The fundamental difference between AS and NT people is ....

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...the ability to control emotions. I have thought about this long and hard. This is based on my own experiences and other people's experiences that I have read on this board. NT people are able to control their emotions a lot easier than AS people. We are sensitive to everything around us. This causes our emotions to control us. My mother and aunt are both on the spectrum. They are both emotionally unstable. I think back to all my failings in life and I can say that my emotions brought me down. Whether I said or did the wrong thing, my emotions got in the way.

When I try to be calm and control my emotions, I can think a lot clearer. When emotions get in the way, it takes away the ability of your personality to speak and causes the mind to take over. This is not natural. This brings forth another difference between AS and NT people. NT people don't think all the time. It is their personalities that are speaking. That is why it is so easy for them to socialize. I put myself in those previous situations that I have failed and think how I would react given this state of mind without emotions. Things would have turned out a lot different.

Our emotions control us. This is why we fail miserably in social and other situations.

I encourage everyone to analyze themselves and their past actions.

Has anyone else thought about this?

Your point is valid, in theory. However, it's easier said than done.

How do you control emotions around people who belittle you, don't think you'll get very far and constantly remind you of that?

Wouldn't you feel angry and fed up?

Sometimes I just think I've had enough. I've been feeling a bit suffocated lately.

That is so true...

I agree with you on that part.

I think everybody has trouble controlling emotions. With us, though, it has the capacity to exacerbate our condition.

I think the fundamental difference between NT people and AS people is focus and extremes.

By that I mean that AS and NT people are the same. They all share insecurities, emotions - you can tell an NT person that when you get overwhelmed you just can't think. Most NTs will say "Yes, me too" But the difference is that the AS person may become overwhelmed much faster or with less stimulus, and may meltdown in an extreme way.

The NT focuses, the AS FOCUSES. It's much more extreme.
The NT gets sad, the AS gets despondent. I have compared notes with several NTs with this exact discussion and for everything I say, they agree, but on a scale of 1 to 10 my reaction is a 9 or 10 (overly focused and overly extreme) and theirs typically would be a 4 or 5.

NTs have trouble controlling their emotions too. But we have more extreme reactions based on focus, I believe.

When emotions take control, it "lifts" you from reality and the ability to think clearly. I don't know how else to describe it. Concentrate on bringing yourself down back down to reality. When an NT is disrespected, they deal with it by not talking to the person. Ignoring the person. Not responding to them when the person tries to talk to them. This is not a conscious effort. They are unable to show respect towards that person. Why are they unable to do this? Because they remain in reality. They can not show respect to that person anymore.

How do we react? With our emotions. Our emotions lift us from reality to deal with the disrespect.

The positive of bringing yourself down to reality is you can think clearer and deal with things better. The downside is you feel a lot of emotions. Mine are almost unbearable and still can be a distraction to my thinking. It is understandable that my emotions would remove me from this reality. I feel a lot of insecurity. I feel a lot of negative feelings when I do this. However, I believe it is possible to deal with the feelings. How?

Compartmentalize your emotions. Put them in a compartment where they won't effect you. That is another difference between NT and AS people. They feel the same emotions, but they are not effected by them. They automatically compartmentalize them.

I know the answer.

Brain damage.

NTs dont' have trouble controlling their emotions. They feel the same emotions as us and it doesn't effect them nearly as much as it does AS people. Of course they have a breaking point where emotions will take over. But their threshold is much higher.



It is likely the sole catalyst for our condition. The one common trait that all AS people have is we are easily effected by our emotions and overly sensitive. This is because we are unable to manage our emotions. The question is. Do we have the ability to effectively manage our emotions?

Last edited by InSpades on 22 Nov 2007, 5:53 am, edited 5 times in total.

You are likely right about that. Our brains just do not have the natural ability to manage these emotions. It might be possible to compensate though.

Few people on this board will admit to this, but the reality is AS is a form of psychosis.


From Wikipedia:

Stedman's Medical Dictionary defines psychosis as "a severe mental disorder, with or without organic damage, characterized by derangement of personality and loss of contact with reality and causing deterioration of normal social functioning."

Last edited by InSpades on 22 Nov 2007, 4:58 am, edited 2 times in total.

An emotion can fixate me on something that an NT would be over in a much shorter time. What the emotion actually is I don't know but I think it might be extreme frustration if frustration is an emotion.

I dont agree. i am told I am the most emotionally stable person in my family, and that i am also a dead calm sort. I was a bouncer for 4 years, and you dont do that if you cannot keep your feelings in check.

Your appear to be dead calm because you are removed from reality. When you are removed from reality, you don't show emotion. Don't confuse the appearance of being dead calm with being emotionally stable.

We are all that way. Everyone with AS has had someone tell them they are quiet and don't show emotion. We deal with not being able to manage our emotions by removing ourselves from reality. When we are removed from reality we aren't effected by things around us , so we don't show emotion.

Last edited by InSpades on 22 Nov 2007, 5:16 am, edited 2 times in total.

I've been trying to analyze my...social interaction from the past to present, to find and remember the emotions I felt/feel, it all returns to the discussions I have with my psychiatrist:

I become fearful in social situations due to the discomfort they cause, much like when you hear sounds that you don't like (sensory troubles); I experience the same discomfort, but from a different cause.

Discomfort equates to fear; I avoid discomfort due to my [real] fear of the pain social situations cause by avoiding them (not that I can interact at all socially, I can't).

Last edited by Danielismyname on 22 Nov 2007, 5:53 am, edited 1 time in total.

I am extremely, painfully, emotional; but I believe that has more to do with psychotic illness than Asperger's. I don't know about AS, but certainly to be psychotic is to be ruled by your emotions. Most of the Aspies I know in RL have been quite emotionless in behaviour and expression, although I often feel that they are probably stifling their emotions as a defence.

Bingo. And the only way to stifle emotions is to manage them by compartmentalizing them so they don't effect you or remove yourself from reality. We are unable to manage them effectively. They effect us too much when we bring ourselves down to reality. I am concnetrating right now on putting myself in reality and I am shaking. I can't manage the emotions I have.