social skills just as good as NT's when younger...

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When you were younger, like when you were a kid in elementary school, did you feel like your social skills were pretty much just as good as everyone else, like at the same level, and maybe even better then some people in a way? I feel like that was the case with me. When I was in elementary school, I still had my odd quirks and obvious ASD traits, but I felt like my social skills were at the same level as everyone else in my grade and I could fit in fairly easily. Now looking back after graduating from high school, I often feel like everyone's social progress surpassed me by a long shot, as if I was ahead in a race and then all the other runners suddenly cought up and then all passed me, even the slow runners. Do you feel like your social progress in comparison to others was like that too?

Nope. I never had any social skills, nor any particular interest in socializing. My mother tells stories of how hard she tried to put me in social situations and get me to interact with other kids and I would still go off into the corner and play by myself.

In the first grade, I became quite the class clown, acting out and being ridiculous, to try and feel like I was fitting in, but I realized very quickly that the other kids were laughing at me, but not with me. I might be entertaining to them, but they did not become my friends. So I remained isolated and apart all my life, other than one friend in Junior High.

We moved to a small town when I was finishing High School and I made a few friends, but only because they befriended me. Any social skills I have today, I developed then, but the ability to insert myself into a social situation or group and blend in with the crowd is a skill I still do not have.

Of course, your situation begs the question - if you suffer from a disability that impairs your ability to read and interpret the nonverbal signals of others, how do you know you were ever socially functional? Maybe you just thought you were fitting in, because nobody told you any different.

I think I have always had social issues but they were not as prominent when I was younger until I was older when kids really started to change. I was surprised at what small children know when I was reading an Asperger book and I forget what it was called but I read at age six, children can do white lies to spare feelings and I didn't do that at that age. I was just flat out honest and said what I thought. I was not even aware such thing existed as a child until my therapist told me when I was 17. At age four, kids starts to understand not everyone likes what they like and not everyone thinks as them or knows the same thing as them so that is why they can past the Sally Ann test.

Kids always came to me so that was how I got friends. I rarely got friends from going to them first. But if a new family moved into the house where my old friends lived, I would go over there just to play and be their friend. I always had the skill to do what other kids were doing like if kids were playing jump rope, I knew to wait in line for my turn. If everyone was in a room playing, I would just start playing with a toy alone.

Yes,my social skill was good until 14. actually I
have mediocre social skills,I get by

My social skills were not better. Socialization was easier.

Hell no

Kicked out by my public school after 2nd grade. After a stint in private school I was alowed back by the administration but not by my peers as it was bully time

When I was in elementary school, I knew I was different. I just didn’t understand why. At one point, I remember convincing myself, “Rocket – If you could just be better at kickball, everything will work itself out”. LOL.



I can relate to that.



This is my experience as well.

I did better on the social scene when I was younger, too. I wouldn't say it's because I had more skills, but socializing just wasn't nearly as complicated. On top of that, because it was less complicated and I was doing better, I had more confidence about it and thus I socialized more. Fourth or fifth grade was when I started having real trouble. Middle school got a lot worse. During eighth grade I would just sit there quietly in my classes grumbling in my mind about how stupid and obnoxious everyone else was. I had a table I sat at, but I wasn't close to anyone there, and couldn't seem to jump into conversations properly. And of course, the social difficulties had already been setting in around later sixth grade.

For me it just seems to be a matter of adult socializing versus child socializing. Even now I still get along really well with younger children (better than most people actually) because there is so much less to worry about; considering they still haven't mastered things like eye contact, themselves, I have less difficulty and my awkwardness doesn't end up being noticed as much. I also interact better with adults than with my peers, because they are less judgmental...and usually have more appreciation for my more 'mature' way of speaking, if that makes sense. I ended up analyzing inertia and force in a conversation with my friend the other day and got some weird/confused looks. Although I sort of get the feeling that once I grow up, speaking with adults will be almost if not just as bad as speaking to teenagers right now.

Yeah, things were a lot easier as a kid, for a number of reasons. Kids arent so judgemental for one thing, they dont really discriminate on looks, or race or any of the silly superficial things adults do. Also with age comes self awareness and that brings its own problems. Things were fine for me up until halfway through secondary school, thats when most kids start forming a real sense of self and identity, splitting into social groups etc. That didnt really happen for me until much later, and even then it never really happened fully. Therefore i still dont ever really fit in, even with the people I share lots of interests with. Also kids are naturally more confidant as theyve (mostly) never had much happen to them to affect this. With age comes disappointment, heartache, rejection and bullying, all of which have an effect on your self esteem and ability to express yourself and communicate with others.

kids in elementary are too young to care about social hierarchies and who has more merit than who and things like that. they start caring once they hit like 6th or 7th grade.

I disagree. I noticed patterns of behavior much earlier than that.

My social skills were definitely flawed, but I wasn't particularly aware of it. I just thought the other people around me were mean or stupid. I didn't really start becoming aware of my social ineptitude until I was in high school.

Before even reading the other responses, I will say I feel the same way about my experience. When I was 19 (I'm 31 now) that's when I was starting to really have issues and then I started self mutilation and seeming really off, distant and stressed to people that were close and family members. I did have some other strange explainable things happening at that time, episodes of *something*, a nothingness I can't explain, often with temporary memory loss, but I do know there was a sudden change where everyone else kept going and I remember I said something to my girlfriend one time during a breakdown that "everyone else seems to be more complicated than me!! Everyone is more advanced!! I'm not sure how or why!! !"

But what made me respond immediately without reading the other responses: I do notice your RDOS image looks similar to mine... (on the NT side of the image, my social is at 4, hunting is at 6, two very sharp spikes) But instead for you your NT spikes seem to be social and perception. On my result, There's one little spike on the NT side for social, and I bet that might be because under all this struggle we are still extroverts, we are still interested and wanting to be around other people. ....Or maybe we were before we noticed what was really going on around us.

One of my parents used that phrase a lot growing up. I still have a hard time telling the difference.

That is profound and sobering.

This could definitely be the case as well. I watched a Seinfeld stand-up comedy routine (This link brings you to the exact line in youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7JcGYilsuE#t=22)where he was talking about how kids make friends fast and adults are not often like this. I am finding even people with similar interests are hard to relate to at 32, I always know that even though people are connecting, I respect that they might not connect 100%, so that I'm not disappointed when there's a disagreement or disconnection on something.