Aspies For Freedom

Yep, I have a problem with criticism too. My when I was growing up, criticism from my mother was the worst.

My other problem is teasing.. I find it very hard to tell when NT's are just having a bit of fun or teasing me to be personally mean. Probably because I grew up with a lot of teasing.

My boyfriend has developed a tactic to help me with this.. and it's really ammusing.. when he's not intending to be mean but wants to have a bit of a joke about something I might have done he puts his thumb to his nose with his hand spread and pulls a bit of a face. Of course this is a very obvious 'silly' gesture so it's easy for me to tell he's just being silly and not 'attacking' me, even if his tone might sound like he is.

It may well vary from person to person..

One of my weakest areas tends to be verbal cues, that's why he picked something visual and obvious.

Flirting I get.. sometimes if I know the person.

I ahve always said to Gemma it is not always what you say but the way in which you say it that is a problem with me.

I also frequently walk away, go out the house or just ignore her. I find that getting away for a while helps.

I remember many years ago i went missing for a week, I don't do that sort of thing now though.

She backs down more than I do, that's very commendable.

Hmm. Does "Christ, I was only joking" sound familiar? To me a joke is something that is funny, criticising someone is not funny, it's like to claim I was only joking or messing is just a get out clause.

The communication class thing sounds a brilliant idea, if I can get help for how I feel one of the things I want to try and improve is the fact i don't speak or tell people how I feel and just bottle stuff up and then I explode to the point where there is so much I want to say and shout about that i don't know where to start.

It is difficult as I know I should speak out but sometimes I don't want to, sometimes I daren't in case it starts and arguement other times I think it's just me being silly and/or paranoid.

I tend to do one of three things :

1. Get sarcastic
2. Be off with people
3. Shout / be abusive

Now when I don't speak out as much as I should I can understand why all of them happen but it does not make it right. I have learnt to try and control my temper but I don't find it easy just to say to someone "can we sit down and talk"

That is os ho true, like I want to say something but I don't want to in case we fall out or we argue or she does not see what I am saying which is frequently the case, not through any fault of Gemmas but just that we see things differently.

We are normally good at making peace at most things. Right now all is calm and well. That makes me very happy.

I do and i'm learning how to keep things that way

I'm not doing or at least I hope i'm not. i don't back down just to keep the peace.

Sometimes you don't know whether the person criticising you is very upset about it, or whether it's just a little bother. Sometimes people talk to you right away when they are upset and sometimes they don't say anything for months.

When someone criticises me, that's always what I think: Just how upset are they about this? Have I been doing this for a long time and they didn't say anything because they thought I knew they were upset? How much do I need to change? Have I been hurting them without knowing it?

There's a sort of paranoia that sets in, because I don't really know how to judge how much of a problem they think it is; so I'm always worried I've done something to really hurt them.

Thats what makes me argue back, it's like why did you not say anything sooner?

Depends on the mistake as well, I find old habits hard to get out of and the ways I have been with people before now are not always gonna be acceptable by the next person.