Disiappointing interaction with other Aspies?

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CentralFLM
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01 Oct 2008, 10:50 am

Have any of you on wrongplanet had disappointing interactions with other Aspies? If you think about it, we are like a slimy fish that you can't catch or keep in your hands. When it comes to social interaction we flop, flail, and slip out of people's lives. Speaking for myself, I want to be with people.........but I don't. I'll tell myself everyday I want people in my life, but then I avoid people like the plague, sabotage relationships, and just avoid interaction all together. The best AS psychologist in my book Tony Atwood said that most people have a large bucket that needs to be filled up with people's love in order to be happy. They need to be filled up everyday with people's attention and love, but they also have a lot to give out as well. We with AS tend to have a little cup that needs to be filled. It gets overflowed very quickly and we tend to have less to give out (yea that seems a little harsh, but could it be true?).

Back to my point, I haven't had a lot of interaction with those with AS in person but I have online. One on one a lot of people with AS seem to be abrasive, quick to offend, sometimes overly paranoid, and just plan rude. If anyone should be able to understand them, it should be me, yet they tend to annoy me and I get offended by their standoffishness sometimes. So can you imagine those in the (neurotypical world) how they feel about us and how hard it is for them to understand us?



CleverKitten
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01 Oct 2008, 11:28 am

I have an Aspie acquaintance who, although he is a nice person personality-wise, I just find it rather tedious to converse with him when we do meet occasionally. Simple responses, uninteresting subjects, shyness, all aid to hinder conversation.

Of course, it must be quite a task to converse with me as well. :wink:

Although I never found him rude or offensive or even paranoid. Just... disappointing. But of course, I'm Aspie too. I don't know how an NT would consider him to be.

Are you referring to the book, "How Full Is Your Bucket?"
I read that book, too.
And I agree with your analogy that Aspies have cups, rather than buckets. :)


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Danielismyname
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01 Oct 2008, 11:37 am

I haven't interacted with anyone with an ASD in person; I've seen many in person, but they and I just kinda stared at the ground.

I know I was wishing for the pain to stop (I don't know what they were thinking). :)



tomboy4good
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01 Oct 2008, 11:39 am

I find interacting with other people in general to be a disappointment. Maybe I have set my standards too high!


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01 Oct 2008, 1:18 pm

I'm just the opposite: The only people I totally and utterly connect with are other Aspies. One of my very good friends is a diagnosed Aspie, and when I'm hanging out with them, we just "get" each other so incredibly well. It's actually kind of creepy at times, because we have the same thoughts and say the same things. I also get along with people who don't have Asperger's but have lots of traits or are overall eccentric individuals. The thing I like the most about interacting with other Aspies is that interruption isn't an issue. Neither party understands when it's their turn to speak, so you don't feel as intrusive when you accidentally interrupt the other. It's just a ping-pong match to see who can gain control and get to talk about their "special interest." :lol:
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01 Oct 2008, 1:57 pm

I'm somewhere between tomboy4good and Tony Atwood's analogy: The few times I've met an exceptional person, I couldn't get enough of them. With ordinary flawed human beings though, a little sip is all I need, and sometimes not even that.


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01 Oct 2008, 3:19 pm

My second cousin (who I feel allowed to bash my head at.) Spoke AT my mother and I regarding our family history and tangent train information for upwards of an hour, on the street! Jeeeesy, I asked him if he had heard of Aspergers syndrome and he just stared for a moment and continued. I hope he has looked it up since, though the last time I saw him, he told me all about his penicillin allergy and said you should email me, we have an interesting family history, stuff going on :roll: I KNOW! Define 'stuff!' The worst part is you are right, we should understand, I have spent a length of time droning on about celiac to all who will listen amoung many other things. Meh!



Last edited by Jenk on 01 Oct 2008, 3:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Aurore
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01 Oct 2008, 3:23 pm

OddDuckNash99 wrote:
I'm just the opposite: The only people I totally and utterly connect with are other Aspies. One of my very good friends is a diagnosed Aspie, and when I'm hanging out with them, we just "get" each other so incredibly well. It's actually kind of creepy at times, because we have the same thoughts and say the same things. I also get along with people who don't have Asperger's but have lots of traits or are overall eccentric individuals. The thing I like the most about interacting with other Aspies is that interruption isn't an issue. Neither party understands when it's their turn to speak, so you don't feel as intrusive when you accidentally interrupt the other. It's just a ping-pong match to see who can gain control and get to talk about their "special interest." :lol:
-OddDuckNash99-


This how I feel too. I was lucky enough to go to high school with two other Aspies, who became my best friends. We were like in our own little world together; no one else got us, but we always got each other. We could be ourselves. We weren't self-conscious about social rules.

I've only met one Aspie that I was disappointed with, but it had nothing to do with his AS; he was a jerk independently thereof.


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01 Oct 2008, 3:33 pm

I've had both good and bad interactions with other autistic people -- probably nearly as good as it can get, and nearly as bad as it can get. Autistic people aren't a homogenous group. I've found people similar to me within that wider group tend to be the easiest to connect with, although I have also had extremely rewarding connections with people very different from me when we were both willing and able to do the work to communicate with each other.


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01 Oct 2008, 3:34 pm

There was this guy I worked with, who was pretty much inescapably somewhere on the spectrum, and almost certainly lower-functioning than me, although I'm no expert. When we talked about anything, i found him to be very INTENSE. This hardly ever happens to me, but I usually wound up staring at the floor when talking to him, and whenever I tried to look back to him, my eyes would get sucked right back down to the floor. He'd just stare and stare at you and stand directly pointed at you like an automated turret as long as you were talking. Needless to say, I actually tried to avoid one-on-one with him, and/or distract him somehow. Usually he'd endlessly say what he felt like saying, though, ignoring all personal barriers and I sort of learned to dislike and avoid him because of it.



nettiespaghetti
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02 Oct 2008, 9:58 am

CentralFLM wrote:
Have any of you on wrongplanet had disappointing interactions with other Aspies? If you think about it, we are like a slimy fish that you can't catch or keep in your hands. When it comes to social interaction we flop, flail, and slip out of people's lives. Speaking for myself, I want to be with people.........but I don't. I'll tell myself everyday I want people in my life, but then I avoid people like the plague, sabotage relationships, and just avoid interaction all together. The best AS psychologist in my book Tony Atwood said that most people have a large bucket that needs to be filled up with people's love in order to be happy. They need to be filled up everyday with people's attention and love, but they also have a lot to give out as well. We with AS tend to have a little cup that needs to be filled. It gets overflowed very quickly and we tend to have less to give out (yea that seems a little harsh, but could it be true?).

Back to my point, I haven't had a lot of interaction with those with AS in person but I have online. One on one a lot of people with AS seem to be abrasive, quick to offend, sometimes overly paranoid, and just plan rude. If anyone should be able to understand them, it should be me, yet they tend to annoy me and I get offended by their standoffishness sometimes. So can you imagine those in the (neurotypical world) how they feel about us and how hard it is for them to understand us?


You summed me up quite well :P And also describes my interactions with others well. I sabotage potential friendships because for some reason I figure they're already doomed to failure and/or could never work so I pull away and hide. Serious social phobia issues. I've learned the hard way that alot of people can't be trusted, and if someone talks about me behind my back for example, I will never trust them again. Even though this seems to be a normal NT thing, one I will never understand. But anyways, yes I have tried to interact with other aspies, even have a sister that's an aspie, and she disappoints me. I feel bad saying that, but it's the straight out truth. She seems to have very little interest in me or my son. She rarely wants to get together the times that I *do* want to get together with another human being and do something or talk. And when I come on here there have been times I've just felt disappointed in general because people seem to be very aloof to me and I don't get the impression that they're friendly or give a damn about me or anything I have to say. Sorry I sound cynical today, I've been feeling really fed up with people in general lately. There's my aspie bluntness shining through again. Cynical and disappointed with the world, yet knowing I'm not perfect either and just not knowing what to do.


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02 Oct 2008, 10:24 am

I disagree with Tony Atwood. I think some of his comments are not based on anything but hearsay. As a so called behaviourist he should take more care. The problem with social behaviour is it is inherent. It is into something people think about they just do it, so they are not really conscious of it and will contradict themselves sometimes. So this makes understanding it difficult. In fact humans know more about the behaviour of some animals than they do of themselves.

I am antisocial but I realise this. But despite this I have met and got on with other people on the spectrum. I made two great NT friends in adulthood (better late than never). You don’t need a massive of fish in a bucket. You need as many that will satisfy you. But if you’re insecure a million won’t stop you from being insecure. I have a NT friend that needed to go out every single night (he has actually improved slightly now), as he can’t bare to be on his own for a second. This is the polar opposite to me. I may not meet up with people for weeks and be content. I only realised that I need friends because if you have zero social contact you can start to get what is termed ‘cabin fever’. So you can have a balance of social contact, it doesn’t have to be intensive social networking.



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02 Oct 2008, 10:31 am

People who post on WP are no worse than others I have encountered IRL and are easier to deal with because they are so far away and not really anything to worry about.

Do WPers annoy me?
Less than the general population. I doubt it's possible for me not to be completely unannoyed.

I don't know if people are standoffish on WP. I don't know what expectations exist. What is it people expect from WP anyway? It is just a forum.

What I enjoy about WP are the occasional posts regarding areas that interest me and the insightful comments posters leave regarding such posts. IRL, most do not consider these things.



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02 Oct 2008, 10:37 am

I work at a job with another aspie. He's rude, he asks everybody personal questions like asking about a person's weight or cancer, or heartburn. He states the obvious about things being done, and he was trying to flirt with me, when I clearly wasn't interested. He says that he's a lover, not a fighter and than when people correct him, he blows up. Nobody likes working with him, and one woman has already quit, because of him.


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