Asperger's frequently involves comorbidity. My son has an Asperger's diagnosis and also has an OCD diagnosis. They can often go hand in hand. Of course, some Asperger's traits are somewhat obcessive compulsive, but that in itself would not constitute a diagnosis of OCD. As far as hoarding, that too, can be associated with OCD. My son does that, as well.

Thank you tara, I get it now. What my friend was saying was that my friend did not have Asperger's, just OCD/hoarding issues. She does not know him well and understands autism but not the asperger's aspect of it.

I have known him for a number of years and I just thought that being aspie automatically had traits of collecting, organizational difficulties, and over-focusing on one thing at times. I never thought in terms of comorbidity.

Again, thank you for the feedback. :)

You're welcome, Deelyn...happy if it helped.

@Deelyn: Aspergers if comorbid with ADHD (or have overlap of traits of both) can have issues with organization as it's part of the executive function disorder or issues that ADHD people have. EFD is put forth by Dr. Barkley (look up EFD and his name on google)

ADHD is neruobiological and affects different parts of the brain but with the frontal lobe the most, where the "executive assistant" is situated for each individual.

Tourettes and OCD are common co-morbidities.
Tourettes is a neurobiological diagnosis and OCD is neuropsychogical profile or psychiatric diagnosis.

Aspergers can be co-morbid with both of those disorders. Recently in the American Journal of Psychiatry they are talking about creating a social dysfunction or Aspergers subtype to OCD and an OCD sub-type under the diagnosis of Aspergers. Psychiatry is kinda absurd as they have been applying the "disease" model to even the most smallest abnormal variation from relationships.

Tourettes and OCD types have more hoarding issues than Aspergers. For a diagnosis of OCD, I would think it would depend on the severity of traits in the AS patient.

And yes Aspergers does have the issues of hyperfocusing on one thing at a time and sometimes multiple things that cycle if you have ADHD.

Thank you dpkid, very helpful. Yes, I have a close friend with ADHD (adult) and he has great difficulty organizing or remembering things and is also extremely impulsive in his actions. His strengths are that he definitely thinks "outside of the box" which is a wonderfully creative way to see things, is a great problem solver, and has a superb sense of humour and also a very social personality.

Sorry for not responding sooner but I have been very ill lately. :)