“Don’t assume, ask” - is the approach I share. However, there are many people to whom asking seems like something rude and inappropriate. And those people would assume.
The thing is, I am one of those people that usually can’t be accurately assumed: if you’d think a person that does this and this would also do that, the one who likes this and this would hate that and so on - most probably, I’d not follow that pattern. For that very reason I’ve been called ‘eclectic’, or less politely - ‘messy’, ‘illogical’, and all sorts of weird - most of my life, and for that very reason some people are kinda afraid of me: they can’t predict because their assumptions aren’t correct.
In turn, for me it’s very frustrating/confusing to see that someone is offended by me asking directly instead of assuming because all I want is to avoid any misunderstanding and clarify things.
I feel like #AuDHD is quite an eclectic thing per se(due to some #autism aspects looking from a certain point of view as opposite to those of #ADHD), so maybe that is the key to me being so, well, contradictory in eyes of other people.
I wonder, if that asking is just #autistic desire to have things clear and precise, or assuming/asking divide does not correspond to the NT/ND one #neurodivergent @actuallyautistic
@olena@actuallyautistic
I'm not autistic just ADHD, but I've had to teach myself in recent years to have the courage to ask instead of wildly guessing what people mean/want.
Like you say, many people seem to find it rude to ask for clarification, but I've realized that it isn't worth worrying about the opinion of anyone who is going to get mad at someone for trying to understand and get something right.
@olena@actuallyautistic
It's still hard making myself ask though because it does often turn out when I ask that I am (apparently) the only one who thought of alternative ways to do something or alternative meanings, so people are puzzled by my questions because they thought the thing they said could only mean one thing, but... That's why I ask.
@artemis@actuallyautistic at work, one of the main things I do is mediating between two sides each of which thinks everything is absolutely clear while actually they are talking about completely different things - and describing things in a way that would allow minimum misinterpretation, and making others ask questions and answering those questions until everything is actually clear for everyone involved. Usually, if from start someone says ‘everything is clear’ - they surely got something seriously wrong.
@olena@artemis@actuallyautistic ha! This is me during almost all work related discussions. Thanks for elaborating in a way that I could make [better] sense of this. I am and most of my life have been quite aware that I'm very good in translations between different groups, professions/specializations as well as different belief or knowledge systems, but now I believe that the [#ASD has a greater and somewhat other influence than I thought!!]
@rebekka_m@artemis@actuallyautistic you know, first years at job I was like: no, it can’t be, I can’t be the only one participating in the discussion who sees they are talking about different thing, right? Right?
@olena@rebekka_m@actuallyautistic
This was me in college. A student would ask a question, and a professor would answer a similar question, but not the one the student was trying to ask and back and forth it would go.
One of my most-used meeting phrases is "I think the two of you are talking past each other. You're talking about X, and the other one is talking about Y."
I think some “assumptions” are so “obvious” to some people that they regard them as facts, and as facts that everyone knows.
We can tell people not to make assumptions, but that only works if they’re aware of making assumptions. It might be more helpful to suggest that something they regard as a well known & established “fact”, might not be regarded that way by other people.
@Susan60@ScottSoCal@rebekka_m@artemis@actuallyautistic one of the most frustrating things about it for me probably is when people would make assumptions about me, guess wrong and than be offended that I would not act in a way they assumed I would, that I “am not what they thought I am”.
@olena@actuallyautistic that tracks pretty closely in my case, too. I am ADHD dominant but medicated, they are equally balanced. I have also been told that I am very “hard to read” been known to “surprise” neurotypicals by showing interest in a very wide mix of things lol people are offended by questions and I beat myself up when I start masking so much that I withhold asking them to avoid offending. Thx for your share - good reminder to keep it real
@olena maybe the divide you're referring to is the same one as "ask" vs "guess" culture. https://therapyinanutshell.com/communication-skill/ i don't know how many, but there are also NT "ask" people, who prefer to ask rather than assume.
I pretty much only communicate verbally. Nonverbal communication is learned young, and the only communication I got for too many years was "fuck off and die", and it wasn't delivered gently. I now have what I call "hint blindness". I think hint blindness is common in the bullied, and all autistic people got bullied.
This is one of those things I can't sort the chicken from the egg as far as how I ended up this way. Autism, ADHD, and cPTSD all walk the same path.
@olena@actuallyautistic
I think some of us are just naturally hard for others to read. Needing to clarify things is also common and also prone to being misinterpreted. Like the mythical Cassandra, our fate so often seems to be to wander through the world, being neither believed nor understood.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic that’s a character I associate with a lot, and my nickname at work - because my warnings and predictions often got dismissed as too pessimistic or overly cautious, but tend to come true
@olena@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I’ve experienced a version of this and I’ve wondered if it (or whatever of it isn’t just my confirmation bias?) comes in part from growing up needing to pay attention to the cause and effect of social systems and being more aware of what may be invisible to people for whole those systems are a native medium — like, I know how y’all do and I bet under conditions ABC y’all are gonna do XYZ and sure enough
@pathfinder@olena@actuallyautistic I feel like I am simultaneously hard to read and predictable, but in different areas. If I asked my friend to guess what I would most likely eat for lunch tomorrow, they would be correct 90% of the time, but if I asked them what music I was listening to right now, they would get it wrong 90% of the time. Idk how to explain it.