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

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For NT young women: Sometimes, when I am attracted to a young woman, I look at her face briefly, smile, and then look away if she smiles back. If after 1-2 seconds, there is no response, I look away also. I never look for more than about 4-5 seconds, regardless.

Is this creepy or weird? The looking away? The trying to catch someone's attention by looking at them and then looking away (not quickly or slowly, but in-between)? It just feels right for some reason.

I don't know if this constitutes the "creepy staring" that I read about.

For all NT's: Also, in conversations, how often are you supposed to look away or look down, at all?

I always trained myself to periodically look away during conversations, until I met with an older professional who was helping me with interviews who said I needed to work on eye contact -- even though I thought I was making periodic eye contact for up to 10 seconds and looking away for much less. Does it need to be continuous? What's the line between appropriate eye contact and staring?

I was wondering if it bothers you when NT's post in the forums other than this thread or the parent forum. I am new here and started a thread that didn't generate much response in the general forums. It is possible that there just weren't that many people that wanted to respond, but it also made me wonder if perhaps I was overstepping boundaries by posting in the General forum.

Any thoughts?

Question for NTs and Aspies:
How do you process the fact that other people independantly(I apologize -- I know I probably botched the spelling on that one) exist? For example, I know you exist. I know you're a living, breathing, human being, and in theory I know you have your own thoughts and feelings. But it completely baffles me that you're in your own head, reading this like I read other people's posts. I don't feel like the world revolves around me, but its almost as if sometimes I'm in a video game or computer simulation. I just cannot process the fact that you're in your head like I'm in mine. Do NTs have this same problem?
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Hello

I'm an NT and whilst I'm not sure that I see it as a problem it is definitely a constant source of awe and wonder. I will often be walking along a street, full of people, and be amazed at the concept that all of these people have histories, lives, dreams and fears of which I have no knowledge.

Yesterday I had one of those situations where I was walking across someone's path and we both hesitated - each of us turning this way and that to avoid a collision whilst both turning in the same direction. We exchanged a smile as we sorted out who would walk where and I spent the next few minutes thinking of how awesome it is that we interact with people for a few seconds before we each go on with our separate lives, never to meet again.

So, to answer your question, it doesn't cause me a problem but I do find it amazing and wonderful.

Paul

OK, question for the NTs here.

What are the best ways of telling if someone is bored with what you are saying?

Also, what are the best ways of knowing if someone is stressed out?

I apparently did not know at my last workplace I was unintentionally causing people to be stressed. And at a previous workplace, I was told that people thought I was excessively talkative.

Tina

I've got a question for Aspies and NTs:
When you hear or use an idiom (like "it's raining cats and dogs") do you think about the literal meaning of it?

I always get some kind of picture of the literal meaning in my head. Anyone else thinking like that?

Little Butterfly

I don't think many NTs will routinely see a picture of the idiom in its literal sense. We'll often wonder where they came from though. That's true of people with half decent IQs and imaginations in any case.

Someone above asked how to tell if someone is bored by what you're talking about.

Top signs:

1. the person looks away frequently
2. the person points their body away from you so that they will effectively be facing in a different direction.
3. they respond with monosyllabic "yeahs," "OKs" and "ohs."
4. they try to change the subject.
5. they become fidgety

Top tip to avoid boring people: ask them about themselves. What do they like, feel and do etc...? People rarely tire of talking about themselves and enjoy being asked.

Paul

So, normal folk...how do you have such short attention spans? I played and listened to music for 6 hours straight yesterday.

Yes, quite frequently. And if it occurs in a conversation, I have to work hard at not laughing out loud at the pictures in my head so as not to insult the other person (people).

About Little Butterfly's post: I'm diagnosed with NVLD, so I don't know if I count as NT or what. I have this issue of seeing idioms literally all the time. Most of the time I know what it means but I still get mixed up sometimes. My NT daughter asked if they were allowed out in the woods at night and I said only if she was with me. She said ,"Oh, so only with supervision" and there I was responding "Well, super vision would help so you could see in the dark." My husband thought I was joking and when I realized it was like "Oh, that supervision". Totally dorky, but it happens all the time.

What can I do to help mah short attention span?

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Feel free to talk to me, if you wish.

Every day is a gift- cherish it!

"A true, true friend helps a friend in need."

So, NTs, (I hate that term...so exclusionary) why do you do so many drugs/act so apelike in company?

I just posted this in another thread, but I'll ask it here, too. I declared my Aspergers to be a disability at my place of work, which honors the Americans with Disabilities Act. All I asked for was help from Human Resources when office politics gets too confusing for me to navigate my way through (this has always been an enormous problem for me).

Only Human Resources and my supervisor know about it, though. I don't feel comfortable sharing it with my coworkers, especially now that some kind of stigma may rear its ugly head in the media because of recent events and the diagnosis of the perpetrator. I don't think people listen that carefully to the news, and even if it's explained in painstaking detail how violence has nothing to do with AS, NT's who aren't thinking clearly still won't get it.

What I'm worried about the most is my direct supervisor. He actually may be on the spectrum himself, but if he is, he's in complete denial ... and has left strange clues that he doesn't think I have the right to claim I have AS (even though my actual diagnosis was done by one of the most respected clinics in Boston, and one of the conclusions was that I was closer to severe autism as a child and somehow worked my way up to being an aspie through the school of hard knocks, aka life without support systems).

Should I continue to lay low on this, and just ignore his snide comments about AS?