Keeping things to myself, is this an autistic problem?

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I have noticed that since the family went through the harrowing experience of my mother running off to Egypt, I have been having problems with containing my emotions.

Since 2006, when I do make friends I rarely ever talk about my interests in any great detail (perseverating on interests is what I am talking about) rather focusing on family issues and my deep personal unhappiness with my circumstances.

My constant discusssion of my personal and social inadequacies (which dominates conversations either with myself, friends, or fellow nerds) makes me wonder if I am truly aspie.

I have a hard time socializing anymore, and often end up in awkward silences.

I tend to be very quiet around my family, but with the few friends I have, I tend to talk and complain a lot.

I can't keep my sexual desires discreet (I am gay), and I am often public about my sexual fantasies.

I talk about things with strangers I have recently befriended or am in the process of befriendding that you usually talk about with confidantes.

My thought is that maybe I am so miserable that I can't keep anything in. My dad has encouraged me since the divorce to talk about your unhappiness with others. I observed recently that my interpretation was that this meant that I can talk with anyone about anything.

Now most of this is rather personal, but do you guys do this?

What causes this? Is this at all related to AS?

What are some solutions to keeping more of your private life to yourself?

Last edited by animeboy on 26 Feb 2009, 6:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I'm the exact opposite. I'm overly guarded and private. I have problems even discussing normal, mundane details about my life and person. I'm embarrassed to share anything about myself with people. Even close family members sometimes. I've often wondered that might be an AS thing.

One of my thoughts may be that much of what I am talking about is unhappiness about my life in reference to my family since the divorce.

I tend to keep my interest in anime to myself, and rarely talk about it with others. I tend to keep many of my intellectual interests and beliefs to myself. I never discuss the difficulties and advantages of life with AS with the family or with friends.

I tend to play my world music quite loudly at college, while other people are watching music videos or the most popular youtube video of the moment.

There are times when people ask me questions about my life, and I feel like anime characters when they get those bulging veins on their head.

It may be a selective privacy, there are certain things I never tell anyone (I talk to myself in private), and there may be some things about me (like my openness about being gay) that I tell to everyone. There may be one or two secrets that I never talk about (as in vocalizing those feelings) but keep them entirely within the confines of my mind.

Maybe some of my openness about certain aspects of my sexuality may be related to my liberalism and my belief in social activism.

Blabbing, blurting things out is really common with AS. I have the same problem sometimes. I can say almost anything about sex without the slightest blush.

I was once in a group who were talking about public restroom experiences and I said, "I know how to pee standing up." Luckily, these were my aspie friends who laughed and gave me a hug and said, "yeah, you're one of us!"

Even though I know how to do that, I don't do that. I just did it one time.

Same.
EMZ=]

I've alternated between the two over the years, never really finding a good balance.

In my early 20s I had a lot of emotional traumas, and would literally spend hours telling strangers all my secrets, feelings, and emotions in a bit of a desperate bit to connect, I guess. I threw everything bad or potentially troublesome about being friends with me in their face up-front, and if they stayed around I knew I had a friend. It was a bit of, "there is so much going on that is totally insane and I'm overwhelmed - I have to tell somebody, might as well be you." When I couldn't find anybody, I started free therapy at university, and I used it in the same way (I had lots of PhD student therapists-in-training who *really* hated being assigned to me. Lots of loud sighing, bless them).

I think it might be a combination of things - anybody going through what you've gone through would probably be having a tough time, coupled with your age, plus your differences in sexual orientation, combined with possible social problems stemming from Aspergers, it sounds perfectly normal to be going through what you're going through. Any one of those things could be enough reason to be trying to make that connection. If we don't all go through it, lots and lots of us have been where you are.

When I was in my teens and a little bit now, I was very closed down and guarded with information about my life and family. I decided that people knowing too much about you can be dangerous, so now I rarely divulge anything too personal to new acquaintances. But that was the result of further really bad social situations. I have a few friends who know everything, and I try to only confide in them.

Even then, I'll just blurt out other things - talking about peeing standing up makes perfect sense if you guys were talking about bathrooms:) - and I know it sounds corny as hell - but those who mind it really don't matter at all. There are very few things that anyone can say that are so weird you should stop talking to them full stop. If you pay attention to controlling how often you're talking about yourself vs. how often you're letting someone else talk about themselves, you should be fine.

Nowadays, I'm most like Emor and Nothing. I am severely reserved. I think of it as having many layers of filters, and by the time the things i say and do make it all the way through, there is not much left. Part of me wishes I wasn't so reserved, it makes it hard to get to know people. I really only show the extreme ends of my emotions ( really angry, really happy, really annoyed seem to be the main ones) and even then I show no where near as much emotion as the rest of my family. Its something my mom has commented on. All this being said, the dialogs i run though in my head are the opposite. I am a social king in my head.

When i was a kid I was more open, and oblivious....

Is it possible that you're depressed, and just looking for some temporary relief? I went through a stage like that when I was an adolescent. I was going through a very hard time, and was severely depressed. I'd go on, and on about my problems to the point that people started avoiding me. I guess that I can still be that way if I have a problem, and I don't have a definite concrete answer to it. It's like I cannot handle unanswered problems, and I'll obsess over it until I can find the answer.

I have a tendency to open up more than is socially acceptable to people online, especially in private (but on forums too).

If I am going to talk about very personal things with people I know in real life I am probably going to do it by instant message or e-mail - it is just much easier that way. It is even easier with people I don't know in real life - I seem to be able to tell them nearly anything.

In person, I am generally the opposite, not at all open and I tend to talk only about external things and not at all about my personal life. I can appear quite personable but definitely not personal, if that makes any sense. i.e. In some real-life social situations I may appear quite "friendly" but it is just a shell or an act I put on and has nothing to do with the real me.

Well, my problem is that I tell people with whom I have just become friends a lot about my life.

I tend to be very choosy about whom I befriend, basically sticking to nerds and people I think are weird, but when I meet those people I tend to open up and spill all to them.

I really don't share anything with "normal" people or strangers (i.e. not family or friends)

I'm the opposite, I'm very secretive. I had to learn to be this way because my feelings and thoughts always piss people off, so I keep them to myself. I don't think being secretive is a bad thing, although my mum acts like it is.

I'm the opposite and that's definitely part of my autism. I can hardly share things I consider fundamental or things I assume will be interpreted falsely because sharing them with other people who think, interpret and imagine ultimately means reality as I perceived it will be altered.

For those of us that are overly private, I wonder if this is due to sharing something with someone in the past and receiving a negative response - Like being laughed at, ignored or thought of as weird? Or is it maybe something to do with being wrapped-up in our own world?

Anyway, in the whole scheme of things, it's interesting how alot of our behaviors are polar opposite even though they might be AS related.

I know I'm usually pretty guarded because of past experiences. I love my mother very much, and she's an amazing person, but I have to be careful about what I say, or she'll start playing shrink. "And how do you feel about that?" and "Hmmm, I wonder why it's so hard for you to talk about feelings? Hmmm...interesting." Sheesh! I can't stand being analyzed. ("Hmmm, I wonder why being analyzed bothers you so much? Why do you think that is?")

Me too. I talk very little and I very rarely talk about something personal. I tend to keep that completely to myself or only confide in one person who I trust.

Same with me aswell.