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Do Any Of you Feel even In autism groups You Don't Know What To Say?

A

Amethystgirl

Active Member
The ironic thing is in real life I'm quite loud when I speak but in these 2 groups that I've started (2 virtual autism groups) I'm very quiet because I don't know what to say. And I feel awkward when I don't know what to say and it can be complicated and I feel I can't win if I'm too loud and it becomes to awkward when I barely say anything.
 
I am the same and why I will never join any kind of group.

Just because there is a similar theme, does not mean that we are all the same.

When one on one, I can be loud and very friendly. Any more, and I am so silent, I am forgotten about.

This is the first forum, I have ever felt comfortable with.
 
I haven't had experience of autism groups, but when in a group that's talking or discussing something, I often don't speak. This can be because I can't think of something to say, or they're discussing something I know nothing about or have no interest in. And even when I do want to say something, the conversation has already moved on before I'm ready to speak and I don't get a chance.
 
I remember about 10 years ago or so, I had joined this social group thing for adults with learning disabilities or mental health problems. But I felt so shy there, that I ended up having hardly any interaction with anybody. I felt like I was just this mysterious person who turned up and just existed there. We all sat around a large table with different activities to do such as colouring or knitting. Among the group there were two older women and a man, who had some sort of learning deficit (I could tell by the way they talked) but they wouldn't stop talking loudly the whole time I was there. I actually found everything they talked about interesting, so I was quite happy to just listen to their rambling when I was colouring, because it was like listening to a podcast.
 
Yes, still. Most of what I say is something where I'm trying to relate to the topic, but I do often worry that it only comes across as trying to talk about myself. Oops. I don't mean that at all, and then I'll get self-conscious to the Nth degree, etc. To make it clear, yes, I can relate, haha.
 
Dagan said:
Yes, still. Most of what I say is something where I'm trying to relate to the topic, but I do often worry that it only comes across as trying to talk about myself. Oops. I don't mean that at all, and then I'll get self-conscious to the Nth degree, etc. To make it clear, yes, I can relate, haha.
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Oh yes I feel this way too. I worry that I'm a narcissist if I talk about myself too much.
 
My problem in groups is more that I don’t know when to say something. There may be something I want to say, and I wait for the person who’s currently speaking to finish. Then someone else chimes in.
 
My experiences with autism groups are the same as I've had in other groups.

Sometimes there's good all around discussion that I join in here and there, sometimes I'm mostly listening and occasionally commenting, sometimes I'm a bystander, and on rare occasions, I'm talking a lot.

It all depends on the group and activity, and sometimes even with the same group and activity, different participants can change the group dynamics considerably.
 
I stopped going to groups because I never felt supported.

The sessions were either dominated by just one person re-re-re-relating his or her single most vivid childhood trauma, or the rest of the group gaslighted and dismissed my experiences and the feelings I had about them.

I get better "therapy" playing Dungeons & Dragons.
 
I've currently started going to online asperger groups and in those groups I really don't know what to say to people. I had a similar issue tonight when I was at my friend's place and he had these other closer friends in her house and when I didn't say much one of his friends asked me if I was OK. (I could wrong but maybe there was a different reason why she asked me if I was OK. The point is I don't feel comfortable in groups when I feel embarrassed and I'm quiet and it's ironic because in real life I'm often loud but when I'm quiet I stick out in a crowd. I feel I can't win.
 
I really can't say it's weird. I'm in general a very quiet person myself. It doesn't matter if it's in person, voice chat, video call, etc. Unless it's specific topics with certain friends. I've always had a kind of aversion to people due to my less than great upbringing by my parents.

Though some of this is probably because I gave up trying really.
 
I often don`t know what to say either. Be it in groups virtual and RL, or just one on one. I can really like a person and still have nothing to say to them. This morning someone from work asked me how my weekend was. All I say is 'Good, yours?" After that the whole 500 meter walk was silent. Trying to think of something to say that also sounds like I want to hear the answer. But more often than not, I cannot think of anything I would like to know or say.
 
Amethystgirl said:
when I didn't say much one of his friends asked me if I was OK
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I've had this happen to me so many times. It's so uncomfortable when people do this.

@Amethystgirl, you seem a bit preoccupied with feeling weird. What you described in the first post is not weird at all. It makes perfect sense to me and I feel comfortable guessing that many others here would not find it weird either. Is there anything you can do to allay your fears of being weird? What seems weird to others may be normal for you and that is okay.
 
Amethystgirl said:
I've currently started going to online asperger groups and in those groups I really don't know what to say to people. I had a similar issue tonight when I was at my friend's place and he had these other closer friends in her house and when I didn't say much one of his friends asked me if I was OK.
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I don't know what to say more often than not. I have a set of "automatic" responses, but I often don't say much beyond them.
 
I realize because I don't know what to say when I'm in virtual groups I don't want to try to make friends in either group and I already have a few people I know online. I just would like to practice social skills. I can't help asking about being weird because of my anxiety.
 
Is it weird that in a virtual aspie group I'm often the last one to speak yet in real life/in person I'm often quite loud? I feel in the virtual group I have barely anything to say, yet in real life I have too much to say.
 
Nope :)

It's two very different environments, and ways of communicating...

When you say that you are quite loud, what do mean exactly?
 
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