Asking for presents and treats when you were small?

Post Reply New Topic

When I was a kid my sister used to ask for all sorts of things for birthdays and for Christmas. She was also the one who used to pester to get riding lessons and a pony. If I ever wanted something used to always think it was too expensive or that they would say no so I just did not ever ask. My brother used to ask fr all sorts of things at Christmas and he usually got them while I was always afraid to ask and if ever I heard my mum say she was short of money I used to feel the responsibility terribly, as if it was my problem.
I used to ask for things I needed and that I would have to get anyway like a school bag or trainers and even then I felt bad about it.
Is this an Aspie trait?

Maybe... I was like that too, except I'm an only child, so the closest I could compare to were my cousins. And I asked for books more than anything - you could say I needed them, as I may be considered addicted to reading. Of course, nowadays, I still get that sort of presents (no, not books, I buy those myself).

Heck, speaking of books, I remember the school rented us the books for the whole year, and they were expensive... so I found out most of them were in the school library too, and instead of renting them from the school at the beginning of the year (buying them was definitely out of the question), I'd take them out of the library and keep renewing them every two weeks.

I started asking things for Christmas when I was six and I would cut things out of the magazines and paste it to a piece of paper for what I wanted and have Santa see them and I am on the spectrum.

Some kids don't care for Christmas or birthdays. My ex always preferred cash and he didn't like presents. He said he wanted cash so he can spend it on whatever he wanted. He always thought getting gifts were "ret*d."

I was the same. I was horrified if my younger sisters asked for things and quite quickly instilled in them that asking was not a good thing to do. Christmas was an exception as we did write letters to Santa, but I would never have thought of asking for anything expensive - often was things like more paper or scissors to fuel my craft activities.

I was acutely aware of my Mum never having much money from quite a young age, and used to lie awake in bed worrying about it quite a lot - whether we could afford the holiday we were having, or the new shoes or uniform I needed for school. I went to Guides and hated it - had no friends there and got teased a lot, but because my Mum had forked out for the uniform I kept going for several years (dreading it every week) in order to not waste the money she had spent. I would feel bad if I got something expensive, and every present I did get I felt I needed to really appreciate, such that being given something I didn't like would make me feel terrible - really sad for the unwanted object and for the person who made the effort to think it up and give it to me thinking I would like it (although in hindsight, I'm not sure other people are always so bothered about things like that). Ended up wearing some bizarre things my grandparents gave me just because I felt I should. I guess I would be hurt if someone didn't want a present I had given them, and I always tend to assume people feel things as strongly as I do, which is generally not true.

When I got older, my inability to ask for things got worse (and not purely due to financial concerns) - as a teenager I desperately wanted a bra as everyone else had one, but was unable to ask, meaning I got teased worse at school. I never wanted to follow the fashions everyone else did, but I also hated the regulation school items which noone else had except me (all of the others manipulated their parents into getting them the fashionable items), and ended up not only unfashionable according to popular taste (which is fine), but without any identity of my own - just wearing whatever I got given even if I hated it because I couldn't ask for anything else. Even worse, as a kid I had hated having a bath and got away with it once a week, but as a teenager I found I couldn't say to my parents I wanted to bathe more frequently, nor bring myself to change my usual routine spontaneously, instead going around with horribly greasy hair all the time, which made me feel ugly. No wonder I hated myself then.

Sometimes, I have desperately wanted things and been unable to ask for them, meaning they take on a sort of forbidden quality - when I first got into music and wanted to buy a tape, I couldnt ask to go into a record shop (I had always disdained the manufactured pop which was all I had heard on the radio up until then and said frequently that I hated pop music, then found I couldn't say otherwise) and so they became hallowed forbidden places to me, which made me feel desperately sad whenever I was confronted with one.

This type of thing has continued until fairly recently, even though I am in my 30s now. I find it very hard to ask for things I want/need from friends (by which I mean non material things - favours, support etc). Only a few years ago I had some friends, but was scared to ask them to do things I liked doing - instead doing whatever they wanted to do. When they went to music classes and didn't directly invite me I was scared to ask if I could come along too and spent weeks in despair whenever the time of the class came along, until finally one day I was able to send an email to one of them and ask if I could too. I guess this is fear of rejection, I'm not sure. Although this has got better recently, partly because I have stopped caring about things so much, there are still some things I will not ask for such as affection - sometimes I do really feel as though I need a hug, but I have never asked for such things before and cannot imagine doing it - most of the time I hate physical affection anyway, and it seems easier to suffer the few times I do want it (after all, I am very used to that), than to create confusion and feel as though I owe too much to people by asking when I need it.

Nowadays I see people who constantly ask for things and almost always get what they want and they disgust me in a way because they get what they want by manipulation usually which I despise. But at the same time I guess I am jealous because I can't do it and without these years of practise behind me like most people have had, if I do ask for things I want I generally fail, which is not very conducive to me trying another time. It is this type of thing that makes life more difficult for me (so it seems) than for most people who just breeze through asking and getting what they want.

I asked for things quite a lot. I'd become really obsessed with something and that's all I'd ask for all the time.

I didn't ask for much as as kid. I still don't. I'm a failry "low want" kind of guy.

As far as I can remember I didn't ask for things..... even if asked
What would you like?' nowadays I feel embarassed to reply. It is sort of if I don't have a right to put people out or something.
When I was 2-3 my grandfather bought me a little wicker doll's pram and I was with him in the shop.....I couldn
t accept it was for me.....the shopkeeper had to take it out the door and put my hands on it before I realised it was mine.

Somehow I got the idea that you can look but not have, and that has stuck with me most of my life......I'm a lousey consumer, not all that materialistic.

I didn't ask for too much except when it pertained to my interests, but I was a bit of a problem when it came to gifts. Eventually my parents just started asking me for lists of what I wanted whenever a holiday was coming up. I sorted it by how much I wanted the stuff...

When I was ten, I really wanted a Sega Game Gear. I kept a piggy bank of loose change which I refered to as my Game Gear Fund. Eventually, after a plethora of sulking and temper tantrums, my parents caved in and got me one. Never underestimate the value of self-degradation.

I don't remember how i was as a kid, but i can tell how my son (AS) is. He rarely asks for something specific for christmas or his birthday. When asked, he says he doesn't know. He's never begged for candy or a toy at the store. His meltdowns were due to being IN the store. He wanted to leave. Even now, he doesn't ask for much. Well, except that we get more chocolate milk!

I generally asked for what I wanted from an early age...I didn't generally get it. I was told that it was because my folks weren't well off, which was true (my dad had a lot of health issues and spent a long time not working).

But, as I grew older, I learned that that wasn't the only thing...if my parents didn't want me having something, they would use money as an excuse. And they didn't want me to have an awful lot of stuff; they were of that old-fashioned WWII mindset that believed 'going without' things was character-building. There were a number of things I wanted that they could, I later discovered, have afforded easily if they'd been willing to buy them secondhand, but they wouldn't do that. Also, any time I showed any kind of disappointment, I got called 'ungrateful', and any time I got anything I had wanted, I got called 'spoilt'. So after a while I just stopped asking for stuff.

From about age nine or ten into adulthood, I started to realize that my mother particularly didn't agree with anyone buying me books - she would tell them 'She doesn't want books, she has too many books' - she wanted me interested in girlie stuff instead, so for years all I ever got from relatives was clothes and makeup and domestic things, and nobody ever bothered to check my size or colors or whether I actually wanted any of that stuff. She once took me shopping to buy me a Christmas present, but she wouldn't physically come in the bookstores I knew would have stuff I really wanted - she waited outside - then dragged me into clothes stores I had no interest in. I ended up choosing a totally random skirt just to shut her up.

These days, I think everyone knows that both hubby and I are happiest with Amazon vouchers, and since the rest of the family does that kind of thing too, we're OK. (We're probably going to the States this Christmas, so we'll be asking for bucks because that's what my brother's done every year he's been over there, so that's all right.)

I would much rather someone ask me than be 'surprised' by someone who actually hasn't a clue what I'd like. And I'd rather ask them than get them stuff they hate - or get them cash if they really don't know.

I asked for thing probably every day. My mom used to bring my home stuff from work and every day when she got home I'd be like what did you bring me!? The same thing happened every time my grandparents visited, and on Christmas, my lists were endless. I still ask for too much, only now it's always money.