28 and after research I think I might be on the spectrum

All my life I've been very socially awkward and never really enjoyed interacting with people who I don't already know in person. I find personal conflict and arguments unsettling, and find it very difficult to deal with complex social situations where there are no scripts to work from.

I work in retail, with a focus on customer service, and as long as I stick to a script I'm fine, but I can't deal with small talk and often find myself standing near a customer that needed my help for perhaps a little bit too long. I also find it difficult to engage in any meaningful conversation with my co-workers unless there's already some measure of conversation going on.

The curveball for me is I suppose the stereotypical lack of empathy people with autism are supposed to have, and if anything I would describe myself as opposite to that. Despite me not liking social situations, I can immediately tell if something is bothering someone and find myself in tune and able to relate to people's emotions incredibly easily. Another empathy quirk of mine is that I get very quickly attached to characters in stories, whether they are in books I'm reading, or RPGs I'm playing (I legitimately cry when emotional things in books/games happen, even at things that wouldn't really impact me if confronted with them in a real life situation.)

Now that I think about it, much of my social skillset feels like a paradox. I am unable to hold a verbal conversation face to face with people easily, yet I find myself able to talk about things with elloquence and at length when the communication is done in the format of text, for example in a forum like this, or a text chat in one of the games I play.

I have an obsessive passion for my PC and PC gaming, especially social MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games), and I absolutely love making friends online and can talk to people online about seemingly random things for hours on end, but I can barely hold together a conversation without a customer service script in verbal, face-to-face communication. The only person I feel comfortable communicating with all that much is my girlfriend (who has been diagnosed as autistic, but like me she's very empathetic, intelligent and passionate about fiction, though her focus is more on books rather than my focus on gaming)

All of these factors have lead me to do some research in to ASD, and I feel like some of the stories I've heard mesh well with my own personal experiences.

Sorry for the long-winded, semi-rambly post, but I've never really had any sort of outlet to voice this to before, so trying to articulate it all at once is quite a challenge.

Anyway, I'm Rapthorne, nice to meet you, community!