Trying so hard to mimic NT behaviour but it never works?

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I'm trying so hard to smile and make eye contact but people are still afraid of me. I tried to start conversation but the person always chooses to speak to someone else over me even though I'm practicing all the time to be more sociable. I make people uncomfortable and I try so freaking hard to fit in but I just creep everyone out. I remember reading a post a few years ago about how women cant creep people out as much with their social anxiety but every since I started school people have found me scary. I have so much anxiety and I work with children I know their kids but it still hurts that the choose literally every other work over me when they have a question I notice. I just desperately want people to like me.

I don't know if I can help you. Sometimes being a little bit scary can be helpful in some situations.

I might suggest wearing blue tinted glasses. I have worn some for a year now and I can observe that people feel more comfortable around me. I have even had total strangers come up to me and begin talking and asking my advise.

Many Aspies do not make good eye contact, which neurotypicals use automatically to interpreting feelings. Neurotypicals focus on the hidden tells on the face and eyes. But this hidden tells are not accurate when applied to Aspies.

Psychologist Paul Ekman, an authority on facial expressions, says that of the 23 facial expressions relating to human emotion, about one-third involve the eyes. Shades may slightly obscure your view of the world, but they also hide the world's view of how you are feeling.

Not being able to see a person's eyes greatly reduces our ability to infer his or her emotions. For example, telling a fake smile from a real one can be difficult; but if the person who is smiling is wearing shades then detecting the sham smile is almost impossible. In a real smile, a muscle called the orbicularis oculi is activated, creating a hard-to-fake crinkling around the eyes. The eyes truly are the windows to the soul.

The eyes, eyelids, eyebrows and orbicularis oculi muscle play a major role in projecting emotions and the degree of emotions. The following is a list of some of these emotions:

* disgust, contempt, upset, unhappy, or miserable,
* worry, apprehension, surprise, fear, terror, or controlled fear
* broad smile, smile of enjoyment, a real smile from a fake smile, angry smile, or miserable smile
* despair or grief
* slight sadness, sadness, intense sadness, agony, or masked sadness
* annoyance, slight anger, anger, controlled or restrained anger, glaring anger, or masked expression of anger
* perplexity, confusion, concentration, or determination

It seems like NTs are always misinterpreting Aspies intentions. They look us in the eyes and imagine our thoughts. By wearing mirrored glasses we deprive them of this tool of assessing our intentions and our vulnerabilities. So I believe this may have a therapeutic value for Aspies.

There are different types of mirrored sunglasses. For one they come in a variety of mirrored colors. Red, Blue and Silver are common. A mood analysis of these colors indicate:
* Blue is peaceful, tranquil and symbolizes loyalty. Blue is reliable and responsible. It exhibits inner security and confidence.
* Red is intense, stimulates a faster heartbeat and breathing. It makes the wearer appear heavier. Does not help people in negotiations or confrontations. Attracts attention.
* Silver reflects back any energy given out, whether it is positive or negative. Silver is respectable and courteous, dignified, self-controlled, responsible, patient, determined and organized. In color psychology, with a balance between black and white, silver is seen as a good critic, unbiased and compassionate with a mature sense of justice.

Therefore selecting the proper color for the glasses can be important because you are projecting your mood into the eyes of the observer. So based on this, I chose blue.

Massive sympathies. That is really rough.

Somehow, the outsiders always know. It is like they are mind-readers!!

Likes blue , been doing brownish tint aswell. Clear can be useable.. no idea why it works but have instinctively used glasses since 19 yrs old over 40 years , now find am starting to actually need presciption glasses .. but still do a grsyish yint , but still like my old collection of
glasses some very different but . But all pretty socially acceptable , whatever that is. Oh yes always yellow , or possibly amber , but yellow seems to filter bright red at night if you drive.
Mostly my collection is just cheap sunglasses.
Good holidays to you.

Hey girl.

Yeah I totally understand where you're coming from. I try to convince myself that I'm going OK with seeming as NT as possible to most people. I constantly have to remind myself everytime I'm about to talk to someone that I have to make eye contact and kinda BS my way in seeming like I'm understanding the back and forth between conversation but I too freak people out maybe cause I'm trying to hard I'm not quite sure. I really need to like watch more people in conversation to learn how to get better at it. So often I'm left saying nothing as I'm totally immersed in observation that it often makes people upset as they think I'm being rude or obnoxious and arrogant or something like that. I find eye contact and being attentive soooo tired and I literally struggle to stay awake sometimes. People take for granted and don't realise how lucky and difficult for people on the spectrum to just get through a day. Much love.
Dani.

I am the type of person that if I see someone in your situation I actually will try to talk to them more then the other people because
I know it hurts to feel like you are on the outside looking in.

It's not a myth that neurotypical people can sense or pick up on when someone isn't neurotypical. At least one study was done which concluded that. This even holds true when an autistic person thinks they can "mask" so well that no one can tell.

In my opinion, you can practice social cues and interactions to master passing as NT for short interactions but any interaction for long periods and I don't think masking is sustainable. I don't think it should be.

OP, you're still at a young age where you should be able to find a group of like minded "quirky" people to befriend. The "friend pool" is larger when you're younger.