"Why do you look so sad?"

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Oh yes, always. People always ask "Why are you sad?". I hate it, why don't they do their own business?

lol. everyone thinks im sad when im normal. they also think im insane when i laugh because i cant stop laughing. i just laugh myself stupid for twenty minutes, then go back to looking sad i suppose. im not sad or insane! im happy damn it!

I'm guessing that it's probably for a couple of reasons- the blank facial expression, which makes people mistake a lack of overt happiness for sadness, and the lack of eye contact, which makes people think that we're disengaging socially because we're too sad to talk.

This started bugging me when I was 17 and had to do 'exam duty' at school - which was basically sitting outside an exam room to run errands in case there was some kind of emergency. I used to listen to my walkman and I hated that I got interrupted so much by people asking "are you ok" or "what's the matter".

Welcome to my everyday living nightmare! I've been living this annoyance for 26 years and there seems to be no end to it. I wish I had been one of those people that no one EVER notices. But I stand out too much.

I swear this is THE aspect of Asperger's that will likely drive me to lose my sanity or commit suicide if the NTs keep this up around me.

I know how you feel sometimes and yes that seriously does annoy me too.... Maybe they seem concern or something? Thats probably what it is.

I tend to get more of the "you need to smile more" or "you should be happier"... Which annoys me to no end. You have no idea what's going on with my life, so kindly keep your thoughts on what I should do to yourself.

People like to tell me to "smile", which is pretty annoying too.

I do sometimes get this, but I don't really get that irritated about it, I just correct them. However, I can imagine how annoying it would be for some people.

Same here. I've also been accused of looking "haughty." Honestly, I can't blame people. The way I naturally look does look like something is wrong, or I'm angry, or disapproving. IMO, I do look haughty when I forget to smile. And I forget whenever I'm concentrating or thinking about something other than smiling. This has caused personality problems for me in work situations, where I wind up explaining to my supervisor that I'm not trying to be moody or condescending, nor do I disapprove of anything...it's just how I look!

I got the entire volleyball team in trouble in upper school. The coaches sat us down and gave us a lecture about "attitude." Saying that we needed to take criticism without getting mad, that they were in charge and we needed to just accept that, and so on. After practice, I went up to them and said, "I'm sorry. I know why you're upset about attitude. I don't mean to give you attitude or seem mad or anything. It's just that when I relax my face...it just looks that way." They never gave us another talking-to like that, although nothing changed!

That happens to me all the time. Not just with my facial expressions either, my body language and tone of voice usually lead people to the same conclusion.

People used to ask me that, or ask if I was okay or something, but they stopped once I made it a point to smile more. :3

My facial expression is very neutral.

I get "are you all right" more.

Yeah, i've gotten that kind of thing from people all of my life. Even when i was a little kid(7 years old) my taekwondo instructors called me "smiley" as a sort of ironic nickname. lol. At work any time i'm focused on doing whatever i'm doing, and not so much on interacting with people, customers will ask if it's "been a long day?" or say that i need to cheer up just because i'm not smiling or whatever. Usually it's just because relaxing my face and thinking about things other than making facial expressions, not because i'm sad.

Instead of looking sad when I'm not, I always look happy. I have a huge smile on my face even while suicidal which makes people take me less seriously. I do smile when I am happy as well which makes it more confusing. I hardly ever cry. What's weird is that I DO cry at movies even at a part that is only a little bit sad. So, for myself I don't show the proper emotions an incongruent affect which is annoying but my emotions are almost hyper emotional but proper when seeing movies. Weird. When I was young many years ago I had a flat affect according to my parents. Just a blank look. I just laugh away now though. Even if the world ended I would laugh even if I don't mean it.