Faking NT

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Excellent.

Are you referring to simply 'mirroring' non-autistic behavior?

TheSunAlsoRises

I think so. Like conscious copying. Look, someone said something, and eberryone is smiling a little. I have no idea why they are all doing that. What was said wouldn't have made me smile a little, but lemme just paint on this same facial eggspression anyway at this party where I am trying to meet people at school or work. Hmmm, they all have one corner of lips turned up a little and the other corner kinda flat, lemme put that onto my face too, I am sure that what they are all doing is what you are supposed to be doing in reaction to this thing that was said. Sometimes, even the copying fails, as you are hesitating over whether or not to copy this look, and you end up with a muddled confused look on your face, or you imagine that such a look is on your face, you don't know since you can't see yourself making it without an actual mirror over there.

Last edited by btbnnyr on 18 Mar 2012, 8:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Manipulating others so they'll think about you differently? ^^ I think the "faking" sometimes comes really close to that. I don't want to change the truth, because it doesn't change anything. I think a lot of this faking is just convention...


Yeah, that's what happens, I guess.

Because you don't see the point why you should do it.

I often have the feeling that I know why people are faking it, but I do not understand why they are doing it. Is it reall worth it?

I fake NT all the time, and it drives me absolutely crazy. It's paid off though, I appear really NT in some situations. To many at school, I'm just "quirky". I only really stim at home, though I flick pens in school. Also, I cannot pay attention that well thanks to the ADD co-morbidity.

I only tried to consciously copy others for a few years before it burned me out.

The other half of faking NT is repressing autistic behaviors and your reactions to what people say and do, and that part is nearly impossible for me. That's the part that makes you look socially inappropriate and really weird instead of just quiet or reserved or shy if you don't put on the NT behaviors while successfully repressing the autistic behaviors and your true self driving those behaviors.

I don't spend much time around people I don't know, so I get to act like myself (weird) most of the time.
If I'm in a crowded place I just be quiet and try to focus on walking "normally" and keeping my facial expressions "normal". I tend to smile at people who pass by, because I like to watch peoples reactions, and see how many people smile back and what kind of people tend to to it more than others, like a little game to make me forget about being outside.
If I'm walking with someone I know and trust then I try and talk to them as much as I can to block out the people around me, but I'm aware of how I look... My partner says I act like a little kid.

When I HAVE to talk to a stranger, I have my "adult voice" and I speak in full sentences and say things like "rather" and "quite" a lot. I respond to their questions in detail and have a list of generic small-talk questions for when the conversation goes slow "are you working/studying""what kind of music do you like""do you play computer games" I steer clear of questions about religion or politics unless they bring it up first.
I am aware that NTs don't tend to answer questions in detail, and that when they ask a question they don't always actually want to know the answer. But, I think the fact that I do answer back and ask questions makes people think that I find socialization easy.

I force myself to make eye-contact atleast every 6th or 7th word and hold it for from 3 to 5 words at a time, but make sure i break it up because i know staring makes people uneasy. but i get confused when i notice that they have kept their eyes on me without breaking contact for a long time because I wonder if they think i'm rude for breaking contact but don't want to start staring for fear that they mistake it for attraction... I don't know, eye-contact is hard.

Because i grew up assuming i was like everyone else i didn't really take much notice of how much focus i actually use to keep up a conversation and (try) to make it feel natural. I learned to put a bit of tune into my sentences, emphasize words and change tone.

I like to think I can fake being normal but I know that people notice i'm different.

I don't think it's very wise to repress autistic behaviors especially self stimulation or stimming. I think such behaviors should be looked upon as an expression of emotional states which result in external behaviors.

To instruct an Autistic child not to stim could be the equivalent of telling a non-Autistic child not to smile, not to laugh, not to cry or not to show pain. IF a non-Autistic child laughs too much or expresses anger inappropriately, methods are not used to totally rid the non-autistic child of how they express their emotional state(s).

Non-Autistics are taught to self-regulate emotions(and resultant behaviors) and so should Autistic children.

Stimming is more than just some type of behavioral addiction used to release endorphins or an arbitrary byproduct of a neurological condition. These are behaviors tied to the Autist emotional state, thus psychological well-being.

*Let's start the more stimming less meltdown campaign

*as usual an opinion and should be taken as such

TheSunAlsoRises

I think that forcing autistic children to repress stimming is and should be recognized as a form of torture. For an NT to understand what not stimming feels like for autistic people who need to stim, we should strap them to a table, then have someone sit on their chest or several people press down on them, and ask them how they feel about being forced to feel like that all the time. Some descriptions of not stimming are even worse than this. This is just one eggsperience of mine.

Another thing about faking NT is that you have to know what is NT in order to fake NT. Some of my problems faking NT are that I have no idear about this. Someone says something to me, and I have no idear what the one or several socially appropriate responses would be. So I go with my instinctive response, but often, that response is not one of the socially appropriate ones. It is either considered socially inappropriate and causes others to form a negative opinion of me, or it is considered weird and causes others to ignore me in the future. But I also don't know how others took my comments, only that there might have been some pause in response, this pause suggesting that something did not go well just now.

I feel like thats what I do as well. I keep a conscious internal filter on. I should not say or do this.

Actually, this seems to happen to me a lot. "Caught faking" doesn't describe it, but it's weird how people try to impose all kinds of expectations and attitudes onto me that they don't expect from others who are not autistic. There must be some reason my sister can get away with having a screaming fit, accusing people of random BS, and slamming her door (and I mean she is 39 years old now, and she is like this) but if I don't walk out of the living room with the proper attitude (I am not sure what the proper attitude is, just told I was doing it wrong), I will get lectured about how I was too angry when I left.

That's one example out of a multitude that's happened to me. In general, it seems like there are a vast variety of double-standards at play, and that apparently if I can properly present as NT, then I would know what these double-standards are and allegedly comply with them, or find acceptable ways to break them. Mostly, I am unaware of them until someone gets fussed over something trivial and stupid.

I can't imagine faking NT. Without being able to understand emotions at all and being inable to learn it, I probably couldn't fake it. But I guess some people enjoy me as I am since when I go to a sparsely filled bar, people end up buying me food and drinks.

^^THIS^^

You just have to learn what's expected and do as much as you're capable of. Hell, I didn't know what autism meant until I was 45, so as far as I knew I was normal, just really bad at it.

Being forced to function in social settings drains my battery really fast and leaves me wiped out for hours or days afterward, and I suck at it even on a good day.

I can't "fake" anything, I am what I am, FU if ya don't like it. This is all I got.

I can get on with most people well enough when I need to. Its management types and other control freaks who can't stand me, because they can't bend me to their will, like a pliable tool. When I tell them "I can't do that," what they seem to hear is "I'm refusing to do that, just to p*ss you off."