, don't post or question unfounded rubbish like this on AIBU. It is perpetuating tiresome old tropes and doesn't help anyone. As an Autistic woman with an Autistic child, this would be the last thing I'd do.

The OP isn't batshit at all. Swedish research in the BMJ suggests that antidepressants taken by those with psychiatric disorders compared to those with psychiatric disorders who don't take them might very slightly increase the chances of a child being autistic. I agree that ASD is mostly genetic as it is in our family - but we know it isn't always genetic and can be caused by spontaneous genetic mutations for example.

From the Study:
'This points to a potential effect of antidepressant use on the risk of autism beyond any effect caused by confounding by the underlying condition. It is important to note, however, that the absolute risk was small, and 4.1% of children exposed to antidepressants in utero had autism compared with 2.9% of those with a maternal history of psychiatric disorder. We estimated that only about 2% of autism cases in this population would be theoretically prevented, if the association was causal and no women with psychiatric disorders used antidepressants during pregnancy.'

The increase is very small though OP and it's just as possible that your child's ASD was just a spontaneous mutation, or that being ND runs through you or your OH's family but has just gone undiagnosed.

https://www.bmj.com/content/358/bmj.j2811

Both of my DSs have ASD. Ds1 has dyspraxia too, he is high achieving. Ds2 likely has an IQ of less than 70. They’re different in their presentation in some ways but similar in others.

I took any sickness meds with Ds1 but not Ds2, Ds2 had anti biotics before he turned 1yo, but DS1 didn’t, the list is endless. Ive never taken any depressants. They were both EMCS deliveries.

I don’t know a single other person in my immediate family or close friendship group with a child who is diagnosed with ND.

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.

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.

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)

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

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.

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 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.

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.’

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.

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

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?