Get too tired(physically) after talking to people .

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I reduced talking to people because because it was draining too much energy. From a year to year and a half I have been leading an isolated lifestyle. Although I have a room-mate, he goes out to work in the day. So, I mostly am alone from morning till night during which I work from home.

2 days back a old friend of mine who was in town called up and asked to meet up. I reluctantly said yes. After meeting & talking(me mostly listening) to him for about 3 hours, I was so drained out of energy(physically). I had to go to bed early that day to recuperate. This has happened before as well and many a times.

Does this happen to anybody else?

Last edited by ThinkingMonkey on 13 Aug 2012, 9:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

Every time. Even if I've just been to a short doctors appointment, I feel very drained.

good to know this is not just me.

You'll find a lot of people with Aspergers and Autism experience the same thing. It's extremely common.

Oh okay..

Well, I've been going to an informal meetup on Mondays at a bookstore and people just chat about random stuff while having coffee. I enjoyed it at first as a social outlet but the conversation keeps shifting into heavy politics.

Also, there is a new member heavily into his political view who vents his frustration with the opposition and perceived bias in the media. This starts as a repetitious diatribe, leads into yelling, and sometimes will just smack the table.

He isn't directly mean personally. In fact I've had decent one on one conversations with him. But this meeting is more often becoming a negative experience.

Once after a meeting this guy was yelling a lot at I made a wrong turn coming home. At the last one I forgot my thermos mug at the store.

I plan to skip the next meeting. There is another event the store owner wants to have that is a spiritual discussion and drumming circle. I'd rather go to that one instead.

i used to have a full-time people contact job. i was exhausted all the time.

Yes this happens to me. I once went to a hen weekend (bachelorette weekend). It was over three days and the week after I had to take a further three days off work to recover - I was just completely drained (I hadn't had anything to drink, it was purely social exhaustion). I can still remember how exhausted I was, and I will never agree to anything like that again.

If I spend a few hours with someone I quickly find myself tired, and I find it harder and harder to make eye contact and communicate normally. I do enjoy the company of certain people in short bursts, but the idea of spending a whole day with someone terrifies me. I am planning my wedding and we have decided to have the ceremony as late as possible (around 4pm) rather than at 12 so that I'm around other people for as short a time as possible.

What you are describing is pretty normal, for an Aspie.

Yup! Social interactions are always a big drain on me both physically and mentally. I avoid them whenever possible.

As said above, it's pretty common to people with autism. Since each effort take energy and soxializing is an effort for us, I guess it's pretty normal, tough I don't think I already experimented a "physical" exhaustion, more mental ones.

Same with me - any more social situation, and I'm sick and exhausted for two-three days - physically sick

@all Thanks for sharing the experiences.

working full time is exhausting, I like to have evenings and weekends free and not have to socialise.

I've noticed that I tend to get really tired after just BEING around a whole bunch of people for a long time. I used to have a friend who made me go to her swim meets on Saturday mornings, and they'd go on for what seemed like hours and all that time I would smushed amongst all these loud, cheering people while tired, hungry, having to use the bathroom, and with my butt falling asleep on the bleachers.

Usually, by the time I was allowed to go home, I'd just fall onto my bed and sleep for three hours when I got there.

Yes, AND that's more a sign of introversion than AS or autism, but it does seem that a lot of autistic people are also introverts.

I'm an extreme introvert as well, and I used to work in such a crowded, hectic environment that now that I'm retired I insist on being somewhat of a hermit. It's much nicer for me, I have energy left over for me now. I see people when we talk to neighbors or do shopping. I live with my husband, so I see him all the time - but even he can wear me out and I love it when he leaves the house for a while and I have absolute alone time. He doesn't like my insistence on so much solitude, but ... I really need it. It's me, and always has been.

It depends on how I'm feeling and what the conversation is about. I was actually discussing this with one of my friends on Friday night and we both agreed that small talk is always hard work and therefore drains energy. When people ask each other what they are doing for the weekend as an example, others manage to naturally produce an answer whereas I feel like I need to prepare one as it just doesn't come naturally. This tires me. However, if I am actually having an actual discussion about something that I can give an opinion on or one where I am learning something from it, I find this a lot less exhausting as there are times where I can either give an unstructured opinion or just listen.