what is the clothes thing about?

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I've read that a common Aspie trait is to wear heavy clothes when it's hot and light clothes when it's cold. This is my son to a t. Today was the coldest we've had this fall and so of course he picks his one tank shirt and shorts. When it was hot, he was wearing turtlenecks and fleece pants. What does it mean?

i think sometimes that aspies experience temperature differently, or their gauge is off. in my youth i used to wear black leather in the summer, and since i developed a sun allergy i have to be covered up very well no matter how hot it is, sometimes with 2 layers depending on the clothes. but i don't get too hot. i feeler cooler when my skin is not exposed.

sometimes i wear t-shirts in the winter (with a coat over top), and i won't realize i am cold. i start to notice when my fingers feel cold or if i actually shiver, but otherwise i don't subjectively notice much about whether i am cold.

I do it but I'm not really sure why.

My daughter does not really have this although she prefers to be nude, always has. She won't fall asleep unless she is bare and many times she gets home from school and strips down. Other than that, whatever clothes I pick out for her she wears without much thought. Of course everything in her dresser & closet is cotton and all the tags have been cut out.

Deep pressure craving. I "borrowed" by Dad's old army jacket and used it for a coat for years. I hated wearing a coat because even a sweater or sweatshirt would make me overheat very easily. If I had to wear a coat or jacket becuase my parents insisted, at least the army coat provided deep pressure. I could never really expirence true cold and was constantly sweating and hot. My parents and teachers would tell me it was all in my head or that I was making it up.

My mother doesn't think I'd be able to tell when I get hypothermic if not for the fact that I almost invariably get hiccups. I tend to agree. I can't stand to be hot.

Also, if it's at the beginning of a season, like right now, it may be that the person is used to wearing one set of clothes and not yet ready to transition to the other set. I seem to recall that six weeks is a ballpark for autistics adjusting to change. But I might be wrong on that.

The solution to that (note: I have no weather where I live) is to wear one set of clothing year round.

I suppose what this goes to show is that there's more than one reason... so maybe you could ask him.

This is something I wonder about too! My daughter is EXACTLY like this!

Thankfully when we go out she will -usually- wear appropriate clothes, but at home it is either impossible to keep anything but underwear on her (and getting to that point took time) OR she is in full winter getup, mittens, hat, everything! And it is generally as you described, the opposite of what it should be, so everyone else is cold and she is stripping down, and everyone else is hot and she's ready for snow! She's also very sensitive and anxious about heat, to her there is cold and there is warm, she doesn't want ANYTHING to do with hot.

I'm sensitive to heat, my husband says I'm cold blooded where he is extra sensitive to cold. Neither of us diagnosed but both quite asperger-like in many ways.

I have no idea what the answer is.

People often tell me I'm not wearing the right clothes for the weather.
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I really only have trouble with cold inside the house. Outside temperatures don't worry me (and with windchill it can get down to -40'c around here), but if the inside is even moderately too cold I go into hibernation or end up wearing seven layers. This is a big difference between me and my mom - she loves to open windows at night, and leaves the thermostats at 15'c. I've tried to convey to her that sleeping in the cold hurts, but she just counterargues that I never wear a hat or gloves in winter... *grumble*

On the flipside, it can get up to 35'c in the summer (plus humidity) (that's 95'f) and I haven't worn shorts - inside or outside - in at least 4 years. In fact, I only own one pair and they've been packed in a closet at least that long.
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I'm not a diagnosed anything, but I think I have alot of traits, but I'm always cold, unless its about 80+F outside with no breeze. I normally wear t-shirts even in winter, but I have them on under my coat.

I don't think it's a social thing, I think it's more a varied sensory experience.

I wear less clothes than other people in winter, my husband wears a lot more clothes in summer than other people. My daughter (AS) as we speak is sleeping with mittens, winter hat and slippers on, while it is perfectly comfortable t-shirt weather with only a slight chill in the air (my favorite) and she told me she is cold even with all of that and under her blankets.

There doesn't seem any sense in it because she does the opposites, less in winter and more in summer, so it can't REALLY be a temperature thing... at least not how I'm wrapping my mind around it. I wonder if it's more a texture/pressure/touch thing, she has been wearing the winter gear for about 4 nights now and I think from what she's said that it is also an anxiety coping mechanism for her, she hasn't been sleeping well.

Another thought, she has difficulty letting go of the fan when the weather cools and letting go of the heater when it warms, so I think that may also have something to do with it, she asked for the fan recently, even with her winter gear on, it is slightly too cold for the fan.

Perhaps it's an inability to adjust to the changing temperatures, thus, a sensory experience/confusion.

I had a hard time adjusting to season changes...when it got cold...I still had some summer clothes that I liked, so I wore them anyway. same for hotter weather...there were some winter clothes that I liked, so that was what I wore. I have a picture of me as a kid, in december, wearing a sweater and 80's shorts. My dad said I dressed like I could not make up my mind what tempature it was. Tempature was not the issue...the issue was change. I liked to wear what I liked to wear regardless of what mother nature decided I should wear.

Some of my most hard-headed and bizzare behavior goes down to this....I dont handle change well at all.