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Selena
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10 Feb 2012, 4:07 pm

An ongoing problem I've had in my social interactions is that my introversion can make me come off very subdued (submissive?). So-called friends often take advantage in a variety of ways--using me as a free venting board for their anger and frustrations without listening to me in return; trying to make life decisions for me or simply starting in with sneaky snarking. When I try to set boundaries, I am careful to use non-judgmental language, don't call anyone names or raise my voice, don't use physically threatening behaviors, etc. Yet they always react to my boundary claiming as if I were a rampaging monster.

Have other people had similar problems? Has anyone had this problem and found a way to resolve it and most past it? I am old enough and have had this happen with enough different people that I can no longer just tell myself to try another group of friends.



justalouise
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11 Feb 2012, 2:10 am

I know I have had problems with hurting people's feelings when I wait too long to enforce my boundaries and sort of overcompensate. Not really the same though, I suppose.



Summer_Twilight
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12 Feb 2012, 10:53 am

I sure have and it always isn't easy to set boundaries like that. However, the reason they are getting mad at you is because you called them out and they didn't like it. Whenever you deal with someone like that, all you have to do is let them throw their fits and then say, "Excuse me," and walk away. You have to also remember that is something that a child does when they get themselves into trouble.

About 10 years ago, I lived with who I thought was a friend and their parent or a time as we considered each other family. However, every time we would eat, this person and their parent would constantly pick at me about being underweight and not eating right. They would also cut me down about how I was too skinny for this or that while other times they made remarks that were just plain sick. They also thought that they could talk to me any old way that they wanted by saying things like ,"Shut up." If I did it though, they would release apocalypse on me. So anyway, the last time I saw them was then their parent was caught telling me to "Shut up," in a really hostile manner because she was mad at me for something. So I pushed back with her. I told her, "You do not ever tell me to Shut up." They didn't like it and told me that if I was going to act like that for me to go elsewhere in their home. The point is that this person was a grown-up and they acted like a child. As a result, they ended up kicking me out because I stood up to them and they didn't like it. It was because I was too "Unruly to live there.

Even if they push back, I would keep advising you to keep pushing back. You may even loose some of those connections but you know what? They were not even worth it.



Selena
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12 Feb 2012, 11:40 am

What you describe with your former friend and her parent sounds almost exactly like what happened with me, a woman I thought was my friend, and her boyfriend when we all shared a house. The arrangement blew up because of his hostility, but my ex-friend believed his lies about me and saw me as the villain.

As much as I try to work on my social skills because I know I can change me but not change other people, I still sometimes get discouraged and feel that Asperger's syndrome is less a matter of aspie behavior and more a matter of how people react to us. I have had situations where it felt as if I was somehow releasing a scent that causes people to engage in scapegoating, bullying behaviors. It's as if people are only willing to accept me if they can feel I am subservient but the minute I try to act like I am an equal to them, they become enraged. This has happened over and over again, even with people who claim to have "worked on" themselves through therapy, etc, even with people who claim to be "spiritual" or "evolved."



Summer_Twilight
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12 Feb 2012, 12:01 pm

People like that are going to get mad because they want to act superior. When you push back, it threatens that superiority.

As for this former friend and their parent, that parent was very pathological now that I think about it. They enjoyed hurting other people and even lying all the time. They enjoyed cutting me down and then laughing about it. In fact, they loved it when their child would make and break promises with me and let them get away with it too. However, when their superiority felt threatened, I got kicked out. This resulted in me not ever wanting to see them again.

Although I did talk to my former friends a few times over the past seven years, they were just too dishonest and would never accept responsibility either.



Selena
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12 Feb 2012, 12:34 pm

In my case, the boyfriend who seemed to hate me instantly upon meeting me had a criminal record and a history of substance abuse. My ex-friend should have known he was bad news, but he would tell her lies about me and she would believe him. She turned out to be one of those people who think co-dependency is a sign of love.

I can see now that it was not a good idea to move in with her in the first place, and that I should have moved out after he became part of the picture. It was one of those things where one bad situation leads to another and then you can get stuck. I had been let go from a job (another typical aspie situation) and needed to reduce expenses, so I thought it would make sense to be in a housemate situation. Once I was there, I couldn't easily afford to move anywhere else when the boyfriend moved in and quickly became verbally abusive to me.

I have since moved to another state and have not tried to get in touch with her, nor she with me. I just don't see the point in resuming any kind of relationship with someone who was willing to believe ugly things about me so she could hold on to some belief that she was part of a sweeping love story instead of a deluded woman in a dysfunctional relationship. For her part, I assume she is either still blinded by his lies, or even if she broke up with him, she prefers not to acknowledge how badly she behaved to me while she was under his influence.

I know incidents like this can happen to anyone and if it were an isolated thing, I would just chalk it up to life experience. The problem is that situations where people believe lies about me, decide to throw me under the bus for the sake of their delusions, or became angry when they realize I see myself as their equal not a servant happen far too often in my life. I have tried modifying my behavior, tried choosing different types of people as friends but if I become anything more than very casual friends with someone, this kind of stuff seems to recur. I have even had situations where people claimed I wrote something in an email and I was able to go back and see they were wrong, that my words were nothing like that, so I know there is some blaming mechanism going on that is unrelated to my actual words.



Last edited by Selena on 13 Feb 2012, 1:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

Summer_Twilight
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12 Feb 2012, 1:02 pm

That is so funny, I moved to another state myself on this person and her but it was nearly two years after I was kicked out. Before I moved out of state, I lived with two other roommates who were six and eight years older than I was. They were already established as I was only starting out and trying get into college. One of these roommates had obsessive compulsive behaviors where things had to be a certain way or I would get condescended on. They also got extremely frustrated and yelled at me for absolutely everything. Either way, they were rather verbally abusive to me by saying that where I was living wasn't the right fit for me and that I was not their age and that I would never be their age. For instance, they punished me once for not being 21 yet because they couldn't bring and alcohol into the house because of that so that they could have parties with drinking.

I also did made some bad choices and that didn't help things out. I ended up writing some bad checks and they got ticked off at me. However, they would bully me when I would be in my room trying to have my own personal space asking me for money. So I started pushing back and they didn't like it but they backed off. When I moved out, I stayed at my parent's house for a week before moving out of state, they called me up and yelled at me about the money. So I said I had to go. Then they attempted to call back and I told them that if they did that I would pursue to call the police and that they were a brat and then hung up.



Selena
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12 Feb 2012, 1:25 pm

Yeah, for aspies mistakes can really blow up in our faces. Basically, making a bad career decision led to me being fired which led to me moving into the toxic housemate situation which led to a series of other difficulties for a couple of years. Now I'm sort of in recovery mode, trying to get my life back on track, trying to work on myself. All of this happened before I realized I was aspie, so maybe it was the universe's way of hitting me on the head with the cosmic 2x4 (over and over and over . . .)

I sort of think that on a karmic level, being an aspie must be some kind of test. Seems like we are given a lot less margin for error than most NT's, we have to pay a lot more for our mistakes than most of them. They are more likely to have a support system around them, even when they behave stupidly/selfishly/dishonestly. Whereas aspies, if we dare to venture into independent living, can really get clobbered.



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12 Feb 2012, 1:38 pm

Selena wrote:
...but the minute I try to act like I am an equal to them, they become enraged.


That's because you're not equal to them. You're better than them, and they don't want to have to face that.



Selena
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12 Feb 2012, 1:52 pm

NicoleG wrote:
Selena wrote:
...but the minute I try to act like I am an equal to them, they become enraged.


That's because you're not equal to them. You're better than them, and they don't want to have to face that.


Hmm, not sure I understand. Are you saying I always choose bad people? Or that aspies are better than NT's?

I am really trying to get a handle on how to change this pattern, other than living like a semi-hermit, so would welcome any insight anyone on the forum has from their own experiences.



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12 Feb 2012, 2:06 pm

Selena wrote:
NicoleG wrote:
Selena wrote:
...but the minute I try to act like I am an equal to them, they become enraged.


That's because you're not equal to them. You're better than them, and they don't want to have to face that.


Hmm, not sure I understand. Are you saying I always choose bad people? Or that aspies are better than NT's?

I am really trying to get a handle on how to change this pattern, other than living like a semi-hermit, so would welcome any insight anyone on the forum has from their own experiences.


To get more specific requires understanding the specific person, but nice people that aren't threatened by you or the truth do not get enraged. There's also some people that are nice, but they still respond quite negatively, but not to the level of being "enraged."

I've come across various types of people that follow the same pattern of not being able to handle my level of honest, but for many different reasons. I'd like to list a few reasons, but I'm needing to head out right now and might not be back online until tomorrow sometime. I'll leave a reminder in my email to hit this thread again later and give some more specifics regarding my experiences.



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12 Feb 2012, 2:45 pm

Selena wrote:
Yeah, for aspies mistakes can really blow up in our faces. Basically, making a bad career decision led to me being fired which led to me moving into the toxic housemate situation which led to a series of other difficulties for a couple of years. Now I'm sort of in recovery mode, trying to get my life back on track, trying to work on myself. All of this happened before I realized I was aspie, so maybe it was the universe's way of hitting me on the head with the cosmic 2x4 (over and over and over . . .)

I sort of think that on a karmic level, being an aspie must be some kind of test. Seems like we are given a lot less margin for error than most NT's, we have to pay a lot more for our mistakes than most of them. They are more likely to have a support system around them, even when they behave stupidly/selfishly/dishonestly. Whereas aspies, if we dare to venture into independent living, can really get clobbered.


That is all part of Harro's Cycle of socialization. People who are NT's fit the norms and we don't because their families along with society drills it into our minds on who is supposed to get what. It all falls into the power and privilege category as well. My roommates both fell victim to cycle unfortunately.

As for you setting boundaries, it's obvious that no one really cares for whistle blowers. That maybe why you are being bullied because you are going against the odds of the norms and the others don't like that.



Selena
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12 Feb 2012, 2:53 pm

I haven't come across Harro's cycle before. Can you give me a bit more background? Is this from psychology? sociology?

As far as what you say about being a whistle-blower, in your opinion is it best then to just shrug your shoulders and either walk away or put up with it rather than trying to make things better when a relationship/social situation seems dysfunctional? In my aspie mind, it has always seemed like I was trying to work things out peacefully--I always used non-confrontational language, tried not to play the blame game but just to speak about how the situation made me feel.



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12 Feb 2012, 5:58 pm

The cycle of socialization was a model that was created by a man by the name of Harrow under social psychology. You have several different levels as to what makes a person who they are.

Here is how it goes
1. Where you are born-How you are taught, what you are told, you have no say in the matter
2. You then go to various institution where you are told specific cultural norms, who gets what, how people are treated
3. Persons of Authority-They set the basic rules in place and make sure that everyone follows the norms: If anyone goes against the norms, then they are rejected. (Target groups: Such as people on the spectrum)
4. You have two types of people: The ones who sit and do nothing, like with my other roommate who gave me a passive answer regarding our roommate's actions towards me. She used words like, "I don't like conflicts. I am also not here enough to know what has been going on.
5. People who are willing to blow the whistle to take actions to break the rules

Basically, people are taught to pick on and reject certain target groups who society and parent or guardians who hold certain stereotypes, prejudices, discrimination.



Selena
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12 Feb 2012, 6:07 pm

I looked up Harro after your earlier post and saw that there are two cycles, one of socialization and one of liberation, which potentially frees people from the first cycle. I would guess that in order to move toward an aspie cycle of liberation, there would need to be an NT version of the "unpacking the invisible knapsack" piece designed to help white people understand white privilege (http://www.library.wisc.edu/edvrc/docs/ ... apsack.pdf)



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13 Feb 2012, 9:38 am

True that.