People seem to cough around me..

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Sorry I do not have Aspergers or Austism, but in searching for people suffering from the same thing Im suffering from I came upon this forum. I definitely relate to this post and to some other responses I read on here (including Doug). This is not paranoia and not people reacting to show you that they don't like you or think you're weird. I constantly have people rubbing their nose and sniffing when they are near me. There's actually a whole community of people who suffer from something similar and a lot of people don't know the cause. My first instinct (and still what I think it probably is) is odor related. I know Doug mentioned that he doesn't even want to make the link to odor but I'm not sure why. People who smell usually cannot smell themselves. I've had people who ive asked tell me that I dont smell (but TBH i think most people would lie to someone if asked that.. people in the community can attest to the fact that people lie to them to avoid hurting their feelings, including parents.. Not to say that you smell, just a FYI). Anyway if you look up TMAU and PATM you will find a lot of people who suffer from this (TMAU being odor related and PATM may not be odor related.. not totally sure). I even came upon a couple of videos showing peoples reactions to someone with a similar condition which I posted below. I think its probably similar to what you're experiencing (please let me know if it is). Also, if you don't think it is odor related, why do you think that? Please let me know and hopefully we can figure out what it is we are suffering from!

Being that Im a new user I cant post links but the reaction videos are on youtube. There are 2 videos, both named "TMAU PATM Body Odor" by user "smllultr"

HI somethinstinks, I wrote a long answer and it dissappeared, so I will rewrite it in short, sorry.
I am sure body odour can be the cause for others. For me, I am 99% sure it isn't. Reasons:

- sitting back to back with someone on the train: no reaction. Sitting in front of someone or being visable via mirrors etc - coughing reactions. So the person has to see me.
- I am sitting in a seminar inbetween two guys: one is very short-sighted with glasses, doesn't see me in the corner of his eye - he doesn'T have reactions. The other one coughs a lot throughout the day.
- I get reactions through glass!
- another example: I sit in a room with some people, somehow relaxed. someone enters at the opposite side of the room (far away), short eye contact - he coughs. If the smell was so bad, the people around me would be couhging and sniffing, too.
- when I'm drunk and less tense, the coughing becomes less
- last, but not least: my girlfriend is really honest with me: sometimes, after a long day+sports+bad food she tells me: you stink. normally she's perfectly fine with my body odour.

Again, I think there can be different reasons. I know my explanations might sound strange but I absolutely believe that I can make people uncomfortable, just by being extremely uncomfortable myself. AFter all, we're in a terrible situation and will have to find a cure or at least a way to deal with our lifes. All the best.

Hey Doug, I hope you're right. Are people awkward around you, avoid you, avoid eye contact with you etc? Just curious cause I get that a lot. I've always kinda assumed it was bad breath but i cant really smell it myself. Mostly i get nose rubs and sniffing (along with the awkwardness and all). Interestingly enough I met up with someone through another site who sounds very similar to you... saying people cough around him all the time thru glass, etc and was 99% sure he didnt have odor as well since he asked a bunch of people (The only reason I dont think you're him is cause I dont think he has a girlfriend lol). Me, personally, I find it hard to believe that you could immediately make all these people so uncomfortable within a second of being in their vicinity for them all to cough of all things. Has anyone ever made u uncomfortable for no reason causing u to cough? As far as your girlfriend goes, those in the odor community claim that people who are around them often for some reason are "immune". It isnt uncommon for them to say that their family doesnt know they even have a problem. Don't know if I believe that but its worth noting. Best of luck. You wouldnt happen to be from New York would you?

Hi somethin,
yes, people often avoid eye contact with me. Well, if I remember correctly the eye contact problem was very intense in the past, but I got used to it and it's not a problem any longer.

No, I'm not from NY, I live in Germany.

"Me, personally, I find it hard to believe that you could immediately make all these people so uncomfortable within a second of being in their vicinity for them all to cough of all things. Has anyone ever made u uncomfortable for no reason causing u to cough?"

You are absolutely right, it IS hard to believe. The only reason I believe in it for now is that there is no better explanation at the moment. Your question is very interesting! I can't remember coughing at someone being somehow uncomfortable myself. But I read an interesting thread in some other help forum where people wrote about their problem, that they cough when someone looks at them! Isn't that strange? There seems to be something about our social behaviour and coughing and I can't figure it out.

I hope you get my answer. It's hard to stay connected to the few people having that problem.

The girl who sits next to me at work has coughed everyday ALL day for the past 5 weeks. It's ridiculous. I've thought about calling her out on it, or dumping a bag of cough drops on her desk lol. But I'm really trying to let this coughing thing go. Besides, she'd just act like I was crazy. Even though it's obvious to me no one should have a cough or cold or whatever for over a month. A few months back when I was training for the job, it was the guy next to me who would cough all day everyday. It's hard to work when someone is coughing as soon as I make a movement. :/

I do tend to smell from time to time because I have issues with body odor, but I don't think that's why they cough. If anything, I would bet most of the people in this thread have social anxiety issues, not issues with odor. My theory is still that something about our body language or demeanor is abnormal and making people uncomfortable. Well I've decided that's their problem. I'm not harming them by being an awkward weirdo. At least if I was smelly I'd feel slightly bad.

Again, I am fairly certain that people do it out of discomfort/"awkwardness" although it could be a form of hostility. I was reading a book, The Husbands Secret, and the author would make the characters cough whenever they felt awkward lol. I don't believe in awkwardness myself, but I do know people think there's such things as awkward silences and whatnot. Now THEY are the ones imagining things lol. Anyway I've decided to make a strong effort to not think about this coughing thing anymore. Obviously I just wrote a lengthy post on the matter but I just wanted to get off my chest that the coughing girl is ridiculous and I'm not going to let her coughing bother me anymore.

ha, ResilientBrilliance, I'm in such a similar situation. The guy next to me at work coughs every five minutes all day, all week. It's almost funny. I was a lot at home in the last years due to anxiety, so I thought I couldn't stand the constant coughing at a working place. Not that I'm there it's like... it doesn't get better but I can't be upset all the time. Sometimes I don't even realize he's coughing for some time. It's almost okay since I have some nice people there, too. And some people seem to be immune or at least more immune to whatever is causing them to cough. By the way when I talk to the "ill" guy, he's nice and acts completely normal towards me.
I agree, I guess most people here have quite similar social anxiety issues. I know it sound quite strange but it would be funny to meet some of you guys in real life and just go out to "dangerous" places.

It happens to me too. Mostly Spanish people. Im pretty sure its a way of saying and or bullying you. Coughing im pretty sure means your sick. Or they know something about you. Do you live in a small town? But you should just look at them in the I mean really LOOK THEM DOWN! And cough back at those bastards. Even on a bus Cough even louder than them! They are pretty much bullying you. Or just look them right in the eyez and ask them "Are you ok??
Its pretty much a cowards way out of saying something to you without really saying anything, like a inside joke. But these people are pretty much cowards and don't say it to you face!

There is no doubt in my mind that certain people (NT's) purposely and intentionally cough around other people for the sole purpose of causing distraction. I'm hypersensitive to people coughing, and it interferes with my daily life. I'm a really nice guy, good-looking, and I get along well with virtually everyone. II've become so upset by this that I've actually confronted strangers who violently and consistently cough in my presence, and I've always been met with hostility. One woman told me to "F" off.

I don't want to believe it, but I do think these people are malicious and are trying to convey a sign of aggression or hostility. 95% of them don't cover their mouth, and their cough isn't indicative at all of an illness, it's their horrible way of communicating some unconscious issue they have with others.

I think it's best to not focus on whether you are presenting yourself in an uncomfortable manner, because by doing so you are only justifying that there is something wrong with you. Don't question their reason for being rude, doing so will only upset you more. I really feel for anyone suffering from this, it really is difficult. I'm glad this post exists, because it is a huge problem.

Do you smoke?

This thread may be the most detailed one around for people with similar problems to share their experiences and seek possible solutions. Hence I hope to contribute my two cents with this newly registered account.

A bit of personal history before addressing the topic of this thread; this paragraph may be safely ignored unless you are really curious. I entered school earlier than most, and have suffered from numerous conditions possibly because of that. The first episode occurred in middle school, when for half a year I felt lonely and depressed and wanted to cry when left alone. Social problems have been around since I was very young, but got considerably worse in college, after several months studying in a foreign country. That summer I worked on a research project in a shared office with a young lady, and sometimes found her sighing for no good reason. Since then communication with others has become more unnatural, and further worsened in graduate school by doing research alone in my office while hardly talking to anyone. More recently, the situation improved somewhat when I had to work in a shared office and teach undergrads during the semesters. However, the problem persists that my office mates often sighs more or less frequently depending on the "positivity" of my state of mind.

In the past year or so, the frequent sighing in my presence has turned into coughing that many of you have also experienced. As noted by some of you, this is an unconscious physiological reaction of neurotypicals towards us. Most of the time they do not hold any negative opinions of us, provided that we do not overreact to their coughs. However, the fact that our presence causes their coughs does create an uncomfortable environment around us, though perhaps not so much for them since they may not know the source or care much in the first place.

This is an ongoing problem that I am still battling with, but here are some thoughts on the underlying physiological mechanism and possible solutions.

Though some of you have attributed this problem to sight or smell, I believe that the true mechanism is a particular type of electromagnetic wave that our "negative" thoughts cause our bodies to emit. In numerous situations, I have found that others cough in my presence even when they do not see me, do not hear me, do not smell me, and of course do not touch me. Currently I live on the fourth floor, and often hear people cough in the courtyard at the very moment that my mind is disturbed. This type of communication does not happen at all through the normal senses, and thus has to rely on some kind of electromagnetic waves emitted by our vastly complex neural system.

The direct solution to this problem, though difficult, is to adjust our neural system to resemble neurotypicals, namely to eradicate negative thoughts etc. This is of course easier said than done, but whenever I gathered the strength to return to the "normal" state of mind, the coughing problem is gone and communication with others gets much smoother. In those situations when I could not reach this state due to fatigue etc, I usually remind myself that this problem does not cause others nearly as much pain as it causes us, and thus try my best to still maintain a peaceful mind. Recently I have relied extensively on noise cancelling earphones to block out the unpleasant sounds others make around me, especially when I need to sleep or read during my travels.

Looking ahead, it should be invaluable for researchers to measure and classify the electromagnetic waves emitted by our neural system, so that the particular "unpleasant" wave pattern causing people to cough may be identified. There should also exist "pleasant" wave patterns that may be harnessed for the happiness of mankind. Though it may be difficult to change how the neural system generates or processes these wave patterns, their measurement may not be too hard.

This problem is so relevant to our daily lives, but unfortunately the research community has not realized its importance. As a researcher myself, I hope to keep searching for an answer to this problem, but my expertise is not in this field. Nonetheless, I believe that as a community, we will be able to raise public awareness of this problem, possibly as a piece of a much larger puzzle, and contribute towards eventually finding a scientific solution.

This post is a breath of fresh air. It's so nice to speak the truth about this without all the allusions to and insinuations of " oh that's preposterous, it's a cough- you're being paranoid"

Bullcrap. The simple fact that it IS obvious that it's a fake ass "cough" makes those retorts false and offensive.

This isn't paranoia. And it is very obvious it has something to do with those of us who recognize the big lie.

I am not sure WHAT these noisemakers are doing (or why) but it very obviously is on purpose. Conspiracy?

If it's not THAT then the possibility that these "fake coughers or throat clearers" are audibly answering the voices in their skulls.

The thing is, this "cough" is always done without the covering of ones mouth. Reason being the fake cough cannot be heard when one covers their cough as the CDC mandates.

So if these rotten individuals are using the fact that "civilized" people don't criticize people with medical issues (as a cover for this rotten behaviour of fake coughing) then I say this;

"Common decency and hygeine dictate that you cover your nasty piehole when you aerosolize your breath and saliva." And, THAT is a fact, whether the coughs are phony passive/aggressive tics or whatever.

I suppose if you were to confront one of these fake coughers and publicly and loudly (but VERY politely) state that you weren't "trying to be insensitive to their 'plight', but you didn't want to inadvertently infect someone innocent as a result of their (the cougher's) inability/failure to keep their germs to themselves"-
well, there's not much they could say.
Truthfully, the day may come where this is a prosecutable offence. As disease control was the basis of the old "don't spit on the sidewalk" blue law, the same may still happen in the near future- for the same reason.

And finally to those perpertrating the fake coughs/exagerrated throat clears:
Be careful of what you do, it may be done to you- and worse so.

But remember most people don't give a crap what is obvious—they believe, or publicly profess to, what their social instincts tell them it's in their best interest to, evidence and logic be damned. Therefore, bullies can count on that kind of reäction.



They're listening to their good ol' instinct telling them, "weak individual spotted—make sure to throw 'em out of your tribe and to pwn 'em for the sake of your own status".



They're hoping you won't dare to break that social rule and using the fact that the audience will essentially unanimously side against you, judging you to be the crazy one, if you do.



Noöne would even listen to that whole sentence. They'd interrupt you before you managed to utter the third word and give you some quick reply or other that would make you look like a complete idiot. They know what they're doing.



Of course there is. First off, they wouldn't allow you the luxury of actually making your point, as stated. Second, they always have the fully general reply you yourself quoted:



Third, remember they can reply with their fists, or by spitting into your face.

It's tempting for us autistics to believe reason should always win in the end, but the neurotypical mind has plenty of resources, perfected through millions of years of evolution by natural selection, to make sure this isn't the case.

A very interesting read and a subject I can relate too.

Coughing is definately used as a code. It is usually used as a social cue and sometimes with body language to indicate the reason. I cant remember it ever being used to be unfriendly, it's usually used to indicate a social faux par or as a friendly warning.

e.g. Two people A & B are in a room and are talking about person C's personal life who is not present. Person C then enters the room but is only seen by person A , if person B does not see person C and carries on talking about person C it may be seen as rude , bitching , nasty etc. So person A can alert person B to persons C presence with a slight cough and prehaps a quick glance of the eyes in person C's direction.

e.g. People A , B & C are talking. Person C has just lost broken up with their girlfriend and is very unhappy & upset. Person A knows how upset person C is but person B does not. Person B then starts talking about how wonderful his girlfriend is which may be seen as being insestive towards C's feelings. Person A can alert person B to change the subject with a slight cough and prehaps a quick glance of the eyes in person C's direction.

So now you know people can cough as a secret code.

A lot of what I've read so far doesn't seem to fit this category but sounds a lot like some sort of "Ideas Of Reference".

I had a few breakdowns in the past and they have put me in a very depressed & anxious state which also makes me hypervigilant and overthink things.
It is at these points in my life where coughing has caused me serious distress , every cough I heard made me instantly think it was a code but my rational mind told me it wasn't.
If you get enough coincidences in a short space of time it takes longer for you rational mind to calm you down.

Sometimes people cough when they're nervous.

I hope by sharing this it helps someone realize that most of the time a cough is just a cough and doesn't relate to you.

I have been experiencing this same exact thing for quite some time as well. For me, the different annoying sounds people make correspond to different sensations I have. When i have a stomach ache, people make loud grunting noises. When my throat is dry, people talk in an annoying raspy voice and cough. When i am just generally nervous, poeple sniff/breathe in loudly. also when the muscles around my nose tense up, everyone i see around me has flared nostrils. When i think about not wanting to make eye contact with someone, they open their eyes wide and stare at me strangely.
In the past, the sounds people made was an immense source of terror, stress, and anxiety for me, but it's gotten better now that i'm on antidepressants. I even had a breakdown in front of my parents once because we were at a party and everyone in the room was coughing constantly for like 20 minutes. i ran into another room and cried, and when they found me they literally pretended that my tears were nonexistent even though they saw them. the party guests did the same. I don't think this is normal.

Its gotten to the point that i can control which type of behavior people around me perform. It's not their choice which thing they do either, I can tell that I'm controlling it because I have those sensations intensify at times, and when they do, so does the severity of the action. like for example, when i have a mild stomach ache, people just generally seem cautious around me, but when I focus on it, the feeling intensifies, and people start clearing their throats and grunting. This has come to a point where I can't shake the feeling that I want to murder every last person in the the room I occupy due to their obnoxious behavior.

in the past the source of my depression was the beleif that everyone who ever met me wanted me to die. This was caused by the coughing and throat clearing. I beleived that if I killed myself, everyone would be glad. I even wrote a suicide note explaining how I wanted both my parents to die a slow painful death, for mistreating me so much.

I get this too. A lot of people clear their throats and make smacking noises when I'm around.

Hey, this happens to me too. Please contact me at 646-637-8323 or [email protected], would love to connect for support regarding this issue.
-Josh