I’ve been lurking/participating in forums for people on the spectrum long enough that I see “issues with being perceived” type posts pop up every so often. This is relieving to me because I have issues like that, and they are difficult for anyone who doesn’t experience them to understand. So it’s nice not to feel alone in that way.

I have noticed a definite pattern after months of reading every one of these posts I came across. I think there are two forms of “my desire not to be perceived is causing me distress / avoidance / ineffective behavior” and would like people’s thoughts on this.

1. Some people fear being perceived, or have a great deal of what they very clearly understand as anxiety around being perceived. I have a little of this going on but it’s by far the lesser portion of my issues being perceived.*

2. Other people seem to have much more trouble with the cognitive load of being perceived. This is the much bigger problem for me. Once another human being is in the same space, some part of me becomes continuously aware of their presence, and devotes a non-negligible amount of energy & mental bandwidth processing … things … related to that. It’s often enough to make me less effective at what I’m trying to do. This can eventually lead to anxiety, but I’m fairly sure the primary emotion here is not anxiety but… avoidance? exhaustion? at the processing demand required to exist in the same space with others. It is also a much larger issue when I am already burnt out or tired. But the end result is the same as if the culprit were simply “anxiety:” I’ll avoid doing things I need to do if the cost seems too much.

I think part of the “cognitive load” issue I just described is in fact directly related to my executive dysfunction. Human beings doing things nearby are one of the most distracting stimuli to me (I’m diagnosed ADHD as well). So if I’m trying to do a task, and somebody shows up nearby, even if they aren’t interacting with me, it’s quite possible for my ability to perform at the task to get noticeably worse once they are there.

As you can imagine, experiencing this enough times leads to emotions, which leads to a “complex” as they liked to call it in the 70s. In my case, I’m fully convinced there are both biological reasons for my bullshit - after all, I get mesmerized by televisions too, something is clearly going on - and conditioned responses that aren’t helpful. Would be nice if I could keep a shrink long enough to get some CBT for the latter, but that’s not how it works in the USA if you’re poor.

Anyway I would love to hear any other thoughts or experiences having to do with Being Perceived as it applies to us!

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* If you’re the type of person who occasionally hurries to get around a corner before someone walking a ways behind you can round their corner and continue having you in sight, or if you’re the type of person who will occasionally beat a hasty retreat when someone is arriving who has nothing to do with you, you probably understand this type of perception anxiety to some degree.