First time in history!! !! The NT/AS open hotline ! !! !! !

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No. Most jerks fit your description anyway.

Chibi-
I'm an NT and YES, YES, YES - I think twice, three times, or more before calling someone a jerk! Calling someone a jerk may pretty much end, or severely damage any relationship you have with the person you are talking with.

To NT's many things Aspies say without thinking come across as the ASPIE who is calling the NT a jerk. From the NT perspective - they are just throwing back what came at them. The NT knows this will damage or end the relationship and, in fact, wants to do just that. NTs do not like to be involved in relationships in which they are subject to what appears to be verbal abuse - even if it wasn't meant that way.

My question to Aspies would be - how can we get you to stop saying things that are mean? Do we have to accept that we will be emotionally hurt or demeaned if we hang around you?

Clancy -

If you're daughter is an NT - this will be very difficult for her in the long run. The research shows that Aspie men that marry NT women are happy with low incidence of depression, for their NT spouses the rate of depression is around 90%. I'm speaking from experience here as well.... I understand your concern and it is valid.
I'm an NT with an Aspie child, aspie husband, aspie sister and aspie father. My mother divorced my father when I was 11 years old. She always told us, "Your father is a great person, remarkably honorable, and intelligent - but he's a terrible husband." (Keep in mind this was before Aspergers was diagnosable.)
My husband is an Aspie, but he's aware of his issues and is quick to try and repair relationships when he notices they're going bad. He's also addressed a lot of issues through medication. That makes it easier ... but not easy. He's also got a very good job, good at what he does, and is interesting ! He's NEVER bored. He's loyal to a fault and would never dream of cheating on me. Our problems are always based on the little things... and there are a LOT of little things. (By the way, I'm 48 years old.)
You might want to read one of those books like "Aspergers in Love: Couple relationships and family affairs" - or give a copy to your daughter. Another issue to consider - do they want children? Raising an Aspie child, as I'm finding out, is a joy - but a lot of work! I've had to quit my job in order to do it.

Clancy -
I just re-read your post. I think this is what you were getting at.... with my husband, even when he's with me and we're having a conversation with each other and all is going well - I feel invisible. You start to wonder, how can he love me if he can't see the whole picture?! This is common and probably the biggest issue from the NT's point of view.

Not speaking here as an aspie, nor an NT, just as person with emotions who's learned a lot about dealing with emotions.

You are in charge of your own emotions. You can choose to not let something hurt you. No, you don't have to accept that you will be emotionally hurt or demeaned if you hang around an aspie. Learn not to get hurt. Learn not to feel demeaned. If the aspie is someone you want in your life, make that choice.

You can't control others. You can't make someone else stop saying things you don't like. You can ask, you can influence. But you can't control them. And you shouldn't try.

When you do ask, be direct. Be blunt. Also, be aware that the person might not generalize very well.

If they keep doing, then choose whether or not to keep the person in your life or not.

The question is kind of generic, so it is difficult to know what you are speaking of. However as a start:

If you have no concept of why the first thing that pops into your head is mean, there is no reason not to say it. It's true of NT people too, the NT says it once, sees that the other person is offended, understands why, links it to other offensive topics, and adapts how they behave. An NT might get to do that process subconsciously and will start to pick up quickly on what offends the people around them.

For a person with AS it is a significantly more complicated process, and it has to be done entirely consciously. Even if you can tell that you have offended someone (which really is not always/often obvious), you have no idea why and most of the time people won't admit why. If you don't know why it is offensive, you learn that one very specific phrase is offensive to one person in one social situation. This is a useless piece of information.

Even what may seem like an obvious connection: overweight people are sensitive about their weight -> overweight people are sensitive about looking like a sphere/ball, is not obvious. Piecing together what offends what topics offend what people in what situation is very difficult, very tiring and people are always complaining that you are not working fast enough. If had to explain the method of categorizing people, places, audiences and topics I have to use we would be here till next week.

The best you can do to help the process is explain very specifically and very honestly why something offends you. If you cannot be honest about exactly why, don't lie or dance around the topic it will only make things worse.

Also try to remember that it goes both ways, NT people often say mean things back without realizing it. I don't mean intentional teasing or bullying, just that people with AS can have a very different set of things they find offensive. For people that you do not know well, you just have to deal with it. For people you do know well, it is reasonable to expect the other part to try and learn as well. Just like I cannot tell when an NT is offended or why, very few NT people have any idea that I am offended or why.

Thanks for writing ~ your insight is most appreciated. She was considered PDD NOS for educational purposes but I've always resisted labels. She says they understand eachother. As I've been reading on this and other places I can understand her perspective. I'm not convinced we're headed toward marriage but you never know...... Will cross that bridge when I get to it, if I get to it. She's never cared for kids, even says she wants to avoid them but one never knows how things will change once she hits her 20's. We'll save that one for another time

In response to your mom and dad's relationship, don't you think we just know more about people and the effects of different issues that we used to not even think about? I just want to understand where her SO is coming from so I can have reasonable expectations and not get offended easily, certainly if it isnt intended that way. I must admit that even as I've read others say how exhausting it is to relate to NT's, it can be a challenge to be on the NT side as well ~ especially when you're the referee in the house!

Thanks again ~ Happy Christmas ~ New Years ~ etc

I'm AS, non-asexual . I ask all the time because I can't figure it out any other way.

Is it usual for NT's not to ask even if they are worried???

Hi. I have a question for all the NTs who look at this thread. I'd like to know whether you use social networking sites and whether you find them a satisfying or unsatisfying experience.

Thanks very much in advance

I use facebook and find it a satisfying and happy experience. It is the perfect medium to share photos and videos with family and friends. It's nice to see my niece's birthday party video because I couldn't attend due to her living very far from me. It's nice to re-discover the kid who moved out of my neighborhood 30 years ago and who I never thought I'd hear from again. These are the joys of a middle aged facebook user.

I have noticed something about the facebook complaints. They seem to be coming mostly from young people because the terrible downsides of facebook are mostly a problem for young people and middle aged people are unlikely to be affected. Although it was created by and for college students (the movie tells me), it seems to have brought the greatest benefit with the fewest drawbacks to middle aged people.

A sample of facebook problems that seem to afflict young people more than middle aged people:

facebook friendships that turn ugly or even scary:
young people grew up in an era of high electronic communication and a culture of over-sharing. This leads to a tendency to friend people on facebook willy-nilly with a "what could be the harm?" or "the more friends the better" attitude. Usually this just leads to a ballooning of the friend list until it is filled with 300 "friends" most of whom are absolute strangers with no actual connection and no more harm done than calling random people you see on the street "friend". But this indiscriminate friending sometimes leads to accidentally giving a truly dangerous person (or at any rate hostile or obsessed person) your personal info which can be used against you. Middle aged people grew up before the culture of electronic communication and over-sharing and therefore tend to friend only the people they know well in real life. Somebody you know in real life can turn on you too, but the danger is less than friending the literally random people that young people friend.

your terrible past coming back to haunt you:
Middle aged people have terrible pasts too. We drank too much at parties and did stupid things at age 17 we would rather forget. The thing is, we can forget them. There is little photographic evidence of our youthful follies because back in those days photography was a more involved process. Cameras tended to be larger and they were only something that you brought with you if you had the forethought. There was a limit to how many pictures could be taken (film gets used up a lot faster than memory cards) and there was a literal price to pay to have that film developed. Once the pictures were taken, they then had to be carefully preserved in albums to prevent deterioration. Many didn't survive that step of the process. All this severly limits what photos can be put up on facebook to embarass us with what we did in 1983.

But today's youthful indiscretions are almost 100% guarenteed to be photographed by somebody's phone, which is always in their pocket, and the odds of them going up on facebook and being tagged is very high. The technology has been in place to do this for several years so today's freshly mature 25 year olds are at high risk of having their drunk party attendance in college appearing on facebook with tags. I attended just as many drunk parties and some of them were even photographed but time and the hassle of finding and scanning what few photos survive makes me and other middle agers at a considerably lower risk of this horror.

Hi Moog, and thanks for asking.

I use facebook, but not in the ordinary "social networking" way. I have less than 30 facebook friends, and I use it specifically to keep in touch with family members and real friends. I have rejected facebook's attempts to foist hundreds of "facebook friends" on me which I consider to be fake. From this perspective social networking has been satisfying, although I dislike facebook's tactics. Hope this helps

My husband and I have been together a LONG time. We usually know what the other is thinking, and if not, we'll ask. In a less close relationship, though, there could be several reasons for not asking what your partner is thinking, even if you're worried about it. These might include: 1. You may be afraid of appearing insecure and needy. 2. You may guess that they are having negative thoughts about you and fear having your suspicions confirmed. 3. You may not want to start a difficult conversation/argument right at that moment. 4. Your relationship may not be emotionally intimate enough to permit that sort of question. There are probably other possibilities as well. I hope this helps. Jenny

I think this is stereotypical. Not all Aspies are like this. I don't think I am. If I am good friends with a person I know what things hurt them cuz I am constantly watching them and paying attention to minute details.

I still mess up though sometimes. It generally happens when I am in a large group and therefore feel nervous and out of my element. In that case you should just accept it.

Hi NTs Thanks Jannisy and DenvrDave. Good imput.

Mmm, it sounds good when you put it like that.

I think I was asking the question because I was talking to a friend (also aspie) about the feeling that we agreed that facebook causes in us, and I remember it being an interesting insight, but I keep forgetting what it is. I need to ask her.

Okay, she said that we said that facebooks seems to highlight disconnectedness for us.



I think that if I had facebook as a misanthopic teen, it would have been a source of horrible pain, and I'd probably not use it. As a reasonably well adjusted semi-autistic 31 year old, it just seems like a venue for slighty vaucous time wasting, and occasional moments of fleeting connectivity.



This might amuse, but I follow the 'add anyone who wants to be added' approach, and I now have a grand total of 38 facebook contacts (deliberate non use of the word friend, but some of them are).

My friend does it the DenvrDave way...



That's interesting. But do kids care about their indiscretions? Will they in 40 years? I don't really think back to my booze fuelled days with shame or anything. To be quite honest, seeing myself plastered on vodka and dribbling might have made me more likely to knock all that on the head. A nice truthful record. But how do modern kids respond? Isn't it fairly accepted in the west that the majority of young people spend large chunks of their lives being paralytic and idiotic?

I'm diagnosed with AS

No matter how many quality songs I listen to

No matter how many therapy sessions I go to, with numerous picke

No matter how much I fake normalicy

No matter how hard I work at singing, writing academic papers, etc.

Emotions and people are still confusing. I studied psychology and philosophy in college. I thought it would help. It hasn't.

I talked with a co-worker recently who said she had friends with Aspergers but they left her and said they didn't want to be her friend anymore. She says she was nice to them.

I can relate, and I just want to know what you do when you are fascinated with and inspired by and can connect with music, some of it emotional and about love .... yet the thought of being in a relationship freaks you the hell out.

Second question: what to do when you seem to always s**t things up. Breaking the landlords' washer and drier by stuffing too many clothes in, putting muscle into cleaning the pot used for pasta but its not good enough and s**t is there even when you think you got it al, and accidentally locking out a family member staying as a guest over the holidays from the bathroom I shard with her.

I just seem to not care about the small things, only the big picture. I want a relationship but I feel only a deep relationship is worth having, not utility friends you hang out with out on the town occasionally. I go deep.

I don't know what to do with myself. Insight?

Swear if anyone b*****s about how I'm moody because of the weather ...

Truer words topic

This is why my NT son opted out of facebook. He wants to be a Police Officer, and does not want his past to haunt him.