Aspies For Freedom

I always thought that I moved my face enough to have a facial expression but after many complaints that I always looked miserable I came to the conclusion that I must just have a bland face as far as expressions go.

I now try to exaggerate my facial expressions, but even for just a smile there are many ways to do it, all with a subtle difference in meaning and appearance, which makes it very hard to get right and if I can't get them right I don't want to use them.

I don't get it. Are we supposed to show our emotions or hide them!? I am constantly told to do both. I actually show emotions prominently. I smile slightly when I think of Wojciech, I cry when I watch sad movies, and I laugh when something is funny. What more do I need to do!?

I also hate it when they tell you to "smile more" in photos. What? My slight smile isn't good enough? No! I don't want to look like a poster you'd find in a dentist's office!

I also don't understand why people have to show their teeth in photos. It's not comfortable, and I only draw my characters that way if they are being dastardly evil like they pushed a kitten off a cliff, or they're trying to look annoyingly confident.

Never had problems with facial expressions but big problems with laughing. i'm always saidf my laughter sounds unnaturally.. And if I try to hold that damn laughter, my face becomes quite messy hehe

HaHAhAhAhahhAHaHAH!!!!
Yeah I guess I might look a bit like that when I am forced to smile.

I got comments about my funny laughter many times on primary school, not very much now. I think I only smile when when I hear something funny now. I sometimes move my eyebrows when I converse, or at least whe I see myself infront of the mirror. I hanv't got many comments about expressionless faces.

i tend to have a blank expression

i feel silly when i smle so i dont ussally

and i look weird when i dont

my main facial expressions are:
sad
angry
and plain
oh and one more laughing (i hate laughing i look like a total jerk when i laugh)

I laugh out loud when I am on my own in public quite often. I never though I could ever be perceived as weird, but then again I don't ever remember seeing anybody else do it. I usually laugh through funny memories or if I have just noticed something going on around me that I thought was funny.

ditto

I have days (mostly during work) when I wish I could manage a completely neutral but slightly reassuring facial expression and demeanor.  I always worry if I am letting my 'mask' down;  letting my facial expression or body language betray my nervousness in social or work situations or betray how I feel about a person.  

this reminds me of something...

i am in the bsa (Boy Scouts of America) and i'm a patrol leader
and people come and look at me and think "he must not like bein here" they come up and have a conversation with me EVERYTHING CHANGES! i have been told by everybody that i am i great patrol leader, because i know how it feels (to lose something, be really late, have a bad day, to be ignored). i am proud of that....its what they say it the inside that counts

I haven't cried since I broke down in school when I was 12. I can't cry even when sad now, it doesn't really matter now since it serves no purpose. But before then I used to cry all the time. I don't understand why it just stopped.

My eyes also randomly get watery, usually when I am excited or if I find something funny. Since it was in the Aspie Quiz I assume this may be common.

I tend to find NTs often have very exaggerated facial expressions.

I distinctly remember a elementry school picture day, probably grade 2 or 3, when the people taking my picture insisted that I wasn't smiling. Well, I was smiling as much as came naturally to me. but no, it wasn't enough. since I was rather small, and the person was rather insistant, I ended up crying, and my school photo for a year was distictly red around the eyes from that. Of course, I managed to be smiling as much as I had the whole time.

About the laughter thing... I've always been told that I laugh oddly, and a few people who are usually good friends of mine take advantage of this, as I laugh at really dumb things, then when they comment on that, I associate those dumb things with thier comment about it, and it stays funny, even though I'm sick and tired of the original trigger. then, they apparently fail to notice how annoyed I get when they keep doing it. I can't exactly start swearing at them, which would be the usual way to tell them to shut up, because I can barely breathe.

oh yeah, and I cry rediculously easy whenever I'm confused and don't feel like someone I'm talking to is even listening, or understanding what I'm trying to say, when they should. Of course, I tend to think of half a dozen concepts a week in my science courses, so when I try to explain them to the teacher, and it either goes over thier head, or they give an answer that doesn't address my question, that becomes a problem. Of course, when they work, they often say something to the idea of "if you're so smart, why don't you ever finish your homework?". Rather annoying.

Yes, I have that trouble too and people sometimes ask if there is something wrong and I think I must look really depressed. I usually say "no" because if there is really something wrong, I would say "yes".

on that note, when i force a smile, i have really exgartaged dimples and is really creepy.  my natural look is me having a netural face (to some it looks spacey, but that's just my normal face, sometimes i would have my mouth open and you can see parts of teeth).  and the diffrences between happy and sad is so simular you can't really tell.

eye contact, i don't make to much of it, i glance in the general direction, and sometimes focus on one of several spots to organize my thinking.  i think my eye contact would be more of japan descent, as i was watching pretty cure (orginal version) and nagasi and the bad guy's eyes met, and she was really frightened, as it looked to be as eye contact is a "i'm going to get you" type of thinking.  i can't see myself looking at someone's eyes all through a talk, as i tend to lose track of what i'm saying and just focus on the person's eyes, and tend to stare, so i focus on other spots to keep my train of thought going, but i glace back at times to make sure they aren't ignoring me.  so eye contact i think is stupid and overrated.  i'm looking at them, but just because i don't follow their eyes doesn't mean much.  i focus on their whole body, so i can remember how they look later, and knowing their body gets me to know them.

and body contact, i would be in trouble there.  i like touching other people.

i think it's just that because we don't follow their little rules, we get called defective.  their rules suck sometimes.

ugh, where's an edit button when you need it?  one more thing, my expression pattern changes the most with my eye and eyelids, not my mouth.  i see this alot in anime charatchers as their eyes seem to do most of the experession, not their mouth, as in the subtile expression.