Say what...?

Post Reply New Topic

For fear of saying the wrong thing (like nonsensicle sentence structure, referring to things inappropriately) I often try to get away with saying as few words as possible, which of course doesn't make me any more clear in the end. Then I will try to nudge the other person into saying what I was trying to get at, then I can go "yeah, that's it".

That's one of those tendencies that took a long time for me to beat and unfortunately when I'm real overloaded or having a day where I'm just too out of it to deal with people, that can definitely come back on me.

I think the trick is learning to pace yourself and learn to speak in that real objective and reticent NT minimalistic way. Civet, I don't know if you ever had this but for me, when NT's used to talk like that I couldn't even interpret it into anything coherant - it sounded like they were speaking a whole other language (something about the angles it came from that seemed completely alien to me). With practice and trying to learn that myself I not only lost that problem but I often times feel I can do it as well as they can.

As for when I'm out of it, sometimes I've noticed that I just have to hold myself back, say less, and just figure out what ever it is on my own that I need to. If I do end up trying to talk and spitting out some jibberish I just play it off like they would (ie laugh, wry smile, or what ever else along with "Ok, let me try that again.." or if it's appropriate "Ok.. I think I need some coffee..."). Just remember that NT's occasionally have all the problems we do as well, just not as often as we do. If you learn to play it off just like they would then you're golden.

What sucks for me though is I"m an extremely visual thinker, so much so that even if I am explaining something coherantly and not jumping a million steps it's still impossible to pass it on. I remember a few months ago trying to explain to one of my friends how to play Euchre. I likened it to Spades (a game she already knew), went on from there at explaining the differences (ie. how the trump suit as well as left or right bower worked), put it in real clear words, and I had another friend tell me "Matt, I've been playing Euchre for years and *I* have no idea what the heck you just said...".

I had a friend come in to work one time, talk to one of the bartenders when he was getting a to go order, mentioned he knew me, and the first thing she said was while I'm nice guy and all no one there ever has any idea what I'm saying. I've heard people explain to me that I'm not speaking to softly most of the time, but from what I'm getting it's like the way I phrase my words or pattern my ideas it all ends up bouncing off people the same way a lot of NT dialog used to for me - like it was some completely foreign language crafted out of English. I can understand them well enough but I think the trick is trying to find a way to do that vague NT prosaicism better and more consistantly rather than just successfully pulling it off half the time or 1/3 of the time. It's like there's an easy-script going arround out there and if you don't know it then no one's gonna understand you...

Happens here too. I tend not to provide enough background information for people to understand what I'm on about... Sometimes I just go on without realising it, until the other party gets frustrated/confused and make me slow down one step at a time.

That's sort of what I'm referring to. I think both visually and in words, but when I need to relate something that happened to me or I've seen or done it's like the images come but the words will not. The whole time I had the image in my head of going to check and find the pack of pencils but I could not for the life of me figure out how to explain the situation to my coworker.



For me it seems I'm either completely silent or rattling off some incomprehensible dialogue. Occasionally I hit the middle ground (when the other person is leading the conversation, it helps a lot).



I understand things on the basic level, but I find I am often missing a lot or misinterpretting it. It's quite common for me to do a job incorrectly or not complete a job at work because I missed the subtext of what my boss was saying. Fortunately, they know I work hard and are understanding about it. I try to ask for clarification more often, now, but I don't always even realize I've got things confused.



Yes, I do that, too.

I wonder if we think slower in certian situations then our NT counterparts as I have found it hard to keep up in other areas sometimes too, like music for example (I played the cello through MS and HS by the end alot of the songs I just played enough to make it look like I knew what I was doing, at least to an audience member... not neccessarily the teacher who always looked at me like I never practed (which granted I didnt do as much as I should have but he had no way of knowing that! besides when my mind cant think that fast it isnt going to help that much anyway), it was an easy A anyway.)

Ah, yes. The "what the hell are you talking about" issue. I know it well.

I think it's related to theory of mind. I've got to work hard to keep track of what the other person knows and, more importantly, what they don't know. The only way I've found to avoid it is to logically work through the facts in advance and make a list of necessary points. I guess it's why I much prefer to know exactly what's going to happen beforehand. Of course, it's a huge drain to do it for very long. And when I'm nervous, I can't concentrate as well and I often include far too much or too little information, or it comes out garbled.

I think this is a major reason why I scored a Moderate on the Avoidant Personality Test... I can't stand to hear myself talk this way, I find it really humiliating, so more often than not I just don't get myself into social situations unless I'm 110% positive that it won't happen.

This mainly happens when I'm in a high state of arousal- happy, angry, sad, scared, etc. I will say things which make little to no sense.