Social people.

Post Reply New Topic

There is this student with Asperger's, and a woman in the disability IT room, at uni. They like me and initiate social encounters with me.

I thought I would see what it's like to do social stuff at uni, so I talked to them.

I found it so overloading.

They kept socialising. They keep initiating social sessions with me.

I cannot cope with it. I don't want to socialise with them.

But I'm a polite person. I don't want to offend them.

I had a meltdown when I got home today from uni, after they spent over an hour with me.

How do I tell them to leave me alone without being rude?

I'm considering trying to avoid them but the disability IT room is the only safe place in uni without my support worker. My support worker had to leave just after my lecture today. I had to stay in uni for a couple of hours after the lecture because there was a planned water supply outage at my house today during lunchtime; I had to stay at uni to have access to water, toilet etc. It didn't make sense to go home straightaway when I could stay at uni, use the limitless free paper printing and have access to water and a toilet.

I was planning a quiet time in the disability IT room but EVERY single time the IT woman is there, I am sucked into this socialising session that ends me up with a migraine and a meltdown. And now this student likes me too!

How do I tell her to stop it? I want to be alone.

Just tell her that, sometimes, you would like to be alone.

Do so in a "nice" manner.

Tell her you have to concentrate on what was said in the previous lecture.

Things that have worked for me in the past are:

- Sitting in a different place.
- Listening to music, or just wear headphones so people think you are listening to music.
- Tell them you feel like being on your own today.
- Tell them you don't mean to be rude, but you're just trying to concentrate.

All of these have worked and failed, and people still continue to talk to me. It's infuriating and seemingly unavoidable.

But you believe in "Hello!"

So that's why I've grown up with this reluctance to quickly get friendly with people, this feeling that I'll let them down if I set the bar too high. I wouldn't mind betting this was a common Aspie predicament.

I'd consider faking a bad headache or two, to buy time to think of a way out. If it's just the one person, it'll be easier. Definitely important to take some control over the situation. Really if you need to work, it's OK to insist that people respect that. It would only be seen as unreasonable if you refused to say a word. I think most ASDers find it less stressful to be with people when they've been around a while. Maybe if you don't reduce the interaction right down to zero, you'll end up enjoying the company?

I'll try those suggestions.

I would consider telling them directly that I am prone to migraines, and sometimes I just need things to be quiet.

Treat the disability IT room as a study room. I assume there are tables and chairs. Sit furtherest away from everybody else and open up your books and read. If anybody comes over to you politely tell them you are studying and don't want to be disturbed.

Would the library be a better choice for you? There may also be tutorial rooms in your department that are not used at lunchtimes etc and your head of department might give permission for you to use them at set times.

Migraine excuse good idea. Disability IT room computers, tables and chairs. Hard to avoid people it's not very large. Will try library but busy at lunchtime and not open until 08:45 in the morning. Will ask support worker to help me find a room, maybe disability services might know.

My uni tutor is fed up with me.