I'm going to attempt to kill my eye contact problem

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After being diagnosed I did not immediately set out to 'cure' myself but spent many hours reading hundreds of articles about AS and social behaviour in general. I now believe that eye contact is my chief problem as an AS sufferer. I'm missing something like 93% of communication by avoiding eye-contact at all costs. I've missed a lot of 'lessons' in life because of this I think.

If I can fix or mitigate my eye contact problem, I'm pretty sure I can be a lot more comfortable with people. At the moment, my eye-contact could not get any worse - but I think it's something I can work on. So this is my first goal.

I had a thought the other day. If a guy held a gun to my head and then told me to go into a crowded room and behave like an NT for 30 minutes, I would probably 'act' the scene out to save my life. I would *make* eye contact because I didn't want to die. There's an invisible barrier, but not an unbreakable one. It might be a barrier that I may never be able to remove, but hell, I've got to deal with this somehow. I'm almost 24, I do not plan on being a reclusive loner for the rest of my life.

I'll post again in a few weeks what difference this has made to my life, if at all.

Oh, and I think another large portion of my failure to communicate well is my voice. I might try to improve that at the same time (I don't stress words like I can in itallics with text). But I'll focus on just eye contact for now.

Good luck!

Yeah, it can be nice to have control over your eye contact.

Feel free to PM me if you like. I went through this process of eye-contact training when I was in my early teens. I'd be happy to give you any pointers I possess. I've also done a good bit of research for my articles and such, so I'm happy to consult, if you think it might be helpful.

I find I am OK as long as I limit it to certain times and give myself a rest from it in between.

I am able to do it when necessary (mostly at work) but it gets very tiring and it's nice to be able to relax it in other situations.

Just be carefull you don't end up looking like this ~

I don't seem to have an eye contact problem with people I know well enough. I do however even avoid eye contact with pictures stairing out at me. I cannot stand it when there are things constantly stairing at me.

It is actually quite funny that I never realized I had this problem before I read about AS. Whenever I am talking to someone face to face I realized that I will often just look in another direction while talking. I my glance at their eyes for short moments, but never too long. I never assumed that they would be looking at me the entire time. I thought THAT would be weird.

Ok here's an update. It was a really bad week to start to try this. I've developed a rather nasty toothache as a result of one of my wisdom teeth slowly pushing upward through my gum. I've been taking painkillers a lot, and it's slowly getting better. The pain has caused me to lose a lot of sleep and as such I'm not in the best frame of mind to try something as traumatic as NT-style eye contact.

However, I am testing a theory based on Groovydruid's article that even a tiny amount of eye contact helps - and it definately does. Every conversation I engage in now, I make an effort to give at least a quarter-second of eye contact. That tiny glimpse makes a big difference. Before I would not make *any* eye contact and I can kind of understand how this would cause problems with people. However it is still too early to tell if this is something that is going to improve my social life or just make me more anxious.

Btw I realised using the word 'kill' in the topic header might have been a bit too strong lol . It almost makes me sound like I'm going to stab my eyes out. Which I would never do btw, I have zero suicidal tendancies - but I wish this toothache would go away!

Toothache gone! Yaay. Myg gums ssare a bbbit flappy buta apart tfrom that I'm mno longer in nexcruciating gpain!

As for eye contact, knowing that people react more positively to brief eye-contact is simply not enough for me to do it. There must be something very wrong with my brain; there is absolutely no logical reason I can think of why this is difficult to do. I also think that 'difficulty' is a bad way to describe this sensation; it's not quite fear, not quite shyness, not quite anything; it's just a barrier - an invisible, indescribable force which means I must avoid eye contact. Until I better understand this really strange barrier, I think eye contact will always be something I just can't do.

Sometimes you have to force yourself, but it's worth it. If you can just hold eye contact long enough, they start talking to you! That's right, you don't have to start the conversation! Just hold the eye contact as long as you can and social situations become 100% easier. I guarantee it.

My problem wasnt actually making eye contact, there was no reason that I couldnt do it. If I consciously made the effort, I could. The problem came after that, people would either look away, or they'd stare back. In which case you are expected to smile and say hello. Well, I cant force a smile... not even for a camera. It just wont happen. I can blurt out a hello but its nothing w/o the smile. So I just end up creeping people out. Therefor, I avoid making eye contact w/ ppl I dont know.

Well - I had this problem too. So I set about solving it with some fierce determination. I did everything I could to make myself stronger and more confident and more extroverted. It worked! I was making eye contact and doing all sorts of brave things. And then everyone started to think that I was really outgoing, and I was treated like one of those really social people. I started to panic a little bit because I couldn't genuinely keep up with all of the social treatment. Eventually I buckled, had a nervous breakdown and ran off back into my cave. Now i'm just happy to keep the eye contact at nil, or rather, at a level that is natural for me. Too much eye contact equals too much exhausting social stimulation!

Good luck