Feeling uncomfortable with people around

Post Reply New Topic

Is it just AS or do I have other problems? I just feel uncomfortable with anybody around. I cannot concentrate on my work very well. For instance I like photography but I can't take good photos on the street. It seems that I cannot identify other people's approach as friendly.

I'm afraid it's impossible for us to tell you without meeting you, and I don't think anyone would diagnose you based on just what you've written here. You sound quite normal from your description.

You have as much information at your finger tips as the rest of us do, so you should probably look up the diagnostic criteria yourself (wikipedia.org) and see if you fit the picture.

I can't say whether it's AS or something else, but I'm the same way. For isnstance, I notice when I come early to a class that others are working on various bits of coursework while they wait for class to start. I can't do any serious reading or studying in public like that. I can read something light or I can work on a math puzzle or I can do a little knitting, but I can't concentrate on an academic reading in the midst of people.

Once, in a graduate seminar, someone treated me strangely because I was knitting a small piece before class started and said something to the effect that they wished they had time for something other than homework to fill their little bits of extra time. I responded that if I were able to focus on homework in the five minutes before class, I would, but if I tried to do so, that time would be wasted because I just can't focus like that in a little snip of time with everyone moving around and being distracting.

Some days, I don't even leave the house at all, even when I've got something I'm supposed to be doing, because being around other people is just too much to bear. I have wondered, myself, whether it's effects of the AS or whether I have something else additionally like some kind of agoraphobia or social phobia but when I read the descriptions of those, they are an awkward half-fit so I keep assuming it's to do with the asperger's that I've been diagnosed with. I wish I had a professional I could talk to about these things, but the only AS professional in this town who sees adults is too expensive and won't take my Medicaid.

You might be a person who cannot block out sensory input - maybe you could have a look at this -

Sensory-Processing Sensitivity (SPS)

I have that problem as part of my AS but I think it can be on its own. The books mentioned on that website are probably available at the library.

Oh, man. That site. I got kicked out of their forum years ago for some kind of social blunder I made and still only half understand. I apparently deeply offended many people and told I was a troll. I was there legitimately seeking help and support for my sensory issues. I hope they're more spectrum-accepting now than they were back then because I'm sure plenty of us end up over there at some point or another.

Good heavens that's terrible! I'm so sorry to hear it. You certainly don't sound like a troll to me. I never got involved with the website itself, just the books - actually I got the first book before she made the website. I only referred you to the website because it lists the books etc.

So - you know about the sensory issues? And that's why you shouldn't blame yourself for reduced efficiency amid sensory interference?

Yeah, I got involved in the forum. It was very shortly after I had been diagnosed with asperger's and I was still feeling upset and ashamed about it so I didn't try to explain myself or why I had gotten people so upset because I felt like it would just be viewed as a meaningless excuse or another troll.

The book list is a very useful resource, though!



I do. Though it's still difficult to feel okay about it when I'm not keeping up with those around me or when I have to explain why I can't or am unwilling to do something and I know I'm about to start explaining things that are so far outside of others' experiences that they won't even properly hear what I'm saying.

Sometimes I get so frustrated with it all that I just repeat "no thank you" as many times as I have to until they give up because it's easier to leave them confused and feeling there's something not quite right about me or even something rude about me than it is to even begin to try to explain myself and thus open myself to all the tiresome and sometimes humiliating questions.

I know I ought to be an "ambassador and advocate for my kind" but sometimes that's just too much pressure and I am tired of it all and just want to be and to be left to be.

Whoa! I'm taking therapy for exactly this! And I thought I was the only one.

**It seems that I cannot identify other people's approach as friendly.**

Exactly. Bingo. Bang on. And I never knew why. But if somebody approached me (and believe me, if you're walking a small poodle, people approach) I would be angry, even enraged. I didn't know why, couldn't figure it out. Except that people should mind their own business.

So what kind of problem is that?

I was hoping you'd know! The best I can do so far is puzzle out part of my childhood, when I was a scapegoat, and the "solution" was to forbid anybody to to speak to me. That way I was lonely but not bullied. So in my mind anyone who spoke to me was about to attack, which was true at the time. Still working on these unravellings, maybe it's something else, but this rings true. How about you?

Look like I have exactly the same history . Plus, I think I am awkward and I don't like people seeing my awkwardness.

I hate groups. I tend to avoid them like the plague.