Everything is "forced"

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I find it so difficult to socialise at all.

What I always experience are anxiety symptoms. Heavy eyes, sweating, dizziness, cramps in legs and 1 of the worst things..... brain fog.

This is for no reason at all either. Walking down the road, in a group, not in a group, in a coffee shop. It's always like that. When the brain fog is in action there is NO HOPE at all. Who would want to be friends with someone they just met that sits there and doesn't say a word?

Now, when I drink alcohol, that's a relaxant that does get some symptoms down. Brain fog eases off. Yet then it comes to my actual social skills.

I have learned some social skills, but there's a difference between learning what to say and just saying it, and saying it with meaning.

So when brain fog is down, I might ask questions that I have learned (Been up to much today? Enjoying the nice weather? etc) but it isn't said with meaning. I don't think "It will be interesting to hear what they have been doing today so i'm going to ask" but instead it would be more like "Asking what they have been doing today is something people ask right? I best ask to show i'm trying".

Then when they answer, I feel bored, struggle to retain the information, have problems relating to stuff or building on what I just asked.

They might say "I was riding my bike earlier in the woods". Following on from that hasn't been learned in advance so I will normally say "cool" or "nice".... Conversation killer.... Or something dumb like "It's nice in the woods" (Even though I have never been to the woods and have no idea what it's like there). Which messes me up even more because they might start talking about the woods, which I have absolutely no idea about and start with the 1 word "yeah", "yep", "cool" thing.

Anyone else with Aspergers a bit like this?

Yep....this happens to me, too.

Sometimes, I mean what I say when I engage in "small talk." Other times, it's sort of a robot-type thing.

Ye, absolutely, and it can be such a constant strain to feel the need to keep on your "mask", sometimes it even leads to meltdowns for me or ruins the next couple days. Often you got no choice but to do it, but you have to find a balance, a lot of people need time alone to recharge afterwards. Unfortunately, people can often sense the disinterest even if your trying to force yourself, I feel like that has been a huge reason why it's been very hard for people to feel like they can continue talking or be friendly with me. I guess I just have this unapproachable aura that everyone sees. I'm trying to work on it .

Good to hear from people who can relate. That is exactly me with the meltdowns and ruining the next could of days.

1 conversation a while back was about my work days years ago (before all the depression and stuff zapped me). I can't seem to piece things together quickly.

It's as if I haven't heard what they said, even though I have but just can't process it.

The conversation in question was 6 months ago. I bumped into someone from my old workplace by chance (I did warehouse stock stuff). They were telling me how the business has now shut and said to me "I bet they had a load of skips out the back when it shut". I just couldn't process it... Skips out the back? My response was "yeah"..... Then came awkward silence with her expecting me to say more or something.

For days I beat myself up about that, trying to go through what they meant? From what I gathered days later, they meant the shop sold a load of junk nobody wanted, so when it closed they had to have lots of skips out the back binning everything as it's nothing but rubbish. Then came the beating myself up about it part, questioning myself why I didn't think of that at the time and give an answer to it.

Same for me

I experience the brain fog too.