How is your sense of danger?

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I used to think I had good sense of danger because I know to not walk on edge of tall buildings or walking on ledges of bridges or speeding but those are extremes I know. But I didn't know I did things that could put myself in danger. I didn't realize it until I saw a thread at another forum I go to that is for NTs and aspies in relationships and other stuff. It was about sense of danger and there was something I didn't get until it was explained to me and I realized I may have that difficulty. So I talk to my husband about it and he said he thinks I do have that problem. He first realized it when we first met and he called me one night like he always had then and I told him how I had missed the bus so I took another bus home and walked two miles to my aunt and uncles when I was still living with them. He made a big deal out of it because it was in the middle of the night, I was by myself and I walked two miles and I told him he was being so paranoid. He suspected I might have difficulty with sense of danger. But it's good now because he gave me a lesson on it but I am still not worried because there will come times when I won't have a choice. But I still have a habit of leaving the door open when I do laundry or check the mail or take out the trash.

I would say that I have had many similar experiences. I think that some of it may relate to logic. We know that there is a fairly high probability of sustaining a serious injury standing on the edge of a tall building and consider it to be dangerous. However, we realize that many other "dangerous" situations have only a slightly elevated probability of producing a serious injury and thus we do not recognize them as dangerous.

I'm extremel cautious hyper-aware danger. But then again, I only fit "Broader Autistic Phenotype" and not a full AS profile.

Sometimes I've done dangerous things, like try to cross a road but the lights change or stuff like most people. I also walk through central Oxford at midnight alone sometimes coming back from cinema or something, but I just think of the unlikelihood of anything happening.
I am usually strongly against risks and don't do anything unpredictable. I have and never will smoke, drink or do drugs (other than the passive smoking I have to put up with from my flatmate who smokes various substances in her room which spread around our flat) and I'm usually very careful crossing the road and stuff. Most times I just think 'it'll be ok' and I go for it. It always has been, but I know some things are potentially dangerous and I do get anxious. But I'm careful.

I've got a very good sense of danger.

Is there a questionnaire or quiz we could do? Thinking about it I've placed myself in danger a considerable number of times, but never thought about it at the time.

I walk out in front of moving cars. It's a problem.

Not sure.
I am however somewhat afraid of the outside world.
But this was more severe when I was younger.

I also had a childhood friend who was, according to my mother, obviously autistic and he was also afraid of anything unfamiliar to him.

Gee, good question League Girl (S.G!)

My sense of danger used to be quite poor. I would place myself in very many risky situations and even if I had a sensory awareness (like an animal 6th sense) of dangerous places or people, I would very often ignore this once I was focusing on the verbal communications of the dangerous or potentially dangerous person.

It is still not good. Better than it was in primary school.Better than secondary school and better than early adultood.

If I rely purely on my sensory realm to "feel out a place" i can remove myself and I listen to that.

But with humans who are dangerous or too negative or toxic it is a far more complicated and difficult process for me. I tend to rely on the verbal utterances and often these can override any other sensory fear or negative reaction I might have about them.
This is why I have a history of being befriended (and then engaging with) rather destructive people who have fairly defined and rigid and even abusive ways of behaving.

There is no doubt I am exceedingly naive and even impressionable with some people.
I let people in to my world - most often online as opposed to in real life - my world, which is actually a really lovely and enriched and positive one - good food, good diet, good exercise, good nature and some good people and a lot of healing and self-care - and they are actually not suitable for me to have much to do with, because I become so impressionable and I can easily get pulled in to their negativity and perspective on the world.
In the past 11 years I have worked at creating a really idyllic life - one that suits me. There are no drugs, no cigarettes or alcohol and lots of nature and animals and birds and blue sky and breathing.......I am learning to watch who I let in, but it is still a slow process and I am nearing fifty and I make a lot of misakes. I give people chance after chance when other people even warn me to "watch that person...they are a bit dangerous," because I am naive and I do not want to be bitter and mean in life. (And I am glad I am not.) And I get burned and allow others to treat me rather poorly in the end, because I do not see the warning bells or danger signs. And it is not that their behaviour is necessarily INTENTIONALLY destructive. But it just IS...for me, with regard to the way I try to live these days. They might live with a completely different mindset about humanity and the world at large.

But if someone oversteps the boundary withe me, over and over and over again, eventually I WILL realise after having processed things slowly and often in a haphazard way that makes sense only to me and my way of thinking. It takes me A LOT longer than anyone else I know. Eventually I will make it VERY CLEAR their behaviour is NOT welcome and NOT appreciated and abusive. Sometimes I have to ask others for their opinion - both NT and ASD people, before I can clearly work out what I feel is right or not right for me. Luckily I have some good AS friends and a great clinical psych and some wise and compassionate NT people in my life who have guided me in this of late...and helped me to see when someone is being plain destructive and manipulative towards me. I'm dancing along merrily not even seeing the signs and when I get a second or thrid opinion - all of which accord, I get ANOTHER reality check in terms of just how impaired I am in reading people. If three people - ASD AND NT eventually tell me that the exchanges that are taking place are REALLY abusive, (and I don't even notice!! !!) I will then act and sever contact.

It takes me AGES to learn this.
I learn belatedly and very slowly about how to relate to other humans appropriately.

But i do learn. And i move on.
And then I go and have a swim, do some exercise, play with the new kitten in our house, go for a bushwalk and another swim in a creek with a waterhole, and try to get back to a more positive way of life.

I do know this too. Destructiveness and negativity lives in every human being. It lives in me BIG TIME. I can be destructive. I can be negative and I can be lacking in principle or behaviour that I try to aspire to. And it lives inside others. I can choose each day to live in accordance with some spiritual principles I truly believe in or I can get swayed and pulled back into the negativity I have in myself, through my own tendencies and cynicism and because of old wounds, or because of contact with others who live in that place. It's taken me a long time to understand this, and I falter often. I want to remember to take account of the fact that we are all potentially negative, we humans. But if I recognise this in myself - sometimes quickly and then sometimes belatedly...very belatedly...I can get back on track to an approach to life that is in keeping with a more positive and accepting and less destructive way of thinking and behaving. (and I have that potential within me all the time. LOL.)

I don't really wish anyone any harm in life. I just wish i could "read people a bit better" than I do and save myself and others, the attempt at friendship that wasn't ever really "meant to be" in the first place.

Last edited by millie on 11 Feb 2010, 5:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Sometimes I can be extremely paranoid to danger (a lot of it due to OCD.) But a lot of the time I can be really liable to danger, especially when I'm crossing the road.

I have no natural fear of walking at night. I agree with the logic thing. When loved ones advise me to be careful, I find myself citing crime rates.

I'm better at this that NTs!

Part of the reason I hardly ever go out is fear of getting mugged. In fact I read on the BBC site today that over 200 mobiles are stolen every minute in the UK.

Stuff like being careful crossing the road I'm fine with.

My sense of danger would just be as much as an NT would be most probably...

I'm definitely street wise and I know when something does seem quite right, but also I do tend to try avoid going out there in the nightime incase I bump into any trouble which i've been lucky not to.

I'm just too fully aware about things like that.

Me too Broox. I have been a very cautious child all my life, but sometimes I would walk onto roads and I used to walk through the most dangerous areas of the city until someone told me it was dangerous. Now I'm very cautious and any slight sound at night makes me run for cover.
I used to do a lot of wandering around as a child, but now I just can't do that. My neighbourhood is much too dangerous for that. It is a pity, I had some good times wandering my small beach town when I was 3 years old.

I do not have a good sense of real danger. However, I'm afraid of many illogical things.

I'm very cautious. My parents made me that way. When I was a kid my parents gave me a "code word" and no matter who offered or said they were supposed to take me home (even if I knew them) I was not to go with them. I remember our next door neighbor offered to drive me home from the bus stop (It was just down the road) and she was freaked out that I asked her the "code word" and adamantly refused to go with her.


I think pretty much everything I know has been taught to me by someone or I've read about it. I don't know things intuitively.