1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:07,480 Hello, welcome to another episode of Unpacking Neuroqueerness. This is your 2 00:00:07,480 --> 00:00:17,400 host George Muniz Gund. Today I wanted to talk about how challenging it can be 3 00:00:17,400 --> 00:00:24,360 to navigate friendships as an autistic person. And this is something that's come 4 00:00:24,360 --> 00:00:32,280 up a lot in support groups that I've been a part of lately. And it's a lot of 5 00:00:32,280 --> 00:00:39,120 people have talked about the difficulty with being able to tell if 6 00:00:39,120 --> 00:00:47,160 someone considers you a friend or not. And that's something that I certainly 7 00:00:47,160 --> 00:00:55,200 relate into a lot. I certainly relate to, I've had that experience a lot through 8 00:00:55,200 --> 00:01:03,680 my whole life. And I feel like a lot of that for me comes from, and I feel like 9 00:01:03,680 --> 00:01:10,840 this is similar for other people from what I've heard. But for me it's about 10 00:01:10,840 --> 00:01:21,400 not being able to tell if someone is your friend or not. And feeling like it's 11 00:01:21,400 --> 00:01:30,280 always a very gray area until it gets said or mentioned somehow, like usually to 12 00:01:30,280 --> 00:01:42,840 another person, your friend, let's say your friend Martha tells Julia, oh yeah my 13 00:01:42,840 --> 00:01:47,560 friend Harold, and let's say you're called Harold. So when Martha says my 14 00:01:47,560 --> 00:01:52,360 friend Harold, that might be the first time ever. You two might have been friends 15 00:01:52,360 --> 00:01:58,720 for two or three years, like whatever. But that might be the first time ever that 16 00:01:58,720 --> 00:02:10,440 it is declared. It becomes knowledge that Martha does consider you a friend. And I 17 00:02:10,440 --> 00:02:15,520 feel like it's very interesting. We talked a lot about this in group. It's very 18 00:02:15,520 --> 00:02:25,360 interesting how with relationships it's defined. With relationships it or 19 00:02:25,360 --> 00:02:31,280 eventually you reach a certain point after a few dates, generally, where you 20 00:02:31,280 --> 00:02:35,800 sit down and you have a conversation. Okay, so what are we? Are we dating? Are we 21 00:02:35,800 --> 00:02:41,320 friends? Are we still not sure? There's usually, and sometimes it can be that 22 00:02:41,320 --> 00:02:47,120 you're still not sure and there's nothing wrong with that, but there's usually 23 00:02:47,120 --> 00:02:55,880 early on in the relationship some kind of, it gets defined like okay, like what 24 00:02:55,880 --> 00:03:07,040 the the relation, like how the two, what each person is to each other, basically. 25 00:03:07,040 --> 00:03:12,080 Whereas with a friendship that doesn't happen, there's not, you don't reach a 26 00:03:12,080 --> 00:03:16,480 point where you talk about where you get, where you sit and you're like okay, so 27 00:03:16,480 --> 00:03:21,400 are we friends or are we just acquaintances? Like it doesn't happen, so 28 00:03:21,400 --> 00:03:28,240 you kind of, it's, I feel like because it's one of those things in most 29 00:03:28,240 --> 00:03:39,160 socialization circles nowadays, where it's a lot about non-verbal, non-direct 30 00:03:39,160 --> 00:03:46,000 communication, I feel like that's why it tends to be very hard for autistic 31 00:03:46,000 --> 00:03:55,200 folks to understand, because autistic folks communicate through direct 32 00:03:55,200 --> 00:04:05,720 communication and do not tend to pick up on the non-verbal 33 00:04:05,720 --> 00:04:13,120 communication nuances that non-autistic people tend to use in their 34 00:04:13,120 --> 00:04:18,760 communication and there's actually a study that came out recently, I'll probably 35 00:04:18,760 --> 00:04:29,160 do an episode on this, but a study recently came out saying that 93% of 36 00:04:29,160 --> 00:04:40,000 the way most neurotypical presenting people communicate is through non-verbal, 37 00:04:40,000 --> 00:04:47,240 non-direct communication, which is what autistic people struggle a lot with, so 38 00:04:47,240 --> 00:04:55,560 you could, they're taking that information, you could say that you could 39 00:04:55,560 --> 00:05:00,040 conclude, and I would not dispute this as an autistic person, I would not dispute, 40 00:05:00,040 --> 00:05:05,960 you could conclude that it makes it extremely difficult for autistic people 41 00:05:05,960 --> 00:05:14,800 to interact with most neurotypical presenting people that communicate 42 00:05:14,800 --> 00:05:20,360 almost entirely, not just mostly, but we're talking 93%, we're talking almost 43 00:05:20,360 --> 00:05:28,920 entirely off of non-verbal communication and that is really a spot that 44 00:05:28,920 --> 00:05:34,000 autistic struggle with, we thrive with direct communication and I will, I will 45 00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:43,040 remind everyone again that autistic communication is not deficient, it is 46 00:05:43,040 --> 00:05:47,680 different, it is like speaking a different language and it's been shown in 47 00:05:47,680 --> 00:05:52,480 studies that autistic people communicate better in between themselves, 48 00:05:52,480 --> 00:05:59,120 autistic to autistic, the neurotypicals do neurotypicals to neurotypical and the 49 00:05:59,120 --> 00:06:04,840 huge disconnect and difficulty comes when you try to communicate, when an 50 00:06:04,840 --> 00:06:10,160 autistic person and a neurotypical person try to communicate and the 51 00:06:10,160 --> 00:06:16,040 neurotypical person will misperceive the the autistic person as being 52 00:06:16,040 --> 00:06:20,540 deficient in communication, but the reality is the autistic person just 53 00:06:20,540 --> 00:06:27,360 communicates in a very different way, in a very direct, very verbal communication 54 00:06:27,360 --> 00:06:33,600 centered way and the neurotypical person, the way that they've been socialized to 55 00:06:33,600 --> 00:06:40,560 communicate, they're constantly looking for non-verbal cues and and that's why 56 00:06:40,560 --> 00:06:45,120 they might struggle to read an autistic person because autistic people 57 00:06:45,120 --> 00:06:52,440 don't really use those cues and they actually generally mean, we generally 58 00:06:52,440 --> 00:06:58,640 mean what we say when we're using very direct communication, there's no like 59 00:06:58,640 --> 00:07:02,600 hidden nuance or anything like that and then it's hard for the autistic person 60 00:07:02,600 --> 00:07:09,440 because the neurotypical person might be saying something with like a hidden 61 00:07:09,440 --> 00:07:14,760 meaning, not really meaning exactly what they're saying, but the autistic person 62 00:07:14,760 --> 00:07:20,000 isn't gonna pick up on that non-verbal part and is going to take what is being 63 00:07:20,000 --> 00:07:27,400 said literally as it is and then it ends up that what gets understood is 64 00:07:27,400 --> 00:07:31,920 different than what's being communicated and of course this goes both ways, like 65 00:07:31,920 --> 00:07:37,480 neurotypical to autistic vice versa and so that's the big issue and I've spoken 66 00:07:37,480 --> 00:07:45,320 about this on this podcast before but I think it's so important to just remind 67 00:07:45,320 --> 00:07:49,520 everyone of that, remind everyone of the double empathy theory by Dr. 68 00:07:49,520 --> 00:07:54,160 Damian Milton which touches exactly on that, the fact that autistic 69 00:07:54,160 --> 00:07:59,800 communication is different, it is not wrong or disordered, it is different, it is a 70 00:07:59,800 --> 00:08:04,040 different form of communicating, it is like speaking in different language, it 71 00:08:04,040 --> 00:08:09,800 is nothing that needs to be fixed or corrected or molded into neurotypical 72 00:08:09,800 --> 00:08:20,600 norms or treated, it just needs to be understood. So that's what I have to 73 00:08:20,600 --> 00:08:27,240 say for today, this will be another short but sweet episode. Thank you all for 74 00:08:27,240 --> 00:08:31,400 listening, I hope you enjoyed this episode, I hope you were able to get 75 00:08:31,400 --> 00:08:42,720 something out of it and I'll see you all next time.