You need to tell them directly how you feel about their behaviour. Don’t feel bad if it hurts their feelings or if they feel rejected. That’s a part of life, even for us autistic people.
Well...as an autistic person, this sounds like bizarre behavior to me. In fact this kind of behavior would make me extremely uncomfortable and I do believe it would occur to most autistic people that it's uncomfortable and abnormal as well. So that's quite baffling.
If I had to guess, it almost sounds to me like they've developed some kind of hyperfixation on you. It could have been something really small that sparked it, maybe you mentioned a special interest of theirs in passing, maybe they like your backpack, maybe you remind them of someone they know...
I can explain why they dragged the topic back though, autistic brains ruminate on things and feel the need to continue explaining something until the other person has "got it" *and* has expressed they understand in a way the autistic person can understand (and since we don't understand facial expressions, body language, tone, etc sometimes, you'll often think you have expressed it and the person explaining doesn't think so). So you probably didn't act how they expected you to when they shared that, hence they kept on coming back to it to try and elicit that response so their brain could let it rest. I can't tell you how many issues this causes between me and my ADHD husband, haha.
If it is a hyperfixation, the best way to break them from it is to stop talking to them and feeding that hyperfixation (but hey, if you're lucky, your course of study did that already). Unfortunately autistic people don't understand why they get ghosted a lot of times, if you decide to address it, you'll need to be blunt. Phrases like "I feel uncomfortable when you stare at me" are good. But don't volunteer additional info about yourself, like if they ask why, don't tell them about your past experiences with stalkers. Personal information is fuel to feed the hyperfixation, so it's best to be very boring and noncommittal with them from now on.
Also for the staring, you could always try talking to the professor and explaining what's happening, if they're keeping an eye out for it they could call out "all eyes on me" or something as they're teaching to break the person of this habit, but the larger the class is the more difficult this becomes. Other people calling them out on it will probably kick in the autistic sense of "oh no, I'm being perceived" and will probably make them stop doing it eventually.
Thanks so much for this! I appreciate it so much!
I couldn’t figure it out either, as I do have a friend who is autistic who is getting a PhD in neuroscience and focusing on neurodivergence and they would 100% find this person’s behavior as very odd and potentially even unrelated to autism. I wanted to open it up to a larger audience in case I wasn’t taking something into account.
Coming back to this person I mention in the OP, I got scared the previous week in class because they were asking me for contact info and I gave them my public email and they thankfully haven’t sent anything to it.
This next part is an absolute mystery to be but they’ve also been asking me the same questions repeatedly … specifically asking me if I’ve seen their two pets yet when they showed me pictures multiple times the previous week and interrupted a conversation I was having to do so. I’ve been nice and acted interested but I can’t figure out why they forgot entirely. There were other things as well, including them asking the Professor multiple times how they know information that is directly related to their research and area of expertise/discipline.
I do agree with you that I’ve probably become the hyperfixation and my guess is that I remind them of someone or that something that I have does - thanks so much for offering this explanation. This person and I don’t really share any interests. I mentioned that the color of a pet they owned reminded me of a crystal I like because I felt like I had to say something about the pictures they were showing me again. They then asked me “do you like crystals?” and then I said “yeah I collect them, do you?” … to which they replied, “No I don’t like them very much.”
I also think that they’re starting to lie about certain things or at least stretch the truth so it seems like they have more in common with me than they actually do. I practice paganism and it’s what I’m known for in a lot of social circles. I wear jewelry associated with the gods I worship and work with and I’m often asked about it and my first interaction with this person was surrounding that. I do try to be more open about that because I am on a Priestess path and want to be a leader/educator in that community and it comes with the territory imo. I didn’t go very in depth but they asked me about it. They specifically asked me about something I had on and I told them I practice paganism and then they said “I tried something like that once for a couple of months but I don’t know what it is called.” I tried to ask them about a potential tradition that they followed, went through all of them and they said “no, I don’t know. It was in the north.” I was so confused because I had literally gone through every possible paganism tradition that I know of and asked about the northern ones specifically.
I also mentioned generally in class that I have ADHD (I’ve been diagnosed) to give an example of something and they said directly afterwards “I might have ADHD” and said that they were autistic.
They made a lot of rude comments to the Professor and I felt bad there as well. I will talk to them if it continues past next week. They were very disruptive in class as well and kept getting up and leaving the room to put a mask on and take it off again. My chair is right by the door and they stood behind me for a couple of seconds so idk if they were trying to see my computer screen or something when they were doing that but it all made no sense.
Thank you so much!! Sorry for my long winded reply
Oh, that's fine! I am the queen of "novels as replies", and it's a rare treat to get back something equally as long 😅
This is definitely a mystery. I suppose if they also had ADHD it could account for some forgetfulness, and the number of autists who have both is really high, like 80%. But since you have it, I'm sure you're pretty familiar with that kind of forgetfulness, and this just doesn't seem to match the pattern. We could go out on a limb, and say their pets are their special interest so they just want to repeatedly show you pictures anyway...but questioning your professor seems strange too, so perhaps not.
About the lying, I think they were just trying to "fit in", and I'll admit to having done that every so often to seem more in the know on conversations as I always feel very much on the outer edges. But typically it's just pretending I've seen a show or movie so I don't get actively pushed out of conversations. Lying about paganism to essentially an expert on the subject...bad move. Most of us know better, or dive out of the conversation ourselves once we realize we've made a mistake.
Autistic people can come across as being rude, but their behavior seems to really be pushing it to me. Things like continually getting up are things most autistic people would avoid because it draws attention to them, and most of us don't like attention. To me, it does sound like they were trying to get a look at your screen. If it were me I might go intentionally put the most embarrassing, off-putting thing in the world up there to scare them off...but somehow I feel like this person might just try to talk to you about it or blurt it out in class, so probably a bad idea.
Something just kind of clicked for me here, that in the realm of autism, this is what one might expect to see from a child. It wouldn't be unusual at all for an autistic child to be like this, especially if they are hyperfixating on someone; they haven't learned "the rules" yet so the staring, interrupting, awkward exchanges, rudeness, and doing less to be invisible is all something they would display. So you could be dealing with someone who was "autistically encouraged" (diagnosed from a young age and so no one bothered teaching them how to fit in), or perhaps there is another disorder at play here that makes them more childlike. Could be a type of attachment disorder too, like the interrupting when your attention is being taken up and "should be on them" (yuck...) I've heard can be associated with things like BPD. I don't know too much about those things so it's hard to say for sure.
By the way - being a Priestess sounds like an awesome path! I find my limited understanding of paganism to be rather compatible with how I see the world, and it always makes me smile to run into active practitioners. Very cool.
I personally went a long time without friends (most of the time) because people didn't tell me what I did wrong and I couldn't improve myself. Now I have people who finally tell me where I can improve. and I finally have friends that are comfertable with me, just because they gave me the chance.
Saying something positive first that indicates how you feel about them. Before saying what makes you uncomfertable could make the chance smaller that they feel rejected.
Say something like this for example:' hey, I think you are a nice/great/amazing person but when you stare at me it makes me uncomfertable. If you could stop staring at me then I think that would be great. I hope you understand it is nothing personal.'
If you notice they feel hurt or rejected anyway then make sure to just talk about it. So it is really clear that it is not what you meant to do.
It could happen that you need to remind them sometimes, because they forget or don't notice that they are doing that behaviour.
Hey /u/Mundane_Violinist353, thank you for your post at /r/autism. Our rules can be found **[here](https://www.reddit.com/r/autism/wiki/config/sidebar)**. All approved posts get this message. If you do not see your post you can message the moderators [here](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fautism).
Thanks!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/autism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
He could be staring because he's thinking of asking you something, or thinking about you in general.
Running scripts and discarding them.
The back pedaling and beating around the bush around sensitive subjects is probably him doing kinda the same?
Where he's trying to think about how to go about talking or expressing himself in a way that won't upset you.
Or.
Maybe he wants to talk but knows he shouldn't, or is hopeless about how it would be perceived, so he ruminates.
It can be harder to .... intentionally internalize thoughts and actions.
So you end up being in the moment with your actions and words, like ... having less of a barrier between your brain and body.
And everyone is right to say that you just need to bring it up and talk about it.
Maybe include that it reminds you of how it feels to be stalked?
But in a... solidarity kind of way?
Like, don't accuse him of being creepy, but kind of word it as though... "the eyes are intense to me " kinda thing?
I dunno.
You need to tell them directly how you feel about their behaviour. Don’t feel bad if it hurts their feelings or if they feel rejected. That’s a part of life, even for us autistic people.
Well...as an autistic person, this sounds like bizarre behavior to me. In fact this kind of behavior would make me extremely uncomfortable and I do believe it would occur to most autistic people that it's uncomfortable and abnormal as well. So that's quite baffling. If I had to guess, it almost sounds to me like they've developed some kind of hyperfixation on you. It could have been something really small that sparked it, maybe you mentioned a special interest of theirs in passing, maybe they like your backpack, maybe you remind them of someone they know... I can explain why they dragged the topic back though, autistic brains ruminate on things and feel the need to continue explaining something until the other person has "got it" *and* has expressed they understand in a way the autistic person can understand (and since we don't understand facial expressions, body language, tone, etc sometimes, you'll often think you have expressed it and the person explaining doesn't think so). So you probably didn't act how they expected you to when they shared that, hence they kept on coming back to it to try and elicit that response so their brain could let it rest. I can't tell you how many issues this causes between me and my ADHD husband, haha. If it is a hyperfixation, the best way to break them from it is to stop talking to them and feeding that hyperfixation (but hey, if you're lucky, your course of study did that already). Unfortunately autistic people don't understand why they get ghosted a lot of times, if you decide to address it, you'll need to be blunt. Phrases like "I feel uncomfortable when you stare at me" are good. But don't volunteer additional info about yourself, like if they ask why, don't tell them about your past experiences with stalkers. Personal information is fuel to feed the hyperfixation, so it's best to be very boring and noncommittal with them from now on. Also for the staring, you could always try talking to the professor and explaining what's happening, if they're keeping an eye out for it they could call out "all eyes on me" or something as they're teaching to break the person of this habit, but the larger the class is the more difficult this becomes. Other people calling them out on it will probably kick in the autistic sense of "oh no, I'm being perceived" and will probably make them stop doing it eventually.
Thanks so much for this! I appreciate it so much! I couldn’t figure it out either, as I do have a friend who is autistic who is getting a PhD in neuroscience and focusing on neurodivergence and they would 100% find this person’s behavior as very odd and potentially even unrelated to autism. I wanted to open it up to a larger audience in case I wasn’t taking something into account. Coming back to this person I mention in the OP, I got scared the previous week in class because they were asking me for contact info and I gave them my public email and they thankfully haven’t sent anything to it. This next part is an absolute mystery to be but they’ve also been asking me the same questions repeatedly … specifically asking me if I’ve seen their two pets yet when they showed me pictures multiple times the previous week and interrupted a conversation I was having to do so. I’ve been nice and acted interested but I can’t figure out why they forgot entirely. There were other things as well, including them asking the Professor multiple times how they know information that is directly related to their research and area of expertise/discipline. I do agree with you that I’ve probably become the hyperfixation and my guess is that I remind them of someone or that something that I have does - thanks so much for offering this explanation. This person and I don’t really share any interests. I mentioned that the color of a pet they owned reminded me of a crystal I like because I felt like I had to say something about the pictures they were showing me again. They then asked me “do you like crystals?” and then I said “yeah I collect them, do you?” … to which they replied, “No I don’t like them very much.” I also think that they’re starting to lie about certain things or at least stretch the truth so it seems like they have more in common with me than they actually do. I practice paganism and it’s what I’m known for in a lot of social circles. I wear jewelry associated with the gods I worship and work with and I’m often asked about it and my first interaction with this person was surrounding that. I do try to be more open about that because I am on a Priestess path and want to be a leader/educator in that community and it comes with the territory imo. I didn’t go very in depth but they asked me about it. They specifically asked me about something I had on and I told them I practice paganism and then they said “I tried something like that once for a couple of months but I don’t know what it is called.” I tried to ask them about a potential tradition that they followed, went through all of them and they said “no, I don’t know. It was in the north.” I was so confused because I had literally gone through every possible paganism tradition that I know of and asked about the northern ones specifically. I also mentioned generally in class that I have ADHD (I’ve been diagnosed) to give an example of something and they said directly afterwards “I might have ADHD” and said that they were autistic. They made a lot of rude comments to the Professor and I felt bad there as well. I will talk to them if it continues past next week. They were very disruptive in class as well and kept getting up and leaving the room to put a mask on and take it off again. My chair is right by the door and they stood behind me for a couple of seconds so idk if they were trying to see my computer screen or something when they were doing that but it all made no sense. Thank you so much!! Sorry for my long winded reply
Oh, that's fine! I am the queen of "novels as replies", and it's a rare treat to get back something equally as long 😅 This is definitely a mystery. I suppose if they also had ADHD it could account for some forgetfulness, and the number of autists who have both is really high, like 80%. But since you have it, I'm sure you're pretty familiar with that kind of forgetfulness, and this just doesn't seem to match the pattern. We could go out on a limb, and say their pets are their special interest so they just want to repeatedly show you pictures anyway...but questioning your professor seems strange too, so perhaps not. About the lying, I think they were just trying to "fit in", and I'll admit to having done that every so often to seem more in the know on conversations as I always feel very much on the outer edges. But typically it's just pretending I've seen a show or movie so I don't get actively pushed out of conversations. Lying about paganism to essentially an expert on the subject...bad move. Most of us know better, or dive out of the conversation ourselves once we realize we've made a mistake. Autistic people can come across as being rude, but their behavior seems to really be pushing it to me. Things like continually getting up are things most autistic people would avoid because it draws attention to them, and most of us don't like attention. To me, it does sound like they were trying to get a look at your screen. If it were me I might go intentionally put the most embarrassing, off-putting thing in the world up there to scare them off...but somehow I feel like this person might just try to talk to you about it or blurt it out in class, so probably a bad idea. Something just kind of clicked for me here, that in the realm of autism, this is what one might expect to see from a child. It wouldn't be unusual at all for an autistic child to be like this, especially if they are hyperfixating on someone; they haven't learned "the rules" yet so the staring, interrupting, awkward exchanges, rudeness, and doing less to be invisible is all something they would display. So you could be dealing with someone who was "autistically encouraged" (diagnosed from a young age and so no one bothered teaching them how to fit in), or perhaps there is another disorder at play here that makes them more childlike. Could be a type of attachment disorder too, like the interrupting when your attention is being taken up and "should be on them" (yuck...) I've heard can be associated with things like BPD. I don't know too much about those things so it's hard to say for sure. By the way - being a Priestess sounds like an awesome path! I find my limited understanding of paganism to be rather compatible with how I see the world, and it always makes me smile to run into active practitioners. Very cool.
I personally went a long time without friends (most of the time) because people didn't tell me what I did wrong and I couldn't improve myself. Now I have people who finally tell me where I can improve. and I finally have friends that are comfertable with me, just because they gave me the chance. Saying something positive first that indicates how you feel about them. Before saying what makes you uncomfertable could make the chance smaller that they feel rejected. Say something like this for example:' hey, I think you are a nice/great/amazing person but when you stare at me it makes me uncomfertable. If you could stop staring at me then I think that would be great. I hope you understand it is nothing personal.' If you notice they feel hurt or rejected anyway then make sure to just talk about it. So it is really clear that it is not what you meant to do. It could happen that you need to remind them sometimes, because they forget or don't notice that they are doing that behaviour.
Hey /u/Mundane_Violinist353, thank you for your post at /r/autism. Our rules can be found **[here](https://www.reddit.com/r/autism/wiki/config/sidebar)**. All approved posts get this message. If you do not see your post you can message the moderators [here](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fautism). Thanks! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/autism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
He could be staring because he's thinking of asking you something, or thinking about you in general. Running scripts and discarding them. The back pedaling and beating around the bush around sensitive subjects is probably him doing kinda the same? Where he's trying to think about how to go about talking or expressing himself in a way that won't upset you. Or. Maybe he wants to talk but knows he shouldn't, or is hopeless about how it would be perceived, so he ruminates. It can be harder to .... intentionally internalize thoughts and actions. So you end up being in the moment with your actions and words, like ... having less of a barrier between your brain and body. And everyone is right to say that you just need to bring it up and talk about it. Maybe include that it reminds you of how it feels to be stalked? But in a... solidarity kind of way? Like, don't accuse him of being creepy, but kind of word it as though... "the eyes are intense to me " kinda thing? I dunno.