I overthink every social interaction

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Mostly at night, but often during the day, I get a sense of regret immediately after I've finihed a conversation if I think even the slightest thing has gone wrong. It seems easier to just avoid everyone than be plaguedwith memories of what I think I screwed up constantly. Does anyone else feel like this?

I do too, and repetition is the only path that seems to work honestly. If I acknowledge I'm being annoying or negative or whatever conversational turn off of the day, I can reprimand myself, and sometimes stop it. Of course, it's a learning process and I have not came anywhere close to managing it.

Yeah, happens to me all the time, too. It's easier to let it go if the conversation I messed up in was one on one, but if there have been more people present I keep worrying more since there are more people who can remember my mistakes and remind me of them or hold them against me.

I do too and it can actually make me physically sick when I know I have to speak to someone a few days before I become really stressed and physically sick.

Absolutely. It has a lot to do with the fact that I expect people to reject me and think I'm boring, weird or asocial because I often don't know how to respond. I believe it's a quite normal thing for us aspies.

It's not very common for me to overthink social interactions, but it has certainly happened. If there's something I do tend to overthink a lot, though, that would be relationship-related things. It has often led to me misinterpreting what the level of "-ship" between a male and female acquaintance of mine is. Thankfully no friendships have been ruined because of it.

Me too. It's terrible, especially if I'm still in the social situation. Then, I have to try to stay with the conversation at the same time. I'm trying more and more to manage it, though. Recently, someone's tone when they said something made me try to analyze if it meant something bad, but I had to stop myself and think to myself, "I can't constantly live like this."

I also found that getting my thoughts down on paper helps.

I do this all the time, with almost everyone I interact with and it really gets to me. I know that I shouldn't but my confidence is so low that I mentally put everyone I know on a high pedestal and act like I'm not worthy of even speaking to them. It then makes me self-analyse some conversations to the point of feeling dizzy or getting headaches, as I'm just constantly looking for any moment where I could have said the wrong thing.

Me too, its so hard to just talk to people normally It takes me ages to think of something to say, and I never feel like Ive said the right thing It feels like everything I say is wierd. Like my mind just goes blank and i dno how to talk lol. I just wish everyone knew about AS and then it wouldnt be a problem cuz they wud understand.

I find it very hard to stop myself doing this.

When I know an interaction is coming, I can spend hours pacing around, stimming, and trying to write a "script" for every possible permutation of what I should say and what responses I might get (all of which are worthless when "line one" doesn't go to plan, as I well know by now.)

During a conversation, the analysing quite often just leaves me unable to contribute, as I get so wrapped up in what was said previously that I'm no longer following what other people are saying. I just don't feel that I can speak up until I am confident that I didn't miss something which was implied by non-literal language or some unspoken context that I might have not taken into account.

And then afterwards, more of the pacing and stimming, as I analyse all the parts of the conversation which I didn't comprehend at the time, and cringeing at the parts which I think I may have got wrong as I imagine what the consequences of that might be.

Randomosity's suggestion of putting things down in writing is a good one, especially for the post-conversation analysis - it is so easy to reason in never ending circles, and this is a very good way to prevent that I find. Besides that, I find that it helps to remind myself:

- No-one else can predict what another person is going to say either, and no-one else knows what my "script" is, so how could they possibly stick to it?
- There is no shame in staying silent if you have nothing to contribute. I find that most people don't even notice if there is a "quiet" person in the conversation, so long as there is someone who does speak up.
- Everybody has "brain farts" where they get distracted or miss the context. Asking for clarification is rarely as embarrassing as I imagine it is going to be. If you think that the point you missed is really important, don't be afraid to admit that you lost the thread.
- A trusted friend who will tell you whether you really did mess up or not is like gold (my sincere apologies to those for whom this is sore point if you have no such friend.)
- If people got the impression that you were joking or being facetious, laughing along with them is an easy way to defuse the situation. Everybody has to say "OMG, that was so stupid of me" sometimes.

Likewise

You are either impulsive, neither or indecisive

I tend to be indecisive

I used to do that all the time. That I don't anymore is likely because I am not in a social environment like school. I work from home and have limited social interactions. When they do go wrong, I can obsess about them for days. Trog's list of things to remember is a good one and corresponds closely to what I have learned over the years. The other nice thing about getting older (though it looks like you'll have to wait a while for this) is you can blame it on a "senior moment" or "early alzheimers."

Something not to do is whine in front of NTs about how you don't get it. They don't get that you don't get it and it just points out to them that you are weird. I know because I used to do this over and over and over again, frustrated, begging for someone to explain to me what was going on. Painful to recall....

Overall, I think that plain old silence is the best "go-to" suggestion. Silence leaves others not knowing what you are thinking and may give them some pause as to their own behavior or circumstances. I learned this by accident. I was in the middle of a discussion with two supervisors who were trying to deny me something or another - I don't remember what and it doesn't matter. What matters is that I was so blown away by whatever it was they said as a reason I could find nothing to say back. I was at a loss for words. There was just blank space hanging there. That is when they stepped in and agreed I could have what I wanted. It was a real eye-opener for me.

I also think my sentences once or twice before saying, practicing especially the tone of voice in my head, because the tone of voice can radically change the way the sentence is interpreted.

Also I systematically blame myself for every detail which would be wrong after every conversation. This may lead to a lot of anxiety, low self-esteem and being less self-assured...

But now I realize that most of the time, if I was the other NT person, I would blame myself at least as much as I blame myself. NT make social mistakes as well, other mistakes maybe, and they less blame themselves than I do.

So now I try to assess myself without catastrophizing too much

Yep. Every day.

I have agonized over certain interactions or situations, but I don't really anymore. I will put alot of thought into a reply sometimes, but I don't look back and think I did something wrong. Just be yourself. There's no right or wrong way to be you. Use common sense, like if someone asks you if this skirt looks fat, you say no. Utilize tact. I know now my neighbor would rather avoid answering my invitation to stop by than tell me to my face that she is not interested. I was upset at first because I know I didn't do anything wrong and she's happy to talk when were outside smoking. I just had to let it go and move on. You can't control how others react to you, so its best just not to try. If you're worrying all the time that you might have said something wrong, then you're likely obsessing about small stuff. And honestly, if I think if I really screwed up I'll say so or apologize and that's usually the end of it. Please try to relax and not worry so much. I know it's hard.

I do this too. It is positive to do that. Try to think it positively to prevent anxiety:

You are learning. Tell yourself how you should have reacted, spoken, how you will do next time.
And forgive yourself for this time.
Relativize, we tend to make it bigger than it is, really.
Rather think what you could say or do that could balance the suspected negative consequences.