Your misunderstandings with NTs?

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After a couple months in my new job, I was approached by my colleagues and informed that I'm unpleasant and that they don't like me and always try to avoid me. When I asked why, I was told that:
1. Sometimes I ask the same question about something I don't know how to do in the job to 2 colleagues instead of one.
2. I didn't bring anything from my trip (I did, but hadn't had the time yet to distribute them).

I know I always meant well, so I guess these could be called "misunderstandings".

Do you too have misunderstandings with people?

all the effing time.

Reading your post I am still not sure what they required of you that you did not do... so obviously yes I do.

I have been told "Most people would have done this" or "Most people would have said that..." more times than I can count.

All I can do is try to explain why I do what I do. That sometimes I just go about the same situations they do, in different ways... but my heart and good effort is still in it. Blah I can't explain...

In any case, I hope you don't take it personally, I am sure they are just not understanding of you and perhaps will warm up to you in time.

Those sound like bad reasons to find you unpleasant. In my experience, people will decide how they feel about you in the first few minutes and then justify it however they can. I don't see what's wrong with asking two people. Well, I see what they think is wrong - that maybe you didn't trust the answer you got from the first one. But still, that's not really a big deal. Most people will ask again if they didn't understand the first answer or if it wasn't satisfactory.
Also, are you really obligated to bring them things? I wouldn't have thought about that, unless it's some kind of tradition they have.

I agree with WurdBendur. I think they don't like your "weirdness", can't put a finger on what it is they don't like, and have invented reasons to justify the way they feel. They may even believe their own lies.
I don't see that you've done anything wrong.

It did cross my mind that might be the case...

People have asked me something and they immediately asked someone else the same thing, so it's not something we do.
The question I have in situations where I'm considered "unpleasent" is why is it my job to make others like me? Why aren't they trying to get me to like them? No one is trying to puts any effort into winning me over and somehow I'm the bad guy for returning indifference with indifference.
It's seems they NTs feel they're entitled to a specific response to what they do. Like if they say something that's part of useless small talk, there's a standard response I'm supposed to give and not giving it is considered rude and a slap in the face. Why isn't it considered rude to go up to a person a demand they give the "secret password" and become hostile if they don't give it, because when someone talks to me about nothing important and reacts badly when I have nothing important to say back that's what it feels like.

Exactly. That's my problem too. I rarely know the standard/expected reactions/responses in any given social situation.

Eg: there was a tremor and several hundred employees evacuated the building (me and my colleagues had to go 9 floors down the stairs). When I got downstairs, I was tired and just sat on the grass waiting for the signal to go back up to the office. Later I was scolded for it. It was expected from me to look for my colleagues when I reached downstairs and stay with them waiting for the signal. They were all standing together.

my soccer team doesn't think much about me either. Even though Im one of the best players, super nice, and accepting. They all shun me and only one person talks to me and sometimes even she doesn't talk to me.

That one's standard because it's a safety issue. I'm kind of amazed you didn't know it - we had the reason for that explained to us in Primary (Junior) school. It allows a quick assessment of whether anyone's missing (so they know if someone's potentially been injured in an emergency situation and needs to be looked for) and also tends to help people reenter the building in a more ordered and therefore faster manner. Don't they have fire and evacuation proceedures displayed within your office which has this information?

In more general terms, I think one of the things we often fail to realise is that we're not being discriminated against specifically, the NT "rules" we don't instinctively know aren't arbitrary, they're based upon normal responses and as such tell NTs useful things such as trustworthiness. Eye contact is a really good example of this: aspies often complain about this "arbitrary" rule of social interaction, but the fact is that NTs find it harder to make eye contact when they're lying or dislike (may wish harm to) another person. Ditto, an inability to make small talk amongst NTs usually indicates a dislike. These quick "gut check" assessments are really helpful to NTs in understanding the motivations of a person and how they may interact. Because we don't instinctively understand them or conform to them, they seem silly to us, but it's important to understand the role they play.

They all sound incredibly immature.
I went on vacation years ago, when I still lived at home with my parents. When I came back, I brought back some stuff. During one of my dad's infernal scoldings, he complained that I didn't bring anything back for him. He was illustrating how selfish and thoughtless I was. I pointed out what I did bring back and he complained, "Oh am I supposed to get excited about that?!"
I didn't understand what he expected at all.

As far as your colleagues go, ganging up on you to say they don't like you is childish and bullying behavior. Those complaints sound obscure. I agree with wurdbender.
My husband worked with a very disabled Aspie at his last place. He did have some very aberrant behavior and poor work habits, but no worse then other minor employees. But because he was "different", people assumed the very worst. His "Aspie stare" was interpreted that he was a child molester or some kind of predator. His chit chat was heard as sexual harassment (eg "Are you married?") The bosses would talk to him in a very vague manner and when he tried to understand their complaints, he was seen as antagonistic.

Yes, I've learnt not to insist that they explain to me what I'm doing wrong. It only makes them become angrier. They don't want to be confronted with their unfair treatment. NTs like to be told that you are "trying", even if they know they haven't explained what you should do differently so there's not a chance in hell you could be improving.

In regard to the tremor, it was a small one and the tremor instructions at this workplace do not include any "stick to your immediate work colleagues" rules.

However stupid their reasons for not liking is-at least they actually said it,rather than just gossip about it when are not there-a lot of the staff am have come across in residential homes are always gossiping about how much they hate each other and make accusations-but when they see them they're nice.
They also gossiped about am when they assumed am couldn't hear-they often said am was faking the hearing level/sensitivity [because am could not hear them when other people were speaking]-it's a bit ironic saying someone doesn't have this problem when they can hear everything they're gossiping about at the complete opposite side of the building-behind thick fire doors and wall,isn't it.hearing test results and autism training from two autism experts [speech therapist and pyschologist] eventually put them right.

Another misunderstanding [that is what she was trying to class it as,and manager was trying to cover it up as but am would call it abuse],was with staff again-am need to finish daily routine before leaving the house if am staying over at parents,one of the staff who was on [is a nasty person and is also extremely noisy] said am not allowed to finish routine and have to stop being selfish and get out of the house or else she's turning the hoover on [can't be in the house when it's turned on due to noise]-it all went bad from there and she started screaming,and pushing am,then she went outside,phoned the manager and said am have just tried to attack her.
Am got to finish routine and was took to parents house by staff,next morning had to get back there and the manager came,and spoke about it with am and the nasty staff-the manager explained to her what she was misunderstanding was part of am and own autism and she should know better,she was told she is going to have autism training and she was fine about this,and said she now understood.
But...as soon as the manager had gone,am overheard her saying to another staff how am was just making excuses to get own way and loads of other nasty stuff.
Recently,she got into a major shouting argument with a nice newer staff lady because she was bullying her and never gave her help when she needed it-she nearly went for her with her fist-the other lady was not even shouting-because of what she did to am and what she did there-she was moved to work in another place last week where all the managers' base is so they can watch her for problems more.

Greentea,
Your workplace is negligent if they never ran drills to teach people what to do in emergencies. I had a drill once, and all the manager types held up signs and yelled for their department's employees to gather round. Then we were told to come back to the same spot in the event of an actual emergency. It would not have been my natural instinct to find my co-workers. I would have just found a quiet place and sat down, as you did.
They shouldn't criticize you for not doing something they never told you to do.

Yes, they can. Breaking the unspoken rules is much worse than breaking the spoken ones.

Continue being yourself.

Last edited by JWRed on 08 Dec 2007, 11:40 am, edited 2 times in total.