Is there a name for this?

[SarahW]

So, I know a Person (a person, lol, this person is not me) who seems pretty normal, but sometimes does weird things. Does this pattern of weird things have a name?

 

1. Person was sitting on the computer doing something. Someone else comes in and rummages around the cabinet where the car keys are kept, can't find them, starts wondering out loud where the keys are. Leaves, comes back, still wondering out loud where the keys are. The Person on the computer notices the someone looking for the car keys. The someone asks the Person on the computer if he know where the keys are. That Person says "yes, I have them in my pocket" and then carries on on the computer. When the other person says in a huff "give me the keys, I have to go" the Person looks shocked and surprised, and hands over the keys.

 

2. Someone is cooking Christmas dinner and the Person comes up to them and starts bothering them. The someone tells them to stop bothering them and go open the wine. The Person says "No." Just that, "no." Odd, the someone thinks they're fooling around. The Person goes and sits down at the dinner table. When dinner is being served the someone asks the Person why the wine isn't open yet. The Person looks surprised and confused and says it's because no one gave him the wine opener and he doesn't know where it is (this was at a close relative's house, btw, the Person has been in the kitchen cupboards there before).

 

3. One time, someone was headed out, and asked the Person to put a load of dirty clothes in the washer while the someone was out. The Person puts the dirty clothes in the machine, and that's it, nothing else (Person knows how to wash clothes, and had used the machine previously). When asked the Person says that he was capable of turning the machine on, he has fingers and can press the buttons and all that, but he just didn't think of it. When told that "putting a load in the washer" includes turning it on, he looks doubtful and confused.

 

There's other little things like that. But those are the most obvious. Is there a name for this sort of behavior? I mean a technical term, something other than "clueless" or "lazy" or other not-nice things.

[MomatHWTK]

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[Monica_in_Switzerland]

If the person is actually neurotypical, I would say they are behaving passive-aggressively.  

 

If they are truly that literal or unable to deduce that a person looking for keys might *want* those keys, or similar... I'd possibly say Asperger's?  Very literal world interpretation and lacking in some empathy skills seems to fit.

[Alice]

Is the person a boy between the ages of 10 and 14? If so, welcome to my world. 

 

If I hear the phrase "technically" one more time I will scream. As in "Technically I did put the clothes in the washer. You never said to turn it on." or "Technically I did take a bath. You didn't say I then had to also wash my hair." or Technically you didn't say you wanted the keys, you just asked if I had them." I should add that my boys are neuro-typical. They know they are being overly literal and just find it funny. They do it to drive me batty. 

 

If it's an adult, the person either sound deliberately passive-aggressive or clueless. Undiagnosed Asperger's is also a good thought. Or if it's an older adult who didn't use to be like this, I'd worry about dementia. 

 

The only scenario that seemed normal to me is #1. When I get really engrossed in a task like something on the computer or reading I tune out my surroundings. I could completely see myself as the Person on the computer and my dh as the person looking for the keys. In that instance I would have just not heard him come in and look for the keys, even it if was right next to me. 

Edited December 30, 2016 by Alice

[Faithful_Steward]

ADHD-Inattentive

 

Is the person gifted?

 

I can do things like you described because I am almost always thinking deeply about something. It can sometimes take me a while to disengage and refocus on someone talking to me or something happening in the same room.

 

But refusing to open the wine is weird.

[SarahW]

If the person is actually neurotypical, I would say they are behaving passive-aggressively.  

 

If they are truly that literal or unable to deduce that a person looking for keys might *want* those keys, or similar... I'd possibly say Asperger's?  Very literal world interpretation and lacking in some empathy skills seems to fit.

 

Being over literal is what I was thinking. But the Person gets jokes and word play and figures of speech fine, and says those sorts of things fine on his own. And the Person does have a lot of empathy, but another issue is that the Person doesn't always clue in that a person is seeking empathy unless it is perfectly clear or bluntly communicated. But once he's talking to someone in emotional distress he's very warm and inviting and caring.

 

When other people tell the Person that his behavior is unexpected he will seem to be honestly confused. He understands that people are telling him that putting laundry in means starting the wash, but he doesn't really understand where the connection is - "I don't get it. I don't see it." When told that other people find his behavior upsetting he is very sorry, but then he gets frustrated because he then tries really hard to think of everything and do everything right, but he still somehow manages to do something else to "screw up" and all his effort is "wrong" anyways.

[Loesje22000]

Being over literal is what I was thinking. But the Person gets jokes and word play and figures of speech fine, and says those sorts of things fine on his own. And the Person does have a lot of empathy, but another issue is that the Person doesn't always clue in that a person is seeking empathy unless it is perfectly clear or bluntly communicated. But once he's talking to someone in emotional distress he's very warm and inviting and caring.

 

When other people tell the Person that his behavior is unexpected he will seem to be honestly confused. He understands that people are telling him that putting laundry in means starting the wash, but he doesn't really understand where the connection is - "I don't get it. I don't see it." When told that other people find his behavior upsetting he is very sorry, but then he gets frustrated because he then tries really hard to think of everything and do everything right, but he still somehow manages to do something else to "screw up" and all his effort is "wrong" anyways.

This is How Aspergers (+ Giftedness) looks like in our home.

[Pawz4me]

Reading your posts, especially the honest confusion description, makes me think ASD-1/Asperger's. But that's what I'm familiar with. I suspect several diagnoses could probably fit.

 

ETA: DS18 is ASD-1 and gifted and he also gets jokes, word play and puns. But if I need to be gone awhile I can't just say "take care of the pets while I'm gone." I need to say "take the dog out in a couple of hours, give him a biscuit for lunch and make sure the cat's food bowl has something in it."

Edited December 30, 2016 by Pawz4me

[Innisfree]

Yup, ASD was my thought, too. My dd on the spectrum also understands figures of speech, though when she was younger (preschool-2nd grade, maybe) she thought they were *hilarious*, and they always distracted her from the rest of the conversation.

[Lecka]

This sounds a little bit like my cousin who has Asperger's.

 

He is very verbal and loves wordplay. He is great at it. He is a fun and enjoyable conversationalist.

 

But his theory of mind is really not good. He does not realize what another person's perspective is. This does not mean he lacks empathy in the sense thatof course he cares about other people, wants to be there for other people, wants to be helpful, etc. He has plenty of empathy.

 

He does not have the perspective-taking skills to always realize what is going on, and that is where the gap is where he would appear to lack empathy.

 

Sometimes the word empathy is used in this way, too.

 

In an autism context, though, there are more terms used to describe the difference between a breakdown in not understanding a need for empathy or that the situation is that empathy is needed or appropriate...... and just not caring.

 

In this context people say things like "perspective-taking skills" or "theory of mind" to describe the getting-it part. Maybe also "social awareness." Those are some buzz words.

 

Then the "caring" part is the part where people use the word empathy, and that is usually (really, almost always from my impression) something that is present, it is just not always shown b/c of the other gaps.

 

But it can come across really rude.

[Kanin]

Wow, I never thought about the difference between empathy and perspective-taking skills. That just blew my mind!

 

I have a Person like this in my life too. Okay... it's my husband. We recently had a skirmish because he does not do smalltalk, except under extreme duress. I was aggravated because although he answers questions readily, he does not initiate conversations with my mother who he has known for over a decade. I told him that it's rude to say hello and then go sit in her living room and read.  She doesn't mind because she thinks he's shy - but it's been over 10 years! I even went to far as to say that he needs to talk for five minutes before he goes to read. He countered by saying that he doesn't really talk with anyone he doesn't know extremely well - and when I thought about it, I realized he's right. I saw him have a conversation with a coworker the other day, and although he did a passable job, it was pretty awkward on his part. Now that I think about it, he talks more with people that ask him lots of questions, but he doesn't chit chat. With close friends, though, he won't stop talking!

 

I told him flat out that unless you talk to people, they're going to think you don't like them. He looked extremely confused, and said that he likes people just fine, he just doesn't say anything unless he's got a reason to say it. When I told him that smalltalk is like the grease that keeps machinery going, he looked so confused. He thinks smalltalk is "being fake," and I think it's a way to show people that you care. 

 

Lecka, you made me realize that perhaps he just can't see my perspective or my mother's - we think he's being a little rude and antisocial, while he thinks he's enjoying our company and talking when he has something real to contribute to the conversation.

 

In the middle of talking about this, I suddenly thought that maybe all this time I've been bullying him into talking and fitting into the "regular" world of social conventions... but perhaps the regular world should be more accepting of people who do not fit the regular mold. My husband is a smart guy, probably gifted, yet he still cannot make smalltalk with a relative. It's driven me crazy for a long time, but maybe I should just let it go!

 

Also - I agree that it's really hard to discern whether behavior like this is passive-aggressive (like - maybe he just doesn't enjoy my mother's company that much, and this is a good excuse to not talk) or if he's genuinely having social difficulties. I always thought he wasn't trying very hard, but this time the experience was different, and I am genuinely thinking that he's got some social challenges. I said something about how smalltalk is easy, you just keep some general categories in your head about what the person is interested in - like gardening, cooking and mystery novels, for example - and pick something from those categories to ask about. He looked at me as if I was describing rocket science...

Edited December 31, 2016 by Mainer

[PeterPan]

We can actually quantify perspective taking and theory of mind with pragmatics testing. The Social Language Development Test is particularly good for that. It's usually something an SLP will run. It's a pain in the butt and takes a LONG time to score.

[SarahW]

This sounds a little bit like my cousin who has Asperger's.

 

He is very verbal and loves wordplay. He is great at it. He is a fun and enjoyable conversationalist.

 

But his theory of mind is really not good. He does not realize what another person's perspective is. This does not mean he lacks empathy in the sense thatof course he cares about other people, wants to be there for other people, wants to be helpful, etc. He has plenty of empathy.

 

He does not have the perspective-taking skills to always realize what is going on, and that is where the gap is where he would appear to lack empathy.

 

Sometimes the word empathy is used in this way, too.

 

In an autism context, though, there are more terms used to describe the difference between a breakdown in not understanding a need for empathy or that the situation is that empathy is needed or appropriate...... and just not caring.

 

In this context people say things like "perspective-taking skills" or "theory of mind" to describe the getting-it part. Maybe also "social awareness." Those are some buzz words.

 

Then the "caring" part is the part where people use the word empathy, and that is usually (really, almost always from my impression) something that is present, it is just not always shown b/c of the other gaps.

 

But it can come across really rude.

 

That's really helpful. When I read descriptions of ASD/Aspie I'm sometimes not sure what exactly they mean. When I hear over-literal or lack of empathy I think of someone like Sheldon. This Person is not always like Sheldon, but there's some similarities. But there's also the word "sometimes" as in sometimes over-literal and sometimes lacks empathy. I'm not always sure if that means the same person can be both, or some aspies are emphatic and others not.

 

So, let's say a person can care about some things quite meticulously. Always thinking "what do I need to be doing about X? how does this other thing relate to X?" Is that rigidity, obsessiveness, or something else? If the X thing stays a priority, even if there are other urgent but short term issues that surface that need to responded to?

 

This Person also has EF-issues. Trivial but typical example - Person decided to make coffee and some eggs for breakfast. He fried the eggs first, and then started the coffee maker. I mean, it could be an honest mistake, "oh shoot, I forgot to start the coffee first, ugh, I guess we'll have to eat the eggs before they get cold and pour the coffee after." But I just asked him why he did it, and his response was that he just decided to make the eggs first, and then do the coffee. When I explained that the coffee maker takes time, and that if he did that first the coffee would be done when the eggs were, he saw the logic in that, but that he "just didn't think of that." And I suspect that in the future if he makes coffee and eggs, whether or not he starts the coffee first will be purely accidental. He doesn't have a good sense of time, as in the time things take, or how to overlap the times things take to complete.

[SarahW]

We can actually quantify perspective taking and theory of mind with pragmatics testing. The Social Language Development Test is particularly good for that. It's usually something an SLP will run. It's a pain in the butt and takes a LONG time to score.

 

Is that only for children or teens?

 

The Person is an adult.

 

Sigh, this is why I don't get people wanting to get evals for their kids. Wait too long, and the problems don't disappear, the help most definitely does.

[Lecka]

Sarah -- we use something with my son that uses a really helpful ranking scale.

 

The scale is 0-5.

 

A 0 is "never present" or "never performs the skill." It is just plain "no."

 

But then 1 is "the skill has been seen." As soon as something is at a 1 then it is an emerging skill.

 

Then 2,3, and 4 are showing the skill is done more and more of the time, and in slightly more difficult situations.

 

Until 5 is "100%," or plain yes, or "you notice no difference compared to others of the same age."

 

So that "sometimes" can mean a range of things. It can mean someone doesn't have any zeros but does have a lot of 3s, a few 2s and 4s, and no 5s.

 

It can also mean that maybe that is a strength area for a person, but they have more of a problem in other areas to be diagnosed.

 

Then there is a range that gets called things like "spectrum traits," "sub-clinical," or "bap broad autism phenotype." That is where yes there are traits, but either not severe enough or not in every area, and so the person is not going to get diagnosed with autism.

 

It is common for some family members to have some traits this way.

 

My older son is officially diagnosed with dysgraphia, and he does have some spectrum traits. The person we saw said he has spectrum traits like she would expect to see in a sibling. But she didn't write that on the report, bc it is that minor. But she saw it, too.

 

It was good for me bc I didn't want to not do things if there were things for me to do, and as I learned more about autism, I realized my older son had had many red flags as a baby and small child and still had some weak areas, and I also worried maybe I think would get more pronounced as he got older. But it hasn't and since talking to the evaluator I don't worry about it anymore.

[Kanin]

Sarah... do we live with the same Person? My husband will do things like that regarding time... like X stays the priority, even if there are three other things that are MORE immediate priorities. He just cannot switch gears to address something else first if he's already decided on the first thing.  He also has a terrible sense of time. Ten minutes, an hour... they're all the same to him so he's always shocked when time is up...

[SarahW]

Sarah -- we use something with my son that uses a really helpful ranking scale.

 

The scale is 0-5.

 

A 0 is "never present" or "never performs the skill." It is just plain "no."

 

But then 1 is "the skill has been seen." As soon as something is at a 1 then it is an emerging skill.

 

Then 2,3, and 4 are showing the skill is done more and more of the time, and in slightly more difficult situations.

 

Until 5 is "100%," or plain yes, or "you notice no difference compared to others of the same age."

 

So that "sometimes" can mean a range of things. It can mean someone doesn't have any zeros but does have a lot of 3s, a few 2s and 4s, and no 5s.

 

It can also mean that maybe that is a strength area for a person, but they have more of a problem in other areas to be diagnosed.

 

Then there is a range that gets called things like "spectrum traits," "sub-clinical," or "bap broad autism phenotype." That is where yes there are traits, but either not severe enough or not in every area, and so the person is not going to get diagnosed with autism.

 

It is common for some family members to have some traits this way.

 

My older son is officially diagnosed with dysgraphia, and he does have some spectrum traits. The person we saw said he has spectrum traits like she would expect to see in a sibling. But she didn't write that on the report, bc it is that minor. But she saw it, too.

 

It was good for me bc I didn't want to not do things if there were things for me to do, and as I learned more about autism, I realized my older son had had many red flags as a baby and small child and still had some weak areas, and I also worried maybe I think would get more pronounced as he got older. But it hasn't and since talking to the evaluator I don't worry about it anymore.

 

The bolded is where I am sort of stuck at. I'm not sure how the points I mentioned above fit into the DSM description of ASD. Or if it fits into enough check marks to get a diagnosis.

 

But what if the specific traits are severe enough that they can be overall debilitating? What if the Person's strengths don't really function that well because of the weaknesses?

 

Getting a formal diagnosis probably won't be feasible, though there are probably a few other specific LD's lurking in the Person as well. Oh well. So whether he would meet the criteria is just hypothetical wondering. But it's just so....it's frustrating, not knowing.

[Lecka]

There is another thing to look at, you can look at the socialthinking.com website.

 

They have things that can be for autism, but it says all over the website that a lot of kids/adults don't fit any certain diagnosis.

 

Or it could be ADD/ADHD and not autism.

 

It is a lot about some of this kind of thing, and doesn't have to get into "does it qualify for a certain diagnosis or not."

 

Then separately, for "where is the line?" I don't really, really know. But you could read more about Aspergers.

 

It is a bit vague.

 

If somebody is doing well overall then it probably doesn't really matter, but it might be helpful in some ways.

 

But for an adult, it is more about what the adult wants or what is helpful to the adult. Some people find it a helpful lens and some people don't.

 

There are some authors that learned about it as adults, one is John Elder Robison, one is Liane Holliday Willey.

 

I think both of them found out about it when a child was diagnosed.

 

With an adult who is not your close, close relative it is not too much your business at a certain point. At a certain point it could be your business, too.

 

But either way you could possibly get some insight for interacting with the person, and that could be nice.

[PeterPan]

Is that only for children or teens?

 

The Person is an adult.

 

Sigh, this is why I don't get people wanting to get evals for their kids. Wait too long, and the problems don't disappear, the help most definitely does.

 

I don't recall if there are tools normed for adults, sorry. There definitely are practitioners who specialize in social thinking who will work with adults, yes. Your best bet there is to find a BCBA who works with adults. Some practitioners really *like* working with adults, like it's especially their thing! So it's good to look around and find someone who has that toolset and experience to draw from. When I went to a Social Thinking workshop with Michelle Garcia Winner, she talked about this. Our behaviorist works with adults. You definitely can find someone.

 

Also, I think with adults that there are just glaring markers. Like they could try to quantify it, but they don't have to. There will be this litany of oh yeah people say that about me or the groans of the other people in the room going yeah s/he does that so much. 

 

While we're at it (and I've forgotten where we were going with this thread, sorry), there are some really good books for adults under the adults tab at the Social Thinking website. You could head over there. Might make some things come together.

[SarahW]

Sarah... do we live with the same Person? My husband will do things like that regarding time... like X stays the priority, even if there are three other things that are MORE immediate priorities. He just cannot switch gears to address something else first if he's already decided on the first thing.  He also has a terrible sense of time. Ten minutes, an hour... they're all the same to him so he's always shocked when time is up...

 

We might be married to the same person, indeed.  ;)

 

I'm trying to objective as I think this through. Because passive-aggressive and/or rude is how it comes across very often. I tell him "It's very hurtful to me when you do X" and he is very sorry, though he doesn't really understand where things went wrong, and says he didn't mean to hurt me. Well, okay, that's good. But still, there's the adage that you believe what people do, not what they say. Remembering that that may not apply to him is tough. Right now we're running on a code word "blue" that was generated out of the keys incident (I wasn't the one looking for the keys, I just observed the incident, and I think that emotional distance helped me see the problem, and not just take it personally). When he does weird things I just say "blue." Because when he's in the middle of a weird thing, rational reasoning has left his brain and taken a vacation on the moon or something. Arguing just makes us both upset.

 

I talked to him the other day about the possibility of him being an Aspie, and he wasn't sure about that. He said that if that was the case, then it meant that he could "never change." As in, never be cured. He said that all his life he's felt like a bad person. Not like an evil person, but bad like he's wrong, a wrong sort of person for this world. I think he has been still waiting on life to fall together and be "normal" for him. That hasn't happened in his 40+ years, but I think he was still hoping.

 

I sent him some links about some local ASD support groups, including one for gifted aspergers. He didn't want to read them, he was afraid to read them.  But he read one with morning with a story of a woman who was diagnosed as an adult and at first he was like "I'm nothing like that!" but as he thought it over today he saw some things, especially social not-understandings, that he realized fit him perfectly.

 

 

I'll also send him the socialthinking link. I think just knowing that he's not bad, and that there's people trying to help, would be good for him.

[Lecka]

I heard about another book on NPR and then I haven't read it, but The Journal of Best Practices By David Finch is also written by a man recently diagnosed with Aspergers, and it sounded good.

 

I think it depends on who the relative is. For me it is not my husband. So I am more in the situation where it is not so much my business.

 

But since one of my kids has autism and I have learned more about, I see it.

[kbutton]

Because when he's in the middle of a weird thing, rational reasoning has left his brain and taken a vacation on the moon or something. 

 

I totally get this phrase!!! It's really difficult when this is the case. And a little distance from the situation helps the brain return, but it's like it has amnesia when it's back. There is never a "good" time to address anything. Sigh. (It's getting better.)

 

I have a loved one that fits some of what you are saying, and some of what fits falls into the "once in a while" category. Not enough categories to probably tick the box for a full diagnosis, etc. Anyway, I think part of the key is that this person was likely reared by a person on the spectrum. His mom has some very, very strong spectrum traits. Key for me is that this person really strongly reverts back to the "family" behavior when the family is together, even when things have gotten better in other settings.

 

I think ADHD is part of the equation, and that is familial as well--there is ZERO understanding of the idea that something can be done efficiently by anyone. I mean, they acknowledge that some people are efficient, but it's magic, voodoo, super power, not an actual normal human trait, or surely someone in their family would have that trait. If someone in this family is not efficient, then they are just enjoying life, smelling the roses, etc. because those super human people are too busy to do that. (And if you are married into this family and stressed out, there is ZERO recognition that you can't stop and smell the roses because you are picking up the pieces that they are too inefficient to do themselves. You are just uptight.)