Irritated by imprecise or unclear verbal communication

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I often get overly irritated when people are not precise or clear enough in what they're saying, or when they misunderstand me even though (in my mind) I have been very clear. An aspie thing? Can you relate to this?

Sometimes I have such a desperate need for clarity and precision that my tone of voice gets aggressive, and I know it's intimidating to the other person. I feel as if they're deliberately being vague to annoy me (even though rationally I know it's not true.)

Often if verbal communication is not clear, I feel totally lost and can't make any sense at all out of the communication.

I can relate. I was just ranting about this yesterday!

Thanks zombiegirl2010!

I'm a 33 year old female aspie too. Yay!

I get frustrated by lack of precision in communication, but then I think, maybe I'm a hypocrite because I also tend to say random, weird things that people don't expect or understand.

I hate imprecise and unclear communication. I hate when people say ambiguous things and then seem to want me to take those things as definitive. When given explanations or answers, I much prefer to have things stated concretely, clearly, and precisely.

I know I don't always succeed at such, and often my communication does not communicate what I want it to, but it doesn't help me in coping with it from others.

Yes!! ! This drives me absolutely insane!

My coaches for sports at school will give us these incredibly vague and frustrating "leading comments", expecting us to give them the next step in the process we are going through, but when I don't get it and ask them to clarify, they won't do it and expect me to understand their original prompt with the addition of yet more ambiguous commentary! It is maddening! I often end up feeling like an idiot, and randomly guessing until one of them, or my teammates, takes pity on me and gives a bit of clarification.

Yes, all the time.

At work, I often have to clarify "No, I said 'x' because I meant exactly 'x'", which is a little annoying when one is dealing with other technical IT people, who are supposed to be precision and detail-oriented. What they do is to "read between the lines" and assume I must have meant something else. Now, if someone thinks that something other than what I said would be a better course of action, of course I am willing to listen, but when they just assume I meant something other than what I said it wastes time and energy for me to get them back on the mental track they would have been on already if they had paid attention. I will admit that I did this a couple of times when I started in the industry because I thought I knew better, but I was quickly set straight, which was easy as it is a very natural mode of thinking to me.

When I play or train baseball I get vague instructions all the time and it would have been so easy to give precise ones. At practice once we did a live running/pickoff drill where the runner was supposed to turn around toward the outfield while a signal was given to the fielders so the runner wouldn't know the play. Every other runner "knew" when they were supposed to turn back around toward the pitcher, I just stood there waiting to be told because there would be no other way I could possibly know when they were finished giving the signal, since I wasn't looking! Another time, the coach had us do a balance drill where we would make throws while balanced on one leg. He said to balance on "your throwing leg". Well, I don't have a "throwing leg", I throw primarily with one of my arms, though both of my legs are involved. What he meant was "the leg on the same side as your throwing arm". If he had said "back leg" or "posting leg" then there would be no question in my mind what he meant, but "throwing leg"? That's just completely useless as an instruction.

I live on a hippie commune. "Non-violent communication" usually means disapproval, aggression, envy goes underground into meretricious rhetoric. I'd call it a private language but, since they all share it, I'll have to acknowledge the private language is mine. If I call my words "poetry" I get slack. Often I say something "poetic" and I receive pitying glances. When I say something that "makes sense," it's usually met with consternation. I'm nocturnal, that works out best for them & me.