Many people talking at once, cant hear or understand.

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So recently ive been trying to get out a bit more, and get to some social events or what one would call them.

But besides all my akwardness and other problems with the whole social thing. From my aspergers and autism. What i really find is causing me problem and issues is, i cannot hear anything, well almost anything, when multiple people are talking.

Been trying to search a bit on the internet to find out more, but im not turning up much. Is there anything at all once can do to improve this in any way.
Its just so embarassing not to mention sad, to sit there and just look stupid, because i cannot hear what they are saying, because im hearing 10-20 people voices at the same damn time.

Its really depressing me i mean social events are hard enough as is, but if i cant even hear what people are saying well, its like impossible and kinda pointless

Thanks in advance.

I'm exactly the same. In a crowded place full of people all talking loudly at once, I can't pick out the one voice of the person talking to me; the frequencies get lost among all the other voices. My ears/brain can't pull the different voices apart and filter them.

I don't have any help to offer as I myself don't know how to solve this for myself either, but I just wanted to say you're not alone in this experience.

I'm very much the same way. When I'm in these sorts of situations, I just try to fall asleep LOL

I relate to you,
I only can understand one-to-one conversation, sometimes even not as I seem to "switch out" regulary and do not comprehend everything what has been said, but I cannot offer you any advice, guess it's how autistic neurology is working.

This is a common problem with me as well, which has been mitigated in my case, by restricting the size of the social gatherings I mix in.

Learn lip-reading? It helps a bit.

I completely relate to this--actually, I was writing about this in my journal to make sense out of it, after attending a large gathering where multiple conversations were going on at one time. It got to be too much for me, so I got up and left at that point. I see myself as being a little like a radio dial that can't quite find its frequency when I'm in large groups, so people's voices sound like so much static.

It's called CAPD----I have it too. I can't "hear" (understand) anyone when they talk too fast, or too loudly. I watch people's mouths----sort of like lip reading, like the OP said.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Au ... g_Disorder

During the afternoon hours at one my favorite restaurants in my area, a 60's themed hamburger joint, it is a very comfortable place to go eat a hamburger and fries and read or do puzzles.

But during lunch time, especially one Sundays, when it is crowded, the acoustics of the place always seem to convey a number of conversations directly to me destroying my ability to concentrate on anything.

Some people wonder why I prefer to go eat lunch at 3 pm, but I think that the reason should be entirely obvious.

I agree that it sounds like auditory processing disorder. I have the same problem. I always watch the person's mouth that I need to hear, and it helps most of the time. My parents actually thought I might have poor hearing when I was younger because I always watched their lips. If I still can't understand, I just tell the person that I can't hear them over the other people talking or the radio, or whatever and have them write it down if possible (this is most common in restaurants where napkins are readily available to write on) or just ask them to tell me later when it's quieter. That may not be a great thing to do at a social event though, unless it is people you know well and feel comfortable with. "Lip reading" might help though.

I get that, it happens if I'm talking to one person and there is no one else about too. Like I can hear them fine but I either don't catch what they said(like it doesn't even sound like a word) or I hear something different but vaguely similar sounding to what they said.

Oh, the horror of trying to talk to someone on my university during intervals.
I know exactly what you are talking about.

That happens to me frequently, my head feels blank when that happens I don't know what to do I feel anxious. I try to listen only one person talking when it happens to be able to at least hear one person.

I have lots of friends and we hang out together a lot.

When they speak spoken English (we're all deaf) in conversations that include multiple people at once, even more than two people, I always become confused because I cannot process so many voices and their words at once. It's like they become scrambled in my mind and I can't follow anything. So I zone out instead. One of my friends will tell me what the rest of the group are talking about. If the group does notice that I'm zoned out, they will ask me if I'm okay and tell me what they have been talking about for the past few minutes. They are very aware of my autism.

When they use sign language, it's the same. I don't know which person's hands to follow.

However, when it's a one-to-one conversation, I can follow and process everything that the person says just fine.