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Metaphores!

Zo

Hello! I'm new to this forum but since I have aspergers, you may be the best in answering my question!

I know it's common for people with aspergers syndrome to not be able to write or understand in metaphores in similies, sadly I'm rather the opposite and cant seem to write without metaphores or similies.

So my problem is, how do you write with structure? or de-similie/metaphor you're writing? O.O

  • I don't think I have problems understanding metaphors, and like to use them if they conjure up a mental image, but am similar to Longman in taking some jokey sayings seriously.

    One (very ex) boyfriend wrote in a romantic card that he wanted to squeeze the life out of me. He couldn't understand why I found the remark creepy and repellant. 

  • I think this is a confusion between diagnostic indicators and everyday reality.

    I've met people on the spectrum who have no trouble at all with metaphors, and maybe others will agree or disagree. I personally, while I actually think about them when they crop up, can grasp their application. If I am writing something I usually put them in inverted commas, though I get pulled up for doing it.

    It is based on a diagnostic criterion about taking things literally. Personally I think this is inevitable if you aren't able to extract information from social exchanges that indicates that wit or double meaning is intended. Therefore people on the spectrum rely heavily on the spoken word and its literal meaning.

    Whether that means people on the spectrum take "it is raining cats and dogs" entirely literally, I'm not sure. I visualise cats and dogs falling out the sky. I don't misunderstand the implication it is heavy rain. I don't see the fact that I process the image means I'm disabled or thick - quite the opposite.

    I used to get upset by expressions like "take a long walk along a short pier" because I visually interpreted it and saw it as a threat. I wasn't in on the jokey language of socialisation, so it tended to affect me more.

    Someone once said "that's ten years off your life" because I'd said something adverse about someone I felt deserved it. I worried for years about the ten year sentence. I wasn't able to process it as social banter, but saw it as a real curse.

    That's not the same thing as being too literal though. My problem is I'm not streetwise to social banter, because I cannot engage properly in non-verbal, and am slow to understand. So I take humorous intention in banter as a real threat. But that, I submit, is not being literal, but not being familiar with NT social play.

    The diagnostic criteria are used by health professionals with little regard for individuality, and without real understanding.

    But as I say, if you are uncomfortable with the metaphor, put it in inverted commas.