Social situations

[SidiousUK]

Hello all,

 

I am currently awaiting formal diagnosis of Aspergers which was picked up during treatment for depression.

My main issue surrounds soclal interaction, empathy and the lack of "logic" shown by people I like to call "carbon based lifeforms".

 

The thought of someone coming up to me and interruping what I am doing just seems to fill me with dread and I start searching my brain for the "How to seem interested in people" chapter in the manual.

 

I have been told that sometimes I have a look on my face as if entering into a conversation seems to be causing me pain

 

As a result, I now avoid outside contact as people's behavour makes me very angry and then fight to stop the anger boiling over makes me depressed.

 

Up until now, I have been able to cope one way or another and was wondering if anyone has experienced the same.

 

Were any of you able to cope up to a point and then for whatever reason just stopped coping?

 

Regards

 

SidiousUK

[LancsLad]

Hi SidiousUK.

 

The thing that shines out from your post is self reflection which requires awareness of what we are doing and how we feel.

 

There have been times in the past where I have not been able to cope this has led to me being on a hospital table wired up to an ECG machine, think this coping was labled 'panick attack', I have been curled up on the floor of a doctors crying uncontrollably 'complete nervous breakdown', and have been naked locked into a bare room being checked on every hour 'suicidal'. There was a common theme running through these scenarios and this was a complete lack of self awareness and empathy on my part as to how I was feeling running up to the events mentioned. As a result I had no means to modify my behaviour, look after myself and aviod the car crash experiences which were just around the corner.

 

I believe the anecdotal experiences you describe will be seen as many as Asperger's type responces to social situations. Personally living with AS is a bit of a balancing act. On one side I am comfortable when I retreat into my shell and feel safe. On the other hand this can cause its own mental health issues and I am better when I am out interacting with the world and my self esteem is supported.

 

I know where you are coming from when you describe other peoples behaviour being difficult. In my experience some scenarios are more difficult than others. I found as a mature student that university was a very difficult environment as young adults in the main seem to be driven by social expectations and are hooked up to their network devices and to be perfectly honest I think they have failed to learn some of the basic ground rules of social interaction. They will carry on having half a conversation with you, um, oh, yes, and not listening whilst at the same time texting a friend on their mobile and what little chance you had will be rudely interupted by an oik of a friend simply interupting both without apollogy to tell us that they are going for a coffee as if they are so important all the world needs to know.

 

I am sure that this sort of behaviour is a frustration to many in the world. Even at home my partner very often gets short thrift from me when she interupts an activity I am involved in. She does appologise but I know she really doesnt understand the really intense concentration I am putting into a task. I think for most of the time we get the balance right and we cope. I think it is also true that we can go beyond this point. Sometimes this is due to a singular even which can take us over the edge or very close to it. At other times it is a general build up of emotional fatigue. When this happens in my life and as I have got older I have become far more aware of it happening I have a choice, either to press on as if nothing has happened or to back off.

 

If I am in social situations and the pressure is getting to be too much, I quietly pick one individual and say 'I need to go and find myself a bit of quiet space' and walk off, if after ten minutes in a tiolet or sat on a stairs going through relaxation techniques stress levels have not come down I would go home to my room and have a break if needs be a nap in bed. After the event I would at a good time explain to the people around me at the incident as to why I behaved as I did. If you get a diagnosis for AS it helps in this way as you can say "you might not have known but I have AS and sometimes......" On the whole I have found people to be understanding.

 

Sidious the concept of coping up to a point and then not coping indicates a lack of self empathy and understanding and that there is an inevitable consequence. You do not come across as someone who lacks understanding about how you feel. What does run through your post is a lot of emotional responses to situations. It is important that we can control our emotions and that they don't start to control us. I think one of the issues with AS is that through environmental over stimulation for many and having to constantly think what are the rules of engagement when dealing with social situations we can get very, very tired. In this state emotions can play a more significant role inour thinking than would be the case when we are mentally fresh. If faced with this situation I simply tend to think "look your knackered and are possibly getting a bit carried away, drop it and think it through tomorrow when you have had some sleep".

 

As I said before for me life is a balancing act and things change quite dramatically at times as I move through the day and as such I have to reassess situations. Life is not simple as black and white there are a lot of grey areas in between and we have to see it as such and manage our activities in respect to background physical and emotional levels of stress. I have found I have two options in dealing with this. The first is in trying to change the behaviour of everyone around me. In reality this one hasn't got much of a chance so the natural conclusion is to accept them for the people they are flawed or not, and if they have a real negative impact on you avoid them altogether if possible. The second option an one you have control over is how you think about scenarios, and for me this means creating a little voice in my head which is my personal manager's voice which at times tells me what to do in my best interests, that might be stick this out for a minute or so put on a false smile and find a quiet corner to reflect, it might be at times today is a duvet day mate your knackered, whatevet it says it has to be in my best interests and that means getting a balnce in my life but also includes going into challenging situations and developing my coping skills.

 

As a side note being aware of autistic traits in your life and having to await for a diagnosis assessment I found to be a difficult period in my life, I was 44 at the time and away from family and home at university. It was an emotional roller coaster and though I had lots of work to focus on my mind was almost constantly preocupied with self reflection and how I felt about AS. It was if it was more important that I made the diagnosis myself before the assessor. In many ways I think this is natural and the right response to take, and my confirmation through a formal assessment was a massive anticlimax. Make sure you factor this reality into your life. I would not be surprised if this is contributing significantly to a feeling of not coping. Do you have a timetable for the assesment? In my individual case I found out in early Novemenr that it would be early March the following year. I managed the first two months ok and was able to hold onto the idea that I will think about this after Christmas. Once in the new year the anticipation tended to take over and I had very little mental capacity left for very much else. I was fortunate that I could ask for a 2 month extension to my work and did what I could.

 

Sidious I would not underestimate the significance of what you are going through, personally it was massive and the hardest thing I have been through and I have been through some pretty major situations in my life. Hang in there, keep thinking, at times it is like navigating through a fog bank in a small dingy and hearing the signs of large scale commercial shipping all around you, look after yourself hour by hour and you will come out of the other side in a far clearer place, where you can take a bearing and move on in your life.

 

Hope this provides a bit of food for thought.

[SidiousUK]

Thanks LancsLad.

 

I don't have a timetable yet for a diagnosis but I am prepared to pay if needs be.

I work with computers all day and this is also my obsession. By obsession, I mean there are problems that need to be solved and this is what I do what I get so absorbed in and I am also very good at it.

 

I don't think that this helps with the way I see things. Everything I do involves 0/1, yes/no, true/false

 

I am at my worst at the weekends when there are no problems that need solving and the question of "do I have A?S" is the only thing that remains unanswered.

 

This also echos in my behaviour if I am forced out into a social situation. I either get pushed in the crowd or (if someone I am with notices it) turn into juggernaught with bodies flying out of my way. So again, All or nothing. I don't have a middle ground or "grey area"

 

I'm 40 now and family say that I have always been like this. I would much prefer to watch a DVD at home for the 100th time than go out down the pub or to a friends house. Over time I have learned to cope with the absense of friends due to loosing contact or makeing a very bad decision in the choice of friends and a carbon based life form is a variable that cannot been factored into the "things to do today" equation.

 

I am semi happy as I now have a possible answer to being the way I am, I just need the answer as the final part of the equation

 

SidiousUK

[darkshine]

"Were any of you able to cope up to a point and then for whatever reason just stopped coping?"

 

Yes, I've been able to cope and then stopped being able to cope. I am currently stuck because of this and my tolerance for people is at quite a low ebb.

 

I can be in people's company for a couple of hours if it isn't too full on. But when I have to engage with someone on a high level of effort, I can do it for about an hour tops, and then I'm just knackered, burnt out, and I have to go and sit by myself or sleep to recharge my batteries.

 

It makes things very difficult because I cannot be immersed in society for very long, I get overloaded and washed out, and it makes me angry that its so much effort when I know it isn't that much effort for the people I know.

 

I have no solution right now for other reasons in my life that have prevented me from getting unstuck... but basically it involves finding coping mechanisms to reduce the stress of it, and it involves thinking differently too...

 

Dunno if this helps

 

Darkshine

Edited February 16, 2012 by darkshine

[indiscreet]

Personally living with AS is a bit of a balancing act. On one side I am comfortable when I retreat into my shell and feel safe. On the other hand this can cause its own mental health issues and I am better when I am out interacting with the world and my self esteem is supported.

 

That is so true. It's the 'balancing act' that causes so much stress and I still haven't found a way to make it work for me.

[darkshine]

Me either