Autism and Alcohol

mia97

I am interested to see the result of the following;

I am autistic and have never had an interested in drinking alcohol - I have tried it literally once but did not like the taste at all!

Apparently not liking alcohol or even having an interest is sometimes a common theme amongst those on the Autism spectrum.

Does anyone else relate to this?

(p.s. nothing against people who drink, each to their own)

Tori_Scope

Apparently not liking alcohol or even having an interest is sometimes a common theme amongst those on the Autism spectrum.

That's interesting @mia97, I haven't heard about that before. Do you have any ideas on why this might be?

When I googled 'autism and alcohol', I came across this post on the National Autistic Society's website, which presents a bit of a different view by looking at the link between autism and alcoholism. Do you have any thoughts on that?

Libby_Alumni

mia97 said:

I am interested to see the result of the following;

I am autistic and have never had an interested in drinking alcohol - I have tried it literally once but did not like the taste at all!

Apparently not liking alcohol or even having an interest is sometimes a common theme amongst those on the Autism spectrum.

Does anyone else relate to this?

(p.s. nothing against people who drink, each to their own)

That is very interesting @mia97, I've also not heard this before, but it would be interesting to know if there's any evidence behind it  

I'm not autistic, but I don't really drink at all. I have the odd drink here or there, but I don't really drink because of my endometriosis. I find that if I drink, it can really flare my symptoms and sometimes it's just not worth it! Do you like to have mocktails/non-alcoholic beverages a lot?

rubin16

Hi,

I have autism and have never really liked drinking or getting drunk, I personally don't like the taste of alcahol and have never really been into drinking like everyone else seems to be. To me beer tastes disgusting and makes me gag, I was always told that as you get older you start to like the taste but this hasn't happened to me and I still hate it to this day.

When I try to drink on special ocassions I get very unwell the next day as I also have crohn's disease so I tend to be sick after drinking so its just not worth it for me. I'm also on medication that doesn't work well with alcahol so maybe thats why I am unwell after drinking.

I'm the only one in my family that hates drinking, i'm also the only one diagnosed with Autism so maybe there is a link there just never thought of it before. Interested to see if anyone else is the same now.

poppy123456

I've never heard of this before either. My daughter has Autism and she's 21 next month. Although she doesn't go out and drink alcohol, she does like a cider or 2 sometimes, she also likes a specific Rose wine. (can't remember the name though)

L_Volunteer

Hi @mia97

What a really interesting thread. I must admit, it is not a correlation I have heard about previously either. However, I am autistic and I have never enjoyed the taste of alcohol and now I can't drink because of the medications I take for other health conditions!