Do I look different than I think I do?

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Hi. First post here.

My therapist and I were discussing my presentation. All along I thought people couldn't tell I was different than others-- that my presentation, though requiring some effort, was generally normal. She said, however, that my Autism shows. I'm a bit unsettled about it because I thought I appeared to be pretty normal. Is it common for Autistic people to appear normal to themselves but not to other people? It's unsettling because I thought I was able to gauge my appearance but this could mean I'm blind in a way to my appearance. Do you know about this?

yes that 100% sounds like autism to me

I'd say this was me to a T. However, now that people have pointed it out to me, I'm self-conscious of it.

Oh, I thought this was going to be about physical features. Apparently there's some phenomenon where, because we only see ourselves in mirrors (and hence a mirror-image of ourselves...well, obviously), when we see what we actually look like non-mirror-imaged...for example, in pictures...we look different from how we perceive ourselves. I have also read that the overwhelming majority of people perceive themselves as physically more attractive than they are, but I can't remember why that is. I think it is something to the effect of: we "see" ourselves including how we feel inside, which is rich and well-rounded and is probably quite lovely in its way, but those qualities are not actually physically visible to others, when empirically assessing "beauty."

Also, we may look very different in still photos not only because of the non-mirror-image effect but because when we're going about our daily lives, we are generally in constant motion - even if we're sitting very still, our eyes are blinking, jaws clenching and unclenching, and so on, whereas a picture captures an artificially stilled presence. For some people that means they may be photogenically much more "beautiful" than standing face-to-face, and in some other people it means the opposite, hence people who look quite nice but seem to always look awful in pictures.

Anyway, no, I don't look - from facial movements, posture, and so on - the way I think I do, or feel like I do. When I've seen myself in videos, I've been shocked. I hardly move my mouth at all when I speak and when I laugh I don't really lift the corners of my mouth. It is very odd.

My posture is also different than I think it looks, and the way I hold my hands.

At this point in my life I figure, tough. I'm not entering any beauty pageants and am not warming up for a celebrity photo shoot some time soon so I'm good. People are going to see me as a bit odd no matter what. I don't flaunt that - at all - but neither do I let it get me down.

Is that so? Because as far as I can tell, people generally seem to perceive themselves as worse-looking than they actually are. I know many attractive people who consider themselves ugly. More that do than don't. And I can only hope that I'm not worse looking than I perceive myself to be.

You have some good points so perhaps I got that wrong. I will try to look it up. I don't want to make people think they must not be attractive. I am so very sorry. I should think before I speak or write.

This is 1000% spot-on for me.
It really got me super down when I was younger (and didn't understand what was going on) that I tried REALLY hard to construct this shell of normality and tried to crush, stuff, and hide away anything I could think of that would make me "weird" and "stand out". I cringed when I heard comments like "You just march to the beat of a different drummer" and things like that- I thought I would go crazy with the self-monitoring, BUT stopped when I realized that no matter how much I tried it was going to go away, I wasn't growing out of whatever the heck it was (spoiler: the autism!) so I just act naturally now.
((More spoilers: I still have basically no idea what it is that everyone else is seeing... ))

"Your autism is showing!" I find that to be a very droll statement.

This is one of the most scariest thoughts I get. Fitting in matters to me. I know I don't look Autistic, because of the way I dress and hold myself masks my AS and makes me blend in. But sometimes I have good days and bad days. Sometimes I go out feeling accepted, like nobody is staring at me,which is what I want. And then other days I can go out, and can feel people burning a hole in my face. There is no pattern either, so I could dress presentably enough and have my hair washed and styled nicely on one day, then another day I could be dressed presentably enough and have my hair washed and styled nicely but feel like I'm being judged by everybody. Maybe it's all in my head.

I am not very photogenic, so I always look weird in photos. But if somebody takes a photo when I am not posing, I seem to look much better. I look more natural.
But when I take a selfie, oh I look awful! My face looks long, my chin looks big, and if I smile my teeth suddenly dominate my whole face.

This is me!
I look pretty good in mirror and in video but it's really hard for me to find a photo where I don't look awful. I am not photogenic at all. I seem to have some weird face on pictures although I don't make such expressions in real life and I didn't do anything weird when the photo was taken either. It must have something to do with the frozen time.

It's my belief that it does. Think, for example, about someone taking a picture of a person in the beginning stage of an open-mouthed laugh. Frozen at a certain specific point, it might not look like a laugh at all; it might look like a sneeze, or a scream. It also might look extremely unflattering (as opposed to our view of a laugh in progress which is more like "watching a movie" than "viewing a picture" - we see the whole) - with the jaw dropped way down, the eyes starting to blink and therefore looking half-closed and stoned, etc., etc.

I used to think I looked average or "normal" but eventually I put 2 and 2 together:

I'm about 5'9"...wt. around 160#....but hat size is on
the large size of large. But if I try to use a pair of adult
binoculars I can just barely close the spacing between
eyes so I can see without getting dizzy. Yet looking in
a mirror I still don't see myself this way.

I also noticed, in recordings, I don't sound anything like I think I do.

I have to be honest here, you look quite handsome to me. I'm not trying to be weird or coming-on, I am happily married, I am just letting you know. I'm not blowing wind up your skirt, rather, am being honest. You are way too hard on yourself.

I didn't mention this previously as, viewing this thread on my Kindle, I couldn't see your avatar. On my Kindle, the avatars are hidden by the boxed quote.

I am NT and I study autism. I have autistic family members, am married to an autistic man, and I have autistic friends and mentors.

When you're familiar with people on the spectrum, it's easy to spot. I would not say it's apparent to most people. You shouldn't worry too much about it. At worst you might look preoccupied, or nervous.

Phew, thanks.

I don't, either. It's invisible to me.

Looking odd at certain times has always been a problem, as seen below where a woman was starting to sneeze:

I guess she wasn't flattered when she saw the photo...