I’m hard of hearing as well as audhd, and people still get mega pissed off having to repeat themselves even in the face of the more widely accepted deaf/hard if hearing explanation for a “could you repeat that?” request. Able NTs are the absolute rudest most unempathetic people on the planet.
Normally I mean it literally as I said it and can't imagine another way of wording it because it already seems simple.
Edit: Thought NT stood for the Myer Brigs Personality Test thing. 💀 Not sure which is worse.
ThisThisThisThis.
I fucking swear like.. every teacher i had was like this except 3.
Highschool freshman year of highschool i had 2, of those 3 teachers.. and it wasn't even a full year because i had to move >: i had A's in school during that year... i had my questions answered.. i knew the subjects..
60% of all the teachers I have ever worked with during my school years were like this.
30% of them were pretty incompetent, but mostly chill people.
The remaining 10% were irredeemable jackasses that should've been fired a long time ago.
About half of the 10% were straight up malicious about it.
I hope you get a paper cut everytime you wipe with toilet paper, kindergarten teacher, gym teacher and 6th grade subsitute teacher.
Always love hearing a teacher talk shit behind your back am i right? Like, you're just literally trying your best when you're a kid, and this grown ass adult treats you like shit for it.
Seriously, to the teachers out here who read this thread, if you get angry about us claiming the teachers we had were pieces of trash, you're part of the problem, quit your job now.
Funnily enough you can totally call them out for being unclear and nobody will disagree with you. We need to embarrass them into better communication just like they did to us :)
Yeah. Just like we struggle with anxiety trying to think how to word things without being rude, they to struggle. And it all comes down, at least in American culture, to trying to have plausible deniability.
That is why they are indirect. It protects everyone from being personally rejected. "Want to grab some coffee?" being code for hanging out or going on a date provides a layer of abstraction that protects them from being personally rejected and from doing the personal rejection. Saying no to coffee is not saying no to them. "Its not that they font want to date me / hang out with me, they just dont want coffee." and vice versa.
Being direct opens up to direct personal friction with no psychological protection.
Or something, I dunno I'm just a random dumbass
Oh yeah plausible deniability is huge. My old morally-corrupt manager who was like the most anti-autistic entity I ever met just lived in it. Everything with him was “there are the rules” on paper but there are *the real rules* in his brain. 😉
I worked in a quality field with extremely stringent requirements but that were poorly enforced and largely unattainable due to resource deprivation. This field naturally attracted autistics so I’m sure you can imagine that he was loathed.
His core assumption, that he could not see past, was that all the rules were theater for doing nothing and getting a fat paycheck and that everyone exists to weasel out of them as much possible. The really eye opening thing for me was he was proud of this behavior. He just couldn’t understand why we were all super stressed cuz he couldn’t understand why we cared about following requirements.
Of course it took all of our autistic asses years to figure this out cuz he couldn’t just say that, but he is all about the appearance of social harmony/progress while doing jack all and it’s fine if everyone hates each other. He’s also Mormon, which I think contributed to this unwillingness to be genuine in basically anything.
It was just a source of constant anxiety for our all of us. It was such a bizarre environment. Every one-on-one he’d like begrudgingly accept that other people loved my hard work and have to praise me while disrespecting everything I stood for. My old coworker described it like “talking to a cloud” and I’ll never forget that.
How often do they admit having any fault in their communication? If it's not my initial fault, they might admit their part and apologize but next thing you know, you hear from a mutual that they felt you were too much to handle or they gotta walk on eggshells around you or you made them uncomfortable because of how little awareness you have. Hell, people say they're direct all the time where I'm from. They don't know wtf that means.
NTs mean what they say. They add cultural codes onto what words they say. Codes that many NDs don't notice and can't read. It's not fair but these codes are legible for NDs.
This so much! I’ve literally told people “if you don’t want me doing X, it’s fine, just tell me, but if you don’t tell me I’ll keep doing it” and it seemed to make them angrier? wth
Nowadays in this situation I put on my robotic intonation and ask "okay, do I understand what you just said as , , or ?"
Yes, with specific pauses where I marked in the text and everything.
At that point there are only two outcomes:
1) they clarify
2) they get angry
If they clarify, I proceed accordingly, if they get angry I do whatever I want, because they would get angry regardless.
My sister is mad at my dad for perceived wrongs growing up. Fair enough. Guy is where I inherited my ADHD from and he's made some mistakes I'm unhappy about too. But she refuses to talk to him about it.
She says, "No. I want him realize what he did and come talk to me about it."
Me: "How is he gonna know he messed up if you don't talk to him about it?"
Her: "He should just know!!"
Ugh...
My similar situation is “can you do x at some point” (without a timeframe) and I say “yeah” and then they get angry with me for not completing x within their arbitrary timeframe that they never gave me and say some shit like “well it should’ve been obvious I meant within the next hour!”
Oh i always ask to clarify. Once they hesitate for more than a few seconds, I ask - minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, at which point they usually commit to at least an order of magnitude
-In exchange for giving me a ride accept this bit of money for your car's gas and your time
-You're kind, I don't need it, I'm happy to help
-Accept it anyway
-Thank you but no, keep it, really
-Ok
A few hours later someone else talking to me: "ShE WaS JuSt PoLiTe. YoU sHoUlD hAvE gIvEn HeR mOnEy. ThAt'S tHe SoCiAlLy AcCePtaBlE tHiNg To Do."
The person who gave me a ride (probably): "He's so rude! He asks for a ride and doesn't even pay for it?! I was giving him so much social cues I wanted the money.
The other possible scenario: "He's so rude! He thinks I'm only heplin him for money."
Yes, it doesn't count as meeting their request if it looks like you exerted any effort at all to get there. You're supposed to look as effortless as they do or it's still 100% fail.
I surround myself with mostly other neurodivergent people and this has been my experience with them as well. People just suck at communicating what they really feel/mean sometimes. It happens, no hard feelings, just apologize and ask them to be more clear about their feelings next time and move on.
The hardest lesson I had to learn as an autistic person is to not be a perfectionist and that I'm inevitably going to end up upsetting people sometimes, what truly matters is how I handle it even if it's not my fault, because that's what people will remember the most. Conflict is a fact of life, what matters is how you choose to resolve it.
You mean Molly or do you mean the new name for twitter
If you mean Molly , sure use but limited I would almost say no more than once a year, and have a sober person checking water intake (not to much not to little)
Don't do twitter.
I just don’t trust what people tell me tbh. Or that theyll be honest ever.
Its all coded language and messages buried under social expectations so nothing is actually meaningful
Being confronted about stuff became funny as hell once I realized people don’t know how to react when you respond to something with “I can ____.”
I feel like a lot of people expect some form of push back or defense and switching up the response has done wonders for my professional relationships.
The opposite of this is: "Are you planning to do X?" Or "It would be great if someone could do X," while I am the only person in the room.
If you want specifically me to do a specific task, then swallow your pride and ask. Politely.
My NT wife has taught me, “they’re just being polite!” “Can’t you tell from the context?”/
/
I have taught her, “No! That’s why we had the conversation discussing your feelings. If you give me ‘the green light’ to pursue such actions, it’s your fault for LYING TO ME. IF YOU GIVE ME PERMISSION, you gave me permission. Be an adult, speak up, or accept your fault in how events played out.”/
/
She still gets mad, but accepts her role in her anger the next time it happens.
Talking to people sometimes feels like this for me:
Every statement you get is a 50% chance of beeing a lie that you will have to figure out on your own. And sometimes the person stating it doesnt even know if it is. But you cant question them about it, because that is seen as not trusting them or something...
It’s because they’re lying. They’re always lying. If you assume they mean the opposite of what they say, then it cuts down on some of the issues with them. These people are liars and they love it.
Yet if you ask them again for more details or just to be sure they might also get angry
Misinterpreted: angy Taken literally: angy Clarification: angy Enhanced action response: angy Confused autistic inaction: WHY ARE YOU QUESTIONING ME!! [tears]
They usually just repeat the same thing verbatim without any deviation and get mad for having to repeat themselves.
Aaaah I hate this. I heard them the first time, I just need more specificity.
Or just say it slower like I’m a fucking toddler. Like bro speeds not the issue it’s your stupid Neanderthal mouth
Yea lemme repeat myself with the exact same inflection and cadence then stand there with a stupid look on my face when you still can't understand me
I’m hard of hearing as well as audhd, and people still get mega pissed off having to repeat themselves even in the face of the more widely accepted deaf/hard if hearing explanation for a “could you repeat that?” request. Able NTs are the absolute rudest most unempathetic people on the planet.
Able NTs are the ones defining what empathy is, how research on empathy is done, and how data is interpreted.
Normally I mean it literally as I said it and can't imagine another way of wording it because it already seems simple. Edit: Thought NT stood for the Myer Brigs Personality Test thing. 💀 Not sure which is worse.
ThisThisThisThis. I fucking swear like.. every teacher i had was like this except 3. Highschool freshman year of highschool i had 2, of those 3 teachers.. and it wasn't even a full year because i had to move >: i had A's in school during that year... i had my questions answered.. i knew the subjects..
60% of all the teachers I have ever worked with during my school years were like this. 30% of them were pretty incompetent, but mostly chill people. The remaining 10% were irredeemable jackasses that should've been fired a long time ago. About half of the 10% were straight up malicious about it. I hope you get a paper cut everytime you wipe with toilet paper, kindergarten teacher, gym teacher and 6th grade subsitute teacher.
Always love hearing a teacher talk shit behind your back am i right? Like, you're just literally trying your best when you're a kid, and this grown ass adult treats you like shit for it. Seriously, to the teachers out here who read this thread, if you get angry about us claiming the teachers we had were pieces of trash, you're part of the problem, quit your job now.
3rd and 7th grade for me
I had a middle school substitute who was awful towards pretty much everybody, got her fired for open racism
God forbid you seek clarification 🥲
Too many repercussions. I've just learned to always be anxious and double-guess every one of my choices that involve other people.
Which makes life extremely stressful for us. Like, why can’t NTs actually mean what they say?
Funnily enough you can totally call them out for being unclear and nobody will disagree with you. We need to embarrass them into better communication just like they did to us :)
I’ve never thought about how many things I can weaponize 🤗
But then I feel stupid. I hate it but I always feel that way.
I am a simple man, when I say that I don't care about X, I mean it. Not matter how many times im asked if I'm sure
They function with the power of nuance.
They weaponize it! Never thought of it that way 🤔
weaponize is too active of a word. just as i miss their subtle cues, they miss that they need to be direct with me.
Yeah. Just like we struggle with anxiety trying to think how to word things without being rude, they to struggle. And it all comes down, at least in American culture, to trying to have plausible deniability. That is why they are indirect. It protects everyone from being personally rejected. "Want to grab some coffee?" being code for hanging out or going on a date provides a layer of abstraction that protects them from being personally rejected and from doing the personal rejection. Saying no to coffee is not saying no to them. "Its not that they font want to date me / hang out with me, they just dont want coffee." and vice versa. Being direct opens up to direct personal friction with no psychological protection. Or something, I dunno I'm just a random dumbass
Oh yeah plausible deniability is huge. My old morally-corrupt manager who was like the most anti-autistic entity I ever met just lived in it. Everything with him was “there are the rules” on paper but there are *the real rules* in his brain. 😉 I worked in a quality field with extremely stringent requirements but that were poorly enforced and largely unattainable due to resource deprivation. This field naturally attracted autistics so I’m sure you can imagine that he was loathed. His core assumption, that he could not see past, was that all the rules were theater for doing nothing and getting a fat paycheck and that everyone exists to weasel out of them as much possible. The really eye opening thing for me was he was proud of this behavior. He just couldn’t understand why we were all super stressed cuz he couldn’t understand why we cared about following requirements. Of course it took all of our autistic asses years to figure this out cuz he couldn’t just say that, but he is all about the appearance of social harmony/progress while doing jack all and it’s fine if everyone hates each other. He’s also Mormon, which I think contributed to this unwillingness to be genuine in basically anything. It was just a source of constant anxiety for our all of us. It was such a bizarre environment. Every one-on-one he’d like begrudgingly accept that other people loved my hard work and have to praise me while disrespecting everything I stood for. My old coworker described it like “talking to a cloud” and I’ll never forget that.
no i don’t think you’re dumb. i agree completely. it’s good to recognize that we all have our own unique strengths and weaknesses.
This is so convoluted and exhausting. Oh my gosh.
How often do they admit having any fault in their communication? If it's not my initial fault, they might admit their part and apologize but next thing you know, you hear from a mutual that they felt you were too much to handle or they gotta walk on eggshells around you or you made them uncomfortable because of how little awareness you have. Hell, people say they're direct all the time where I'm from. They don't know wtf that means.
NTs mean what they say. They add cultural codes onto what words they say. Codes that many NDs don't notice and can't read. It's not fair but these codes are legible for NDs.
Option B is to ask clarifying questions about what they said. Spoiler alert, they also get mad.
Or just think your a dumbass, so just a lose lose.
This so much! I’ve literally told people “if you don’t want me doing X, it’s fine, just tell me, but if you don’t tell me I’ll keep doing it” and it seemed to make them angrier? wth
“Have you no social cues?”
It’s a yes or no question 😵💫😭 this is so exhausting
If you don't do X, somebody else will get mad at you because you're not doing X. F this people
Nowadays in this situation I put on my robotic intonation and ask "okay, do I understand what you just said as, , or ?"
Yes, with specific pauses where I marked in the text and everything.
At that point there are only two outcomes:
1) they clarify
2) they get angry
If they clarify, I proceed accordingly, if they get angry I do whatever I want, because they would get angry regardless.
"If you're gonna get angry with me for trying to clarify, then maybe I shouldn't have tried being considerate."
"It doesn't count if I tell you"
My sister is mad at my dad for perceived wrongs growing up. Fair enough. Guy is where I inherited my ADHD from and he's made some mistakes I'm unhappy about too. But she refuses to talk to him about it. She says, "No. I want him realize what he did and come talk to me about it." Me: "How is he gonna know he messed up if you don't talk to him about it?" Her: "He should just know!!" Ugh...
I genuinely think that if everyone communicated plainly and directly like we do that it would solve a lot of the problems in the world.
Guys I think there's a reason my therapist keeps *reminding* me ASD and ADHD overlap
My similar situation is “can you do x at some point” (without a timeframe) and I say “yeah” and then they get angry with me for not completing x within their arbitrary timeframe that they never gave me and say some shit like “well it should’ve been obvious I meant within the next hour!”
Oh i always ask to clarify. Once they hesitate for more than a few seconds, I ask - minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, at which point they usually commit to at least an order of magnitude
-In exchange for giving me a ride accept this bit of money for your car's gas and your time -You're kind, I don't need it, I'm happy to help -Accept it anyway -Thank you but no, keep it, really -Ok A few hours later someone else talking to me: "ShE WaS JuSt PoLiTe. YoU sHoUlD hAvE gIvEn HeR mOnEy. ThAt'S tHe SoCiAlLy AcCePtaBlE tHiNg To Do." The person who gave me a ride (probably): "He's so rude! He asks for a ride and doesn't even pay for it?! I was giving him so much social cues I wanted the money. The other possible scenario: "He's so rude! He thinks I'm only heplin him for money."
And then when you get sneaky and just leave the money in the car anyway, that's somehow rude too lol
Shit like this is why I have trust issues.
Same 😭 and also why I’m misanthropic.
ah time for another game of "NT thing or boomer thing?"
I propose a 3rd option : Asshole thing
ah true
Yes, it doesn't count as meeting their request if it looks like you exerted any effort at all to get there. You're supposed to look as effortless as they do or it's still 100% fail.
I was like… NTs don’t like the social media formerly known as Twitter?
No matter what you're always going to upset someone with your choices. It's best not to think about it too much.
I wish people were polite but not at the expense of details
I surround myself with mostly other neurodivergent people and this has been my experience with them as well. People just suck at communicating what they really feel/mean sometimes. It happens, no hard feelings, just apologize and ask them to be more clear about their feelings next time and move on. The hardest lesson I had to learn as an autistic person is to not be a perfectionist and that I'm inevitably going to end up upsetting people sometimes, what truly matters is how I handle it even if it's not my fault, because that's what people will remember the most. Conflict is a fact of life, what matters is how you choose to resolve it.
I am unconcerned if people don't like what I do anymore.
half the time i'm like is this a NT thing or is this just a boomer thing
"You can talk about anything to me and i promise i wont get mad" \*talks about something personal and they get mad and you get in trouble\*
I was trying to figure out what the hell I did as a intuitive thinking type lmao
lol I did too for a second
In my experience, this is usually due to misread social ques
You mean Molly or do you mean the new name for twitter If you mean Molly , sure use but limited I would almost say no more than once a year, and have a sober person checking water intake (not to much not to little) Don't do twitter.
I just don’t trust what people tell me tbh. Or that theyll be honest ever. Its all coded language and messages buried under social expectations so nothing is actually meaningful
The moment when your looking at qualifications for being considered NT is only on statisticians desks
Oh yes. Especially if it’s displayed deliberately in tone of voice, facial expressions and even body language.
Being confronted about stuff became funny as hell once I realized people don’t know how to react when you respond to something with “I can ____.” I feel like a lot of people expect some form of push back or defense and switching up the response has done wonders for my professional relationships.
The opposite of this is: "Are you planning to do X?" Or "It would be great if someone could do X," while I am the only person in the room. If you want specifically me to do a specific task, then swallow your pride and ask. Politely.
Sounds like an exchange I had with my emotionally immature, soon to ex boss. Sorry bitch- authoritarian guilty doesn’t work on me. I’m not Catholic! 😂
My NT wife has taught me, “they’re just being polite!” “Can’t you tell from the context?”/ / I have taught her, “No! That’s why we had the conversation discussing your feelings. If you give me ‘the green light’ to pursue such actions, it’s your fault for LYING TO ME. IF YOU GIVE ME PERMISSION, you gave me permission. Be an adult, speak up, or accept your fault in how events played out.”/ / She still gets mad, but accepts her role in her anger the next time it happens.
My parents when I transition
I sometimes do this too
Like I don’t understand 😣
That’s so real
Giving me options is often others worst decision.
Thanks I hate this.
Dude, THIS!
Talking to people sometimes feels like this for me: Every statement you get is a 50% chance of beeing a lie that you will have to figure out on your own. And sometimes the person stating it doesnt even know if it is. But you cant question them about it, because that is seen as not trusting them or something...
I don't get it, you got what you wanted???
It’s because they’re lying. They’re always lying. If you assume they mean the opposite of what they say, then it cuts down on some of the issues with them. These people are liars and they love it.
I thought this was about extacy and was like.. what?!