Page 1 of 3 [ 34 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2, 3  Next

ghotistix
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,186
Location: Massachusetts

28 Feb 2005, 11:41 pm

Bec wrote:
For the most part, I act like myself. Occasionally it is necessary to act NT. It is sometimes better to 'be NT' in social situations. When I am talking to a person I don't know well, I think I concentrate on as much nonverbal communication as I can. The idea of not thinking about my difficulties when I am having a conversation with someone new actually makes me more nervous. The truth is to properly execute unfamiliar social situations, we have to act like we are NT.

The downside to acting NT, is stress. If I put on the facade to long, I feel like I am going to go into meltdown. That is why when I am around my family, friends, and other people I feel comfortable with (generally people who know I have AS), I am myself. Of course, even with them I can't entirely be myself. Before my diagnosis, I was thought to be cold, unfriendly, and uncaring. Around them, I am still an Aspie. I try to be more aware of what I do socially.

I started rambling. I hope that made sense. Sorry.

It makes perfect sense, in fact it's the way I am to a T. I have to say I never thought so much of my own behaviors were part of AS and not just weird tendencies in my personality. It's great to find that out.



Bec
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Aug 2004
Age: 36
Gender: Female
Posts: 1,918

28 Feb 2005, 11:43 pm

axelkat wrote:
Why don't NTs wanna be like us? Because it would be interesting if we were the majority. I can asure you, this world would be much more efficient.
A


Why don't we wanna be like NTs? :wink:



1PeaceMaker
Raven
Raven

User avatar

Joined: 26 Feb 2005
Gender: Female
Posts: 108

01 Mar 2005, 12:05 am

axelkat wrote:
Why don't NTs wanna be like us? Because it would be interesting if we were the majority. I can asure you, this world would be much more efficient.
A

Here's a thought:

we can and do influence NTs. Just by standing up (so to speak) and saying, "Hey, I don't do it that way" ..we give them a chance to join us in doing something different.

I think some of them envy some of our characteristics, and perhaps some even try to emulate us a little now and then. Why not?

Bec wrote:
Why don't we wanna be like NTs? :wink:


Well, Bec, some of us do want to be like them. I used to want to.. and I have heard others on this board say they would like to be like them.

PeaceMaker



Bec
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Aug 2004
Age: 36
Gender: Female
Posts: 1,918

01 Mar 2005, 12:48 am

1PeaceMaker wrote:
Well, Bec, some of us do want to be like them. I used to want to.. and I have heard others on this board say they would like to be like them.


I know that. I was just trying to say that people can't be what they're not.

axelkat wrote:
Why don't NTs wanna be like us? Because it would be interesting if we were the majority. I can asure you, this world would be much more efficient.


I asked my mother (she is NT) when she came home. I will qoute exactly what she said to me:

'Well, I think that NTs think that it would be lonely. It would be sad. Bec, you can go so long without seeing other people and you don't care. We (NTs) wouldn't want to lose that connection with other people. When you keep talking about facts, sometimes it's like, just shut up already. I don't care. Can't you just talk about something fun? I agree, the world would be more efficient, but rather cold. Emotionally disconnected. Bec, you don't need to have a social connection with another person to feel whole, I do.'

So there you have it. NTs can't feel whole without emotional connections.

ilikedragons wrote:
I don't get most of stuff NTs do, but what I've wondered most about is this: Why do the other girls my age walk around in packs? They don't even go to the bathroom alone.


I have AS and I walk around in packs sometimes. They go to the bathroom in groups to talk. But that is less of a NT thing, and more of a teenage girl thing.

ghotistix wrote:
I don't know why they act like their future doesn't matter.


Once again, a teenager thing! I've met people with some very autistic tendencies who couldn't have cared less about their futures, too.

ghotistix wrote:
I don't know how they can keep a straight face when they say 'I love you' to their fourth, fifth, and sixth girl- or boyfriend this year.


This is also a teenager thing! Teenagers (me included) can have a difficult time telling the difference between love and lust. They think they love someone, but they don't. Instead of saying 'I love you' it would be more accurate for them to say 'I lust after you'! :lol:



axelkat
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 24 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 760
Location: the desert

01 Mar 2005, 1:33 pm

Bec wrote:

I asked my mother (she is NT) when she came home. I will qoute exactly what she said to me:

'Well, I think that NTs think that it would be lonely. It would be sad. Bec, you can go so long without seeing other people and you don't care. We (NTs) wouldn't want to lose that connection with other people. When you keep talking about facts, sometimes it's like, just shut up already. I don't care. Can't you just talk about something fun? I agree, the world would be more efficient, but rather cold. Emotionally disconnected. Bec, you don't need to have a social connection with another person to feel whole, I do.'

So there you have it. NTs can't feel whole without emotional connections.




That makes us sound a bit inferior. Is the implicication here that we cannot express ourselves emotionally? Iam offended.
A


_________________
Uncle Joe loves labor


ghotistix
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,186
Location: Massachusetts

01 Mar 2005, 10:47 pm

Since when does expressing emotions come easily to us?



axelkat
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 24 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 760
Location: the desert

01 Mar 2005, 10:52 pm

ghotistix wrote:
Since when does expressing emotions come easily to us?


It doesn't but we still have emotions
A


_________________
Uncle Joe loves labor


Bec
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Aug 2004
Age: 36
Gender: Female
Posts: 1,918

01 Mar 2005, 10:59 pm

ghotistix wrote:
Since when does expressing emotions come easily to us?


Exactly what my mum was saying.

axelkat wrote:
That makes us sound a bit inferior. Is the implicication here that we cannot express ourselves emotionally? Iam offended.


Inferior? Did you not read the part where she agreed the world would be more efficient if everyone had AS? Generally people with AS do emotionally express themselves poorly. If this does not apply to you, axelkat, don't be offended. She was referring to me in our conversation. I am not a very emotional person. I was just trying to help give an explanation of why NTs don't want to be like us. She thinks we are much more brilliant than any NT she knows (except we're a little weirder :wink: ).

axelkat wrote:
It doesn't but we still have emotions


I'm sorry, but I think you migh have misunderstood my entire post. It never says we don't have emotions or that ours are less genuine than a NT's. Emotional disconnection is not the same as not having emotions.



Last edited by Bec on 01 Mar 2005, 11:09 pm, edited 2 times in total.

axelkat
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 24 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 760
Location: the desert

01 Mar 2005, 11:07 pm

im sorry i used the word inferior, it just seemed as though she was expressing the AS person as almost like a robot. very efficient but socially and emotionally on a lower level(so cold) almost. Perhaps thats it all gets evened out. inferior was the wrong choice for the thought.
A


_________________
Uncle Joe loves labor


axelkat
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 24 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 760
Location: the desert

02 Mar 2005, 10:07 am

your mother is right the more i think about it. i did not read thoughroly(spelling?) and jumped to a conclusion. I formally withdraw my statement.
A


_________________
Uncle Joe loves labor


ghotistix
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,186
Location: Massachusetts

02 Mar 2005, 10:44 am

Bec wrote:
'Well, I think that NTs think that it would be lonely. It would be sad. Bec, you can go so long without seeing other people and you don't care. We (NTs) wouldn't want to lose that connection with other people. When you keep talking about facts, sometimes it's like, just shut up already. I don't care. Can't you just talk about something fun? I agree, the world would be more efficient, but rather cold. Emotionally disconnected. Bec, you don't need to have a social connection with another person to feel whole, I do.'

So there you have it. NTs can't feel whole without emotional connections.

But can we? I think we all need emotional connections on some level to stay sane. I don't like being around 99% of people and I'd rather stay in my room alone, but at the same time, I feel like something is missing. I think for me, the problem is less the hate of all socialization and more the feeling that I'm an alien faking as a human. There are a select few people who I've really been able to click with as I wrote earlier in this post, and it made me realize I really do like clicking, so to speak.

PS, I realize teenagers act like fools sometimes. Just having fun and not caring about your future at 15 is fine by me, but the people I was talking about were in their twenties. They regularly skip classes to get drunk.



Jetson
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,220
Location: Vancouver, Canada

02 Mar 2005, 12:41 pm

merien_took wrote:
Though sometimes when things are going well I have wondered maybe I'm just a hypochondriac and I just tell myself I have Asperger's when I'm depressed

You took the words right out of my mouth. I've managed to hide all my problems for so long that everyone just assumes I'm an eccentric NT. For decades I've proudly told my mother of my accomplishments while holding back the psychotic break, suicide attempts, drug abuse and outrageous behaviour that dogged my teen and 20-something years when she wasn't paying attention. Sometimes I tell myself I must be a hypochondriac, but then I'd have no way to explain 99% of what's happened to me over the years.

Yesterday I asked my mother to write up a detailed childhood medical/developmental history for me. (Even if I never go for an official Dx it's something that everyone should have in case they need to give their family doctor the back-story for a new development after their parents are gone.) I didn't even tell her about my suspected AS Dx but mentioned that my dys/gra/phia (split so she doesn't find this post on Google) has gotten much MUCH worse in the last few years. Of course she's in total denial because discovering I've had a hidden PDD for almost 40 years might say something about her parenting. When someone else tells me there's nothing wrong with me it only makes the hypochondriac feelings resurface and I have to beat them down again.
merien_took wrote:
Even on these boards where, granted I <i> am </i> talking (which is more than I've done on other boards) but I still have this nasty feeling I'm talking <i> at </i> people instead of <i> to </i> them. :?

I've always done that, and I doubt it will ever stop. It's one of my most enduring Aspie traits. It drives my bf nuts when he asks me a simple question and I feel compelled to teach him everything I know about the subject. In written forums like this one, I can usually tell when I'm turning into "the little professor" because parenthesis start popping up all over the place and even nesting. I just digress and digress until there's no sentence structure left. Maybe I should just post in XML. :)



Kenorri
Hummingbird
Hummingbird

User avatar

Joined: 6 Jul 2004
Gender: Male
Posts: 22
Location: Maryland,USA

02 Mar 2005, 2:16 pm

Have you noticed? They always hammer the nail down that's sticking up. You get noticed because you are a bent nail in a world of straight nails. Find a box full of bent nails and nestle in. We are all around you. It's OK to be a straight nail when the situation insists. You who are bent can pretend to be straight but the straight ones can never aspire to being bent. What a wonderful world. For what its worth, Kenorri



merien_took
Blue Jay
Blue Jay

User avatar

Joined: 25 Feb 2005
Gender: Female
Posts: 79
Location: Georgia, USA

02 Mar 2005, 2:47 pm

Jetson,

Thanks for your post. That was actually one of my posts that I felt bad about since I thought it was too off-topic and self-centered. And thanks everyone else for making WrongPlanet and being here to talk to. This is finally a place a feel I can belong. :)



axelkat
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 24 Feb 2005
Gender: Male
Posts: 760
Location: the desert

02 Mar 2005, 5:26 pm

Kenorri wrote:
Have you noticed? They always hammer the nail down that's sticking up. You get noticed because you are a bent nail in a world of straight nails. Find a box full of bent nails and nestle in. We are all around you. It's OK to be a straight nail when the situation insists. You who are bent can pretend to be straight but the straight ones can never aspire to being bent. What a wonderful world. For what its worth, Kenorri


very interesting and good analogy
A


_________________
Uncle Joe loves labor


TAFKASH
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 10 Jan 2005
Age: 55
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,100
Location: UK

02 Mar 2005, 6:39 pm

Kenorri wrote:
Have you noticed? They always hammer the nail down that's sticking up. You get noticed because you are a bent nail in a world of straight nails. Find a box full of bent nails and nestle in. We are all around you. It's OK to be a straight nail when the situation insists. You who are bent can pretend to be straight but the straight ones can never aspire to being bent. What a wonderful world. For what its worth, Kenorri


Errrrmmmm.... I'm assuming the term "bent" has slightly different connotations in the States to what it does in the UK then? You might want to re-phrase that analogy for a UK audience..... 8O


_________________
"Heeeeeeeeeeeeere's Johnny!"