Autistic withdrawal

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Hello.

I wanna know more about the withdrawal/social indifference aspect of autism, but theres not much to find about it on the internet.

So anyone who knows a book wich tells about it, you could recommend? It should be someting in-depth and not just a short desciption.

I've been in the library but no of the autism books tells about it, so if you know a book with a good section about it i would buy it.

Or just a link if you know one?

I'm sorry, I know of know such book, but I'll bump this thread for you so it more likely for someone who knows of such a book to see it.

Thanks. Nice of you.

Last Chance. Anyone knowing some books/links?

Try Google. There is information about almost anything on the Internet.

Bluler came up with the term and idea of "autism" being "self-ism," so you could try looking up books and papers by him.

What exactly are you looking for?

Most autism books have stuff on the social abnormalities of autism. I'm not sure what you mean when you say you haven't found anything about this in autism books.

Asperger's Syndrome books really don't talk about it. Most of the ones that mention it seem to say "If the kid doesn't constantly feel lonely, great! Let's focus on those who want to be social and suck at it!" But most of the general autism books I've read have at least mentioned it. Temple Grandin, for instance, talks about how she was "in her own world" as a kid, and how she encourages parents not to let their kids get lost in their own world because at some point they (if they're capable) have to grow up and live as a part of society.

I'm a relatively socially withdrawn person. I have been since I was a kid. I wasn't as bad as say Temple Grandin, but I was always more interested in books than people. (I was a hyperlexic little kid.) I look back at my childhood and, excusing the one friend I had at the time, I don't really remember even talking to other people. All I remember is constantly reading. I even read while walking down the halls. I couldn't stop reading, which frequently got me into trouble.

As an adult, it almost resembles avoidant personality disorder. I have trouble seeing relationships as being worth what it takes for me to maintain them and frankly find the idea of forming more than the most casual of friendships to be intimidating. I don't really want the demands people place on me because I don't seem to get as much as others do out of relationships. About one real friendship at a time is all I can handle and about all I ever had. It's been a trouble lately because I've gone a couple of years now without an actual friend and now I'm in a position where I'm making friends again. It causes me some anxiety because while I can convince myself that having friends is necessary and even good, I can't help but feel like it's going to be more stress than it's worth.

I've heard others here express similar ideas. Some of us simply don't care whether or not we have friends. Period. End of story. If we have them, great. If we don't, great. Personally, I feel a bit like a failure as a human being without friends for an extended period of time. (It took me almost two years before I started feeling traditionally "lonely.") Young female college students are supposed to have friends. That's just the way of the world. And I feel like a failure if I can't live up to that standard.

Anyway, I don't know if that's what you're looking for, but I hope it helps.

Whats the name of that temple grandin book? That could be usefull.

But... It is because i want to know what autistic withdrawal is about. What is the nature of it, how it affects the behaviour and what happens
in the mind.

Is it just simply a lack of joy being with people (that would mean it just is social anhedonia like in other disorders like schizoid, but more extreme). Or is it more special than that? The lack of responsiveness, ignoring, lack of eyecontact makes it sound special than just social
anhedonia, but are those things just things besides that? Besides that it is an unique disorder, wich means is could be more special than
just that.

But thats in regard to schizophrenia and is probably a different thing.

Well, there's the rub right there: feeling like you have to live up to society's standard. While humans are innately social beings, not all humans are that way. There's really nothing wrong with feeling like you do and not having friends if you are fine about that. Some of us just prefer to have less friends, less socializing, less contact with people, but society thinks this is wrong. I can easily go days or weeks without having any real contact with other people, and I'm fine with that. I don't feel pressure to "get out there and socialize." Now granted you are in college, which encourages socializing and team building, but don't worry about "friends" so much. For people like us, friends tend to appear because we are often very much alike. Take it easy and don't stress out too much.

I am looking of something to read about the withdrawal part, not the other social things.

OK, I went back and looked at the Temple Grandin book I own (The Way I See It) and I was a bit mistaken. She doesn't ever directly address the cause of or properly describe social indifference. She mainly addresses it indirectly when talking about early intervention programs for autistic children. She might talk about it more in her autobiography, but I've never read it so I can't say for certain.

I don't personally think that autistic social indifference is directly related or comparable to the social anhedonia you see in personality disorders. The social indifference you see in autism is neurologically based as opposed to avoidance based or personality based. There have been studies done that show how the autistic brain reacts differently to human beings than neurotypical brains. For instance:

In one study, they took a group of autistic individuals and a group of neurotypical individuals and had them view a film while wearing eye-tracking devices. On the whole, the neurotypical individuals focused on the eyes while the autistic individuals focused more on the mouth, body, or inanimate objects. The eye contact issue in autism is different from the eye contact issue you see in the socially anxious. From my understanding, our brains seemed to be wired to look for social information in the mouth as opposed to the eyes. I think this is connected to how much the mouth moves, but that's just personal opinion. My eyes always seem drawn to the part of the body that is moving the most. But if you want more factual information, here's a study: http://jp.physoc.org/content/581/3/893.full

There was another study done that studied the way the autistic brain reacts to the sight of other people. I don't remember the details, but the basic conclusion was that autistic people view other people with the same part of the brain that we view inanimate objects. This was also an explanation for our poor reaction times.

Another focused on the levels of adrenalin in autistic individuals. I don't know if this has been actually scientifically studied or remains just a speculation, but some people have argued that the approach of another human being triggers a fight or flight response in autistic individuals. Other people trigger a release of adrenalin into our system, causing us to freeze. This is one of the explanations for selective mutism. On the other side of the issue, neurotypical people are said to derive an innate comfort from the presence of others, a sort of "safety in numbers" comfort. Autistic people don't have that. While we can be comforted by the presence of particular individuals, people in general do not give us the same sense of safety and security neurotypicals experience.

Here's my personal perspective on the "fight or flight" idea: Imagine cheering with an audience at a football game (or a rock concert, or any crowd of your choice). People are screaming and stomping and moving, but even if you don't necessarily like the crowds or noise level in these kinds of situations, it doesn't scare or threaten the neurotypical individual. Now imagine that you are in a crowd at the scene of a natural disaster, or trapped in some space with a crowd of terrified people screaming for help. This is a completely different experience, one that evokes fear and anxiety. Functionally, there is no difference between these two situations for the autistic individual. Of course there's the cognitive difference. We would naturally be more terrified in a natural disaster than a football game. But the point I'm getting at here is that for neurotypical people there are good crowds and bad crowds. The energy of the people in the stands around you at a football game can energize you, a mob can infect you with anger, and so on. A natural sort of herd mentality. Autistic people seem much less susceptible to this. For us, there is no difference between a crowd of screaming people at a football game and a crowd of screaming people in a storm shelter. We're not tuned into this energy that tells others "we're all safe and excited!" We are simply surrounded by yelling, screaming people. Again, though, this is just an observation of mine.

That's not the point. The point isn't that I'm failing to live up to society's standards, the point is I'm failing to live up to my own standards.

I think this is an issue a lot of people ignore. When we tell our stories, we talk about how society's expectations harm us or how we have to struggle to overcome society's expectations. We completely ignore how we can fail our own expectations.

I'm not just talking autism, I'm talking minority groups as a whole. The kid in the wheelchair isn’t sitting around wishing he had working legs, he’s telling people that he’s handicapable and the only trouble in life he has is that people look down on him figuratively instead of just physically. The gay kid isn’t struggling because her dreams of a big, white wedding now have to be completely reworked to include two white dresses, she’s struggling because her family won’t come to her two-dress wedding.

We don’t like talking about how we fail ourselves, especially if we’re born different. It’s not cool enough to talk about. It just makes other people right about us, so we can’t talk about it. It was just society forcing its expectations on us, so the feelings weren’t real. We were just troubled. We just weren’t getting it. We were just depressed. There are a thousand reasons why we shouldn’t talk about it.

But I think we should talk about it. Because the feelings are real. They are valid. And not just because it’s a stage we all have to work through, but because we are justified in our feelings. We are justified in being disappointed in ourselves for failing to meet our own expectations.

I’m not advocating that we’re justified in staying disappointed forever. Life is what you make of it, and it’s no use crying over spilt milk. But I think that ignoring and trivializing this aspect of our existence is counterproductive. We can’t just wake up OK with who we are. It’s a journey. We have to get there. And don’t wise men say that the journey is more important than the destination?

When you look into your future, how do you define "success?" Do you see yourself married? With a job? Doing that one thing you love? Do you see lots of people at your funeral or just your family?

I have expectations of myself. I expect to grow up and be successful. I expect to have a good job I like. I expect to fall in love and live happily with someone. I expect to live in general comfort. I expect to have friends. These are the standards I hold myself to.

And yes, unlike many people I have to question whether or not I can meet these standards or if I would even enjoy the fulfillment of them. Another of my recent struggles has been with my expectation that I will meet someone and fall in love. I ended up with the alexithymic side of Asperger's. I don't feel my own emotions properly sometimes. If I don't consciously understand why I should be feeling a particular way, I simply don't consciously feel the emotion. I get weird almost-stomach aches instead, or headaches. My heart will race, but I won't get anxious. I'll have the classic physical symptoms of depression, but I won't feel depressed.

So what does this say about my ability to fall in love? I'm 20 years old and I've never even had a baby-crush on someone. What if that's because I didn't consciously understand my own emotions and therefor didn't feel them? What if I literally have to learn to fall in love because I'm not capable of just naturally falling in love?

This is a major point of concern for me right now. I feel like I'm failing to meet all my own standards. I don't have any real passions, so I chose a major based on job security. What if I'm making the wrong choice, one that leaves me qualified only for jobs I dislike? I don't feel emotions properly, so what if I never fall in love? I have poor social skills and don't really feel the same need for friendships others do, so does this mean I'm going to live the rest of my life alone? What do I want from life? What are my goals? What am I living for?

I think... I may have gotten distracted from the actual matter at hand. There's a lot of different ideas that I've been thinking about lately mashed together here. I guess the main idea I'm getting at here is that I can't just sit around and hope everything turns alright in the end. I have sat around hoping things would just work themselves out. People said I'd eventually figure out what I wanted to major in, but I'm in my 3rd year. You seem to be saying I should just relax and let friendships form naturally, but I went almost two years without anything even vaguely resembling a friend before now. I think there's a real threat that if I keep on waiting nothing's ever going to change.

So I did do something. I joined an organization on my campus. It works for me. People know my name. They say hello to me. They sit beside me and start conversations with me. There are events with the organization, and this gives me a structured, predictable social life. I'm fitting into one of the little cliques within the larger group and I'm largely comfortable and happy with the arrangement.

But now I'm moving from that stage of "casual acquaintances" to proper friendships and I find it stressful. I would like one real friend. I miss being able to have a personal conversation with someone. I miss having people to talk to when I've had a really good or bad day. I miss the ability to share personal things that comes with a genuine friendship.

The trouble is I'm being rapidly initiated into a group of friends instead of a singular friendship. This is coming with burdens I find difficult to handle.

In a large group of acquaintances, the conversation is relatively shallow. No one is hurt if you forget their birthday or if you don't show up this week because you're too people'd out. The conversation is relatively contained. It doesn't matter if you forget what was going on last week because the topics are immediately concerned and often reactionary.

In a small group of friends, the expectations are higher and hard for me to live up to. The social situations themselves are more stressful. I can handle small talk in my large group of acquaintances better than I can handle discussion over a dinner table. I am getting very tired of people being shocked at every word that comes out of my mouth while I'm near-dizzy from all the noise around me and desperately trying to hide my stims under the table. Everything I say seems to either go unheard or completely disrupt the conversation. In a large, insular group like the one I joined, it's easy to be eccentric. There, I'm just interesting and unique. In a small group, I just don't fit properly.

I want one real friend, but I'm discovering that people don't come without connections. When you're kids, it's easy to just make a single friend. Now, they want you to meet their boyfriend and their three best friends and their boyfriends. And when they're all together they talk about houses and babies and relationships. It's too much.

But the alternative is having no friends whatsoever. There simply are no good options.

Considering how important this "autistic aloneness" is, it's surprising that it hasn't made its way into all the books about autism.

When I was a kid, I was a classic example of the autistic child who was completely socially aloof and completely ignored people, so I'll try to explain what it was like for the OP.

The outwards behavior was that I appeared to be in my own world and took no notice of others. People called my name, and I didn't answer. It was like they were not there. I displayed no reaction whatsoever. People spoke to me, and I didn't speak back, even to questions addressed to me. Again like they were not there. I didn't look at them either. No acknowledgment of their presence. But if they gave me explicit directions to do something, e.g. tuck my shirt into my pants, I could do it, but did not give any indication that I was going to comply before complying. I never initiated any communications with anyone. I never greeted my parents when they appeared in the room. When I was a baby, I never responded to my parents playing with me over my crib.

On the inside, what it felt like was this: There was no difference between people and objects in my mind, and I didn't know that there was such a thing as communication. When people called my name, I heard my name, and that was it. It was like I had heard a car passing on the street. End processing. There was no social meaning to the sound of my name. The idea of responding didn't occur to me, and the sound of my name meant nothing beyond the sound itself. Same for when people spoke to me about anything. The idea of responding didn't occur to me, but if they said to do something that I knew how to do from connecting the action with the sound of the words to do the action, then I could do it, no problem. My mother always used the same words when she told me to do each thing, so I could do what she wanted just fine. The teachers at preschool and school sometimes used different words, so that was sometimes a problem for me, and I just gave the appearance of not hearing them at all.

So this whole time that I was effectively alone in my own world, was I struggling to communicate? Did I feel locked-in? Did I suffer from being so alone? No, not at all. Because I had no idea what communication was. How I could miss something that I didn't know existed? Everything was great, and I had a very happy childhood. I did my few activities alone and hyperfocused. I felt happy to be living almost entirely in my own mind, with brief forays into the external world to have my physical needs taken care of. I had bad motor skills as a kid, so my parents didn't expect me to do much physical stuff. They didn't want me to, for fear of accidents. I was totally happy in my own internal world. In my mind, everything was great. I was learning a lot from my reading and drawing and block-stacking and lining stuff up. I taught myself arithmetic before age three from arranging piles of dirt into patterns. There was no need at all to connect with another person, and I was not aware that such a need existed.

As a child, I was alone and happy. On the outside, I appeared to be "locked-in", a description that could not be farther from the truth. On the inside, that was the best time in my life, before the 8-10 age range when I started to take notice of people, because I was totally free from what I now call the "social prison". If given a choice between being "locked-in" to myself or being "locked-in" to the social prison, then I would definitely choose freedom.

Sorry this post is kind of incoherent. I just blabbed it here, without really organizing my thoughts on the topic.

Thanks. That was usefull. A very good description of what happens.

So would you then say the lack of responsiveness is another part than social indifference or is it a result of not seeing the point of communicating?

But how about now? Have you grown partly out of it?