Published on 12, July, 2020
So, since diagnosis in December 18, not only do I now know why I don't quite fit into normal society, I'm also trying to be a bit less awkward to try to fit in a bit more, to mostly good effect. But the thing that I have noticed is that my awareness of the social cues etc that I just don't 'get' has been magnified so much. A couple of weeks ago my attention was drawn to my tendency to take what people say as what they mean and the fact that I have absolutely no clue if someone is saying something just to be polite or if they really mean something completely different to what they say. I found myself trying to analyse what people were saying a few times, to try to work out the social undertones of the social interaction, but a drew a blank, not surprisingly. That bothers me as not only must it make me appear a bit oblivious to others, it also makes me very vulnerable, that I can have whole conversations with people and yet have no clue what they are really saying to me. This morning on the school run I was doing my usual recent thing of making a point of saying "hello, how are you?" and smiling to people that I know (as opposed to completely ignoring them because my anxiety told me that they don't want to talk to me). To be fair, I do seem to be making progress with this and people do, in general appear to be responding better to me. But, I noticed during/after a brief conversation with another mum, I had no clue whether or not I was supposed to continue the conversation after the initial exchange of pleasantries, luckily on this occasion, the other mum kept turning back around which I figured probably meant that she wanted to chat, which we did for a bit, people aren't always this obvious, then I probably appear rude for not continuing conversations. Luckily it was only a short walk to the school door as I run out of things to talk about quickly when doing small talk, but it was a reasonable conversation. Then there's smiling, people do this when they're engaged in polite social chat, smiling that I have come to realise is warm and friendly, I can't do warm friendly smiles, I hate my smile at the best of times as I look like a frog when I smile and I hate my teeth, my smiles very rarely reach my eyes either, unless I'm laughing at something funny. Then there's the eye contact. not just any eye contact but socially appropriate eye contact. How do people even know how to do this? Even my 4 year old daughter does this naturally and I watch her sometimes, intrigued. It's not just making eye contact and then looking away at appropriately spaced intervals, it's about people communicating information through eye contact, information which I am unable to convey or understand. Then there's the end of the conversation, I'd got to the school door and while I was glad that I'd been polite and had a conversation I also really wanted to draw it to a close and escape as I was feeling awkward, so I made an excuse about needing to speak to the teacher, which I kind of did, and wished the other mum a good day. I'm sure though that I come across as abrupt when I do this, I suddenly end a conversation with no prior warning, I'm sure most people are able to start bringing a conversation to a close before it ends to let the other person know that that is what is about to happen, totally lost on me though. So yeah, a short social conversation that probably lasted no longer than 2 minutes, but a magnitude of social skills deficit in that short space of time, a social skills deficit which is becoming more and more excruciatingly obvious to me. I guess I also realised that as much as I study social skills, I can only really change the way that I behave in social situations, I can't change my lack of awareness about other people conveying social information to me through conversation undertones/eye contact/subtle variations in tone of voice/etc; I am still 'mind blind', the information conveyed by their 'normal' neurological circuitry is completely lost on me.
I know what you mean about talking to and approaching people. I find it difficult starting a conversation and often feel like I highjack others conversations for something to say. I also find if a subject has been talked about for a while I wonder if the other person is getting bored and how do I change the subject. You are not a freak though just like me a bit 'spectrum'. You also seem like a very nice spectrum person.
Thank you bookworm. I also have to analyse and understand absolutely everything about myself and why I do things; how could I have done things better etc which is perhaps also a classic AS trait. There's a chapter in Daniel Wendler's book about how to know if groups are open or closed, that is open to outsiders joining or not and how to join in the conversation, I must get back to that book when my children allow me the time! If I'm aware that I am being a bit too long winded when talking to someone then I usually summarise the remainder of what I'm saying and then ask the other person a question to switch the conversation back to them and allow them a chance to talk. How's your day going?
Haha that's another question. I always think when somebody says how are you? Do you say yea I'm fine or tell the truth? I know what you mean about analysing yourself, my biggest problem is analysing others, I'm so bad at it my OH always says analysis paralysis, because he knows I analyse everything.... Drives you mad doesn't it.
Join the club. I spend far too much time thinking about things/sorting things through in my head. Which never really leads to anything productive. Though I do feel better when I can eventually get things in order in my head and understand things properly.