Becoming termporarily "blind" when meeting someone

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I've noticed when I have to talk to someone I don't know and or I am not expecting to or have not previously thought about first talking to this person that I only think about what I should be saying to the person that I can't seem to see what they look like or only one par to of them like their face and no other characteristics. And then realizing everything I should have said afterwards.
So when you first meet someone, is it hard for you to catch their name (even if they say it to you), what clothes they are wearing, most significant characteristics, etc? When I first meet some one I almost feel like I am closing my eyes holding my breath because I am putting 100% of my effort towards trying to think of what to say (and hardly succeeding), and no effort towards anything else.

YES! And it is maddening. I simply cannot recognize new people for a long time.. esp when I was working and met other professionals.. the other professionals would immediately identify the new one and I could not. It was as if I'd never met the new person before.

The anxiety is part of it.. having a hard time really looking at them.. focusing too much on what needs to be done for conversation so there is no energy left over to take in the visuals.. all of that!

Welcome to the club! I'm the same.

Me too. I won't recognise them next time I see them, unless I make a conscious effort to observe their faces and record something to identify them by next time that is not the hair or the clothes, because those can change.

As whiteTiger said, I think part of the reason (apart from the anxiety and our lack of eye contact) is the AS hyper-focus and difficulty with focus multi-tasking. I have to really stop myself from paying attention to what they're saying in order to take a minute to study their face and salient features so I'll recognise them next time.

My son seems to have a terrible time remembering faces and names. It seems he has to meet someone several times, and continue to see them regularly before they really "sink in" for him.

Actual part of a conversation we had not that long ago, "Hey, I think I remember seeing you before!" I said to him, "I should hope so, she is your grandmother!"

I see your son has quite pronounced prosopagnosia, unless he has seen his grandmother very few times and far between...

Well, she is my current husband's mother, so they have only been "related" for almost three years. However he had seen her only months before, and in fact he has stayed at her house before. Once we stayed with her for three whole weeks. He has this issue with other people as well though. If we ask him what color a girl's hair is from school or what color her eyes are he cannot remember. So I suppose I should ask about it next week... although Wiki seems to think there is nothing to be done about it.

Yes. Just like that. Obviously I can see, but my vision seems sort of garbled to me. I can't remember the person's face well. Often my speech to them makes sense and doesn't seem odd, but it's like that's the only function turned on properly. To remember a person's face I need to memorize their features. I stare too hard at them in order to do it. It's best to do it when they're not looking, really. I have to specially and consciously tag the remembered image of their face with their name to get their name right later.

All that effort and I still make mistakes with people who look alike, and sometimes not even very much alike.

Yes. Used to feel a little guilty like I didin't care enough about meeting them to remember their name. Some first meetings are to comlicated for me to keep up with banter and remember details. Then I will be reviewing the interaction for the rest of the day. It's no wonder large social fuctions are draining.

Faces are not a problem but names go in one ear and out so quickly. People have to tell me there names sometimes 3 times and that's in one conversation.

Yes, I have always been that same way, although it is less now that I am older. I do still have a hard time remembering faces and names, though.

Yeah, definitely. I've realized recently that the way people 'look' to me actually has a lot to do with their personality/what I think of them. I actually pay little to no attention on people's actual looks. I don't see any physical details about any of the people in my dreams. If someone is a real jerkwad, I literally see them as an evil ugly creature. And the opposite for people I like. I could spend the entire day with someone and not be able to tell you what color shirt they had on

This could definitely play into the whole temporary blindness thing. On meeting a new person, I have no opinion of them, therefore I don't actually see them at all.


That's a really feeble explanation of it but it's the best I can get at the moment

It takes quite a few meetings until I recognize someone facially. The interaction is memorable, but connecting the right person to it does not come naturally to me.

When I was in school I used to run into difficulties because it was easier for me to get visually fixated on something unusual a person was wearing. The next day when they changed clothes, I wouldn't really recognize them.

I also have problems remembering the names of authors and other people (but no problem remembering book titles, plot, interpretation, etc.) unless I make myself mentally "file' the name in last name, first order.

The odd thing is, I have a great memory for facts, trivia, information, etc. as long as it isn't directly connected to a person (likeness, name). If I see an object briefly, I can remember what it looks like in detail and reproduce its color perfectly by memory using paint. But I have no idea what colors various people's eyes are, no matter how long I have known them.

I have difficulty with that as well. If I talk to someone shortly after the first meeting with that person, I'll invariably think that I'm talking to a total stranger. It usually takes me a few meetings and a few chats with someone before my memory is able to make the connection. For the most part, I remember people by their voices, mannerisms, and maybe hairstyles and/or beards.