A couple of days ago, I got reminded of something I knew was going to happen next that would require a lot of effort on my part to correct. When I first knew of Aspergers existence, I tried to explain about it to one of my neighbors I’m becoming acquainted with. At that time, his opinion of Aspergers was that it didn’t exist and that it was something made-up by psychologists with nothing better to do who are looking for ways to make more money.
Now that a few years have passed and public awareness of Aspergers is increasing, this man now is confused because I don’t fit his image of what Aspergers is. It’s that same problem the movie Rain Man created about autism, except that this is worse! It’s worse because of researchers being in competition for answers. They are behaving just like technology does — wanting to make claims faster than allowing enough time to prove that those claims are true or accurate.
Anyhow, this male neighbor (who I’ll refer to as MP) is baffled over how come he and I can converse as easily as we do. In fact, he and I converse so well together that I have to limit the times I talk with him (as in once or twice a year). We usually have trouble stopping our conversation once it starts. We can talk for hours (as in like beyond eight hours non-stop!). He is stumped over the fact that I am not mind-blind, I can read his facial expressions, and I look him in the eye.
I began to become acquainted with MP just before I became aware of Asperger’s existence, so MP never knew what I was like during my growing up years. He has no idea how much I have changed. Many of those changes about me contribute to the confusion some people have over me being an Aspie. Those who are more familiar with what is true about Aspergers have a much easier time at seeing how much I’m not a neurotypical person. When my husband first met me (neither of us had any information about Aspergers back then), he knew there was something odd about me (it took him 20 years before he told me this!), but he had no idea what it was. More and more people are confessing the same thing now to me.
I tried to explain to MP that he is handicapped in his perception (Aspergers vs. “normal”) of me because of who he is… that it has to do with the combination of the wrong information he has about Aspergers and that he isn’t like most people. MP is the kind of rare person I naturally feel safe around. In my previous post, I mentioned Rudy Simone’s statement from her blog on Psychology Today, “…we [Aspies] don’t see safety in other people.” I’m not going to claim I see safety in MP and that’s why he and I converse more easily than I can with most other people — it is because I do not see the same level of risk involved with my association to MP, as what I normally experience with people.
I know I’m not the only Aspie who is acutely sensitive and aware of what emotion another person is experiencing. Keep in mind the importance of my stand (many, many other people → including professionals ← share this same belief) on Aspergers not being a form of autism. Because of how well I could know the mind of others, without needing to look at their eyes to do so, during childhood I would not look at someone’s face unless I felt safe.
When my best friend (an Aspie, of course) pointed out yesterday to me why he would not take the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test, my curiosity over why Aspies struggle with looking at people in the eye ended completely. Throughout my life, I always pre-consciously knew why I didn’t like to look most people in the eye. Because it was pre-conscious knowledge rather than information I was consciously aware of, it was easy for others to confuse me into thinking the wrong thoughts about myself. These wrong assumptions made about me hindered me greatly from realizing the truth that was hidden all along.
While growing up, my mother told me I was being a snob towards people (because of not making eye contact with them). She should have known better than to say that, because she also was the one to always ask me, “Where is your pride?” To me, snobby people are proud people. Even my daughter made the same mistake of saying that I was a snob. They made that wrong claim about me because they were projecting themselves into my behavior — their reasons for not looking someone in the eye are not the same as my reasons (they’re both NTs). My daughter learned that she was wrong. My mother went to her grave without ever knowing me (mostly because she didn’t want to believe I am who I am, because to her, my way of being was unacceptable).
The reason my Aspie friend would not take the Mind/Eye test is because eyes are too intense for him to look at.
Eyes are the window of the soul.
He reminded me that looking at a person’s face isn’t the same thing as looking in his eyes.
People put on a facial expression, but people can’t put on a soul. Eyes reveal the truth. A face may mask the truth.
It’s what the eyes are saying that overwhelm an Aspie.
Because so often there is a clash between what eyes say versus what the face and mouth are saying, Aspies are challenged to know what to do with that information, especially when he or she knows what’s really going on but is stuck in a predicament that seems impossible to know how to deal with. That’s what adds to the social divide between neuro-A-typical and neurotypical people.
Mary McGarry Morris hit the nail on the head in her novel A Dangerous Woman when Colin Mackey points out to Martha Horgan what it was that people disliked about her. It isn’t mentioned in the book, but the character Martha Horgan is absolutely an Aspie. I already said this in my post Birds of a Feather,
Mackey told her→ it’s not so much that people don’t like you, but rather dislike your ability to see them.
Being able to see others as they really are is a wonderful trait to have, but that by itself isn’t enough. There are other factors that can cause this gift to be a curse more than a blessing, if those factors are not remedied. For example, believing what people tell you, especially if they’re telling you something about yourself that isn’t true because they can see you’ll buy it; OR believing information that is NOT ACCURATE, like that Aspies are mind-blind and can’t read facial expressions.
Great! Tell Aspie children they are mind blind! What do people think the outcome to that is going to be? Build confidence in trusting what the gut feeling is saying? If all other Aspies are like me as I was when I was a kid, then false information like what’s now circulating around about Aspies being unable to empathize with what others feel, will really screw up progress for them! Because of false information, we end up seeing articles like Asperger’s theory does about face.
Two and a half years ago I wrote Eye Non-Contact Explained. It has some research to back up my point I hope I successfully expressed. If the researchers had probed deeper into finding out why Looking Away Helps Concentration, they probably would have to recruit Aspies at least 30 years older than the ones they chose for their study.
I’m learning that age is a HUGE factor when it comes to influencing information gathered for statistical studies. I can understand why researchers are leery about using older people. They think that us older folks are not as capable of knowing what we’re experiencing as the younger generation is. The truth is we’re more capable. However, just because we’re capable doesn’t mean that all of us reach our potential. Some remain stuck. I should know… I’m one who used to be stuck for a very long time!
Because of all the years I’ve been stuck in confusion, working so hard to find answers, and now am finding the answers coming from within my own mind faster than I can keep up to know what to do with all the new information, it’s very hard for me to write about it all. That makes sense considering that most people don’t have or haven’t been as motivated to figure out why their lives don’t “fit” in the mainstream of society. It would be like expecting an experienced brain surgeon or rocket scientist to explain what he knows to someone who has spent his life being a car salesman without ever being in an operating room in the role of doctor or at NASA as an employee involved in rocket design.
No Aspie can explain Aspergers to a non-Aspie so thoroughly that the non-Aspie will be able to comprehend and recognize other Aspies as easily as a properly educated Aspie can. The key word here is ‘properly’ educated. Because Aspergers is now getting lumped under the autism umbrella, things will become more chaotic than they already are. In the minds of most people, this might not be evident.
If that’s not bad enough, there is another horror which follows it. The more that people think they have the truth (when in reality what they have is just a bunch of opinions they think are facts), the more those people will create blocks for those who do have the truth and are trying to get others to see it.
Including this post, at the time of this writing, there are five posts in this blog on the topic of eye contact. I don’t think there is anything more for me to say about this subject, but that could change. I’m hoping MP will read through what I’ve said about this and give me his feedback, because that will tell me how successful my explaining is so far. I will soon be helping him to set up his computers for online use. He has never had a computer or the internet in his house before, so it might be a long time before his input on this gets back to me.
Postscript added 10.30.10 — If figures!… After I wrote and published what I’m saying here, I get more information on this subject to bring it to an even deeper level yet! I’m not ready to add more to this topic on eye contact. All I’m going to say for now is that what I’ve learned today enables me to understand much better why it is that Aspies are not popular or generally liked by NTs. However, that new data isn’t going to change anything in regard to my being able to improve how others respond to me. If only NTs knew how weird and illogical their thinking can be to Aspies like me!