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How do you guys explain yourself to other people?

Einfallspinsel

I just recently realized that what I think of as buffer overflow is officially called sensory overload. I mean noisy busy babbly situations that "drain my batteries", so I leave. If I stay, my perceptions sort of... stop adding up to a meaningful whole, and eventually I "forget" what talking and moving is. (Luckily it only rarely gets to that point because I stay away from these situations.)

But for example last week I made the mistake of trying to go to a concert (being over 30 I thought I could handle it by now!), and I just barely escaped. ;-) I paid, unsuccessfully tried to be invisible for half an hour, and fled before the band arrived. I didn't sleep that night and my knees were still trembling the day after (no drugs!). I couldn't explain to my friend why I walked out on her ("because everything was wrong"?).

And now I heard my company is planning another "team building" day. I don't want to go, or at least I want to be left alone, but how do I explain that to them? (I'm glad as heck I have this job, I don't want to jeopardize it.) What if I go braindead there too, or stop talking or look away? It just makes my colleagues try harder to "cheer me up" (Like last year, where I eventually left the campfire and stayed away from the madness in a sleeping bag at just above freezing)

Do you have some advice how I can get the message across, do you ever have this problem? 

It's not against my colleagues and (potential) friends that I prefer to be alone. From my point of view, it's rather a compliment that I invest the bit of energy I have in them sometimes. Guess that's not much of a compliment. 


I have no excuse not to go, other than that I hate pretending to be fine while I'm not. I am not even officially diagnosed with anything -- I just see quite some overlap with your list of ASD symptoms, and was hoping for some advice from people who might at least understand what I'm talking about.
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  • Einfallspinsel said:

    What's an 'anamnesis'?

    That was their fancy word for a patient's background info and medical history. Innocent Because often there are early signs that were ignored, and only looking back you suddenly understand them.

    In this particular case the psychiatrist wanted to analyse my behaviour at a young age -- which of course I do not objectively remember. So the only way to get this piece of history is to interview another witness (typically the parents).

    Ah, I see, and yes, as hope explains, Asperger's is present from birth and there are usually signs of it from very early childhood onwards.

    However, I know of people who have been diagnosed in their 70s, and find it hard to believe that they would have had that kind of early childhood information available.

    Aspergers would have affected you at school, teachers would have been concerned.

    I'd change those 'would's to 'might's - I went all through school, college, university, numerous jobs, and nearly 40 years before I was diagnosed - looking back I can see I had difficulties my whole life, but it clearly wasn't all that apparent at school, and my teachers certainly didn't seem to be at all concerned.

    Now-a-days, it's different, but for someone my age, when we were at school, it was not well understood, so even if there were clear signs, they were often not spotted, particularly in the case of Asperger's.

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  • Einfallspinsel said:

    What's an 'anamnesis'?

    That was their fancy word for a patient's background info and medical history. Innocent Because often there are early signs that were ignored, and only looking back you suddenly understand them.

    In this particular case the psychiatrist wanted to analyse my behaviour at a young age -- which of course I do not objectively remember. So the only way to get this piece of history is to interview another witness (typically the parents).

    Ah, I see, and yes, as hope explains, Asperger's is present from birth and there are usually signs of it from very early childhood onwards.

    However, I know of people who have been diagnosed in their 70s, and find it hard to believe that they would have had that kind of early childhood information available.

    Aspergers would have affected you at school, teachers would have been concerned.

    I'd change those 'would's to 'might's - I went all through school, college, university, numerous jobs, and nearly 40 years before I was diagnosed - looking back I can see I had difficulties my whole life, but it clearly wasn't all that apparent at school, and my teachers certainly didn't seem to be at all concerned.

    Now-a-days, it's different, but for someone my age, when we were at school, it was not well understood, so even if there were clear signs, they were often not spotted, particularly in the case of Asperger's.

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