Emotional maturity

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Those who are following my threads note that I am separated from my wife. The big issue she quotes with me is my emotional maturity, or specifically lack of. Can anyone further clarify what this means because my wife is rather vague as to what she means by this other than sometimes you behave like a child, or you can be good n short bursts but prone to childishness.

I would argue that she is emotionally irrational, overly sensitive but if I made those comments whoa would that be w war 3.

I don't know if this helps:

http://djchuang.com/2008/what-is-emotional-maturity/

Aspies tend to have social and emotional learning disorder. For example, an Aspie might have an IQ of 140, but a Social and Emotional IQ of 70. This would mean that the Aspie has greater intellectual insight and ability than their age peers, but much less social and emotional insight and ability. We often have difficulty understanding our own or other people's emotions. We can have difficulty managing our own feelings (we easily get anxious, depressed, angry) and managing other people's feelings (i.e. we don't know what to do when they get anxious, depressed, angry, etc). Because of this, we often behave in ways that NTs regard as being more like a teenager than a full grown adult (apparent lack of self-control being one of them). We get frustrated, lose our tempers, appear to throw tantrums (actually they are meltdowns or shutdowns), and seem to be a lot more self-centred (because we are coping with more things than they are and have less mental space for thinking about other people - and less interest in other people).

I would find it hard to say much more than this, because I am one of those with a low Social and Emotional IQ. The above reflects more my intellectual understanding of the issue than any real intuitive insight, I think.

Judging by your threads it sounds as if, based upon the definition above, that your wife is emotionally immature. As far as how I am, it depends, but in many ways, my lack of emotionalism much of the time can make me more emotionally mature than like...everyone, sometimes. But then sometimes I get "meltdowns" over dumb things. It's a double edged sword.

I think in some ways, though, what she might mean is you might be alexithymic, or unable to know how you're feeling, other than like "good" or "bad." That's the way I am. That may be more what people mean by "emotionally immature."

Yes I may have AS and yes I don't think I show my emotions in the same way but I certainly do have them. I think more and more that my wife is in many ways the opposite of me - and is emotionally over sensitive. Thanks 1000knives, you've made me realise that not all our problems are my fault.

My opinion is that emotional maturity relies heavily on self-awareness. So it isn't a case of not experiencing strong emotion, or not reacting at all, but rather being aware of what's really going on in your head, what you need to do about it, and whether you should communicate that to others around you before you act. I can imagine some or all of that being extremely challenging for many AS folks.

For example, I (NT woman with history of mental health issues inc. social anxiety) can get overwhelmed when out in crowded places, especially if there's noise or bright light to contend with as well. My husband is very cuddly and hands-on, and is pretty much incapable of keeping still while holding my hand - he has to be stroking it or twiddling my fingers or something. When we first got together, holding hands with him while walking down a busy street could emotionally send me over the edge. I would get extremely irritable with him for doing it, because I lacked insight into what the real problem was - simple sensory overload. I once yelled at him and ran out of a shop because he'd asked me whether we needed salad, and it was just too much for me to process on top of my heightened anxiety. To anybody without a direct line into my mind, that was the most enormous overreaction. There was no legitimate reason for me to be angry with him, and so even though my outburst wasn't causeless, it was unreasonable for me to yell. It wasn't his fault.

These days, I am aware of my own emotional danger signals and would ask if we could sit down somewhere for a coffee before going into the supermarket, so that I could relax. Or if I missed the first cues and ended up feeling bad in the shop, I'd say "I'm sorry, I'm getting panicky - can I just walk behind for a bit while you take the shopping list and get what we need?" I have even gone and hid in a corner with my eyes closed and fingers in my ears, but I explain what I'm doing first. All ways to avoid freaking out, all ways to make it easier on him and me.

Most NT people don't have those specific problems, but I think almost everyone has quirks and trigger issues that spark an emotional response. Emotional maturity is recognising the processes going on inside our heads and dealing with them appropriately and effectively, rather than automatically blaming others or beating ourselves up. It's recognising how much of our emotional reaction is genuinely caused by others, and how much is down to our own traits. It's finding ways to keep ourselves running fairly smoothly, which may take some advance planning, and having strategies to manage ourselves when in crisis. Basically, it's being in control of your emotional responses without simply squashing your feelings down and pretending they don't exist. Nobody manages it all the time!

I'm 38 years old and watching Muppets as we speak.

Mature? Many "normies" would think not.

Me and meltdowns, venting. Everyone who has seen me meltdown says I need to stop. Wrong thing to say. They also say I am reacting wrong. When I get like that all I want is to be left alone and vent in my own way. If someone is judging me as I have the meltdown I will lash out at them. I know I am most likely reacting in a way that is not appropeate, but I don't care. Let me react the way I am feeling.

Others I have seen that had meltdowns or need to vent, let stuff out I never tell them they need to stop or to calm down. I let them react to what they are feeling. I feel its a double standard because I allow people to feel what I feel. But other people don't want me to feel what I feel.

I know in this way I am emotionally immature. But I really don't care. I think its worse not to let people express how they are feeling, as long as you are not a threat to yourself or others.

Thing is, people's response to a meltdown is very likely fueled in turn by their feelings - it can be very frightening to be on the receiving end of such a strong reaction, especially if they don't understand why it's happening. If they're strangers whose opinion doesn't have much impact on your life, then meh, it's none of their business anyway. And presumably it will be difficult to explain what's going on while you are in the middle of a meltdown, because I guess it must be pretty overwhelming for you. But if they are people who matter to you, it would probably be good to talk sometime about how and why you react, maybe like a kind of debriefing. That's emotional maturity to me - if there's stuff you can't control, emotional maturity is figuring out possible strategies to limit the impact before and afterwards. Just knowing that it's an AS thing and the best course of action is to leave you alone should help anyone who cares about you and is willing to understand. But if they don't know, they will probably think you hate them!

If someone lashed out at me and then didn't care what effect that had on me, even once they'd calmed down, I would think they didn't like me or care about me very much. Not everybody has to like me, but I'm unlikely to stay around for it to happen again.

Well most of the time the people that see me meltdown are people that I know. I am close to. They know about my AS, have seen me like this before, so they know how I am going to react. They know I am going to react bad to them when I get like that and they try and tell me not to act like that, judging me. These are people that I have seen meltdown and I don't judge back. I have talked to them, told them how I am during a meltdown and if they see me like that to leave me alone. But whenever I meltdown and they are around they always do the same thing even though they KNOW it will worsen the situation for me.

They know how I am and they don't seem to get it. respect how I am feeling and leave me alone. Don't judge, but they can't help but judge EVERY TIME. These are people that matter to Me. But I must not matter to them because they don't respect my feelings.

Good to know it's an aspie thing. I am very mature except when it comes to emotions. My emotions are out of control!