Being asked "What are you thinking?"

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From time to time, and almost at random, my g/f asks me this question "What are you thinking?" and maybe its a perfectly reasonably thing for her to ask, but it makes me really uncomfortable because a) I consider my thoughts private, at least to the extent that I don't always want to share them with others and shouldn't be made to and b) she has a great tendency to ask me this when I'm really not thinking of anything, or thinking of stuff I certainly don't want to share with her. So I find myself either making stuff up on the fly when she asks, which sucks because I don't want to lie to her, or telling her "nothing really" which I can tell doesn't really satisfy her.

Is it normal for her to be asking me this all the time? How do the rest of you deal / cope if so? Does it make you uncomfortable too?

I am a NT woman and yes it is pretty normal that she asks and usually it means she feels you are disconnected from her and wants to feel connected again. It does not literally mean she wants to know exactly what you are thinking at that exact second. Even saying something like "nothing important, I was just lost in my thoughts" and then trying to turn your attention to her in some way like asking how her day was or something like this, may satisfy her and may make her feel you are connected again. Again, NT unspoken language , I hope this helps you.

I think it's a bit intrusive. It's one thing to share your thoughts, another to have someone attempting to scoop them out of your head. Thoughts that I don't 'package' for delivery are difficult to talk about, I find they are elusive and hard to shape and transmit spontaneously.

LOL Moog, she probably does not really want to know his thoughts. She just wants to feel connected and I know this is not always easy with an Aspie. NT keep many of their thought for themselves too, I know I do. But with that question we usually mean "Can you please connect with me? I feel you are on another planet". So if he can make an effort to reconnect with her, she will be happy.

My partner has started asking me this question and I really hate it. He usually asks me it when I'm either not thinking about anything or when I'm thinking about something I'd rather not talk about. It makes me feel very uncomfortable and don't know how to deal with it.

I always thought it was one of those questions you're supposed to answer with something gushy like "I was just thinking about how nice you look/how much i love you, etc."

I get asked that by every guy. I don't like being asked it much. You can't always put your thoughts into words. Most of the time I'm just thinking random garbage like "I'm hungry" or "whats that smell"

The first guy i was with back in 2004 was really bad with it, he would ask it ALL the time trying to be "deep" when h wasnt and it really really annoyed me. Usually buy others it just gets asked when they want a general opinion on something.

My mom and brother ask me the same thing, and my feelings/reactions about it are the same as yours.

Moog I know sometimes our garbage gets in the way of saying things in a nice way. If we all could just be straightforward and nice to each other. Unfortunately, NT rely up to 80% on body language, facial expressions and behavior in their communication. To undo that it is a lot of work, probably as much as it is for an Aspie to try to learn some of NT unspoken language. But first and for most she needs to know that her boyfriend is an Aspie so she can learn to communicate in a much more straightforward way, without the hidden meanings that we use so much.

"Thoughts"

Cuts straight to the mustard

My late wife and me used to say
"PING" and the other would respond
"ACK" for those non-nerds it is
computer speak.

People would ask me that when I'm not thinking anything at all (or nothing really important) so when I say "nothing" they don't believe me. D:

when ask me what think I say just whatever is in
front of me, I'd say I'm thinking about finishing
these potatoes and I wish I had more mustard
on them.

Just for example if that is what was in front
of me.

Moog, it is kind of garbage cause it is our wounds and our insecurities that always make us assume the worst. If we could just step back and think that maybe the person in front of us just did not get us, everything would be much easier. But because we have been hurt by people, we have been treated like crap sometimes and some people have used us or whatever (I am sure most people can say that they have experienced at least some of this), then a behavior that a NT reads as "I don't care about you" triggers a defensive reaction.

That's why it is so important to me that Asperger is discloseed. Second the NT has to make an effort of revising his/her assumptions of what certain behaviors mean, cause most lilely they do not mean the same thing for an Aspie. It is like two people from two different countries speaking different languages, they have to find a way of communicating that can be understood by both. I am glad I could help. Maybe I can become the official translator of NT behavior and yes I am NT, whatever that means.