Learning from your mistakes

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The ONLY thing I have benefited from AS is learning from my mistakes. I know this is true for everybody, because NTs make mistakes too all the time, but I am just talking about the ASD group here and all the social mistakes we make and learning from them (NTs are welcome to give views too, since NTs probably may be able relate here, I don't know).

When I was a teenager, I used to be obsessed with a man I knew about, and I would not stop talking about him. Some of my friends knew of him too, because he lived locally, and the more they told me new facts about him, the more excited I would get, which made me talk about him more and more. And because of my intense obsession over him, I lost friends, and even one of them said, ''you are going to lose a lot of friends through life if you don't learn to tone down your obsession.'' Talking non-stop about him to the only friends I had at school was a huge mistake, and after I left school and made new friends elsewhere, I taught myself not to talk about anyone I was obsessed with any more, because I knew what the consequences would be. It has worked. So that is one mistake I have learnt from, and there are probably several others too which I can't think of at the moment.

Anyone else had shown intense Aspie traits that you thought it was something you could work on to keep under control a little because of a horrible/embarrassing experience you had with other people because of this mistake?

There is an old doctor joke that applies here I think: If it hurts when you do that, don't do that! Needless to say, there are a lot of things that I don't do any more. I find it safest to do only what is absolutely necessary. In general, that means to just sit quietly in my corner with the headphones on listening to my music, or at my computer. I no longer even leave the house unless it is an absolute necessity.

I love when someone is willing to point out my mistakes. I am usually not aware of them so I can't fix what I don't know is wrong.

When I was little, I skipped a grade and got into a new class. At first, I was very popular, likely largely because I had a computer game that no one else had. Tons of kids came to my place. After a while, though, they all left. Why? I had a specific way of playing the game (it was a racing game, and I continuously paused to check who was driving where in the race because I just wanted to know). People didn't like it if I randomly paused their game or changed the camera angle they were using. I did not realise this, and so they stopped coming, one by one. I often blame this episode for the years of relentless bullying that started afterwards. My parents are convinced it has nothing to do with it, but I'm not sure.

Good lesson, though. Can't say I'll ever forget it.

I do try to learn from my mistakes. Sometimes I learn. Sometimes I make the exact same mistake again in an emotional moment. These days, my hugest source of mistakes is in being an NT raising an AS child. You could write a book about all the mistakes I've made (lots of parents do exactly that- the memoirs are pretty numerous these days).

My first gigantic set of mistakes was when I didn't know she was autistic and I kept trying over and over again to use the same techbniques that worked with me and so many other kids and were in all the parenting books.

The next gigantic set of mistakes came when I found out she was autistic and I attempted to use things found in books by "autism experts" and I listened to the advice of some doctors and wish I could undo some ill-advised things I did (anxiety medication was a major disaster, detailed in my post in the Parenting subforum). One doctor advised me to try to make her stop stimming. Ha ha. Everybody here knows that was a big mistake.

My current set of mistakes are a combination of subconsciously falling back on NT parenting when emotional (it always fails) and things that I won't realize are mistakes until the future.

Hopefully she'll forgive me when she's an adult as some members have stated that their own parents did the best they could with what they knew (and some posters have stated their parents were just awful- hopefully I'll land in the former category).

It's a pile-up of mistakes

It is better to have tried and failed than never to have tried at all.

I often times don't. Something that has always bothered me and I've never been able to reciprocate is when someone says "how are you doing?". I always reply but never ask them how they are. Its always just "I'm fine" and that, as they say, is that.

I've found it more productive to observe the mistakes of others, and just try not to do those.

Not so much with the idea of "oh wow, that was stupid. I'll never do that myself." Because the moment you convince yourself of the impossibility of that situation, you may blind yourself in the future when you slide into that very situation. (Short version: "when you decide something is impossible, you close your mind to recognizing that possibility")

The males in my bloodline have tended towards alcoholism, for example. I've seen the chronic harm they've caused themselves and others. [1] A close friend of mine slid into drugs. It took him a long time (and several hospital visits) to snap out of it, and he was somewhat lucky since brushes with some of those drugs tend to cost lives.

I like to think I have a good handle on "well, if I do such a thing, I've already seen the suckage it causes" and leaving it at that to inform my choices.

[1] I sometimes wonder if I'd be stupider being a social drinker not realizing the harm from overindulging, or if I'm stupider for knowing the harm from overindulging and taking the risk anyway.

I try and learn from my mistakes but there are actually people who don't learn from them and I used to think it was due to stupidity. You've heard the phrase "smart people learn from their mistakes, stupid people do not." But no I learned on my Fun Facts Coach that it's due to the wiring of the brain.


Sometimes it takes more than one mistake for me to actually learn like I learned after three times that when you suggest to a parent what may be wrong with their child, they get mad at you. So lot of parents do not like hearing their child could have autism, so I assume it's with other disabilities too. So if they are complaining about their child's difficulties, do not suggest they could have ADHD or autism or sensory issues, learning issues, etc. Unless they ask if their kid is disabled or something or has some sort of mental condition, then it might be okay to share my opinions about what they could have. If they got mad at me for that too, then I have no idea how to act in those situations. I don't even know why parents whine about their kids problems and then get mad when a condition is suggested to them, maybe because it means their kid isn't a brat and it means it's not their child's fault so now they have to give them some slack and have some understanding for them. Even use their money on therapy to help their child or do some extra work to help their child without a therapist and find other ways. Even doing reading as homework. Or maybe because they think they are doomed and their child will never be able to help it. Maybe they just want to hear how bad their kid is or something or want to hear what to do with their child or want you to whine with them about yours so you both can give each other sympathy. Maybe they are fishing for sympathy.

I even learn from other peoples mistakes too. I read things online or read about things people do and I learn to not do them.

In 10th grade I use to talk about this radio station and radio DJ I was obsessed with, constantly and I annoyed my friend till no end, and she didn`t wanna talk to me anymore, and told my guidance counselor that I was too "repetitive." we`re not friends anymore and we needed to stay away from each other because she became so mean to me all of a sudden!