I keep hearing that this is frowned upon, but I cannot help it. After I share, I circle back and explain how and why I connected the two stories to try to recenter the other person. Is this annoying? How do you want ND people to respond in that case?
Edit: not neurotypical, but replying anyway I guess :P
Oops, I did this exact thing with this comment. Then I quickly edited it to add a spoiler warning that I’m just going off about my own shit. Thankfully Tommasi didn’t take it badly but it has happened to me before. Although when I do talk to other autistic people irl, I notice they do it too, so I just view it as a way that the person I’m talking to is relating their own experience to something I said and letting me know they understand what I’m saying by giving an example from their own life.
Yeah, that’s how I’ve always viewed it even before considering I had an Autism or ADHD diagnosis, it’s just very difficult for me to see it as anything but. I hate that it comes off that way and it’s soooo hard for me to just shut the fuck up and not say anything lol. Like just saying “I’m sorry”, “that sucks”, “that must have been hard” makes me feel like I’m therapizing that person, and it just feels so impersonal!
Not NT, but going to just say that this is one of the ways NT and ND communication differs.
It’s pretty common that Actually Autistic, ADHD and some other neurodivergent brains share relatable stories as a way to connect and empathize.
While all parties can in these situations work to better accomodate the other, ND folks are a minority and more vulnerable in their position. A NT person can ask us to not share stories and explain they just need to vent, but them getting angry at us for our relatable story sharing is not ok and is a problem that forces masking and dismisses our completely valid communication style.
Yeah, but I guess I wanna hear from someone who is NT how they perceive it when it happens. A lot of people just aren’t direct at all so I feel it would be more likely that someone would just pull away or share less with me or other people who communicate that way. I also hear this often but haven’t heard that it’s off putting directly from an NT person before so I just wanna know what goes through each person’s mind and if the way I circle back is helpful or not
I’m also interested in what NT people perceive and what the NT expectation in a situation like this is. In my mind, the story sets the theme of the conversation so it only makes sense to relate similar stories. Am I just supposed to say, “Wow, that’s awful. I feel for you.” and leave it at that?
Pretty much. The more hollow I make my communications with NT’s lately, the better reception and response I get, but I honestly feel like I’m being rude for not trying to relate.
That’s exactly why I’m puzzled about it! The standard issue responses don’t feel genuine, or like you want the other person to open up more. But I guess that’s all people want, usually. Surface shit
basically my entire friend group and family is autistic so advice may not apply to NTs
i always try asking the person what they want/need from me- like if they come to talk to me and are clearly upset, i ask “hey, what’s the best way to support you rn? you wanna rant to me, problem solve, share experiences?” that kinda thing. obvs sometimes people don’t know what they need and may need a minute to figure it out, but it’s become automatic to us now so i don’t often need to ask
also just to clarify- people haven’t said you’re being rude to your face/made any implications you’ve picked up on? i’ve seen people talk about it too so completely understand the worry over it. also culture impacts this kinda thing a lot (as a non-american, i’ve personally only seen americans say its rude, but social media focuses on them so much idk anymore). if nothing else, you could preface any story with “i experiences a similar thing so totally get where you’re coming from” as it might drive the “i’m not trying to make this about me, just supporting your emotions” point home more.
regardless, communication is important and the people worth sticking around should want to talk about these kinda things with you so everyone is supporting each other correctly
Thanks for that, I think asking what their needs are is probably a good segue. I don’t think anyone has ever said that I’m being self centered directly, but I have lost friendships and people refused to tell me what I did wrong soooo who knows what people really feel. Just sucks too, to have to be the person to ask what the other needs when that’s not afforded to you such is the life of an AuDHDer tho
Depends on the similarity of involved emotions (at the moment) and issues, is it one on one or in group (here might be advisable to dodge like 80 percent of the times if you are first to do so) and random stuff.
Usually I’d only share something like that in a one on one setting, I think. And usually after I share I’ll say something like “all that to say I really relate to the pain/frustration/sadness and can’t imagine blablabla”. Would that still be annoying though?
Depends on the thingy in question (and very much on recency/freshness of emotions).
bad
Like say someone pet died, if its like a week ago i would ask about the pet themselves, and their life to let person dump their memories (if they want to that is) and cry and/or give a hug, if it’s 2 years ago we can bond over sorrow/rage/whatever. If it’s death of family member, highly contingent on their relationship (did they love their parent/grandparent, were they estranged, did they hate them for a time, did they hate them period), if i don’t know, more likely i would ask around about that stuff first. Sure i grieve my grandparents and great grandparents, but also they were good people, and i can’t truthfully say “i know how you feel” in worse situations. I think, i cautiously ask around in general to gauge distress and kinda go from there (?).
i would only find that annoying if it’s a fresh stuff vs old thingy. Even if you do know how they feel, it still rubs the wrong way, if it’s recent bad stuff. If it’s continuous ongoing vs ongoing stuff, also fine to share, i think.
I’m NT. The reason it’s considered rude is because it can feel like you’re trying to compete or to make it about yourself. Usually when someone shares a story like that, they want the focus to be on them for a bit. It’s fine to say, “I can relate,” or, “I know how that feels,” but it’s usually best to save the whole story for later.
Hm, well it doesn’t feel like, shallow to just get the “that must have been hard” standard issue comment after sharing something vulnerable? To me that just kinda feels dismissive, like the person saying “that must have been hard” is offput, or it would stop the conversation
ND here, and yeah, I’m just as surprised by that response. But fucking noted, damn. My whole life I’ve done that to try to connect with the person, and I never realized everyone around me thinks I’m rude. It kind of circles back to my definition of friend: an actual friend would have told me it’s considered rude and why.
Sometimes when people are feeling a lot, all they want to do is get it off the chest or just simply be heard. “Good listening” usually means “paying attention and not saying a lot in response”. Allowing or helping someone to get their story out is usually the most important thing in situations like this. This is where stereotypical “therapist questions” like “How did that make you feel?” fit in.
As a fellow NT, this hits it on the head. This can be considered rude for exactly what you say: it can come off as one-upmanship or an inability to not have the conversation be about you. Obviously, the flow of conversation, relationship, tone and topic can change just what exactly this feels like, because there are situations where it can come off as empathetic or an attempt to showing common ground. Like most things in human interaction, there are not hard and fast rules. But if OP needs hard and fast rules because of having trouble parsing things like tone and flow, I would err on the side of not sharing personal story unless specifically asked.
An assumption of needing hard and fast rules because deficient parsing of tone and flow is peak NTness.
And honestly communication does come with pretty stern (unwritten) rules, the people doing them just don’t necessarily notice them, because they are very automatic and given. The NT rules have a lot of aspects like face-saving that can be entirely foreign to ND people. And on the other hand the upfrontness of ND people can be very umcomfy to NT people.
The rules are only noticed when someone does not follow them and this is where people with different communication styles get into trouble.
