How old were you first experienced "embarassment?"

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The poll about whether or not we Aspies are "embarrassed" by our obsessions got me thinking....
In order to be embarrassed you have to be able to think about what other people are thinking about your actions or appearance.
This requires theory of mind or the ability to step into another person's shoes and reflect on how they perceive us.

When I was a kid, my parents always told me I was embarrassing them but I had no inkling what the concept of embarrassment was until around 12 and didn't really feel embarrassment on a regular basis until high school. I knew what the word meant in terms of vocabulary but just didn't understand what it meant to feel embarrassed back then.

It seems that most NT kids can feel embarrassed as young as preschool with the fear of embarrassment peaking around middle school.
Was my experience common among Aspies growing up?

Last edited by AllieKat on 05 May 2011, 3:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't really know how to answer. Do you mean embarrassment of ANY degree or...real, burning humiliation? I can remember being vaguely embarrassed by things (causing awkward silences, kids walking away while I spoke or calling me names, being berated by teachers in front of the class)...but this was a very fleeting feeling. I did not feel GENUINE embarrassment (to my recollection) until the end of 5th grade. The kind of embarrassment that makes you feel ill for the rest of the day, makes your face burn hot, keeps the interaction replaying itself in your mind for days thereafter...perhaps weeks...years even.

Actually I'm thinking of neither situation: I'm talking more along the lines of regretting what you did because and you realized that you made fool of yourself in front of your peers and then feeling badly for a considerable period of time after it. It could be attributed to an action or an appearance (you could be behaving totally normal but still have a zit that you're worried about how others will perceive). It's like "OMG- everyone's gonna think ***** about me" rather than just a brief awkward moment.

I actually experienced humiliation before I experienced embarrassment. I felt humiliated in fourth grade when I was being bullied by my peers but didn't yet understand that it was my behavior that was causing this even though i had realized that they were teasing me because I was different from them.

An example was when I forgot to bring a quarter to buy ice cream as my school sold ice cream for a quarter every Friday when I was in fourth grade. I remember having a meltdown, crying and begging the ice cream lady to give me ice cream and I'd pay her two quarter next week. When she said no and I pitched a fit, a staff member whom I knew came to me and and loaned me a quarter. I got my ice cream but then the other fourth graders were teasing me calling me "crybaby" and "brat" and mimicked my tantrum for days afterwards. But I still didn't feel embarrassed for having thrown the tantrum- I just was upset because I was being teased and humiliated by my classmates.

It was more like seventh grade when I finally put the two together; my reaction to the situation= ridicule from my peers= how embarrassing; I shouldn't have have done that in front of everyone.

Last edited by AllieKat on 05 May 2011, 3:51 am, edited 3 times in total.

I remember very little of how my mind worked when I was a child. I do remember one situation in which I was embarassed though - when I was 7, I somehow accidentally kissed this girl that was my friend. I was embarassed, as in "what the hell did I just do?", and apologized.
There were probably other situations in which I was embarassed in as well, but like I said, I remember very little of how my mind worked when I was a child.

I know I did embarrassing things when I was a child, because my parents would tell me to stop embarrassing them. But the first time I remember feeling anything like embarrassment, although it was possibly more like humiliation, was when I threw up in front of half of my school after a 1500m race. I was 12 or 13. PE was a great source of humiliation as I was so bad at many physical activities, and refused to do things like forward rolls, high jump and hurdles, as I was afraid of falling or breaking my neck.

I know I did a lot of other things when I was a teenager that should have embarrassed me, as my peers would tell me that I shouldn't or should be doing something that I was or wasn't doing.

For example we wore white blouses as part of my school uniform, and I didn't start wearing a bra until I was about 15, when I probably should have started at 12. A girl in my class kept telling me I should wear one, but I didn't understand why. It was only in my 20s that I realised that I should really have started to wear one sooner, and felt embarrassment about it.

Henbane: You and have nearly identical experiences. With me, it was that I wore shorts in high school without shaving my legs and it took my classmates' ridicule to get me to shave them or wear pants if they weren't shaved. Most NT girls would have known better to bare their hairy legs at school in the first place.

Thank you for the clarification. That would make it 5th grade. My mom told me that I embarrassed her prior to that year, and I felt bad for, in my mind, being bad....but I didn't feel embarrassed. I just felt...bad. If that makes sense. I felt guilty.

I can remember embarrassment pretty early on, around 4 or so. It's hard to not feel that when you have the kind of parents who'd do this all the time - "This is our daughter. She's so smart. She knows this and that and can do this and that. Come on, sing that song you just learned to this lady..." Or they'd give someone a totally over the top compliment. Then "Just ask my daughter. Little kids don't lie." Then I had to say "Oh ya you look great in that outfit and really young" while wishing to vanish into a hole in the ground.

I didn't experience anything that I considered to be "embarrassing" until I was about 16 at the youngest.

Hmm... interesting. This is a little counter-intuitive to my possible Aspie-ness, but I think I may actually have quite good theory of mind. My breakdown in social understanding must be related to something else.

When I was 5 or 6 (not sure of the exact age, I was still very young), my mom got lost while driving to the zoo. I could tell that she was distressed because she was pinching between her eyes and sighing a lot. I wanted to help, so I began to look around at the street signs. I couldn't make sense of what was going on, but apparently I told her something akin to: "Mommy, I'd try to help you, but I don't know how to read yet."

Here's an example a little more on-topic:
When I was 12, I wanted to watch Sailormoon. But for some reason, I thought that it was something that I "shouldn't be watching". So I pulled down the curtains and shut the door before I settled in to watch. Even before then, I had a very strong sense of what a girl should or shouldn't like. For example, I felt embarrassment that I liked Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I thought that was something only for boys, so logically I shouldn't be interested in it. But I was.

Anyhow, these sorts of behaviors continued and spread over time, to the point where I started just not telling people what my hobbies or interests were. Even now I have trouble with talking to people about what really interests me. This behavior didn't lessen my interest in whatever subject I was pursuing, but I just didn't want anyone to know and I still don't. Each time I feel like I'm committing some kind of "cardinal sin" by brushing over the details of what I spend most of my time doing. It's annoying at best.

I also used to regularly feel embarrassed when my parents would put the spotlight on me during conversations. "Oh, say something that fellow in Spanish!" It wasn't the act of saying something in a foreign language that bothered me. It was that it always felt horribly unnecessary and out of my control. It was their idea, why did I have to go along with it? I didn't mind it when they spoke for me because that meant I didn't have to participate in the conversation. Similarly, my perfectionist nature bristled at the thought of me butchering someone's language. I was good with languages, but I very clearly knew that there was a big gap between fluency and being able to say "this food is delicious".

I was surely embarrassed when I was placed in the center of interest of my peers by any reason, be it a compliment, around the age of 12.

The time of embarrassing myself might have begun when I went to high-school around the age of 13. Since then, I more and more noticed that I embarrass myself by my awkward/inappropriate behavior. Until then I might have thought that I was cool and smart or something, only my peers didn't understand me... Although, on PE classes, I always tried my best not to embarrass myself too much.

As for humiliating myself, Oh, it was my common practice at the age of 8-10. I played the role of 'the clown of the class', that was embarrassing to me, only it was years later...

I don't know exactly, but I would say age 6 or earlier, though perhaps I didn't get embarrassed by all the things I should have been embarrassed about until age 10 or so.
I didn't vote because I don't know when exactly.

i do not know what it really means to be "embarrassed".
i gather that it has something to do with "humiliation". i have asked many people to describe it for me but i still do not feel i truly understand.

what is "humiliation" ?. does "humiliation" mean to instill "humility" ?

people have said to me that "embarrassment" leads to "shame" but i also do not know what "shame" is.

some say that "shame" is the opposite of "pride". but that description does not help me either because i do not understand the notion of "pride". all these colors of perception that normal people have, i am blind to because i am emotionally color blind.

if i say something that is not understood by whoever i said it to, then it is them that heard wrong and not me who spoke wrong. why would i feel any negative whatever feelings about it?
people are animals anyway and whether or not i "click" with them is their problem and not mine.

i always feel utterly justified in emanating what i decide to present, and if someone or another does not like it (that is dislikes it), then they are reduced to insignificance in my deeper appraisal.

Wow. That sounds a whole lot like how I ask people to define certain emotions...(And then I'll ask for a million examples and I'll still ask again everytime the emotion is mentioned when someone talks to me) But it's just some emotions to me; embrarassment is very familiar to me. Umm. I think embarassment is more momentary and shame is more long term (but I'm not sure what long term emotions really mean, that they feel it constantly or just sometimes with it always being ready to jump out?) but they are pretty much the same thing otherwise? And humiliation would be the whole event causing a person to become embarassed? Does "humiliation" mean to instill "humility"? If it's intentionally caused by someone (like someone getting bullied?), I guess perhaps...Dunno.

EDIT: I think I got it now. I'll explain it with an example - some random kid gets bullied. Let's say this kid has bad teeth and he's aware of it and places some amount of importance on looks.

Shame = (GENERAL EMOTION) The kid feels bad and inferior to other kids due to his appearance.
Humilation = (EVENT) The bully goes to mock the kid's teeth in order to make him feel bad and inferior (= to instill humility in him in a very negative sense)
Embarassment (a) = (EVENT) The bully goes to mock the kid's teeth
Embarassment (b) = (EMOTION DUE TO THE EVENT) what the kid feels when being mocked (and what he feels is shame)

others;
Humility = Feeling inferior to others...but yet it's ought to be a positive emotion? I don't get it.
Pride = This would be feeling superior to others, then. And feelings can't really be explained, can they? Or at least I can't explain them. You can just kind of say whether they feel "good" or "bad", and I'd figure pride to feel "good", while embarassment/shame feels "bad". And "humility" is supposed to feel "good" which I don't get.

I was 5 when I first experienced embarassement. I've also moticed that a lot of NT get embarrassed about many of the things that I don't think are worth being embarrassed about, like chipping a nail or not being able to find their car keys.

No clue. But I did had that bad feeling during my early years of elementary school that being picked on, laughed at, and harassed by my peers was gonna be my life forever. I sure called that one.