Tired of not being able to communicate
I have the easiest time in larger groups. Someone is always saying something, so it goes unnoticed if I'm not talking, and it's easier to come up with something to say with no pressure on. Then when I'm in a smaller group or with just one person I'm not already great friends with, I can think if absolutely nothing to say. It's probably the only time my mind draws a complete blank - no thoughts go through my brain at all. So whoever I'm with that this happens with, I feel more uncomfortable around them, and then I can't even talk to them in a larger group anymore.
There was an attractive girl I'm friends with that a few months ago she started to flirt with me. It could have been so easy. But I could do nothing. Same with a girl I had met only once nearly a year ago randomly texting the friend that I knew her through that she has a crush and me, and to give me her number. I went to see her over last Thanksgiving break, and it was the same thing but to a seemingly greater extent. It should be so much easier than this.
This is my first post, so a bit of back story: Years ago, I was watching Comedy Central, and they had some charity event for autism. This was the peak of my read-everything-I-can-about-a-subject-on-Wikipedia, and I went on Wikipedia and read about autism and anything linked from it, anything linked from that, and so on. I was confused about how much it was talking about me. I can't remember whether or not this was during high school, but I tried to attribute it to my depression and convinced myself was just trying to find something to latch onto and to blame instead of facing my problems (I was suicidal through all of high school). I just finished my junior year of college, and the night after finals week - time to celebrate - a non-drinking, soley pot-smoking, friend of me and my roommates' was over for our party. When I went upstairs, he was talking to my old roommate and his girlfriend about how he just found out that he was autistic, that his mother found out when he was young and never told him. During this conversation, I brought up how I had read about autism some time back and thought I may be as well. This girlfriend of my former roommate said that it made sense, and the one who just found out he was was autistic agreed. The next time the friend that found he was autistic was over and we were smoking a bowl, I said something - something I thought was completely normal, something I had trained myself to say and act from years of observation that I thought I knew fit me in with everyone else - and he immediately says, "Wow! You ARE autistic!"
The month after I went back to being trapped inside my skull like I was in high school, hating the fact that I had a name to everything I'd hated so much growing up, and finding out that it wasn't something that can go away. But last week I shroomed a bit. On Tuesday night, I had half an eighth in tea, and ate the other half about an hour later. Towards the end of my trip, I had what seemed like a religious experience. I may be fundamentally incapable of understanding other people on a very basic level, nor they me, but what's going on in my head right now is mine and mine alone. We experience something completely different on shrooms, and these trips are just mine. And then I was fine the rest of the week. I took that eighth to make sure I wouldn't have a bad experience when I ate shrooms again the following weekend on a camping trip, and ate another eighth then. I tripped harder than I had my previous five times, and again, thought about autism at the end. This time it wasn't quite so good. But what about when I'm not tripping? Even if I've come to accept that I'm psychologically disabled, the intense part of trips that are mine and mine alone don't make up for that. I can't talk to people the way they talk to each other, and they don't even realize how left out on absolutely every life experience I am as a result. Even after that awful end of a trip, my friend offered me the rest of his later that day, and I wanted to face my demons and eat again. Between these two times, a friend of the attractive girl I mentioned at the beginning of the second paragraph (this girl is also sister to the aforementioned former roommate's girlfriend) was trying E, and while I was stoned and forgot she was rolling, I talked to her for a moment about why my trip ended badly. She's not psychologically disabled, but she's schizophrenic and her brain's wired strangely, and she understood how lonely it is not being able to experience what everyone else is. I told her about the religious experience I had earlier in the week, and her being around and understanding when I ate the rest of the shrooms made it so I had the most pleasant experience. But at the end of the trip, it happened again - I thought about my autism, or Asperger's, or whatever it is. I felt lonely and trapped. While she helped me out of it, it still summed up how I feel in general. I'm lonely and trapped, and all because I can't communicate.
I don't want this. Excuse the bitching, but it's just not fair. Why isn't there a how-to book on blending in with neurotypicals?
Ah.. I have those all the time...so awkward...I understand, i do.
There is no way for use to become NT, except for the memorization of scripts for each and every situation one can think of, before they happen. They can adapt socially very quickly. It takes me hours to years (really.) I have a "one size fits all, but not really" script (as I make fun of clothing with that tag...rare occurrence to fit!) but outside of that, it's a craps shoot.
Thats what I thought. I used to have the same problems to the point where I sometimes was unable to speak at all. It's an odd situation to be in because you become anxious and of course that is not a good start, its hard to 'think' of things to say when you are tense and worried about making an arse of yourself!
