Looking a lot younger?

[Jimbo]

I too look younger. Most people say I haven't aged at all since high school 25 years ago. I also tend to dress just like I did back then and am very immature acting for a 45 year old.

 

[joshuaturbeville]

Well, obviously that's the other good side of having an aspie. I don't care if people like you doesn't act of their age.. People should learn to understand each and every one of us.

 

[AutisticallyInclined]

I look about my age but I has big eyes and flawless (knock on wood) skin. Here's hoping it lasts.

 

[whatJimhasbecome]

I wish I looked my age. At 31, I still get carded occasionally for booze. I meet people younger than me that look older than me. It looks like stress aged them but I've dealt with tons of stress and it doesn't show. I hear that people that were molested as children often have younger looking faces. Personally, I'd feel most comfortable if I looked like a 3000 year old wizard. Then I'd look how I feel/think.

 

[Sev]

I look considerably younger than everyone else around my age. Though, I'm a pretty frail person in all honesty; due to the fact that I spend most of my time reading instead of exercising. But in general, yes, I look younger than my age. However, my maturity is spot on, if not above the expectations for my age.

 

[Sunnylims]

This is totally me. Ever since I can remember, I have always looked younger than the rest of my friends/peers. When in reality, I was always one of the oldest in my class. I remember being the first one to get my license, and everyone said I looked like a 13 year old behind the wheel. But then they quickly shut up when they needed a ride somewhere

I just turned 21 in November, and sometimes I just sit there and think about how crazy that is. I often (jokingly) wonder if I was really born a couple of years later than what is on my birth certificate, but everyone has just been lying to me my whole life for some reason. My boyfriend (not an aspie, but not completely NT either) and I went to a casino recently, and we felt like the most out of place people there. We had no idea what to do, where to go, and we kept getting looks from people like "who let these 15 year olds in here?." So we ditched that place and went and nerded out at Dave and Busters. It is also funny that I would muuuuuch rather play on a playground with my 5 year old nephew than go to bars with people my age. No contest.

P.S. I am in the process of a diagnosis at the moment. But I have never been more sure about anything in my life that this is what I have, and it is actually a huge relief. My dang therapist is going out of town for 3 weeks though and we are RIGHT in the middle of our assessment. So yeah, a little frustrating. I want to know right meow.

 

[Warwick C]

Best of luck with your Diagnosis Alexa. I had some thing similar mine ended up over two months, one general psychiatrist and then one specialist who had a four week holiday in the middle of my diagnosis.

 

[Spinosaurus kin]

Huh. I seem to look younger than most people my age, according to my friends, and my possibly-aspie friend looks like a little kid when he wears his orange body warmer.
But my definite aspie friend looks like he's fifty. If you look at him from a certain angle, his acne could pass for ageing skin.
We joke that he should grow a beard and shave his head to look like Walt from Breaking Bad. He's only 17.

 

[Paige]

I look about 16/17 with no make up on and I'm 20.

 

[anthoskate]

I'm 24 and people always say that I look like I am 17. Someone even said that I look like I'm 12, but I think that their brain stopped working when they said that.

 

[Sunnylims]

Maybe it's because of the muscles in our faces or something. Like, it is impossible for me to lift one eyebrow at a time. When I raise them, you can see a definite muscle like connecting my eyebrows, kinda looks like it would be a unibrow. Also, I am known to be sort of expressionless. I don't even realize, but when I am just walking around minding my own business, people often think I am angry or sad when really I guess I am just in deep thought. I also have a pretty epic poker face. So like maybe the fact that we don't move our faces as much results in less wrinkles and therefore we look younger! Just a theory.

 

[anthoskate]

Maybe it's because of the muscles in our faces or something. Like, it is impossible for me to lift one eyebrow at a time. When I raise them, you can see a definite muscle like connecting my eyebrows, kinda looks like it would be a unibrow. Also, I am known to be sort of expressionless. I don't even realize, but when I am just walking around minding my own business, people often think I am angry or sad when really I guess I am just in deep thought. I also have a pretty epic poker face. So like maybe the fact that we don't move our faces as much results in less wrinkles and therefore we look younger! Just a theory.

Just wait until the NTs hear about your theory. Everyone is going to be walking around expressionless.

 

[donkey_kebab]

Yup. I was always asked if I was sad when I was younger. I often surprise people when they ask my age, so definitively something in it.

 

[bentHnau]

Yep. 33, still mistaken for a teen.

When my class finished the eighth grade, the school put photos of everyone from that year alongside ones from kindergarten. So many people walked up to me that day and said, "You look exactly the same as you did when you were five, only taller!"

My own sister said this to an adult me while looking at my baby picture. I went to an appointment last month and the woman I saw asked me if I was there with my parents.

It's a pity, though, that people who would never talk like that to someone older, are willing to talk that way to children and young people.

This is really bad for me. I'm quite tired of being talked down to. However, I do appreciate getting the youth fare on buses.

I don't feel comfortable with thinking of it as a blessing. There is too much ageism and looksism in society, and to think of looking younger than one's age as something positive seems to be a part of that.

 

[Ereth]

I don't feel comfortable with thinking of it as a blessing. There is too much ageism and looksism in society, and to think of looking younger than one's age as something positive seems to be a part of that.

I agree that ageism and discrimination based on appearance are bad things, but this sort of thing is probably best assessed on a case-by-case basis. I'm not going to get angry at anyone who says I look younger than I am unless it's meant as an insult to me or to someone else.

An example of a case in which I would be angry:

In grade school and middle school, many of the kids made fun of my father for being advanced in years compared to theirs (we're talking a ten-to-twenty year gap). Naturally, my brother and I didn't like this at all, and we took to answering their "old man" comments with "Well, I hope your father lives as long as mine has." I think they got the point.

Dad's almost seventy-three now and he's doing quite well, all things considered.

 

[bentHnau]

I agree that ageism and discrimination based on appearance are bad things, but this sort of thing is probably best assessed on a case-by-case basis. I'm not going to get angry at anyone who says I look younger than I am unless it's meant as an insult to me or to someone else.

I'm not sure that I know what you mean, but I think that I cannot agree. Whenever someone places a value judgment (beyond personal preference) on looks, positive or negative, that is lookism by definition. It's true that this is not always meant as an insult, and I do not suggest that anyone should or would get angry one way or another, but sometimes such things are said without malice simply because people are not thoughtful enough to see the implications of what they are saying. When people say that it's good to look younger than one's years, they necessarily imply that it is bad, or at least worse, to look one's age, regardless of whether or not they are aware of that implication. Intent may vary, but this implication does not.

 

[Ereth]

I never disagreed with you, for the record. I just don't think an argument needs to be started every time a (generally harmless) compliment is given. There's a time and place for the soapbox, as I've learned.

 

[bentHnau]

I never disagreed with you, for the record. I just don't think an argument needs to be started every time a (generally harmless) compliment is given. There's a time and place for the soapbox, as I've learned.

In that case, I don't understand why you quoted me. I never suggested that anyone should start arguments over compliments.

 

[Ereth]

In that case, I don't understand why you quoted me. I never suggested that anyone should start arguments over compliments.

Quoting a post doesn't mean a disagreement's going on. I was responding to some things you said and quoted the post for reference, as I've done again in this post.

 

[bentHnau]

Quoting a post doesn't mean a disagreement's going on. I was responding to some things you said and quoted the post for reference, as I've done again in this post.

I'm not accusing you of disagreeing with me at this point; I simply don't understand your thought process. From my perspective, what you posted has nothing to do with the part of my comment that you quoted. I just don't see the connection.