Some struggles

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I hate to use the phone, unless I have a technical thing to discuss. I get very anxious and avoid it. When I am on the phone, if the person I am dealing with is negative, I just don't know what to do. I can't negotiate or look for options.

Sometimes, a situation gets too complicated and I seem just incapable of dealing with it and become sort of paralyzed. I can really let people down when this happens, but I really can't do anything about it.

Sometimes, I can't do something and can't explain exactly why, but when I'm asked to explain it, I sort of panic and make up some explanation of why the thing is impossible--but it's bogus. The thing is possible, just not for me at that moment.

Often I can't remember peoples names, even people I know quite well. Sometimes I can't connect the person standing in front of me to the information in my memory about them. It's very awkward. It's like a word on the tip of your tongue--the identity on the tip of the mind. I think I completely alienated an old friend this way--he thought I was insane or on drugs--and I could not find a way to explain why I did not, at that moment, know his name.

Does anyone else experience anything like this? Are these related to autism?

I can relate somewhat. People think I'm slow because I don't know how to respond properly, so I just give them a blank smile. As for the telephone, I hate it and use it as little as possible.
I don't forget names so much as have poor recall in general. It's very bad with time, but I know that feeling when you know the info is there, but can't access it. I still hear about when I didn't realize it was the day of my wedding, because the date was mixed up in my head. I would guess it could be autism related, but anxiety exaggerates it.

I'm not a shrink....but I was under the impression that some issues with names were co-morbid with face blindness.....

Many of the exprerences here also sound like verbal processing speeds, which is where there is "probably" an issue relating directly to ASDs. Several theories lay out that ASDs feature slower verbal response processing speed, partiarlly in large groups.

That's to be expected, if your brain is wired to generate a correct and accurate response to an issue, which would come in handy if you're facing a critical problem. If social obligations impose a requirement to fire off a quasi-accurate response on a comparatively minor issue, that's a socially-imposed issue with a slower verbal response processing speed.