How do you get rid of people?

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I find that social politeness rules make it difficult to get rid of people I don't want to be with. I know it's not cricket to just say "will you go away now please?" So what else do you say to them?

Ideas I've had:

Generally: I think that withdrawing warmth is the common theme in my specific tips. It goes against the grain...I'm so used to running socially warm scripts (I've been trying to be sociable for years, to make friends, and the habit, the frear of seeming cold, is ingrained).

Individuals hanging around me in public: Show disinterest by not really seeming to listen, stop bothering to echo the highs and lows of their banter, reduce eye contact (just a matter of relaxing for most Aspies), make some excuse about needing to go to the washroom / go talk to somebody.

Individuals texting or emailing me too much:. Stop following up their attempts to share their life with you. Politely but firmly refuse any favours they request. Don't encourage them by replying in kind - consider making no replies at all.

Individuals phoning me too much: Interrupt to break up any long rants. Ask "is there anything else?" to get them to just say what they want to say and go. Make up an excuse - easier with no visual evidence to tip them off, but of course if they believe it, they won't get the message.

Individuals disturbing me in my home: Ask them to tone down whtever it is they are annoying you with. If that doesn't work, tell them to knock it off. If they persist, ask them to leave.

Unwanted "friends": Stop seeking them out in any way - never be the one to contact them first. Discourage their overtures using the above techniques. Explain simply how you came to need to ditch them - I'm not sure if this is appropriate or not - on the one hand I don't want to ditch anybody without giving them my reasons, but on the other, my experience is that they only tend to quibble and suck me into an argument, which in itself only prolongs the contact. I was wondering whether explanations are best reserved for when you have to ditch a partner? I guess that is rather a special case.....it seems normal to ditch friends and reject suitors without necessarily giving reasons, but if I were to use my above techniques to get rid of a partner, I'd be withdrawing my warmth and they'd be wondering why...given the strength of feelings in a relationship, a good attempt at explaining why is surely the only noble way to go?

The only "don't" I have so far is, don't tolerate their behaviour if it annoys you......it can build up into a big angry knot until you want to rage at them and throw them out of your life - and then they'll crow to the heavens about how they don't like you any more "because they acted like a jerk." That's also made me wonder if part of the problem is in the annoyed party - if I bothered to nip things in the bud, then I'd probably still have a perfectly acceptable friend. So I can't justify rage - both of us are responsible for the annoying stuff........if I lead them on, I can expect to be fleeced.

Do you think that some people have an eye for finding placid people who don't like to be rude, so they can exploit them? Or do you think it just happens when the assertiveness levels aren't well matched, and nobody is really trying to do anything?

Very interesting thoughts.

You can get rid of somebody without being rude. It's called making excuses. Most people do it, and even if they know that it's a lie they accept it and pretend to believe it in appreciation for your not wanting to hurt their feelings.

You can tell someone who stops by that you are busy. If they are there and you want them to leave you can tell them you need to get ready to go somehwere and then stand up. Tell them you have to go shower. They will get the hint. If it's someone on the phone say "hold on a second" and halfway cover the mouthpiece and say "Be right there!" to a nonexistant person in the distance and tell them "Hey listen, I gotta go. Catch ya later" and hang up. If they are hanging around you in a public place you can just tell them that you have a lot on your mind right now and say "I'm sorry, I would be terrible company tonight. I've got a lot on my mind right now and just need some time to myself to think things out"

That stuff works on most people. I do it to people. It doesn't work on me. I'll be completely clueless sometimes if it's a person I'm comfortable with. I won't mean to, but an example is my best friend. I'm at her house, we have been hanging out all day and she says the shower thing. I say "OK" and go back to what I was doing. She says "You gotta go" I say "Why? I've been here when you took a shower before, go ahead" and go back to what I was doing. She thought it was funny and grabbed me by my arm and said "Girl, you just don't get it sometimes do you? I swear I love you! Now you gotta go, I GOT BOYS COMING OVER, GO! NOW!" but not in a mean way. I said "Oooooh, well why didn't you just tell me that?" She said "I was trying to be polite" I said "No need to be with me, just tell me the truth, I have no problem with that". I guess thats how you handle a clueless person.

By the title I thought you meant the "stuff the corpse in the cellar" variety of getting rid of people

I'm sure that works with a lot of people. Some would just take me at my word and therefore think it a promise that I was still basically interested in being with them "some other time" (that's another social lie isn't it?). I'd be angry and wonder why they didn't just tell me the truth and stop leading me on. Do you think it's just Aspies who get led on by social lies?


So you finally got the truth out of her.....I tend to do that to people I'm close to as well - I break down their BS by highlighting how potty the idea was, like you did. I don't see why she thought you'd be hurt to be told that she'd got boys coming over though. Was she trying to protect you from envious feelings, or just didn't want anybody to know what she was doing?

All my examples were about permanently getting rid of people. Yours is about getting rid of them for a limited time. When I have to do that, I try to remember to soften the rejection by talking about the next meeting......I once asked a guy if he was into a visit that night, he didn't say no, he said "Thursday," when I was seeing him anyway. I think I appreciated the soft touch. But I always feel wary of such devices......when I've heard them I've often translated them in my head into "I don't really like you" and I've just felt abandoned and fobbed off with a lie. So I tend to expect others are likely to be similarly offended if I were to do it. I wonder if I'm right in the case of Aspies? They don't seem to like my bluntness much better than the NTs do. Mostly they seem to try to ignore it, or they interrupt and change the subject, often angrily.

Dead limpets are much easier to prize off than live ones. If you don't dislodge a live one with the first blow, it clings like hell and the only way is to smash it.

Murder them?

It doesn't mean that they dislike you. They obviously like you enough to not want to hurt your feelings. They simply don't feel any interest in hanging out with you. You have met many people that you felt that way about and so have I. Most people have. In fact, most of the people you meet you won't have any real interest in befriending, but you don't dislike them or want to hurt their feelings and you would like to be cordial to them. That's being an acquaintance. Friends hang out or communicate regularly, sometimes with long gaps in between, but there is a connection. An acquaintance is someone you know who you are nice to and will talk to when you are in the same situation together. You don't dislike them, but you don't feel a connection with them. I don't get my feelings hurt by it anymore. I used to, but since I figured that out, I don't.

Wow, I've been reading entirely too much about the Mafia... I thought "murder" too when I read the topic title. Aren't we a bloodthirsty bunch?

Being honest works most of the time. Saying you're an introvert, you need some alone time to relax, is usually accepted by most NTs.

I suppose.....and I've mellowed a lot....but I guess I don't see myself as wanting to deal with a whole group of NTs in a culture.....I'd deal with individuals, reject the ones who annoy me too much, which would probably remove the worst excesses of social lying, and hope that way I wouldn't get too many problems having to fit in with a greater whole.......the majority of NTs are probably off limits to me.....I've yet to diagnose more than one, and I believe I've managed to largely screen them out of my life since years ago, without knowing I was doing it.


I didn't, but I guess it figures...young people, bah!


Glad to know she doesn't really practice it......I don't see how anybody could, though if relationships weren't very important to them, I suppose it would make sense. Funny how unworkable some of these mantras are, isn't it?


I would have thought that simply saying that she had a guy coming over would have been enough for most people to get it. Failing that, maybe "so we're going to want to be alone for a while." would get the penny to drop? I'm not knocking her, just don't see why the true reason had to be hidden.


I wonder if he was autistic or just plain stubborn. I know of an Aspie who ended up hosting such a limpet, being unable to be blunt enough to clearly say "I want you to go."


The guy was getting rather snowed under with unexpected visitors, which invaded his privacy esepcially as he had a live-in partner. I think I was the victim of a general clampdown. But they gave me mixed messages about how welcome I was......they'd be friendly talking to me, we would seem to be relating well, but I think it was him really, he'd start flirting with her as another hint, which I felt was bad manners, looked like sexual rivalry of some kind........I stopped seeing them, she left him, he's made a few overtures to me to hook up, but I was never in to take the messages, so I just ignored them. It's not tit for tat, I just don't feel any interest in hanging out with him these days, back then there were usually 3 or 4 of us rapping together, and I only buddy females.

I'm trying to think of other examples......but I guess it hasn't happened much. One old school friend (we hadn't been close) made a big thing of asking me to meet him, he was late and hardly stayed long enough for one drink....it was as if he'd been judging me really quickly for fun potential, and figured I was pretty dull (couldn't think of much to say), anyway he said he'd got more people to see and wished me the best, and I never saw him again. Probably a misunderstanding about the nature of the encounter....I hadn't particularly wanted him to become a buddy, but didn't realise he'd be gone so quickly. I don't think he was very sensitive to my feelings.

Mine aren't so well-defined like that - I'm closest to my partner and my son, quite close to an old friend (we meet only rarely now but we can carry on where we left off as if there had never been a gap), another couple of guys I like well enough but haven't made much time for, and strangely don't really value their acquaintance....neither of them are hard to get rid of, I just politely decline their invitations.

I probably made you think I'd had a lot of white lies and rejections to contend with.........but looking back on my experience of rejection, I've more often than not been the one who does the rejecting. Most of my loneliness has come from my reluctance to risk social rejection in the first place.

It depends on the situation, and it's NEVER easy, but it feels right after you do it, and if the person is a friend who you don't want to offend, it's actually better to be honest and do it sooner than later. I just say something like "I'm really having fun visiting, but I need to take care of a few things, so let's call it a day for now, and maybe let's get together again on (_____________)? Sometimes that won't work if the other person is inattentive to subtle suggestions, and in that case, you might have to say "I sure don't mean to sound rude, but I need to do other things now, and I can't do them while we're still visiting". And if they question that, and ask "What do you need to do?", you have the right to stop being so polite, because their questioning of YOU, is more rude than an invitation to buzz off.

Charles

I like the idea of describing yourself rather than your rejectee as a way of softening the blow. Better than saying "you're invasive, you do my head in" - which is usually what it initially feels like to an Aspie, I think. One I heard was a girl rejected a suitor who was too much of a nice guy by telloing him that she herself was nasty. Trouble is, it's too easy for the rejectee to think "but I don't think she's nasty, so why should that matter?"

Yes I see........and it's so easy for an Aspie to simply take it literally and want to know what the guy wants to do that's so important. I don't know that I'd have the right to be rude back though - if the Aspie really took the excuse literally and was sincere in questioning it, he's not being deliberately rude. So the Aspie would just be hurt and baffled if I lost it and told him to buzz off.

It is all about setting boundaries with people and learning how to use 'social lies'.

The OP's first post made me laugh.

I had friends in HS who wanted to talk for hours on the phone after school about what I considered, 'nothing.' This was pre internet young ones. I did not know a polite way to stop this endless nattering. I am pretty sure I flat out refused to answer the phone and had my Mom say, 'she is busy'....

What is needed are 'social lies', which NTs use all the time without even thinking about it. Such as, 'oh I wish I could stay here all day and talk with you but I have to go....'

I had a friend, who's mom sold real estate. She was very clever and very socially astute. She also could not afford to be seen as rude to her neighbors, her potential future customers.

There was one lady who used to come to her house and then want to chat with her for hours. Molly had a plan for this lady, if she saw her approaching her door, she would grab her purse before she answered the door and then would say, 'Oh Eleanor, how lovely to see you but I was just on the way out...'

Convoluted but it worked. Molly was much to polite to say, 'sorry but this is not a good time for a visit' As a mixed traits Aspie/NT person this blew my mind. She can do this? She can tell a lie like that? Yes she can and she did.

As far as phone calls, there is always the old technique of saying, 'I can't hear you, there must be something wrong with my cell, let me call you back later'....

And a tip from the Emily Post website, how to say no gracefully:

I think the biggest problem I still have, is not reading people correctly and not interpreting their social lies fast enough or completely misunderstanding them. It pretty much never goes way for me. I still find social lies maddening, evasive and insincere but I know that is how the world works.




emilypost.com

The financial motive lends this one a murky aura........if it were purely done not to hurt, I'd probably forgive it, though I'd always wonder why they didn't just tell me a bit about their workload......I get busy too, I understand, I expect nothing if I have the cheek to call on somebody without warning. But I guess the truth is, often the person has nothing in particular to do, but they expect the visitor to be boring or outstay the welcome.


You might be interested in this thread:
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postxf187342-0-15.html
I'm skeptical of the notion that Aspies never tell porkies.


Good....except that asking for the number might encourage them to ask for yours in return.



Judging by the vitreol I've heard from Aspies against lying, they must be at some huge disadvangage in an environment of social lies. Pathological honesty is a very vulnerable state to be in.

I do not have pathological honesty at all. I can lie in any situation I need to, believably. My friend in high school actually gave me lying "lessons" because I was so bad at it. I learned over the years, it does work.

I won't lie just for fun, but I'll lie when I need to. There is nothing wrong with it if you aren't lying to try to get over on somebody.

I know somebody somewhere will post to this telling me what a horrible person I am for feeling that way, and that's fine. I'm not saying anyone else has to lie. I'm not saying that anyone else must accept the concept. I'm just saying that it's part of life, and most people do lie when they need to.