Social Cues, Communication, and Sensitivity Issues

Social cues seem to come naturally to everyone else around me. When to speak up, when to not speak up, who wants to be my friend, and who is just being polite until I go away. These are just a few of the things that I struggle figuring out. These are things that I can learn, but it takes a lot of time and effort and someone to help me understand them. Also, these social cues can differ between people, and they can change as society and the world changes.

Part of my shyness is that I don't know how to read most social cues. If I am around someone for a prolonged period of time, like a coworker that I work with almost daily or a friend that I am with a lot, I can learn their behaviors and learn how to tell when something is off. I can go off of past experience with that person to know what is wrong and what to do to help them. When it comes to people that I don't know as well, or don't know at all, it can get very confusing because I have little or no past experience to go off of for that person, and all the "Covid safety protocols" of 2020 and beyond made it pretty much impossible to read anything from facial expressions in public for a while and even now some people still wear masks in public.

Sometimes I don't know how to react in the proper social way in certain circumstances. Sometimes I don't know if anyone wants to hear my opinion or point of view in a conversation. Sometimes the conversation goes so fast that by the time I think of a good response, the opportunity has long since passed and the conversation has moved on to other topics. Sometimes I can't tell when there is a break in the conversation that is okay for me to start talking without people thinking that I am interrupting and being rude. Some people can't stand any lull in conversation, so they keep talking, especially if they are experts at talking. Yet, a lull is that is exactly what I need in order to know that I can start talking and contributing to the conversation without interrupting or being talked over.

My brain processes things at different speeds than most normal people. While people are talking to me, my mind can take rabbit trails on things that their conversation reminds me of. Sometimes I have to remind myself to quiet my brain and come back to listen to what they are saying and that means I missed the conversation in between, so I have to figure out what I missed while my mind was on the rabbit trails. This is why writing and texting is often my preferred method of communication. I can take my time formulating a response, I can go back and read whatever I might have missed and maybe even read it more than once to make sure that I fully understand what is being said. I can write it out and read it over to make sure that it is clear before I send it, which is not really doable in verbal communication. In verbal communication, I am usually in the middle of what I am saying while I am figuring out how to end it. But, if I take the time to formulate the whole thing before I say it, the conversation usually moves along without me and the moment of opportunity to say what is on my mind is lost forever. It sometimes feels like a no-win situation.

One of the things that I have discovered with my writing is that it helps me to process my thoughts. If I don't write down my thoughts, they usually just run around inside my head finding endless ways to be phrased and they stay there for a long time. If I write it out, it helps me by putting the words in print and I can also see it instead of just hear it in my head. This helps get the words out of my head and then my brain is free to move on to other things. Often times it doesn't matter if anyone else sees it. Just the act of writing helps me process. For a long time, I wrote things down that most people never saw because I didn't think that anyone would really want to see it and they didn't need to see it in order for my writing to be beneficial for me. I was never a journaling type of person, I just write notes about my thoughts.

A lot of Aspies and Autistics have higher than normal sensitivities to one or more of their senses. This can include not being able to eat certain foods solely because of texture, needing to wear headphones or earplugs to block out the noise around us that everyone else takes as normal life, hearing and/or smelling things that no one else seems to be able to hear or smell, needing to protect our eyes from lights that everyone else is fine with, and only being able to wear certain types of fabrics. I have had most of these at various points when things were too much for my senses. I have worn ear plugs to indoor sporting events because they cut down significantly on the noise and allowed me to actually enjoy myself. Little noises, like the chirping of a smoke detector with a low battery, can drive me crazy. Others have suggested that I just ignore it, but that is not possible for me. I have recently become even more sensitive to noises, possibly due to age and definitely due to rising stress levels in my life. I had to wear sunglasses the first day that they installed LED lights at my work because the light was a new level of brightness and my eyes needed time to adjust. When I am dealing with sensory overload, lights that normally aren't a big problem for me can quickly become a problem and I have used sunglasses before to deal with that.

I can usually smell certain things like moth balls and cigarettes from quite a distance away. I don't wear certain fabrics or styles of clothing solely because they bother me or never feel right. I have learned how to tell by touch and texture if the item I am looking at is one that I will actually want to wear. Thrift stores are great for learning and developing your own personal style because they are cheap and not much money is wasted if you buy something that you find out later you don't like how it feels on your skin. Touch is also one of my hypersensitivities, but most times it helps to compensate for the other hypersensitivities that I have. When I am overwhelmed by sounds and lights, a human touch or a hug can help to ground me, and a hug can be like a blanket that wraps me and blocks out the busyness of the world around me for a while. especially if the hug lasts long enough for me to be able to relax, take a few deep breaths, and let my stress leave me as I rest in the comfort of someone else showing that they truly care about me.