I can learn social skills, but....

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In the 8 years since I got diagnosed with AS, I learned more social skills. Looking people in the eyes, how to make a little small talk, ect.. I found this makes people think I'm more normal then I am.

But no matter how much skills I learn, I still can't read what people really mean. I am always second guessing them. Are they smiling just to be friendly? Or are they flirtiing with me? Do they want to be friends or just making small talk to make small talk? I am tired of always trying to think about what people really mean. Very frustrating. I feel I will be this way all my life.

Anyone else feel this way?

I have similar problems. I had a conversation with my mom recently and I am still trying to figure out what she was really trying to say, or rather why she felt she had to get her point across in the way she did.

It's always hard; but try to think about how far you have come and how much you can do.

I agree. Social skills are learnable, but there is only so far it can go. Social skills for me are also incredibly draining.

Always. Mimicry isn't the same as having it come naturally. I can act my pants off in the right situations, but it doesn't change the fact that I'm dying inside and that I'm going to go home and get drunk because I feel like a disgusting fraud who could never be liked for who I really am. And yes, I constantly second-guess others, to the point I feel paranoid. I can't stand hearing people laugh because I can't stop thinking they're laughing at me.

I've never felt this way, although I have, and still do periodically get annoyed with people's hypocrisy - saying one thing while meaning another.

The biggest thing that has helped me was studying NLP and hypnosis. You get a lot of models for learning to recognize body language and beginning to understand other people's motivations and their dynamics. Often, the other person doesn't even realize that they're not being sincere. But by learning to read both their conscious and unconscious expressions, you can begin to recognize or at least theorize what's going on for the whole person.