One-Upping Problems?

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Have you ever encountered NT friends who seemed to brag about their issues like depression, anxiety, social isolation, etc, and always had to be worse off than you?

I know NTs can have issues as well. Everyone goes through hard spots, but why would anyone be proud of such things? It's not a contest.

Yep, I think it's a habit of NTs to make everything a contest. I'm often surprised that people are trying to compete with me when I'm not trying to compete with them.

Don't you know that controlled bipolar is worse in every way than being autistic? I mean, they even can have panic attacks, because they have real reasons to have them, but people on the autistic spectrum, they have no reason at all to meltdown. They should be actively shunned for ever thinking of showing difficulties, because they're only fake problems.

(Yes, I've dealt with this.)

That's sickening.

I don't really have meltdowns......I do get panic attacks for no reason though. I don't have bi-polar, though so I can't say I know how that disorder feels...I have Major Depression though.

I have one NT friend who claims he always has it worse off than me. Sick with the cold? NT friend claims he has the flu....

Yet another reason i don't understand people. I understand wanting to compete with silly things, but not things like this....

Yes, and usually they are lying to get attention on themselves....

I have IBS and someone at work was trying to get me to go to an indian\thai restaurant to try the food, and I explained that I couldn't eat spicy\hot food due to IBS..... This person says "oh really? me too etc" and launches into a diatribe. Yet they go out and eat this type of food regularly, so its just BS to get attention.

Yeah, I've been really unsure how to deal with it at this point other than just avoiding everyone associated with that person.

I've had NTs try to convince me that they were having a hard time out of life, and trying to dismiss my problems as trivial. I feel completely validated in that I lost my temper with them and explained in excruciating detail how bad my symptoms can be sometimes. No sense of social inhibition can come in handy sometimes I've never been told I was overreacting again.

My sister-in-law is apparently the only person in the world with worries. She has acquired the title 'poor D'. In fact, her worries are no greater than anyone else's, but she just makes such a big issue out of each little thing, for the sake of sympathy. During an argument with my mother-in-law last year, I mentioned this. I told her that I had worries too, one of them being that my cousin was in Afghanistan and his platoon had the largest death toll of any UK group of soldiers. He's my cousin, but more like a brother, as he lost his parents as a child and my parents raised him as thier son. Why wouldn't I be worried? My MIL told me that he wasn't immediate family, whereas poor D's worries are about her mother (who has nothing wrong with her, except what you'd expect of a woman in her 70s and nowhere near as severe as my own Mum). Unbelievable.

My sympathy. IDK. My sister is severe bipolar (DXd), in her high mood she was plain unbearable. I think she had (and still has) delusions (mainly delusion of grandeur) too, which suggests a connection to schizophrenia. From her point of view, she sometimes longs for that rotten periods of highs, she felt much better than currently being on medication.


Congrats!

Are most bipoplar people like that?

In my experience that's the best way to deal with this issue. It may convince the person to change how they act, but in my experience, probably not. It may be difficult at first to lose that connection at first, but ultimately you're likely better off anyway and you'll feel better in the long run. Just don't be surprised if you go through a period of 'withdrawal'

Those people are unbearable children right down to their self-centered little cores. Feel free to stop talking to them and make new acquaintances.

I just get up and physically leave the room when people start one-upping. It's not abnormal behavior if you're just being rude. The problem I find with the one-upping is that it's a form of condescending that people don't realize is wrong. What you're saying when you 'brag' about your problems is that the people around you don't really know anything about living a difficult life, because you are in every way much more miserable than them, but so much better at the same time.

Just get up. And leave the room. Do so for a reason that is important to you, and not them "Oh I have to go call a friend" "Sorry I gotta grab something to eat"