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Jayo
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05 Oct 2013, 6:48 pm

This is something I find condescending and presumptuous, when I get people who will tell me (or instruct me to do) something and they repeat the same thing to me like 3-4 times as if I'm a moron or I have some extreme form of ADHD. On a tongue-in-cheek note, I guess it does take away any propensity for echolalia that I might have had :P but seriously, since taking communications courses I have practiced active listening and gotten quite good at it most of the time, with occasional lapses, which are unfortunately noticeable enough to get this down-putting treatment. As it became apparent to me by my mid-twenties that people would not accept me merely repeating what they said verbatim to confirm my understanding of what they said. Isn't it funny though, how the people I describe above will spare me that trouble :)

I had this with co-workers, where they'd repeat something to me like 3-4 times - and it wasn't because of any misinterpretation of what they said in the recent past so much as it was a lack of a "common sense" response on my part to a given situation, where they felt compelled to instruct me directly and repeatedly as to how I should handle it. They probably and inaccurately misinterpreted my improper response as being impulsive and therefore ADHD so they responded in a way that they thought made sense.

The other verbal rub-in that I despise is when somebody ends an explanation with "Does it/that make sense??" and with a rather abrasive tone. (of course, when I ask "does it make sense?" at the end of my speech, it's due to lack of confidence that my message was understood.) In the other person's case, they KNOW that what they said adds up, but due to my executive functioning difficulties with processing speed and central coherence, I try to connect the dots as it were and say slowly, "yes...it makes....sense...." to buy time then tentatively lay out and paraphrase how the components of their explanation add up to a whole. I found this tactic works well.

As patronizing as the "does it makes sense?" remark may seem, I have to give credit to the speaker for having more insight into my condition than those who just repeat their message verbatim. At least the person asking "does it make sense?" infers that I have some central processing difficulty, not a lack of attention span or being distracted.



Kuribo
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05 Oct 2013, 7:22 pm

People, mostly teachers, used to repeat things and talk down to me a lot, but as my social anxiety improved and I began speaking more often, I deliberately used sophisticated language to make them realise that I wasn't the simpleton they assumed I was.



Jayo
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05 Oct 2013, 7:29 pm

Kuribo wrote:
People, mostly teachers, used to repeat things and talk down to me a lot, but as my social anxiety improved and I began speaking more often, I deliberately used sophisticated language to make them realise that I wasn't the simpleton they assumed I was.


Yeah, I tried that tact too in school, and found it worked well...trouble was when I got into the corporate world, I found that talking sophisticated wasn't welcome, and got rebuked several times for using language that was "over my audience's head" and was essentially saying that I think I'm better than them - well, that's NTs for you, looking at the subtext first and main text second...

...hence my defence wiped away and back to them repeating things to me. :(



tweety_fan
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05 Oct 2013, 9:01 pm

People have done that to me and it bugs me.



auntblabby
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06 Oct 2013, 1:28 am

I WANT people to repeat things to me, as I seldom get it all right the first time. :idea:



Threore
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06 Oct 2013, 2:20 am

Yes, people do so quite often. I find it's generally because of my (apparently lacking) reaction to the first time they said it. I don't experience it as condescending at all though, they're just trying to get their message across and try again when they think they failed. So I don't think it's inherently condescending to repeat something.



Lord_Psych
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06 Oct 2013, 3:59 am

My father repeatedly tells me to lose weight. If only I cared.... :lol:



Epsilon
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06 Oct 2013, 1:56 pm

Threore wrote:
Yes, people do so quite often. I find it's generally because of my (apparently lacking) reaction to the first time they said it. I don't experience it as condescending at all though, they're just trying to get their message across and try again when they think they failed. So I don't think it's inherently condescending to repeat something.

Same with me, I understand the info/instructions but don't react/process fast enough


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ZenDen
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07 Oct 2013, 12:03 pm

Epsilon wrote:
Threore wrote:
Yes, people do so quite often. I find it's generally because of my (apparently lacking) reaction to the first time they said it. I don't experience it as condescending at all though, they're just trying to get their message across and try again when they think they failed. So I don't think it's inherently condescending to repeat something.

Same with me, I understand the info/instructions but don't react/process fast enough


Yep, same here. The most hilarious (now not then) was stopping, on a car trip, to ask for directions. Until I learned I was an aspie I never knew why the good Samaritan would always want to repeat and repeat the directions while looking at me as though I wasn't "getting it." :lol:

I guess they were always waiting for an expression or micro-expression (not in my repertoire) to let them know that I "got" it.

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BeggingTurtle
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08 Oct 2013, 7:52 pm

Too much.


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