Hyper-NT Behavior on a Moving Ship

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I recently got back from a cruise. I took the cruise by myself (known as "solo" in the cruising community). The weather where I was sailing was just plain beautiful: hot and partly sunny. But it was bad in other parts of North America, which caused the sea to become choppy. Plus, from what I heard, the stabilizers on the ship weren't working properly. So one day, when the sea was particularly choppy, the ship was tilting, listing, and heaving intensely; it means rock back-and-forth, side-to-side, and up-and-down, respectively. (These terms are just for ships; airplanes use different terms to describe their motion.)

Everybody was walking around like drunk people. I was stumbling into walls, columns, and furniture (but not people). But I found the rocking relaxing like you wouldn't believe! I was walking around with a big smile the whole time. (Interestingly, it's considered quite normal on cruises, as opposed to in real life.) And also, I was acting way out of character, like an NT. I was starting conversations with strangers very easily, based on topics I picked out from my surroundings, like another ship I saw outside the window, and they were responding to me very positively. I made friends with a big group of people by the second day, and we hung out together for pretty much the rest of the cruise. Women I knew for less than ten minutes were giving me very close, warm, emotional hugs. And it was for simple things, like thanking me after I danced with them really well, or as a way of complimenting me on a shirt I was wearing. Also, I was acting quite aggressively in a good way. Example: when a Latin dance song I liked came on, I'd just grab the first friendly-looking girl by the hand and start dancing with her, as opposed to asking her "would you like to dance?" as dictated by dance etiquette. If need be, I just walked her through the dance moves using word commands and hand gestures; more often than not, she'd get the basic steps if she didn't already know the dance. And most importantly, whenever I committed an act of physical awkwardness (as opposed to social), such as bumping into a person, stepping on someone's foot, or accidentally bumping a woman's breast with my hand while dancing with her, I could just "blame the ship", and people believed it. (Well, technically, I was telling the truth when I blamed the ship, but still.)

What's even more interesting is that I somehow magically gained NT skills: I was understanding subtle jokes, I was responding properly to verbal jabs, and I knew how to balance assertiveness and deference when talking to authority figures. The NT effect carried over into ports of call and the airplane ride back. Even when I got lost in one port and it took me half an hour to find my way back to the ship, I really impressed myself. I approached the local police for help in such a way that one officer went out of his way to help me. I refused offers from aggressive vendors in such a way that they backed off very quickly, although with one, I pretended not to know English. Even during the airplane ride back, TSA officers were super-polite with me, even after I forgot to take off my belt prior to going through the full-body scanner. He even said it was his fault for not telling me because rules changed a lot lately. (Of course, knowing TSA's authority, I apologized profusely first.) And as we all know, politeness isn't TSA's strong point.

Now that I bragged without intending to, on with my question. How was all this possible, and what made it happen? I did NOT bring my anti-anxiety medication on the cruise with me. I didn't want Border Patrol to assume I bought it in a foreign country and hassle me over it, plus cruising isn't exactly an anxiety-provoking experience. And yet, I had no AS-type anxiety whatsoever. Did the rocking of the ship really relax me that much? Was it the friendly, socially forgiving environment of a cruise ship? Some combination of both? Share your thoughts.

Maybe it was the rocking. Or perhaps it was just being in a good mood because you're on vacation, or it was the change of environment, or just alcohol or something like that?

Post your photo and I'll tell you

If you're suggesting if my looks had anything to do with it, I'm pretty average looking. In fact, I went over my old pictures; I looked "just OK" when I was 23 (when I started getting dates more than once a year) and "downright ugly" when I was in my late teens (when I couldn't get a date at all). But now, at age 29, I suppose I grew into my looks. I like my current pictures exponentially more than than my old pictures. I'd go as far as saying I look handsome in a few of this year's pictures.

So back to the "hyper-NT behavior on a rocky cruise ship" topic. It may be because the women who hugged me and who danced with me when I grabbed them by the hand found me physically attractive. Or maybe because it was a Carnival cruise, where fun outlandishness is subtly encouraged. However, on my cruise last year (also with Carnival), women responded to me equally well, although I showed more self-restraint, since that was my first cruise ever. (And interestingly, the seas were calmer, except one night.) On this cruise, I could easily pass for an NT, for reasons described in my first post.

I even recovered nicely from a faux pas. When I was walking along edge of the Lido deck pool, I tripped over someone's full cup of iced tea, knocked it into the pool, and fell in myself, all while wearing street clothes and pool shoes. (Luckily, my pockets were empty, except my ship card.) Once I surfaced, I broke into laughter, gave the onlookers a fake embarrassed "oops", and high-fived one guy who held up his hand. I swam a few strokes just for laughs, then climbed out, and walked to my cabin in wet clothes like everything was normal. If this happened, say, in a hotel, I think I'd run to my room and hide there the rest of the day.

And outside of cruise ships (and ports they stop in), my social awkwardness and anxiety range from mild to "through the roof", and women have more mixed reactions to me. In real life, I can't even imagine myself "just grabbing a girl's hand" to dance with her, no matter how drunk I am. I engaged in these highly NT behaviors on every cruise I took. Outside of cruising, those occurrences are very few and far between. So it's gotta be something about cruising. But what exactly is the question in this thread's poll.

Last edited by Aspie1 on 19 Apr 2013, 5:57 pm, edited 5 times in total.

It's really funny reading this because last night I watched a movie called Limitless. NZT-48 could also turn an autistic into a socialite.

You've contradicted yourself - one minute you're pretty average, the next you're handsome in a few pictures.
As I suspected, looks played a major role in this QED

If what you're saying is true, then I only feel better. Especially considering that it was a Carnival cruise, so looking sharp and dressy isn't a priority, except during dinners and theater shows, so it was my natural features that sparked the attraction. Plus, on cruises, women ages 30 to 45 (the ones showing interest in me) tend to act more aggressive than "on land", which is a blessing for aspie guys.

But the original question was about my actions. After all, I'm bringing the same looks with me everywhere. And yet, I just can't replicate that same hyper-NT behavior outside of cruise ships. I just can't bring myself to feel and act as confident as I did on this year's cruise. Something about being on a cruise ship brings out the NT in me. And I'm trying to figure out what.

I think the age group of the women has a lot to do with it

you became a hot commodity as a younger than the average male on the boat with a captive audience

on land you're one among many young men

The rocking motion of a ship or boat relaxes me to no end. I really should get a water bed. I'd sleep like a baby.

I suppose I should mention some actions I engaged in, to see if they're what caused me to pass for NT and/or get hit on.

* Calling other ships docked in the same port of call as "our friends" when mentioning them by name, especially when talking about other Carnival ships. The intention behind this was showing friendliness. People listening immediately understood and responded in kind.

* Loudly yelling out the ship's name from the deck while sailing away, as it passed along beaches, bars, and oceanfront condos. One or two people on deck yelled along with me. A few people on shore yelled back either "boo!" or "whoo-hoo!", or some disparaging remark about Carnival. Carnival has a booze cruise reputation in many circles, due to its past history of actually being a booze cruise.

* Yelling "Carnival!! !" at other cruise lines' ships, and having people join in. At least among the people I hung out with during the cruise and the strange women who hit on me, our ship, and to a lesser extent, Carnival in general, acquired a mascot-like status; we'd shout its name with the same fervor some people root for their favorite sports team. A handful of people from my ship heard me as well, and join me in support. The only cruise line we showed relative restraint with was Disney, and that was to protect the innocents.

* When approaching women in port bars (that is, the ones who clearly looked like tourists), "hey, what ship are you from?" was literally the most effective opening line I used in years! If they named a ship other than mine, I'd jokingly bust their chops over it. If they named my ship, they'd get a manly high-five. In either case, I'd be dancing with them minutes later. Of course, the dancing part is helped by the fact that I've been taking lessons for the past seven years. Without it, I'd never be able to pull all that off.

So there you have it. I adopted the NT traits I normally hate, and used them to my advantage to make friends. Traits like groupthink, desire to exclude, blatantly acted-out empathy, etc. And people really liked it! And again, I just can't replicate the same abilities and behaviors outside the context of a cruise ship (and its ports of call). What was it about that cruise that gave me those abilities, that's just impossible for me to replicate "on land"?

I'm thinking this is a combination of you being determined to emulate NTs and doing things like taking those danccing lessons
plus the cameraderie that being on the boat created - it became a community and easier to get to know a wider number of people in it. Everyone was in a happy mood as it was a cruise/holiday, plus I'm sure a fair amount of alcohol was consumed.
Were you expressing your normal personality ie are you usually a loud extrovert?

In terms of the rocking of the boat, I went on a school cruise on the SS Uganda (which was apparently used as a hospital ship in the Falklands war) round the Mediterranean and to Egypt and Israel in the 1980s and when we set sail from Naples most people had bad sea sickness. I had a horrible sick feeling in my stomach for a number of days until I adjusted to the boat movement but a lot of people were really sick - you'd regularly turn corners to see sand covering the floor (where someone had been sick) and people were beign admitted to sick bay left right and centre. It wasn't as if the boat was rocking a lot; it was the constant underlying low-level movement of the boat that made you feel nauseous as you had to adapt to this as the norm.

So we definitely weren't feeling better from the motion of the boat! lol

Dont know.

But you and I oughtta book a singles cruise together sometime.

I'm usually fairly extroverted. But I never act this loud and social outside of cruises. And I certainly never have such an easy time coming up with social tricks on the fly. I acted still slightly reserved the first day, then let loose after the ship hit choppy waters and started rocking. Things like acting loud and crazy (while not crossing moral lines), recovering gracefully from falling into the pool in my clothes, and dancing with a girl by grabbing her hand are normally impossible for me. And I know my behavior didn't turn NT-like until the ship hit some choppy waters. Before that, I was relaxed and happy, but my aspie traits still creeped in.

My thing with referring to other ships in port as "our friends", only to turn around and taunt them later was based on NTs' tendency to exclude outsideres in order to unite their own group. On the cruise, I did that all subconsciously, just like NTs do. However, I stayed within my moral principles by excluding ships, and not people. But since people have been humanizing ships since they first started building them (giving them names, calling them "she", etc.), I guess taunting ships satisfied their need to exclude, and my extension, include me. And since modern cruise ships have names (and not just hull numbers), just like many ships did throughout history, I guess they were "humanized enough" to fit the need to exclude.

I've never wanted to be NT that badly - a lot of their behaviour is unpleasant in my opinion and I have no wish to emulate it.

I guess this is where I'll disagree with you. Being able to emulate NT behaviors as easily as NTs do them naturally is what made my cruise so much fun. I went from being a stranger in the crowd on the first day, to truly being a part of a group on the last day. I did, however, redirect the exclusionary behavior to inanimate objects; namely, ships. After all ships are just vehicles, not people; I wouldn't exclude a person, unless I flat-out have a problem with him/her.

And I think the ship's natural rocking is what brought out the inner NT in me. I was doing everything NT guys do: act loud and look good doing it, randomly grab girls by the hand to dance with, and effectively assert my opinion with little effort. However, when I went out clubbing the first weekend after getting back, it was back to same old same old. I was getting turned down by girls, feeling uncomfortable around tough guys, and even found shyness creeping into my behavior.

My guess is your poor social skills are partly related to sensory processing issues. (For example, SPD can make you have difficulty interpreting sensory cues, which could apply to social cues.)

Many people with sensory processing issues crave a certain type of sensory stimulus, and if they get it, their sensory processing improves temporarily. Vestibular stimulation is a common kind of stimulation to crave. (Personally, I really like falling onto a soft surface, and falling a few times makes my tactile defensiveness less acute.)

Maybe try working in some kind of vestibular stimulation to your daily life. For example, there's this one sort of thing you can buy that looks like an exercise ball that's been cut in half. You put the round end down and try to balance on the flat end. If my interpretation is right, this should have a similar effect to being on the boat (though probably less intense).