Aspies For Freedom

Well micgrace - my husband was brought up by VERY conventional and polite parents.  This means he has problems the other way round.  If anyone asks him how he is he always says "Fine thanks" even if that person is a doctor and he is ill!!  He is in fact overly polite to the point of never revealing his own feelings or thoughts.

This works in many ways - but he can be seen as a bit colourless and cold by those who don't know him well.  Because he is never really sure when it is approriate to show excitement, pleasure, fear etc he often just doesn't.  Strangely he has never been like that with me, but I'm sometimes surprised by others view of him.  Having watched him in social situations I can see what they mean and I've noticed that if I say something like 'We are really excited about our holiday" he will become more animated almost as though I have given him 'permission' to act out that emotion.

Being extremely polite has got him by in lots of social situations but also means that most people don't know the real him.

I've been trying to train myself ever since my diagnosis last year, as problems with social conventions can limit my future job performance (just completed a communications degree, of all things, and seeking to work as a journalist/reporter). A year ago I would have probably said major problems, but I think I've graduated to some. Certain things seem more problematic than others (giving and receiving compliments, small talk, large groups) but I think I'm learning something, as far as I would want to at least.

I understand social conventions more when I'm drunk. Like, seriously, maybe alcohol bypasses a part of my brain that Aspergers dominates. But I can function far better socially with a drink in me than I can sober.

I am drunk writing this though.

Ah, the drink!

Love the sig, ocampo.  Woman in the pic is how I imagine I look - if I were younger and thinner and sleeker, with longer legs, a red scrap of a frock, bandages, gun....well, maybe not the gun, ok or the bandages!  But I could live with the rest!

And....you always choose song lyrics I love!  Cheers!

I know who it is this time!  Neil Finn, Crowded House! Yay!

Marcia, you cannot be serious. If you looked like said woman in my signature I would have to attempt to mount you, and our friendship would be scuppered. And as for your son, well he would have to always remember the time you spent together

OH mumbles when tired or stressed.  He is rubbish with compliments.  If someone compliments him e.g. "You are good at xxxx,"   he tends to say "Yes" which sounds a bit bigheaded.  

I have to remind him to congratulate or compliment others.  He says it makes him feel stupid.
This is something I have a hard time with.  I think it is bad manners not to congratulate or compliment people.  It is nice to be acknowledged.

He has a special 'compliment word' which he will now say to me after i complained about never getting any compliments!  Silly but it does make me feel better.

I'm jealous- I wish I could be immune to pain.

I hate it when I then have to explain Aspergers to them because they haven't got a clue what it is. It's so hard to describe it- and telling them to google it doesn't help as half the classic things don't apply to me, and other things which are accepted s fact, like 'Aspies have no imagination' is total ballcrap half the time.

Oh God I know! And usually your planned comment is really witty or something. I hate trying to start conversations- I just can't do it. I can't think of a subject to talk about- and if I do the other person usually just answers it with Yes or No, or one sentence, so we're back to square one.

I hate slushy compliments. Otherwise I normally just say 'thanks'.

I'm not sure how I am with eye contect. I think I sometimes just don't do it, but I can do it.

I'm the opposite. I'll say 'Are you OK' to someone in a desperate bid to get a conversation going.

1. Small Talk

I'm not good at this, but better than I used to be, mainly through practice - which is a ***, because it means the only way to learn is to make a fool of yourself a million times.  But I guess if you're going to make a fool of yourself anyway, it might as well be a learning experience.  I'm still most likely to be the one looking on following another group's conversation than the one actually taking part, though.

2. Compliments.

I only make 'em if I mean them.  However, I've learned the value of complimenting someone even if I don't think they deserve it as a means to an end.  For instance, at the moment I'm supposed to be training some people at work in some duties which were originally part of my job, but have now been farmed out to them.  They're doing the passive-aggressive thing of doing it as slowly and badly as possible, knowing I'm a perfectionist and hoping I'll give up and do their work myself.  Instead, I just tell them "Wow, lovely.  Well done."  Even if it's NOT lovely... in the hope it might encourage them to do more.

3. Inappropriate Topics.

I tend to be quite conservative - I'm always the one at work who DOESN'T want to hear about their nipple piercing infection, their kid's bowel problems, their wife's miscarriage or the dog's anal gland condition.  I think this comes from childhood embarrassment caused by a relative - if she wasn't on the spectrum herself she was a bit Cousin, and she had a habit of replying to "how are you?" with details of her urinary tract infection.  Ewww.

4. Talking too long.

Did as a kid.  These days I talk too short instead.  However, don't ask me about Dangermouse unless you've got three hours you never want back.

5. Eye contact.

I fake it - looking over their head, at their eyebrows, at their nose, wherever.  

6. Formal Greetings.

I occasionally get stuck on rituals like 'how are you' or 'how do you do' - I'll ask them, they'll ask me, I'll have an echolalic moment and automatically respond to their asking me by asking them again!  Then as soon as I've done it I laugh nervously and say what a long day it's been, and wish a giant eagle would swoop down and carry me off.

7. Coming out (aspies, that is)

When I was diagnosed I told every dog and his man... I was so stoked to have a reason I am what I am, after years of being told I'm just a bloodyminded specimen.  These days I tone it down a bit and only mention it if it's relevant.

Anything else??

How To Win Friends and Influence People - which should really be called How To Sell Stuff And Ingratiate Yourself With People - is a useful read.  It gives some practical tips on small talk (people like to talk about themselves, basically) and how to start a conversation and keep it going.  What it DOESN'T go into is then knowing when to stop!

Did I cock up the bit about compliments?  Now I'm not sure if you were asking about giving them or receiving them.  Not bright this evening, sorry!

Haven't laughed so much in a year!!!

As I have mentioned already in another thread: Kate Fox, Watching the English. It's a whole book about social (unwritten) conventions and you always get an explanation why the conventions are as they are.

Yes I have some problems with unwritten social conventions.  When I'm going with my Mum round someone else's house for dinner, she always warns me never to say things like "I'm really hungry."

Ocampo's first whole paragraph doesn't make me laugh. It's my visualization of the situation that gets to me. Not so much the first 5 words in the final sentence as the last word standing "though". I don't laugh now though.

I voted for major problems.

They're not unwritten.  According to Tim Page, they're in Emily Post's Etiquette.  He mentions it in an essay here:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/..._fact_page

The ones I have the main issues with are inappropriate topics and knowing when to stop talking and giving compliments. I can never understand why I get into trouble for talking about certain things while other people talk about worse and grosser things and nothing ever happens to them. I've worked out it all depends on whether you are "in" with the "in group" or not.

There are two parts to the talking too long thing. It's hard to get me started unless I feel comfortable with the other people. Then if I get onto a pet topic, it's difficult to get me to shut up. I also don't get the cues that the other person doesn't feel like talking any more unless they are quite obvious about it eg. saying that they have to go or changing the topic to something completely different.

I'm fine with taking compliments and can comfortably say "thank you" if complimented. That doesn't mean I don't feel a bit embarrassed if I think what I did was nothing out of the ordinary but actually saying that is to my mind putting down the person doing the complimenting; saying in effect that they have poor judgement and taste.

Giving compliments is harder because I don't believe in giving them unless I think they are deserved but there is a worse issue still - finding the right time to insert them into the conversation. I'm better at giving the compliments such as "your hair looks nice today" or "that's a pretty dress" than for personal qualities unless it is something like saying "it was very kind of you" if somebody gives me a present or a compliment.

I'm not sure about the eye contact. It used to be a real hassle when I was a teenager as I was too embarrassed to give much eye contact but it has improved a lot since then. The main time it is a trouble is if I don't like the other person and don't want to be talking to them at all.
I probably don't give them much eye contact then. Ditto if they are talking about something I don't want to hear about.