It usually takes a very particular kind of moment for others to even notice but I don’t lie ever and I’m completely unable to give short inaccurate answers that borderline on lying.
I’ve basically trained the people around me to not ask if they don’t want to hear the truth or conversely that I’m the one to ask when everyone else is just handing out comforting lies.
… you realize you are almost certainly autistic, right?
I realize the stack of evidence supporting that possibility is quite high.
Same here. It’s a real barrier at work. Leadership doesn’t like facts. That said, apparently ADHD causes some symptoms that most people consider autistic. A doc told me that when one of my kids who appears autistic was evaluated for it. But it’s all just labels anyway. The symptoms are what matter.
I feel the same way about labels. It feels like a binary way of thinking, whereas I see this stuff more as a spectrum - and honestly even that feels overly simplistic. Maybe a 3-dimensional one. I’m not planning to medicate it anyway, so getting an official label is hardly new information or useful. I embrace it, whatever it is.
People in general dislike anything that might inconvenience them, the truth included. Effective communication lies in one’s ability to make them understand despite these emotional barriers (with techniques like the “compliment sandwich”, “I feel” statements or opening with some light jokes, for example). 👍
Yeah, but compliments require lieing in my head usually. Especially to the kind of people we don’t like the truth. I just avoid leadership. Communicate through my manager with them if needed. And avoid any management type positions.
Usually but not always. Sometimes it’s just a matter of perspective. I understand though (maybe it’s my own neurodivergence, although I’m an ADHD enjoyer social butterfly), and in those cases I just say nothing and nod if needed, lol. For me, the truth is something I discuss with those ready for it, for adults I respect (in the absence of trauma, ofc, some things are better left unsaid if all they’re gonna do is cause pain), everyone else gets the kid’s gloves treatment, which I don’t mind providing since I’m somewhat paternalistic in nature.
I have a bit of a righteous tendency as well. It drives me to feel the need to point out when someone says something false. Which leadership types constantly do. Just a bad combo.
A lot of the behaviors are similar, but their causes are not. This Dutch white paper explains this: https://www.anneliesspek.nl/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Whitepaper-ASS-en-of-ADHD_16-9-24.pdf
I feel ya. I have the absolute worst poker face, and I cannot bluff. My uncles all liked to get together and play poker over the holidays, but the one time I was invited it was a bloodbath.
The work people haven’t figured this out yet.
I’m in a similar boat. Social deduction games make me very nervous.
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I go into my backyard to trim my beard so I don’t need to clean up anything
When I’m sitting barefoot I like to tuck my index toe under my foot, it’s a comfort thing. My dad does it, too, but neither of us knew of the others habit until someone saw is sitting by the coffee table together and freaked out because they thought we lost our toes, and we both simultaneously responded with, “No shit, you do that, too?” I’ve never seen nor heard of anyone other than the two of is who do it.
index toe? you mean your big toe? hahahaha
Nah, that’s the thumb toe, it’s the little one next to it. Like your hand.
I keep a bug-out bag in case of fire.
It’s not that I’m particularly afraid of fire, so much as I’m afraid of being thrown out into the night wearing nothing by my skivvies.
So I keep a back-pack loaded with:
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A change of clothes
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photocopies of all my identification
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Spare car keys
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Spare credit/debit card
Every person I’ve shared this with says “Hey…it makes sense…but it’s still a little weird.”
What’s your bag of choice for your bug-out bag?
I don’t find that weird. I find myself relatively negligent for not having this sort of thing prepared in some way, if not by go bag then by having the copies at a friend’s or such
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Can you remove paid games from your library? I have removed a few f2p ones, most notably Apex Legends after removal of linux support. Turns out you can add them back and your hours, achievements will be right back.
What? I completely get discarding things and living a life without the burden of clutter, but having a game in your Steam library is essentially zero cost/burden right?
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I hope it’s the loud minority that buys that many games. I think most people don’t have the luxury to think that way.
I have over 200 games (not the largest library I know but still sizable) and most of them are unplayed and never will be. A majority of them come from the monthly Humble Bundle subscription that gives me like 7-12 games a month. I haven’t redeemed any in a while, I mainly keep the sub for the store discount, and the mild feeling of goodwill I receive for having donated to “charity” (since Humble’s acquisition by EA I question how much of this goes to charity).
Games are meant to be played, not collected.
I’m not a gamer myself (the only game I ever purchased are a few chessboards ;) but as a book reader I know many people do buy books they will never ever read. They just collect dust on their bookshelves. It may be sad they don’t get to enjoy the content, but it’s their choice and there is nothing wrong with that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsundoku
Tsundoku (積ん読) is the phenomenon of acquiring reading materials but letting them pile up in a home without reading them.
Seems to be quite universal phenomenonemon. I wonder if theres a word for someone who spends a year or two buying books, letting them pile up and then has a few month period where they read for hours and hours every day. If there is, that would be me.
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That sounds good to me. I actually have some major JOMO these days, with pretty much everything. I think the most recent film I’ve watched is from 2019, the most recent music I listen to is ~2011-12, I enjoy listening to people tell me about that party/event/whatever they went to and I didn’t etc. So your description fits better than you knew lol
Especially since you can hide them if you want to maintain a clean interface. That way you can bring them back later if you decide to replay the game, or share it with your family. There’s so few reasons to ever delete a game.
Clutters the interface, harms discoverability in the backlog, and may point to a game that doesn’t even work anymore.
this sounds like just throwing your money away. I think it definitely takes the cake for weird/interesting habits.
I agree, it costs nothing to not delete them, and if they ever added a framework later on for reselling or trading, you’re just out money.
Not to mention if you wrote a review for any of the games, I’m expect deleting the game from your library unmarks the game as you owning it, which means that your review no longer contributes to the game’s rating.
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I fully understand not wanting them in the library. How I go about it is I have a category that’s called finished, and when I finish a game, I remove them from all categories, except for finished, and then I hide/collapse that category. Alternatively, you can also filter by installed games.
I have a review for most of the games that I’ve played, but almost none of them actually count towards the game score because Steam has a really stupid way of deciding if a review actually counts or not. basically, for a review to count, you have to own the game or have refunded the game(I’m nit sure if deleting the game counts as refunding). And it must have been purchased directly through Steam. and it has to meet whatever Automated metrics they have in the background to decide whether or not it’s a bot review or not.
I’ve had fully valid games that I purchased through Steam just not get included in the review system because something I sent in the review triggered some form of abuse system.
I envy anti-hoarders.
I’m surprised that anyone is answering anything. If something would seem very normal to me, as in, I think this is something everyone does, I wouldn’t know of it would seem odd to anyone else. By virtue of it seeming very normal to me.
Something being normal is rooted on it being the norm, as in, something typical. If you think something is odd, you can’t feel like it’s normal just for you, that’s not what the norm means. Maybe it seems natural to you? Sure, but not normal.
Sorry for my reading my pedantic rant. In my case, these kind of rationalizations of the language using its roots seem pretty natural and fun but I know most people look at me weird for over analysing stuff.
You can have been informed by other people that things you thought were normal are not and continue to do them though. It’s likely that abnormal behaviour is pointed out at some point if it’s encountered enough
That’s why I specified that the things I like doing, that feel natural to me, aren’t thing i think are very normal, but “natural”. Even though I know that they are not normal, they are in my nature, for whatever reason.
The moment you are told that something is abnormal, you can’t think of it as very normal, by definition, no? 😅 You might still think that you prefer it, that it feels natural to you (it’s in your nature, personal preference), but not normal.
I have full on conversations with myself. To the point where I simulate talking with two people. I don’t have any multiple personalities or any mental illness (as far as I know), I just use it as a way to think about what I need to think about.
Your left brain and your right brain are talking extremely
I think that’s normal if you have an inner voice. I do that too to an extent. However, not everyone has an inner voice. I can’t imagine how life works for these people, but it’s not that rare not to have an inner voice.
I got my inner voice around 20yo, it was very surprising at first… I thought that’s it, the family strain of madness finally got to me, I’m weeks away from being restrained.
But no, it’s harmless. Even useful because it’s like rehearsing -it means I don’t have to improv all the time.
Do you use pronouns for yourself during these conversations and if so, are they first or second person (I vs you)?
I imagine I’m talking to someone else so I use ‘you’ mainly
You’re not talking to yourself, you’re crafting a socratic dialogue outloud.
Like I dunno if there is any particular evidence that Plato like, talked to himself aloud in developing his plays… but a substantial amount of the foundation of ‘Western’ canon is pretty much Plato making up conversations that probably are not verbatim accurate, but work to dramatize and illustrate some kind of tension between characters with different worldviews
I have this reporter/podcast host living rent free inside my head to whom I have to give daily interviews to.
You might be trying to find bugs in your own thinking system, rubber ducking it all the time lol
I don’t look at which way I’m putting the toilet paper roll on, and I don’t care.
Yes! So many details in life matter to me but that one doesn’t and I’ve never understood why it would.

I have a song in my head, almost all the time. Invariably it’s some 90s jingle from a TV commercial. I habitually repeat certain phrases. Pretty sure I’m autistic in some way, but I mask like a pro. I’m popular at work, socially and adapt to people quickly. I retain eye contact, but I’m actually staring at a point just above their eyes as I find eye contact insanely intimate. I don’t think I’m a complete psycho - if anything I have an almost paralysing amount of empathy. I even sympathise with people who really don’t deserve it (politicians etc). I’m pretty happy now I’m pushing 50 and have a family, but I still use alcohol in excess most weekends. It just makes the world make more sense to me. I analyse almost every social interaction I have. I feel a sense of triumph when it goes well, and shame / responsibility when I doesn’t. I’ve been told I’m very agreeable and easy company, but the truth is it’s not easy for me and I feel like I do most of the heavy lifting in conversations. I envy those who can just sit in their own awkwardness, but I feel like I have to perform and make people like me. It usually works, but when it doesn’t I stew on it endlessly. Anyway, no idea why I unloaded all that. Cheers!
I have a song in my head, almost all the time. Invariably it’s some 90s jingle from a TV commercial.
I swear my brain is a broken jukebox that’s permanently set to shuffle.
And yeah, sometimes it’s the most random shit from a TV commercial from 30 years ago.
Sometimes I’ll hear a single word, and it will remind me of a song and it will immediately get stuck in my head whether I like the song or not lol.
Though I have actually figured out some ways to stop that from happening by immediately starting to hum or think of a different song (I’ve got one or two go-tos) to kind of “reset” it, but I have to act really fast or else it’s too late, and I’m singing the theme song to Doug for 2 days straight.
All very relatable probably autistic traits tbh
I’m actually trying my best not to buy from countries I see as vile and inhumane, and businesses owned by people who support vile political ideologies. Spend a good amount of time checking for the brand and country of origin while in the shop.
You’re not weird, just more dedicated to being a moral person than most. 👍
Interestingly, according to the common interpretation also mentioned by @fushuan@lemmy.blahaj.zone this is not normal.
but what is it, if not normal?
Have you read the amount of responses in this post? 😂
No way the definition of normal I gave is the common one. At some point it doesn’t really matter what the dictionary says, if enough people change the meaning of a word they use, it changes meaning.
Still interesting to look at the roots of a word to see original meanings and so on though.
Have you had any success? How? Every time I’ve started down that road, it’s a maze of twisty passages, all alike
I recognize people by the way the walk/move, not by their face.
'Tis Cinna, I do know him by his gait.
It’s a thing!
Huh, I wonder if that’s partly me …….
- Most people I recognize by “normal” things like faces
- ephemeral people like waitstaff or someone I pass in the street, never get committed to memory
- but some people I can’t distinguish from others, no matter how different. I never knew why but maybe gait
For example there were two kids in my high school. I interacted with at least one of them on most days, so they were familiar. One was much taller than the other, one was brown hair the other black hair, they were in different classes, one was in a club with me the other not. They really had nothing in common that I ever figured out. Yet all four years of high school I could not tell them apart.
I am really bad with names, which may be relevant.
I use that as part of recognizing people. Mostly from behind or far away.
Do you have aphantasia? This is pretty common among people who do.
He probably has some level of prosopagnosia.
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Rubbing my legs. Especially the inner adductors.
Before I fall asleep, I self soothe by playing with the hair on my head in a very specific way.
I rub my feet back and forth. It’s so nice
You can’t just leave me hanging, what’s the specific way?
It’s weird but I lie on my side and comb and tug my hair as flat to my head as possible against the direction of growth, especially around my neck, ear, and temple, where the growth direction is most opinionated. Usually I comb it with my fingers, but sometimes I use a pick or brush. It’s careful work and I try to fall asleep with it like that.
Edit: I’ve wondered if other people do this, because it feels so natural to me, but I’ve never heard anyone describe it.
I did something similar as a toddler/child, but once done I would isolate a single strand of hair and then yank it out. Then I’d start all over again. I had bald spots.
Ever since I was a kid I’ve been a people watcher. I can sit and just watch people and observe behaviors. I’ve been out with friends and nudge them to watch out right before fights break out. They tell me it’s creepy. I say not really, those people stand out to me.
Your friends are idiots. People watching is a normal human trait.














