Autism and maturity?

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I've seen a couple of threads at least on autism and immaturity... Does anyone else feel 'older' than others, and that it isolates you from people? A lot of my childhood memories don't even seem to fit a child, I might even dare say I was more developed intellectually from a tender age, just didn't have the tools to acquire knowledge. But my environment doesn't nurture kids anyway, so I always brought myself to the adults' level, later I compensated for some of that, but I still look a lot at other people/NT issues and think 'LOL really?' because I feel like I'm over what they're starting to experience.

Yes and no. When it comes to a lot of stuff, I tend to relate better to those who are about 10 years older than me. On the other hand, I've been known to have the occasional meltdown where I behave like a six year old all over again.

Oh, and I have a soft spot for building toys.

Can you explain 'building toys'? Is that like Lego or planes, or making things from scratch?

Adults have always told me I'm mature for my age. My teachers too. I've always felt more mature than my peers and I'm guessing a lot of that has to do with my interests, how I value the intellect and how I analyse life. But in other areas in life I feel really immature. For example, I can act like a child if I lose something I'm very attached to or things I fidget with. Also, I avoid conflicts like a child. I refuse to talk, I walk away and I can't be reasoned with. In those situations I often get to hear things like "Oh, that's very mature of you" but that's sarcasm.

Yes, true, Aspies tend to have different priorities/interests to others - it might be seen as immature when I get protective about my own property, the way others do only if they've lost something valuable in financial terms. I tend to value things that are usable to me more than I do for expensive things.

I'd say it depends on the aspect you're looking at.
There are people who've told me that I act very mature and many times people much older and much younger than me said that I was wise beyond my years. Then again there are situations where I will act child-like or childishly.
I don't think about feeling older or younger than others, I just do what I do and if that makes me seem old- or young-spirited then that's the way it is.

Say...when I was in my teenage years, most of my peers would get drunk all the time and do weird stuff that often led to bad things happening to them. I wouldn't do that because I don't see any purpose in there. Hence, people would assume I'm more mature and responsible than my peers and I would like to be around older people since they wouldn't necessarily do such things. But I didn't feel older, it was just one aspect among many where I could weigh the scale and classify it as X or Y behaviour.

For feeling younger: I'm very curious so I ask a lot of things, even about the simplest things and sometimes I get distracted by other very simple things. E.g. some weeks ago I saw a plastic bag floating 10 meters in the air and I looked at it and was amazed. I even told my friend to look at it but she didn't understand why I would find such an amazement in such a simple thing as a bag floating in the wind (very high up in the sky). At this time, I probably appeared like a child. I sometimes get people who tell me they feel as if they are mothering me, too.

All in all, I'd say it's that I may appear like this or that depending on the situation.

You make very good points, Mayel.

Even though I am 56, I still am viewed by some as a quiet intellectual while others view me as a man-child.

Yes, I feel older than 22. I mostly hang about with people much older than me, and I fancy men much older than me, but the older the person, the more they enjoy talking to me and I seem to be on their wavelength more than young people of my age.

But there are some things that I can do better with people my age than older people (this is not due to immaturity, this is more to do with not wanting to do ''old-womany'' things). Like one of my friends, who is in her 50s, likes going into charity shops and looking at the clothes, and mostly in charity shops they sell clothes that aren't really for my age group, only some but I prefer to look in ordinary clothes shops. Charity shops make me feel bored. But when I'm with my friend who is the same age as me, she never goes into charity shops and so we have the same mind for fashion.

I can't seem to get along with NTs of my age. I can either get along with NTs who are older, or people my age who have a learning disability of any sort. So the friends I've got of my age aren't NTs, and the older friends I got are NTs.

^ I go for older men as well.

I do feel very old and mature for my age. I think it comes from the constant analysing and philosophizing about life that I do. I feel like its given me a level of wisdom that people would usually expect from an older person.

But like other posters have experienced, in a lot of ways I feel very child like.

When I was a child people told me I had an old soul and I had no idea what that meant because I didnt know what a soul was I think visually so I thought it should be some sort of organ in the body so I imagined it as a kidney looking thing....anyway, thats another story.

I have adult children and my daughter used to take toys away from me at the store or something else I was "playing" with and say "would you act like my Mother".....so I dont know, guess you can read under my avatar .
Unfortunately we have to deal with adult things and when I was a child I had to deal with some adult things that Im not going to go into. Maybe its why I sometimes act like a child now because it was something I missed in a lot of ways. Maybe I am trying to fill that hole.

Sorry Im a little silly today, its Friday and my kids have vacation for two weeks and they are my last two babies and I love having them with me, we have a lot of fun together. My son is Aspie so he sort of older than his age (he is 9) and younger in ways too. My daughter is classic autism with a huge IQ but she is still my baby at age 7 .

Also not going out to bars drinking alcohol makes me feel older, which is another reason why I can relate to older people better. Mostly when people get to their 40s or older, they realise that drinking yourself stupid isn't all that great, but I've realised that, well, all my life. I'd rather sit in a pub with older men or women having a nice meal or just having a few mild alcoholic drinks (but not getting drunk), than going to a noisy bar with rowdy youngsters with girls in mini-skirts and boys going stupid and getting pissed out of their head and throwing up the next morning.

I was always mature for my age as well. Even now, at 24, I've been told I'm "weirdly mature". Many of my friends are older than me; my best friends are in their 30's/40's. However, I think my social intelligence is stuck at the level of a 7 year old, as in, I'm extremely naive. This is a good thing and a bad thing; I can't lie, and I always assume the best of everyone, and I'm WAY too trusting. The combination of being weirdly mature and weirdly naive has unfortunately led to some awkward misunderstandings with older men. I hate that.