"You definitely don't have Asperger's!"

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League Girl, I used to think exactly like you did about mental health.

Aniihya, I can tell nowadays. In the past I couldn't and it led to some horrific experiences. Once my mother was helping me with homework and she said "I had to draw my hand so she could cut it". I thought "it" was my hand and ran way because I was too literal to realise she was going to cut the paper instead of chopping off a limb of mine. (For me, draw meant as in "draw you swords").

Or thousands of times people joked about many things and I took it literally like "Don't let the beg bugs bite" and even now that I'm older, sometimes it's still absurd or I don't understand it. But now that I'm older when I think of something absurd out of what they say, I just ask someone for an explanation or google it. I study language, metaphors and double meaning, so many of them I'm familiar with.

It was tough and scary.

Peacefully,
Dante.

I never really took things too literally, however past and present everything needs to be logical for me. If people cant give me a logical explanation or evidence, then it is fiction to me or just an opinion.

My family's Christian and I explained God and the devil, good and evil with a perfectly logical system of premises. They freaked out, bought incenses to cleanse my spirit and forced me through their rituals. And then I'm the weird one... I guess not.

I'm sure lot of people feel that way about mental disorders.

I just started watching people, I don't know when and teaching myself what body language meant and how to read people. I think part of my issue is I tend to get vibes from people and that normally throws off whatever emotion they are displaying. I think I learned more about emotions from the different tv shows and movies and books I read sometimes though.

And Criminal Minds is a police drama that follows a team of FBI Behavioral Analysts who go around each week and catch different serial killer each week along with discussing different psychological conditions in their extremes. It's not for the faint of heart. But I love watching it and currently have it playing in the background as I type this out

The show 'The Mentalist' is a good one for that purpose.

In response to what EmmaHyde said:

I've learned a good bit about body language and reading people from watching movies/tv especially psychological thrillers, horror movies, and crime shows. Though it only really made me good at predicting movie/episode plots and I can usually figure out the killer and motive in a lot of crime shows. I still have a hard time with real people because there are a lot more patterns that change and can mean multiple things depending on the person, their mood, and even if they are being genuine or trying to manipulate you. Sadly, I know multiple people that are manipulative and I end up completely lost at what to do.

That being said, I absolutely love Criminal Minds! I'm currently rewatching the series (I'm back up to the ninth season). Spencer Reid is my favorite character, probably because I can relate to him the most (besides the whole genius with an eidetic memory thing )

(I had to delete the quotes AND retype my response because of captcha. grrrrr... )

I used to wonder why I could read people better in movies and know their motives than I could in real life. I thought I maybe needed to pay more attention to people. But now I know movies are inaccurate and not real life portrayal and movies are pretty predictable.

Usually from the first scene of interactions of the characters on series / movies, if the actor is really good at it, we know which one is the evil one. That's because they usually ample behaviours or speech patterns to make it more obvious.

There was only one time everyone was completely, absolutely wrong... A brazilian soap opera. One of the female characters was PERFECTLY GOOD. NO sign of evil. And then, she was a cold hearted killer all along and her behaviour, body language, voice tone and even microexpressions changed when she was revealed. Damn, she is a good actress.

Her name's Patrícia Pillar. Just google image it!

DaughterofAule, just click the "back arrow" and the page will come back with all the things you wrote. The forum has an auto-saving mechanism. It works for me, might work for you.

She can understand herself perfectly, but other people can't. That's why she needs a label, because people are more comfortable understanding things categorically.

I myself only started getting along better with my family after my diagnosis - before then, they took it personally when I needed time for myself or if I left the room when someone else came in with food (I can't listen to the sound of the spoon banging against a plate). They just laugh at it now. Obviously not the whole world needs to know, but it helps if those close to you do.

I just realised something from the visit to the doctor. I was shaking for the whole consultation! I told myself I was feeling cold as I couldn't understand why, but when I went outside at the end (colder than inside) I stopped shaking.

I don't ever shake or even feel cold but when I'm moderately hypothermic. And I was NOT hypothermic. My hands weren't even that cold.

I now realise I was in a state of borderline panic. Extreme nervousness. When it was becoming too evident, I told her I was cold and that it was why I was shaking, but that I knew was a defensive excuse to not knowing why I was like that.

Wow... Not being able to well identify feelings is very weird sometimes.

Peacefully,
Dante.

Last edited by Dreadful Dante on 28 Jun 2016, 3:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

My family takes it in a very personal way. They believe I intend to offend. Some of them can get very agressive and ocasionally violent.

EDIT: Some of them would call me a f****t (homophobic curse words) and say things like "That's why you're creepy! Why don't you come back to your planet?"

My family is also inclined to act as though I am deliberately attempting to annoy or upset them in a cold-hearted and uncaring manner. They don't want to think that I cannot help it. Instead of accommodating or supporting me, they become angry.

Sorry this took me a bit to reply too / warning for long post so I can respond to all.

My family hates that I can often guess the plots of movies or shows and end up breaking them down/ pointing out what will happen next. Thankfully my girlfriend is okay with it and we'll make snarky commentary on a show or movie when we watch. I'm making a youtube channel to be able to talk about movies and shows instead of annoying my family.

Omg same!! ! I'm not a fan of tenth season but that's cause I'm more a Garcia/ Morgan fan than what they did with it. Reid is one of my all time favorites and I love Garica the best cause I identify with her sass/ fandom love. Plus she rambles like me as demonstrated below.


As for people, I still have issues with figuring out intentions (I often have people take advantage of me/ never pay me back for things) but have gotten better. There are still times where I have issues/ don't understand if I'm socializing right, like at my work.



I think shows and movies become predictable and are easier to read because they have have a formula, know as the Hero's Journey, and tropes that they follow in some way. For example of this, movie wise, the first Star Wars movie, A New Hope. We follow Luke becoming a hero and met the Princess (Leia), the Wizard (Obi-Wan), the Villain (Vader), Rogue (Han). In the movie, we see him respond to a Call to Action, move to the Climax, and resolve itself. Because of this, any form of literature (written or visual) become easier to figure out and their characters easy to read because they have unwritten rules to follow.



See I tried getting into it but like... I just wasn't able to, even though I watch a ton of crime drama. But I'm going to try and give it a second watch later. I had to do the same thing with the Walking Dead and ended up loving it.

I also constantly analyse films, breaking down the film techniques and the intended reaction of the audience towards characters. I also sometimes share this with my family and, like yours, they don't appreciate it.

I have researched Criminal Minds extensively, and very much enjoy learning about it. It was, breifly, a secondary special interest of mine (Autism/ASD is always first), but then I ran out of new information on the subject; however, I have never actually watched it.
The moment I read about Reid I was overjoyed to find him so relatable to me (more so than any other character I have learnt about).

One day, during a discussion with my sister about Reid (she has researched CM as well), I ventured to ask, 'Do you think Reid is Aspie?' She replied that she wouldn't know. Asking this question was very intimidating for me, as she does not know about my ASD suspicions, but knows how much I relate to him. She has also previously noted that I always seem to relate best to socially-awkward ND-style characters.

It is strange. I was having some physical symptoms that were scaring me. After getting some tests done the doctors said all the tests can back as normal. Then finally a doctor said it sounded like I was having anxiety attacks. I was very confused thinking I didn't have anxiety. I've thought about it and I now agree, and it also now makes sense that working from home rather than being around people has lessened these symptoms. So I've had anxiety for a very long time without knowing I was anxious.

Also, sometimes clicking the back button saves my response and sometimes it doesn't. Thankfully, this time it did