Published on 12, July, 2020
I always struggle with this. I find it incredibly difficult to say anything but the truth. But this means that sometimes I imagine I get viewed a little odd as it may come across as what other people call “oversharing” and therefore potentially not socially appropriate e.g. you may not tell the person you met at the gym your physical health problems. I take things very literally which ive learnt over time can cause problems socially and lead to me feeling very misunderstood. For example, when someone asks me a question I literally tell them the answer because that is the truth. I don’t know how to answer a question which is not the truth because then it would not be true.
For example, I have a long list of odd symptoms after getting covid 2 years ago. But if someone asks me what I do for a living or how my day was I literally cannot lie. I just tell them the truth. I try to keep it generic so I don’t tell them my whole life story. The issue is people start asking more questions. So if I say “oh I’m not working atm as I haven’t been well the past 2 years” rather than respect that, they then ask me “oh what’s wrong” to which I begin to tell them all health problems post-covid. Or even worse if they ask “oh what did you do before you got sick?” I then cringe and don’t know how to answer that as I cannot and do not want to say “oh well I was misdiagnosed for a DECADE in the mental health system in hospital with a mental health condition I didn’t have and I was finally diagnosed as autistic and then I was due to leave hospital but I got covid for the first time whilst waiting for accommodation and then I spent the next 2 years acutely unwell I thought I was going to die so I haven’t actually been in work” ………
I’m not sure if I’m making sense or not and this is just 1 example but I really struggle with navigating conversations without telling people my entire life story and then panic that they think I’m weird and judge me and I leave feeling vulnerable and hating myself….not sure if anyone else can relate? I really find talking to people difficult, I really just do not understand how other people know what to say, when to say what and who to say what to….
I relate to that too! I don’t know how to change it. I just avoid talking much to NT people about personal stuff. I get much better understanding with ND people. They are also in many ways “odd” like me, so if we both over share to each other, then I don’t stress so much that I seem weird to them. My colleague at work has ADHD and BPD. Although he is doing much better in communication and social interactions than me, we both happily over share many things to each other and I could say we have some few things in common. I’m not sure if my coping strategy with the problem is good, but for me kinda working
Thanks for your reply. I am glad I am not the only one. I don’t have many people I talk to even fewer that are autistic. My main challenge is talking to everyday random people like at my gym or day to day interactions with strangers or starting a new club or group etc. mainly who are all NT. I feel so deeply embarrassed and ashamed of myself that I then want to not go again just to avoid how embarrassed I feel about the reality of my life story
You can ask yourself a question (if you didn’t yet) - do you feel like you should talk to others, otherwise they would think something negative about you, but you don’t know what to talk about? I was told multiple times to stop over sharing so as a result I only say “hi” and hardly ever anything else. I stopped caring what others think about me and my behavior. I also talk to myself when I’m alone and imagine that there is someone listening to me and I over share everything I want to the invisible person, or talk about my interest and this way I kinda get rid of the charge and feel fresh and it on one hand helps me avoid overshare with others, on other hand I get even more used to this style of interaction so I totally forget how to make some small talk. It’s all hard and complicated