What is your difficulty in socializing?

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I don't get it. I know all social cues, and it's not often that I say the wrong things at the wrong times, and I often know what relevant thing to put back to someone on a text message, and I know how to greet someone and remain friendly, and I know all the rest. But it's just that I don't always have the courage to actually use them. Is this how other Aspies feel, or do you really not know much social cues? I know them all, but it's just the confidence to actually peruse them, and I know I can do it, but there's jut something what holds me back. When I'm in a group of people who are having a general conversation, I'm always scared to join in because I fear they might not listen to me, or I'll get interrupted, or I keep thinking they might think I'm butting in if I do join in. There's just loads of these little fears I have, which stop me from actually being able to use normal social skills, even though they are there for me to use. And when I'm in a noisy environment I'm often more ''scared'' to talk to the group, in case they don't hear me or I don't hear them, and sometimes I even feel embarrassed to hear my own voice suddenly pipe up which will get everyone in the group looking at me, which also puts me off. So it's not that I don't know how to communicate, it's more so some sort of fear I have what holds me back from expressing my ''NT social-knowledge'' what I seem to have. There is always a voice in my head saying, ''go on - ask her this, ask him that, you know you can do it, and it's the right time and place too. Go for it!'' and I go to, but then I think, ''no, I can't. What if they start talking and not hear me and I feel stupid?'' It's always been a sort of excuse for me, even when I was a child. All the social cues come naturally to me. They all come rushing in my mind, just like a NT, but I just can't seem to get them out into the open a lot of the times. I'm excellent with one to one communication - anyone would think I am NT, or if I'm with a group of relatives - but just colleagues and friends and neighbours, it's a little different. Other people become confused with me too because I seem normal (I don't stim or make funny faces, and I smile and laugh and not talk in monotone and I use facial expressions and body expressions, and I understand their emotions and everything), but it's the social-verbal confidence I'm lacking, which ruins it. I'm very confused about my social skills here, because they aren't like a typical Aspie, yet I'm a typical Aspie in everything else; meltdowns, anger, special interests, sensory issues, routine obsession, anxiety, ect.

For example, once my friend and her mum went with me to book an eye test at the opticians, and the woman behind the desk asked if Wednesday was OK, and I said yes. Then I remembered that I had to go somewhere else Wednesday, but I seemed afraid to quickly say, so I didn't say it. Then when we came out of the opticians, I told my friend, ''I can't have the appointment on Wednesday now - I've got another appointment already booked somewhere else! We've got to go back and change the appointment.'' And my friend looked irritated and asked, ''why didn't you just say there and then?'' and because I know I should have, I felt stupid so I lied to my friend and said, ''I just remembered about it this minute, that's why.'' It's not that I don't understand how to do these things. It's just that I always feel afraid to speak up sometimes.

Do other Aspies feel this way with communication, or do you really not know the social cues?
Is this just shyness? Or Social Anxiety? Or low self-esteem? Or is it typical in AS?

Hi there,

you are a perfectly "normal" aspie... hehe, at least its very similar to me. I also notice must cues, and so on, and have no problem with looking someone into the eye. But this changes when i meet a highly sensitive person, then i hardly can see her face, an i miss many cues, als when talking to a person related to her, and I have problems answering.

My head just thinks everything is most important, and doesn't filter out anything, and everything comes up in my conciousness, and thus i get a overload, too many things to think and feel about.

byebye,
anton

You nailed one of them that I also have, knowing something will happen but being to afraid to speak up and sort it out. I always wait until I see my mum so I can get her to sort it out .

I have insane trouble with everything in socializing: Coming up with something to say, getting the timing right, social cues, forgetting to breath in between setences and nearly passing out

Joe, I have exactly the same problem. I keep getting a voice in my head too telling me to say things but I never think they will be good enough. I also have the problem of running out of ideas after a while too. Where else I suffer with socialising is I'm terrified of people who are laughing. I don't know what they're laughing at and usually when they see me, whether I look serious or amused, their smile slips and they look offended.

I have realised one strange aid. If I loosen my right arm and right hand and stop moving them and keep on moving my left hand's fingers I can think a bit differently, more confidently and sociably. Since I have limited scientific knowledge, I don't know why that is but it does seem to help with eye contact and confidence and knowing how to make the right body language, though doesn't make much difference with knowing what to say. It's worth a try!

I think that understanding social cues is much more subtle than many of us may realize. It sounds to me like you know the fundamentals of social engagement intellectually, but not with the immediacy and unconscious confidence that an NT might have.

I know that for me, I am somewhat capable in engaging in a conversation that seems fairly normal -- as long as the other person is doing most of the heavy lifting and I just have to react, rather than create the conversation from scratch -- but I still feel very tongue tied and uncomfortable. I don't think this discomfort comes mainly from fear, although the fear is there too, but from feeling like a deer in headlights. Other people are this constantly moving target that is constantly looking at me expectantly, and it's overwhelming to keep track of all the nuances and changes that conversing with them requires, even if on the surface things seem to be moving along fairly normally. It's the subtlety that gets me, even if I can seem like I'm doing an okay job of it.

My 2¢'s is that it's all like a big TV soap opera to me. I can seldom get into the storyline. I can't remember who feels what, when, and why. I never feel like Im integrated into the big story. When I speak my lines everyone seems to stop... pause... and ignore. And when I do pick up on the proper vibe of an issue or emotion... I cant keep it up and feel about it like everyone else does into the future.

That said... I know that when friends have disrespected me... usually by ignoring me... I am crushed.

From behind the lightly frosted glass wall which seems to permanently isolate me from everyone else I can see many of the social cues and have learned through watching others the sort of things which are acceptable or good as a response.

But it's a thick, partially soundproofed wall and the only things that stay with me on my side are doubt, anxiety & analysis.
I doubt I can get the timing right (often), or I might be too loud, or just blurt out the wrong thing, or I completely miss what the cue is about (often).

This makes me more anxious and my fairly weak filters just break down completely as my attention moves from trying to follow what's happening on the other side of the wall to what's happening behind my eyes - and then very little of what I see or hear makes much sense at all. It's just noise, light & movement happening somewhere else and it quickly becomes uncomfortable to be near it.

Then the analyzing starts. The relentless tick-tick-tick of the little machine that picks apart what happened and lays it all out in front of me - as if I'm supposed to put it all back together again, make sense of it and "just join in all the fun with everyone else".

Well... Been there, done that and tried it until I'm frightened, in tears, frustrated and exhausted through trying when all I really needed was someone to hold my hand and show me how to do it. Just to gently show me how.

I don't go out much and most times, I'm glad of it. And as I get older, I care less and less about "being social" and it just doesn't bother me as much that I can't play these little games.
That's all they are: little games.

What I find most difficult about socializing is that I desire the presence of others but all that can change in a moment. I can be the life of the party one minute and want to lock myself in a closet the next.

I've got several problems in the social area:

--First, I often don't recognize people I've met before, and so I try to play it off, but they invariably realize I don't know who they are, and they get insulted. This is especially troublesome in my waitress job, when I introduce myself to people I've waited on ten times.

--I can't do small talk. At all. I never know what to say. After "So, we're supposed to get a lot of snow tonight, huh?" I've got nothing. I had to quit bartending because I couldn't talk to the regulars, and they stopped coming in on my shift.

--When in a group of people, I think the things people are talking about are usually boring and stupid.

--If by chance they actually are talking about something I find interesting, I can't ever seem to find a good moment to break into the conversation. I usually end up interrupting somebody and looking like an as*hole.

--In a one-on-one conversation, I never realize until too late that I was supposed to ask the person something about themselves. For instance, if somebody asks about my kids, I'll go on and on about my kids, and never ask about hers. Then I'll realize she probably only asked about my kids because she wanted to talk about hers. Or she was just being polite and didn't really want to know about my kids at all. But, seriously, who really cares about anybody else's kids anyway?? I sure as hell don't.

--At parties, I drink too much and make an ass out of myself because I feel so excruciatingly uncomfortable sober.

--Most people don't get my humor.

Too much work/effort for too little return. I like having 1-2 close friends and I do and even that at times can be very tiring. I'm often worried about saying something inappropriate and upsetting people or creating conflict.

I have to work very hard at not saying "Hang on a minute - is this actually going to go anywhere, because if not ..."
Mouth-flapping, I call it.
Or - "I'm not going to hit you so all this social frippery where I'm expected to demonstrate that I'm not is just a waste of my time and yours."

From my experiences, that's because they usually are boring and stupid. (see above!)

I've (unknowingly) wound people up so much by doing this that the conversation stops while they shout at me for interrupting so often.
And that doesn't help anyone, really.

Ah, but you're supposed to, apparently.

Those that get mine sometimes wonder if I'll stop to let them get a word in. I tend to go into a one-man stand-up routine.

I've read that this is a very specific difficulty that Aspies have. There is a split second when someone has finished talking and it's your turn to talk, and we are not able to catch that moment, so that our only options are either to interrupt or not say anything. I don't think that a skill with this degree of subtlety is something that can be learned, it's either automatic or just not there.

Yep, it's something like that but there's a subtlety in the duration of it too, and that's what I keep tripping over.
It always seems to go "the words have stopped, so it's my turn now" - but all they might have done is pause for breath, or go "umm...". Too late - I'm in there already with the follow-up.
A couple of times it's worked out satisfyingly for me (definitely not for them, though ) because I can get "Hang on hang on - you don't even know what I'm going to say yet!!" - and I then launch into an exposition of exactly what they were going to say, along with my answer to it. And be spot-on about it.
(an answer which they would have likely got in due course, if only I could pace things and shut up for a while! )

Joe, you've described a lot of my experiences. I often have the same "blocks" that you have, like not being able to talk in loud environments or changing appointments.

I also have the trouble that Cornflake describes, of not understanding the subtleties of when to jump in on a conversation. Thus, I always sort of stand on the outside, kind of smiling and nodding politely.

My biggest problem is over analyzing social situations. It's better to just exist in the moment and enjoy it instead of always worrying about things I do wrong. Can anyone be 100% perfect at it? Maybe we are all better at it than we realize, we just talk ourselves out of being confident.
My advice is to smile and stop worrying about it or it will be impossible to enjoy social encounters.

This. I had a couple rag on me - good-naturedly, I think! - about it so much that I jotted down a note in my order pad. I didn't dare do less than recognize them instantly the next time! But if they'd come in and simply placed the same order as last time, I'd've known who they were, when they were last in, and where they sat. Go figure. I also do office work, which is wonderfully relaxing asocial fun until the hostesses come in for their tips...and I never know who the heck they are...

Another waitressing trouble is - how can you tell the mood of the table, really? Are they being quiet because they need you to draw them out? Or because they just want you to let them alone? Or because they're just being rude, and you're better off letting them alone? It's a guessing game and I tend to guess wrong.