So how old do you all feel? (socially and physically)

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Knowing by reading these boards that a lot of us have difficulties in socializing and being a lot more outgoing. What I feel is a situation where I am behind age wise in socialization. For example I am 26 years old but feel I have the social capability of only a 15 or 16 year old. Physically I look about 17.

I feel I started falling back when I was about 9 or 10 and feel the need to catch up. If I did I wouldn't know how long it would take and if I would be too old to continue the process (especially in physical activities) or just being too old to do certain soc. activities like parties (which I prob. wouldn't do anyways)

So I don't know if I have this guilty feeling or regret not being able to do all the fun stuff then. It makes me think back and become upset about my past, present and future.

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Last edited by GalileoAce on 02 Apr 2006, 11:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

This is a tough one!

Hmmmmm? Let's see!.....
(slight dramatic pause by
ghosthunter as he ponders!)
! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !!


I communicate not as a grumpy
39 year old, that much I can say!

I can reduce myself to juvenile
humor(see "Starship WrongPlanet")

emphasize professor language!

go inbetween Dr.Phil advice to
Dear Ann landers level?

I am confusing? Hmmmmm?

I have no way of categorizing my
language level! Sorry!

I'll straighten up my own description here.

I am 26 but feel I can only socialize like a 15 to 16 y.o.

I don't want to socialize with them because it doesn't look right. 20 year-olds and up I might be okay with.

Being around those my own age and not being able to reach out to them is so irritating.

So then I feel I need to be around a few older folks to feel safe in a way.

Be around those a few years younger for youthfulness.

Don't lose your youth, be proud
that you can be and sound young.
The young in the financial district
try to act old and lose their youth
too quickly.



Age-Smage! People can be as*holes later
or earlier in life. People can cooler older
or younger in life. Age is a #, and f**k #'s!



This I can relate too! I try to reach out to
those I am able to help and communicate
with! Age is a number, not a language!



??????Huh!! !! !!???????



This rules! I am 39, your 26, Sean is 17,
Sarcastic_Name is 17, Bec is 18, and do
these #'s matter, it is communcation not
age that counts, f**k #'s!

Hmmmmmm?
Ghosthunter

Okay, when it comes to intellectual capabilities and expressing those values and myself, I feel more adapted to being around those a few years older. Maybe because I feel that those my age and younger wouldn't understand me at all. Or maybe wouldn't care.

Mentally i would say i am in my mid 30's, chronologically i am 18. Socially i would say i'm entirely outside the age spectrum. It isn't that i am immature with eye contact and social rituals, to the point where i interact with people like a NT would at the certain age. I interact with people in an entirely different way that NT's do. I thoughtfully interact with people. I don't do small talk at all. Anything I say, is said with specific purpose in mind. And somehow I am able to pull this off without too much akward silence. Part of it is that if you are creative there is no shortage of things that are True which can be stated and applied in any given situation. So any time I write a sentance or say a statement I say something that is relatively True. If I say something which is a truism I don't feel as though what I said was stupid, meaningless, hollow, redundant, and obvious.

So what I did was I analyzed human communication to the point where I was able to create a strategy for communication which works but is entirely different from the way NT's talk.

i am 18. often in social situations i feel incredibly young, and this is horrible. inadequacy, naivety. things i know do not apply to me, but they overwhelm me.

and yet ometimes i feel older than i am. i am often mistaken for mid-late 20's. knowing that the way you work is somehow different to other people makes you grow up fast. also, the openmindedness that comes with this kind of diagnosis can make you seem very mature. and i think i am very mature.

Physically - 20s
Socially - Mid to late teens (Maybe even still in Middle School)
Chronologically - 31

I'm 34. At the weekend, I got harshly 'shushed' for interrupting. I felt like a 4 year old being chastised.

I have mostly got the hang of not interrupting conversations, but have done this by adopting a method of hovering nearby unsure of when it would be appropriate to join in. I get it wrong a lot of the time, either misjudging the appropriate moment and annoying people, or not saying anything until the conversational topic has changed. I would say my interaction skills probably match those of a 10 year old, unless I'm having a particularly good day!

I don't think it's really possible. To put an age on myself socially would be saying that the way most people behave at a certain age if they are non-autistic, is the definition of that age, and I will not do that. So I will say I have exactly the social age of this particular autistic 24-year-old, same goes for mental age.

Time... I find the whole concept somewhat hard to understand. It is probably my biggest struggle.

Physically: My age
Socialily: Feel like in my early teens, am 19 now

Socially, I feel behind.

I could essentally cut and paste what you guys just said.

I feel extremely childlike when talking to someone and this is particallary akward b/c I look like I am in my mid-30s physically. I am 20 chronologically and I feel about 11-13 socially.

I used to think I quit developing socially when I was 11. I kind of did an accellerated teenage life the year I was 17, then I dropped off the map again. I have no idea what "normal" age I would seem now, and I think anbuend has a point - it's not something that can really be classified without assuming an NT definition of normal. But when I'm around people older than me, they mistake me for older, and when I'm around people my age, they think I'm much younger.

Anbuend, I was surprised when you said you were only 24 - I'd thought you were in your 30's or 40's.

Physically, I look younger than I am. Psychologically, I act WAY younger than I am. But in an academic or intellectual situation, I feel much older.

Physical: appear ~18. Actually am 23

Psychological: 13 in social; 60 in academic/intellectual

Argh. More of those damn valleys and peaks!