Eye Contact

I really struggle with this. Even my friends, Girlfriend and my family. When i do make eye contact its at silent points in the conversation which is obviously not the correct point. Also when i have to look into peoples eyes for a long time they start to water and since im mid conversation, whether that be with my employer or my parents, i cant do anything like wipe them or anything. I cant do this eye contact thing, I do listen to what people say but since im not making eye contact they think im taking no notice. I also feel like im being watched when im out. One way i dealt with this is wearing sunglasses everytime i went out. It helps a lot and makes me feel more at ease making eye contact since the person i am chatting to cant see my eyes. This of course isn't always possible to do for example at night time you will look silly.

Any tips for improving eye contact. I have tried the talking to myself in the mirror but i feel so uncomfortable and my eyes start to water and i just automatically look everywhere but myself in the mirror. Its annoying because people get a bad impression from me. They think im taking no notice and im not interested in the conversation or im not listening etc.

Sorry about the puncutation in this post. I tend to use commas a lot instead of full stops. Dont really know the difference Stuck out tongue

Thank you for taking the time to read.

Parents
  • Greetings. I suppose I should say this (again)... With Autistics "eye contact" is sometimes said to be painful. Also lack of eye contact is officially used as one of the diagnostic signs of Autism. Some advice for avoiding "staring" at others, is to look at one eye and then at the other eye and then at the mouth... and then repeat that.

    (Lastly, if anyone uses the "search" box then they will see a lot of other Threads about this topic exactly which give even more answers.)

  • It was the main reason i got my diagnosis. I was given an ADOS test and was asked to go through a book and interpreting what i saw all while they was watching my body language and they noticed i made little to no eye contact for the whole 30 minute test. The first test i did said i had signs for both autism and ADHD and the ADOS test confirmed that i was more over to the Autism side of things.

Reply
  • It was the main reason i got my diagnosis. I was given an ADOS test and was asked to go through a book and interpreting what i saw all while they was watching my body language and they noticed i made little to no eye contact for the whole 30 minute test. The first test i did said i had signs for both autism and ADHD and the ADOS test confirmed that i was more over to the Autism side of things.

Children
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