Obsessed with "not offending anyone" - anyone else

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Hey beautiful ladies

I am 30yo and just investigating the idea that I have Asperger's. I am quite convinced.

One thing that makes me wonder though, is the idea that if you have asperger's, that you are insensitive to other's feelings. Although I do have my times when I am like this, I actualy find that I spend a LOT of my time worrying about whether I offended someone or not and how best not to offend anyone ever.
I say "Sorry" aaaalll the time, for everything! I am constantly explaining myself and apologising, just in case someone is annoyed with me or took what I said the wrong way. I put a lot of thought into every sms I write, and things I say so as not to have any misunderstandings.

I go above and beyond what is "normal" in order to make sure I don't "upset" anyone. To the extent that people kind of give me a weird look and say "It's ok, Liz" lol

Are there any other women out there who do this? Is this BECAUSE I am not good at reading people and never have any idea what the rules are with people therefore I overcompensate? I hate it when people misunderstand me and when they get angry at me...

Liz

Hello! I do that too. It's incredibly difficult to explain myself if something goes awry.

Oh yeah.

I've had people tell me to stop apologizing

Me too. It's a bad habit I have.

I hate hurting other people's feelings, but no matter how careful I am about it, I wind up doing it anyway. Usually by accident but sometimes as a result of an angry outburst, in which case I have an extremely difficult time forgiving myself.

I think my fear of saying the wrong thing limits my communication skills. I can't instinctively tell if something I might say in jest will be taken seriously, so I tend not to kid around. I used to mentally edit so much if what I said I ended up not saying much of anything. Being on antidepressants helped me with my social anxiety a bit so I'm more likely to be verbal but I still try not to offend. I figure just because I think something negative about a person does not mean I am obligated to blurt it out. If someone asks me a direct question I'll do my best. It kind of gets me when people justify their rudeness as "just being honest" when the truth of the matter is it's just their opinion. You know what they say about opinions.

Listen, you can't stop not offending people because people get offended all the time for no reason. Anything can offend someone so it's impossible to not offend. I learned this on another website after seeing how many things people get offended by so I concluded "this is impossible because anything can offend so I shouldn't even worry about offending someone."

Sometimes I feel bad but if the other person is just a jerk or they asked for my opinion or they weren't nice to me after I had said something, I am not going to care.

Without really analyzing why (because I could be here all day), I have actually been trying to break myself of the habit of worrying about whether I offended someone and constantly apologizing to people.

Okay, some analysis: I am used to people getting upset at things I said or did without ever telling me so, instead choosing to hold onto it until something else pisses them off, and then I hear about all these things I supposedly said or did maliciously without ever realizing or intending to be malicious. This has cost me friends and roommates (and thus places to live) over time, to the point that I always felt that I was in some kind of invisible minefield of random social rules. Without feedback, I couldn't figure out when I was saying things that hurt people's feelings or not. So I started to focus on learning how not to do this, but as with many things I believe I took it to excess and became excessively apologetic.

I also believe that the abusive relationship I was in for five years played a role in developing this pattern of behavior, as I was blamed for and accused of many things by way of projection and splitting on my ex's part.

I feel the same way. I am walking on eggs most of the time, trying really hard not to say the wrong thing, and then I will just fly off the handle unexpectedly, negating all the trouble I went to to try not to offend. And I feel terrible about it as well.

I'm like this as well.

I realize (logically) that the situation didn't require an apology, but it's become similar to a reflex. It's just "things I say to avoid trouble".

Most people tell me that I say I'm sorry too often. It's a habit that I'd like to break.

I still do say things to people that gets them very upset with me.
Best way i have come around that is to always try to be friendly, even if you are not. I read somewhere that people with AS are great actors. i believe that is true as I have to act everywhere I go so I act friendly. Also if i think i did something wrong I usually apologize immediately, 9/10 times they don't even know what i am talking about.
The third and final thing I do, and this is only with people I trust, is I tell them that I can and will say things that can and will upset them and that they should please tell me asap. from this I have made more friends,

I've read this in books. It seems to hold especially true for most a lot of females with AS. However, it's not universally true. Due to my obsession with certain movies and certain actors/actresses, the topic of my own acting ability was inevitably brought into question by my brother, who flat-out told me I'd make the worst actress in the world. My parents confirmed this.

On the bright side, I could never pull off pretending to be someone I'm not. In fact, most people I meet nowadays compliment me on how "genuine" and "true to [my]self" I am.

It wouldn't take a very long search through my comment history here to discover this is not an issue for me. I've had to learn to "care" that I can offend people, mainly by being blunt and untactful when speaking my mind. It's not that I have learned to care that I can hurt other people's feelings, but more than I recognize that it's just not useful for anyone to cause unnecessary emotional drama. And other people seems to LOVE emotional drama, even some of the so-called Aspies here. Myself, not so much. So I try to be more careful, to avoid excessive emotional backlash, although some of my comments here may not seem like that.

I can emotionally connect to people if they are hurt by cruelty, tragedy or loss, but not when they take offense at the truth or by facts. So I'm largely indifferent to whether I offend people by saying what is factual or what I think it truthful--I have to see an intellectual reason to be more tactful. Being overly sensitive to other people's feelings doesn't sound like an Aspie thing to me at all, frankly. That seems more OCD or bipolar. My bipolar friends obsess over hurting other people's feelings. They marvel at my ability to just say what needs to be said.

That is one trait that I do have that makes me think that perhaps AS isn't the right diagnosis for me. I am deeply concerned with what others think. I'm too empathetic and it bothers me deeply when I hurt someone else, intentionally or not. I have done my best to grow a thick skin over the years, though, and the more confidence I have, the easier it becomes.

However, nowhere does it say that there has to be a lack of empathy. From what I've heard and read, individuals with AS have just as much empathy as anyone else. However, they may not express empathy at the right times. For example, they might not know when a situation is sad because they can't read expressions well. Or they may not know how to react to a certain emotional situation even when they do find out what's going on. As well, they might offend someone and not know it. I think this latter, when they eventually find out about it, is what then causes the anxiety. You can't not offend people, but what you can do is beat them to the punch and apologize preemptively.

In my opinion, it's not really the best solution. But I can see how some people would turn to it. And why I feel compelled to apologize too. Like I've already said... it'd be great to learn how to break this habit. I know a good half of the time no apology was needed at all.

I realized that my apologies were annoying people and decided to stop them. I preemptively apologies much less than I used to.

I know for a fact I'm not OCD or bipolar. I do know that I simply tried to fit in and front as neurotypical. I know this experience is not uncommon, and that it can twist one up in knots. Maybe if I'd been among those first diagnosed with AS I might have turned out differently, but I find it really hard to care about what ifs.