Special Interest in Social Success Like a MMORPG?

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On the thread just started on the same subject, at: http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt114029.html

I used to do this constantly, about anyone who seemed popular, "cool", trendy/in the know and so on. I can still remember how a girl in my class at grammar school turned the collar up on the school uniform summer dress and transformed it into something chic!

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Just looking at the poll results so far and, as I suspected, women seem to be far more likely to make socialising a special interest. Twice as likely as men in fact.

Out of the 14 women who have so far voted 5 have, or had, a special interest in social success,which is about 35%, whereas out of the 12 men who have voted only 2 have, or had, a special interest in it, ie. less than 17%.

Out of the 29 who have so far voted 7 have or had a special interest in socialising, ( around 25% ), but I think it is highly significant that most of them are women.

And I suspect that most of the AS who still pour that much energy and attention into socialising ( "special interest" level of concentration, intensity, and skill, however superficial/artificial and useless for intimacy etc ), aren't likely to be on WP at the moment.

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I voted "other" in the poll, because I am a female currently making the transition from "is" to "was" as far as socializing being a special interest. I didn't realize until very recently that the past four years of my life that it even WAS a special interest. I think that with all the real progress I made, I got cocky and somehow deluded myself into actually believing that I could become NT if I worked at the play-acting hard enough. I have a bookcase full of books that could basically all be called "How to Act Like an NT." Now it is dawning on me that I have been fruitlessly beating my head against the wall all this time, and this is becoming a pretty ugly situation. BURNOUT BURNOUT BURNOUT!! !! !

So that makes 6 out of 15 women for whom socialising is or has been a special interest, compared to 3 out of 14 men.

Yes, I think that's the danger; that because it is "socialising" one thinks that it is part of oneself, to do with real relationships etc, and don't recognise how external it is to one's "real" life. I had no idea either.

It's quite a shock. And the burnout is painful, because if can no longer manage to pour in the energy it requires the apparently real social success just peels away, evaporates. It's maybe the same sort of shock that a rich person might get if they suddenly lost all their money, and over half of their supposed friends disappear.

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That's a really accurate observation, and a great analogy. It explains a lot. I was so "popular" at community college that I rarely could get from one end of the campus to the other without being stopped by several people who greeted me warmly and wanted to talk with me, and now at the university it's back to the way things were before, with my being a loner in spite of my best attempts to make some friends. I just don't have the energy to put into it anymore, so my "best" attempts are not nearly as good as what they were.

However, to take your analogy further, once the rich person has lost all the money, he/she finds out who the REAL friends are. I am starting to get used to being a semi-recluse again, and quite honestly, it's pretty nice to not expend all that effort anymore. I guess I'm finally beginning to adjust.

Thanks again for your excellent comments!

It took me years to adjust, and I am now wondering whether perhaps the fact that you knew that you were on the spectrum may have been a useful "piece of data" for reorienting/repositioning yourself, because I wasn't diagnosed, did not hear of Aspergers, Autism etc, until just a couple of years ago, certainly never imagined it applying to me, and so for most of my life simply thought that I was doing what everybody else did, just a bit later than other people.

I believed that everybody had the same, or similar, problems socialising as me; I thought that my difficulties, and the amount of energy that I put into it, were "normal". A "trivial" example; it took me until a few years ago to understand that high heels and makeup are not experienced as unbearable constraints, even oppression, or at least as effortful requirements, by most women. I thought that my social life, copied painstakingly from what I saw around me, was my "real life" because that's what it seemed to be to others.

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I was only dx'ed in 2007 myself, after suspecting for a couple of years before then that I might have it. Yes, it is a useful piece of data, though.

About your second paragraph: I can relate there as well. I was nearly 40 years old before I realized that people were actually enjoying various events, activities, etc., as opposed to merely enduring discomfort and pretending to be enjoying them like I was. I spent years and years and years trying to figure out how on earth everyone else kept up the act 24/7...and finally it dawned on me that for them, it isn't an act.

EDIT: By the way, I brought this thread up in my therapist appt. two days ago, and we had a very productive discussion about it. I am now finding yet another piece of the puzzle that is the process of finding out exactly who I am. Thanks again for providing food for thought for me to make another important discovery!

I can relate to all of this. When I was in Orlando, I was able to make several friends because I tried as hard as I could to figure it out and get along with people. It took so much effort that, when I decided to move away, I practically completely shut all of them out and quit talking to them until I moved. After I moved, I met someone from Orlando and he said I'm much more introverted than I used to be. It's because I don't have the energy to keep it up anymore. Also, I wasn't really as interested in socializing as I was before. It comes and goes.

About the enjoying things part. I relate to this as well. I used to think everyone disliked social gatherings as much as I did and everyone found people just as annoying. I was confused as to how some people would be able to have conversations with so many people in one night when I just wanted to talk to maybe one or two people at max. And that's only if I REALLY liked those two people. I just thought it was because I wasn't fake like everyone else. Then I realized it wasn't fake. People really enjoy talking to lots of people in a night and especially meeting new people ( which I hate)

Huge bell ringing.

That is so exactly what I used to do/think; the "not being fake" thing. We, the "gang" I hung around with at the height of it all, used to feel very pleased with ourselves for that, for sussing out/discovering the "authentic/genuine/interesting" people at events.

The only way that I could do it, ( actually talk to anyone that I wasn't really into ), and even then it was fleeting, sort of "speed-chatting" before scooting off to pace around the bar/party/whatever, was by drinking, a lot.

I used to swoop around in a classic hostess sort of way, ( even though I usually wasn't the hostess; I guess it was because that was the act I had copied! ), being hyper-charming and intense with someone for ten minutes and then, feeling "bored"/restless, ( but what it really was was that my performance was exhausted ), whizz off to talk to someone else who looked interesting, and if they weren't, ( if I couldn't get into something immediately more interesting then chit-chat with them ), and I couldn't drum up the small talk, I'd be off again.

And if I didn't drink ... disaster, social-death, unless there was at least one person with whom I could huddle up and talk intensely about "deep subjects".

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Oh yes, drinking is a must in these kinds of social events.....

On the topic of "enjoying oneself": I remember it came as a shock to me, relatively recently in fact, that other people seemed to actually enjoy dating...(something that was always particularly anxiety producing for me). I assumed it was just as hard for other people to date, particularly when they didn´t know the person too well. I assumed it was just as difficult for them as it was for me, but that they did it out of necessity and faked it better than I did. It slowly dawned on me that other people are less fearful of this than I am, and actually seem to enjoy it. And for years, I was told that I didn´t "try hard enough"...(not that I really knew what that meant, either...)

yeah i agree. me + party without drinks = sitting in a corner by myself. Also, I remember being on a date with this guy once. He asked if I was nervous, like it was such a weird thing to be nervous on a date. I was thinking, "aren't you?" but he didn't seem it at all. I actually said no because I was afraid of telling him the truth, thinking he would think I'm weird.

I don't know if I'd count it as a special interest, although I voted that way, but infiltration of certain social groups was a big puzzle for me in high school, and remains so whenever I see said people. How people work is also a big interest of mine. And I got some friends out of the bargain. I also tend to romanticize people in my head--I seem to get more pleasure from imagining and wanting to hang out with them than I actually do when it happens.

That's actually the crux of the whole thing. My desires and expectations for social relationships do not match up with reality. I didn't really have any desires and expectations until a few years ago. Now I do, but they're quickly getting replaced with lots of experience with reality. Soon I will probably give up altogether. It's like I went from aloof to active-but-odd, and am returning now to aloof. Anyone have a similar experience?

Totally!! ! That is exactly what has happened to me.

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Yeah, MMORPGs are one of my past obsessions. I spent more or less $500 just to buy top up cards for my accounts.