Aspie eyes

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I'm not sure that how you look at someone talking is negative exactly, or impolite or scary. This has been an issue with me and my husband. When I talk to him, he looks at me blankly. No movement, no expression, nothing. When he does this I tend to think that he is not understanding what I am saying to him. (which is true sometimes) so I tend to repeat myself. He complains all the time that I repeat myself, and I tell him that he gives me nothing that shows that he is getting what I am saying, and this is why I do that. I ask him to nod, repeat what I say to clarify, burp, fart, anything, I don't care...just give me something to let me know he is understanding me. After 15 years we still have this issue. I explained to him why I repeat myself and he doesn't get it. One day I did the same thing to him. I gave him no expression at all. I waited for him to repeat what he said 3 times, and then told him he just repeated himself just like I do. He gave me the same reason, he couldn't tell if I was understanding what he was saying so he said it again until he got a response. After this exercise, he still complains that I repeat myself, and I still do.

It's one of those things that we work through together. It's just a communication difference...nothing more than that.

Well, I'm not exactly silent the whole time somebody talks to me. I nod and answer. But my face is expressionless all the time regardless. Unless I finally get aware of it (which happen more frequently now than earlier) and I give off a few cramped expressions before going back to listening mode.

Sometimes, I concentrate so hard on analyzing expressions and cues that I don't hear whatever they're talking about.

I remember being in high school and two of the smartest students would look at you but looked like they weren't looking at you. I could never understand it. I'm on the spectrum but I don't have these eyes. My eyes are orange and because I'm so dark-skinned, people have told me my eyes look like flaming daggers that made them uncomfortable. Once I posted a thread about people with pin-pointed pupils who also seemed "difficult" to get along with...what it turned out to be (I'm 99% sure) is that they were on the spectrum and had "light-sensitivity"...that why their pupils never seemed to dilate. They had social difficulties. In my case, I can make a dozen friends easily upon first meeting but I don't have the skills to make those friendships endure. People would come in and especially "out" of my life more often than I liked. So I stopped trying and I'm alone socially but I have my hubby and two sons. They are my life and I feel full.

Yes, but it's not that the NTs don't understand that the mask isn't real. I had a friend who drifted away, probably because of my lack of understanding social cues. I used to believe that the social skills thing is really just a copout, a bad excuse for rejecting someone when one can't come up with a real answer. Now I think there's something to it and I am noticing my differences more and more as I get older.

This friend once told me about his experiences at a show where hypnosis is used. I commented that hypnosis isn't really real. It doesn't really work, does it? What is it supposed to do? He said, that the people are just having fun with it, and that the value of the experience is to just go along with it. So yes, it is recognized that the mask isn't real, but you become a spoilsport if you relate on a level of how things really are, rather than engage in the pretend play. I have made people uncomfortable with the question "Is that really true?"

I have rather nice sky blue eyes and normal pupils. But when I look at something, faces, anything, I automatically keep them completely still. I think this is the unnerving part, because you are supposed to move them all the time, or so I've heard.

I spy with my little (aspie) eye topic

Your eyes look deep and dark. Shadowy? Mine are just strange, especially when I take off my glasses.

I just realized I posted in Love and Dating.

There have been times when I've had the "thousand-mile" stare. Quite often, actually. I have a manager who, when he catches me looking at him like that, asks, "Did I do something to p*** you off?" My first response should be, "No, it's just how I am." However, I like to have fun with people sometimes, so I'll usually respond with, "Not yet" while maintaining a deadpan expression. Not the best way to climb the corporate ladder, but it's fun!

As for reading expressions, that's a part of the issue I have. I struggle with it at times. Has anyone read any of Paul Ekman's books? He's done extensive research on facial expressions and the emotions they express. He helped develop the facial action coding system (FACS) that breaks down all the different muscle groups of the face and how they contribute to facial expressions. Interesting reading. FYI, his work was the basis for the TV show "Lie to Me" on Fox. I particularly like his work on microexpressions (split-second "leaks" that reveal what a person is really feeling).

that is a funny way of putting it.
it is like saying "outrageously calm"

my face rarely has any expression on it. i do have some expressions sometimes however, but they are not related to anything that a person who is talking to me is saying.

my expressions are more the product of mainly unrelated observations rather than the product of being engaged in their talk.

i think NT people (i am not a person who demarcates between autism and NT by the way) do not have much expression on their faces when they are not in company.

i have seen it. i have seen car salesmen who have very animated "nice" expressions on their faces until they lose the sale, and then their face drops dead.

similarly, but in a very diluted way, my mother used to smile and have much expression on her face while her friends were at our place, and as they all drove off, her face went back to neutral.

in my case, i sometimes pull some slight expression on my face whether or not i am in company.

my facial expressions do not match what people are expecting, and that is because my expressions are not about anything they do.

if i am talking to someone, i may suddenly frown slightly about something i observe on the ground while i am "listening". i get a slight frown when ever i see something i can not define.

i may squint if their voice is harsh. if they smell bad, then i can not keep that expression from my face.

usually i have an expression of boredom on my face if i do not notice anything to be interested in when someone is talking to me. it is not really a facial expression, but i may look at the ceiling. and look at length at just one thing there while they talk if i am bored.
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my eyes do not have that "aspie" look. (i do not use the word "aspie" myself so that is why i enclose it in quotes)

i think i know the look you mean. the look i think you are talking about is the large eyed spacey mysterious look.

i do not think that is a factor of AS. i think that some people have those eyes and some do not, and whether they have AS is unrelated.

i have seen many picsof the AS people here on the "post a pic of the real you" thread, and there are many AS people without those type of eyes.

my eyes are not penetrating either. they are kind of sterile and blank. i do not think people are affected by me looking at them at all.
i do not have a look of "understanding" in my eyes so they feel that none of their secrets are being revealed to my gaze, and they are correct.

and i almost never look at a persons face anyway because it distracts my thinking, so my eyes are not noticed i would think.

here is my eyes from when i was 15. it is the best shot of my eye shape i have. it was taken by my father who asked me to look into the lens to see if the shutter was working.
it is a natural shot where i did not suspect i was going to be snapped.

the "aspie" eye shape that i think you are referring to is fully developed by 15.

my eyes do not have the shape or intensity or mystery you are referring, to and i am AS.

I'm going to point out a dichotomy that I find absolutely hilarious...
somehow we think we know what an NT is thinking by looking at them,
somehow they think they know what WE are thinking by looking at us.

After all our experience with being misinterpreted, why are we so certain that we're any better at it than they are? I'm willing to admit I haven't got much of a clue about what's going on in anybody's head... oh heck, half the time my own surprises me.

If we were good at it, we wouldn't be so insanely socially inept, for pete's sake. If it was in our interests, we could respond appropriately. But we can't, no matter how much we try... because we aren't getting accurate information to start.

Seems to me, anyhew.

b9:
I don't think the "aspie eyes" are directly linked to Asperger's either. I believe they develop, not necessarily by the age of 15, but when your subconsciousness finally realizes that trying to fake expressions is futile.

DonkeyBuster:
Of course you could be right that our interpretations are just as wrong. This doesn't however automatically mean we are. I believe that I'm capable of reading more accurate information not really meant for public display and which is therefore more than often denied. I've achieved several positive confirmations about this through observations of subsequent actions, but never through dialogue. I never use facial expressions as benchmark because they are often completely ambiguous to me. Instead I observe movements, behaviour and language. It's not about who they're going to talk to or any ability to see the future, but rather an ability to understand the persons actual intentions.

What happens then, is that you become insecure about your findings because what you see and what they tell you belong to two different categories. Observations say one thing, people another. I have a sad tendency to believe in my observations before whatever they out. But I've stopped talking about this many years ago.

if you can read them so well then sorry, but there's no way you could be AS.

The whole thread is nonsense, there's no way to know if one is AS or not based on how his/her eyes are in pics.

Of course you are right (and its very Vulcan of you )

I'm only posting because Labpet did (Bazza likes Labpet) and Bazza has blue eyes.

Yes that's probably closer to the mark, it's a matter of entering into the illusion and responding to the illusion (given that NTs create illusions of themselves in the minds of others as a standard interaction).

To 'see' the real person is like stripping them naked, of course they will move away from you or react negatively. Aspies do that 'the emporer is naked' stuff all the time, you have to be a bit careful about exposing people, because the illusion is their armour and weapon. it's just the custom! cultural clash. when in rome.....

It's not that i'm that good at this stuff, I understand it in theory but seem unable to put it into practice.

No, the problem is I can't. I just believe I do.