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Aspie/aspie (non)dating

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E V Tooms
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Joined: 16 Oct 2015
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30 May 2016, 8:44 am

rdos wrote:
E V Tooms wrote:
The anxiety comes down to two major factors:
1. Lack of information - i.e. inability to read the other person's signals and body language due to my own incapacity and the other person's ambivalence. This is unexpected and even frightening, because most people will launch into some kind of social behaviour to compensate for my social awkwardness.
2. Lack of control. This leads on from the lack of information. Since a large part of how we process the world is through solid data, the absence of this causes panic.


That's correct. It's also a matter of how you process the information you have, and that's also the solution to how to better handle these kinds of situations. Much of that goes back to cultural expectations like "guys that don't make contact are not interested", and "romance starts with dating and conversation". If that is not your preferences, you can learn to ignore those and apply different standards instead.


Indeed, but there is also a grain of truth to the notion that men who don't initiate aren't interested: some give off mixed signals as a form of control. This will generally only tend to reel in vulnerable people. Anyone whose intentions are a bit obscure will automatically add to my anxiety because I was fooled in the past by a disordered person who was good at appearing socially awkward. In his case, I couldn't read him because he didn't want me to.

I think part of the problem is the somewhat unnatural environment, which also adds to my anxiety because I'm only (somewhat) comfortable talking to people in a familiar environment. Although I met him somewhere relevant to my special interest (so we should have something to talk about) at the moment we only meet at 'event' type scenarios at which you circulate with your glass of wine, so doing the social dance (badly) is almost inescapable. I would never normally go to these and only do so at because it's the only way to meet him right now.

I hope it doesn't seem as if I'm rejecting anyone's suggestions.



rdos
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31 May 2016, 3:20 am

E V Tooms wrote:
Indeed, but there is also a grain of truth to the notion that men who don't initiate aren't interested: some give off mixed signals as a form of control. This will generally only tend to reel in vulnerable people. Anyone whose intentions are a bit obscure will automatically add to my anxiety because I was fooled in the past by a disordered person who was good at appearing socially awkward. In his case, I couldn't read him because he didn't want me to.


Right. As a girl, I'm sure you need to handle typical men and NDs different for optimal results. It's even worse if somebody appears to be ND, but only hides things to deceive you. To handle that you would need an effective "ND radar" that detects more than just shyness.

E V Tooms wrote:
I think part of the problem is the somewhat unnatural environment, which also adds to my anxiety because I'm only (somewhat) comfortable talking to people in a familiar environment.


Certainly.

E V Tooms wrote:
Although I met him somewhere relevant to my special interest (so we should have something to talk about) at the moment we only meet at 'event' type scenarios at which you circulate with your glass of wine, so doing the social dance (badly) is almost inescapable. I would never normally go to these and only do so at because it's the only way to meet him right now.


Can't you "negotiate" some better place to meet him instead? Based on personal experience, I think that might be possible without discussing it directly. At least if there is a mutual interest, in which case he should be open to that possibility.