interests / obsessions

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I am very commonly told to "stop obsessing". For example, I became quite interested in the recent riots in England - this was partly due to my having a friend in Birmingham at the time - anyway I spent hours on the internet, looking for more information on the situation, what caused it, similar events in the past (apparently rioting is not totally uncommon in England, which I didn't know), ended up learning about the socio-political-economic factors involved in UK rioting over the past 50 years. A few days ago my family learned that a friend who was a Marine in Afghanistan had been seriously injured; while others were coping by shoving food and alcohol into their mouths, I took to the internet to work out where exactly he had been when it happened, information that is sorta-kinda "secret", although I think "not readily available" would be more accurate since I did in fact figure it out. Anyway I was told to "stop obsessing". HOW is this a worse response than drinking??? At least I ended up with information instead of a hangover....

I also encounter amazement that I can be so interested in a single topic. My thing right now is WWII aircraft and I have several dozen DVDs on the subject. I watch one or more of them every single night. And of course I also snag every book, magazine, newspaper article, or anything at all related to WWII aircraft that I come across. I understand that most people don't do this, but I don't understand why it's so hard to understand. To me it's like being really, really thirsty - dehydrated even - and coming across cold water...I mean, could you ever really get enough? That's how I feel about my interest, I literally could not ever get enough of it.

Anyway, is anyone else ever told to stop obsessing? Do people understand your interests, has anyone ever asked you whether you don't already know everything there is to know about x topic, or how you're not sick of it yet? (I'm not even referring to the "shutup about airplanes already" type of reaction, b/c we all know [intellectually at least] that most people don't want to hear all about it.)
I hope this poll works, I have never made one before

Maybe I'm an oddity (even amongst other aspies) but I never talk about my interests and obsessions to anyone. I've always mulled over them in my head constantly. But I never felt compelled to tell anyone about them.

Might be because I don't talk about much at all as I'm one of the "silent" aspies rather than one who goes on and on about anything. Or maybe I feel that some of my obsessions could get me thrown in the psych ward if anyone found out.

Well, first, there may or may not be something wrong with your poll setup. First I tried to vote "not applicable, I keep it on the downlow" (which may, btw, not be a very good way to put it: "the downlow" has a sexual meaning, too, which might well be a genuine obsession), and when I hit "Submit", the page it took me to said that the page I wanted could not be found. This may just be a similar phenomenon to the message "your browser sent an instruction that this server could not understand", which I get rather frequently: I just get where I'm going from another direction. I got to vote by voting "suitably impressed", which operated properly.

My first try was really more applicable, though, because I don't go on and on about my special interests: many people don't even know that I have them. But I'm delighted when one of them does brush by the conversation, and I can put in something really abstruse of my arcane knowledge, or merely useful, and then people _are_ suitably impressed.

Ooooops! I see that one "downlow" vote did come up: that might have been mine. But it still said zero when my "suitably impressed" vote already showed. I dunno.

People are amazed and impressed by the amount of knowledge I have pertaining to my interests. I've never been told to "stop obsessing" over anything, but a couple of my more controversial obsessions (such as The Salem Witch Trials) have been met with disdain.

I don't talk about them. They're like a secret part of me, that would feel tainted if I revealed any of it to the people I know.
My best friend is an exception, and she actually likes hearing about my fictional world.

I'm not very talkative and I don't like talking much, especially to people who are not interested or not really listening, so I rarely talk much about my special interests. Very few people know how obsessed I am with them.

People are generally impressed by my extensive knowledge on some subjects, but many are also amused by my geekiness or think it's weird.

When I was younger, I normally hid my obsessions... In my teenage years, I tried opening up a bit, and most people thought I was kind of eccentric/weird but otherwise they seemed fine with it. However, my dad, who was verging on obsessive about being normal and having me fit in, grew to really hate me and my interests. He'd get really angry and scream at me about what a freak I was. Eventually I just went back to keeping them to myself again. I care about them a lot, and I've found that my life's actually a lot less stressful if I don't talk about them.

People are generally amazed at the knowledge I have on roller coasters. Roller coasters have been a special intense interest of mine since I was a little child. By the time I was in high school I had memorized (without trying) the statistics of every roller coaster in North America.

I don't talk about mine all that much as in the past people have looked down on me or roll their eyes.

I only really talk about my interests with my friends, and even then I do it rarely because of bad experiences in the past. I'm lucky that my current friends usually just think it's funny. Like today a friend mentioned she was going to see a musical that I'm currently obsessing over one song that's in it, and I complained that no one shared my very specific interest in that one song and would talk about it or at least let me talk about it. And she laughed, but I think it was in a nice way, not a mean way. She didn't tell me to shut up, and I really tried to talk about it like I was kidding.

I learned long ago that most people aren't interested, so generally I keep them to myself. But I am fortunate in having a couple of relatives who, though they take no interest the subject matter of my interests, understand that they're important to me, and patiently suffer my monologues, within reason.

My special interests have been met with disdain by my family. I always got in trouble for talking about them all the time, and my parents thought that the only way that I could be normal was not to talk about my special interests. At the age of 14, my mum told me that she was embarrassed to take me out in public and that people gave us looks when we were out, because of the way I opened up when I heard somebody talking about one of my special interests. I didn't want to go anywhere with her for a very long time, after she told me that. It made me hate myself to the point of suicidal feelings. My mum even asked how come I don't go to the mall with her, anymore. I told her that I didn't want to embarrass her, anymore.

I was spending the week at my parents trailer two years ago, this week. My mum told me that I wasn't going to obsess and every time I told her that I wasn't going to see Austin Powers 4 and that I was going to listen to my favourite music at home, she told me that I was obsessing again, and she told me not to do it. She even got mad at me for saying the word, Bloody and she got all impatient with me and told me, "I think that you've gone from one fantasy to another. You're a Canadian. You were born in Canada. Act Canadian! How hard can it be? Is it really that hard for you to do that?" I was wandering in the field with a vacant look on my face, and my mum asked me what was wrong. I told her that I was looking at pointers on the Internet on how to be more of a Canadian in order to make her happy. I told her that I could be one of the guys and watch the hockey game on TV with the guys at Stepping Stones on Friday Nights. My mum said, "You're not one of the guys, you're a young woman!" Being reminded of my gender pissed me off, so I told her that I could cook a beaver and eat it.

Three nights later she was bitching at me again when I was wearing my Kinks T-Shirt and listening to music on YouTube. She came marching up to me and she said, "This is the worse that I've ever seen you. You've been here for five days and all that you've done is this!" pointing at the computer screen when I was listening to The Kinks. "You have a one track mind! I've never seen you this way! If you don't get better, you're going to end up in the hospital. You've been talking to yourself and about yourself since you've got here. It's been all you, you, you!" I got up and left the room and I tried to sleep, knowing that my mum was embarrassed to have a firstborn "Daughter" who grew up to look and be just like Mick Avory. I even went the distance to tell Jenny McCarthy's clone, "Mum, I have something to say to you and you're not going to like it. Mick Avory is my favourite Kink. He's always been my favourite Kink. I wish that I would have told you that back in 1998. He can be quite the little rebel. You should have been there to see how quickly I've calmed down, after I said that to my mum. I was actually able to sleep and I didn't mumble to myself anymore.

I was in Emergency at my Langley Memorial for a night one Saturday, the first week that I was home from my parents place. Why, because a bimbo by the name of Teresa phoned the ambulance on me. The paramedics got me and than they asked Barbie why they were taking me to the hospital. Barbie hissed, "She's obsessed with The Kinks!" I went into a long monologue to the counselor at the hospital about my special interests, The Kinks, Mick Avory being my role model and if I want to dress like The Kinks did in the 60s, I can. I also added some details about how Mick Avory and I had similar childhood experiences being tormented by adult authority figures for being highly sensitive children and how we both had medicine balls thrown at us by authority figures. Him by his gym teacher and me by my dad. The counselor had a talk with my mum and they both decided that I didn't need to be in the hospital and that I should be at home. I told my mum that Teresa put me in the hospital because I'm obsessed with The Kinks and she told me not to hang out with her, anymore. That was a turning point for my mum and I, and we've understood each other a lot more since than.

I'm into aircraft too. It used to be just WWII aircraft especially the Spitfire, P-50 Mustang, Wildcat, Sturmovik and the German planes were pretty cool too...ME 109 I think was a good one. My memory is hazy. Now I like the most modern day craft though I will always love the MiG 21. I've got a book called Air Force that shares certain operations in the RAAF (Royal Australian Air Force) and goes into detail about the planes. So far, they've just been describing cargo planes.

I think it's great that you are learning about socio-economic issues. Maybe you'll begin learning about other political issues. I've been through all that - anarchism, socialism - I was even obsessed with the Soviet Union at some point.

People are impressed with my knowledge but I've been told that I'm just getting obsessed and need to get on with my life. Lately, though my mum has been really encouraging. She is planning to take me to an Air Museum in town. We live really close to an Air Base. She is even encouraging me to buy model planes. I'm moving away soon so I guess the stress of me growing up is off her shoulders a bit.

I've also learnt how to talk about other things that are not my interests, although most things I talk about have to potential to become an interest. I may also just give little tidbits of my interests, like a 'did you know' fact.

My advice to people if they want people to ease up on them is this: Try not to always be about your interests, maybe get into many interests and watch a lot of news and read various things so you'll be able to share with people. You may not want to but the result is people give you less grief about being obsessed. You can still have your interests but people will leave you alone with them.
People are just concerned that you're missing out on the world. They think just because they like to socialise that you do too or they want you to learn more skills so you'll be able to be independent one day.