• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

My interests seem to be arrested at middle school level

Metalhead

Metalhead

Metal health will drive you mad!
V.I.P Member
I love my loud metal and my loud gangsta rap. I love my anime. I love my video game consoles. I think Steel Panther is hilarious. I love obscenely twisted horror movies.

I love staying up all night on weekends engaging in these things.

A friend just told me that I do have a tendency to want to act like a middle school boy again, and he probably is right.
 
I understand, my interests always seem to loop back around to what I was interested in back in those years.
Do you have a favourite video game console? I like the ps2 the most simply because I love to play Shrek The Third on it.
 
I've always said my growth in most ways, except physically and mentally, was arrested around age 13.
Other Aspies have said the same.
The growing up phases just didn't seem to happen normally as they seem to for most people.

Oh, well, I'm 65 going on 10 ! :joycat:
 
Hmmmm, I wonder if this is why I get along with children so well as compared to adults.

It is not because I feel immature, it’s just that I agree with their worldviews and their communication style makes more sense. Arrested development, most likely. I’m okay with it. Adults stink.
 
Completely normal pastimes are the immature thing to do because to be mature is to be terrified of being associated with children. After all, what would your coworkers think? Obsessing over that is the far more healthy and adult thing to do.
What? Kids like to watch sports too? No that doesn't count because your coworkers like watching that so they won't make the link to kids in their heads. Social status secured! Three hurrays for being mature and not at all insecure in your self expression!
Another victory for adulthood.
 
Wait, we're supposed to stop listening to metal? No thanks!

With that said, I've been told by a psychologist that I'm basically frozen at 16 as well due to PTSD, so what do I know?
 
Linear maturity is a crock anyway. Most obsessions shouldn't be tied to any one arbitrary point on an often jagged line. Sometimes I get lost for hours in a rabbit hole of scholarly journal articles about unethical experiments or medeival literature, sometimes I want nothing more than to stay up until 3 AM sippin Capri Suns and playing Sly Cooper. "Immature" hobbies are how we reclaim the agency we were deprived of in that particular point in life, or to cope with a current-day adversity to conjure up feelings of nostalgia, control, and consistency in a tried-and-true refuge.

As long as you aren't wearing diapers and sucking a pacifier on the subway, is it really a crime to wanna be a big kid again? Most anyone will agree the coolest old folks are the ones who preserved their youthful enthusiasm and never rested on their laurels, who did honest self-reflection their whole lives. The people I admire most, who come closest to "winning" maturity in my book, often never "grew up" into taking the establishment's beating

No accounting for taste, although for the record yours and mine line up rather nicely.
 
Last edited:
My interests are also what high schoolers and middle schoolers are interested in. (kpop, korean and chinese dramas and novels) I don't speak about it much but don't hide it either
 
I have also noticed that some NT friends have had their taste in music fossilize in their teens. I have been more flexible, recently getting into the complex rhythms of Afro Pop. But it's all good. I have enjoyed Lollapalooza and this year looking around for a Bluegrass festival to attend.
 
It's been my observation that many of us often connect with the things associated with the happiest times of our lives. Sometimes you see older people with hair cuts and clothing that were popular when they were in high school. Same thing with music.

I listen to a wide variety of music genre,...but if you want to put a smile on my face, crank up the volume on popular rock songs of the late '70s-mid '80s. Van Halen, Motley Crue, Def Lepard, Judas Priest, White Snake,...and so on.

I rarely wear anything long-sleeved. I wear Polo-style shirts 90% of the time. I am loosing my hair, but it's the same basic style since middle school.

I was never into video games, but if I were, I would probably identify most with the games I played at the local arcade as a kid.
 
Neonatal RRT said:
I rarely wear anything long-sleeved. I wear Polo-style shirts 90% of the time. I am loosing my hair, but it's the same basic style since middle school.
Click to expand...

I am inundated with diagnosis related reading at the moment, and I keep coming across this notion that people on the autistic spectrum tend to choose comfort and function over style when it comes to clothes. It certainly doesn’t seem worthy of diagnostic criteria, but I have read about it multiple times.

Is this just nonsense? Or do you think there’s any validity to this. Especially for women apparently?

It does certainly hold true for me - function over fashion, but that just seems like personal opinion rather than “autistic trait.”
 
Rodafina said:
I am inundated with diagnosis related reading at the moment, and I keep coming across this notion that people on the autistic spectrum tend to choose comfort and function over style when it comes to clothes. It certainly doesn’t seem worthy of diagnostic criteria, but I have read about it multiple times.

Is this just nonsense? Or do you think there’s any validity to this. Especially for women apparently?

It does certainly hold true for me - function over fashion, but that just seems like personal opinion rather than “autistic trait.”
Click to expand...
I think there is some contribution to "function over fashion" with regards to folks with an ASD,...primarily due to "sensory issues" that are common within the population. When it comes to preferences of clothing styles,...I wouldn't consider this the reason,...but one of a handful of reasons. There may be some statistical analysis that I may not be aware of, but I am open to the idea that there may be some statistical trend in this phenomenon when comparing those with an ASD vs. non autistic controls.

Having said that, you don't have to be autistic to have "sensory issues",...so I think this phenomenon my be more specific to an individual,...but as you suggest, I think on the broader perspective, it may become more nebulous.
 
Neonatal RRT said:
It's been my observation that many of us often connect with the things associated with the happiest times of our lives. Sometimes you see older people with hair cuts and clothing that were popular when they were in high school. Same thing with music.

I listen to a wide variety of music genre,...but if you want to put a smile on my face, crank up the volume on popular rock songs of the late '70s-mid '80s. Van Halen, Motley Crue, Def Lepard, Judas Priest, White Snake,...and so on.
Click to expand...

Is this classical conditioning?

Pavlov's dog associated a bell with food.
You associate certain music with positive experiences.

Pavlov's dog salivated (a normal reaction to seeing food) when it heard a bell.
You smile (a normal reaction to positive experiences) when you hear certain music.
 
Beanie_bonnie said:
I understand, my interests always seem to loop back around to what I was interested in back in those years.
Do you have a favourite video game console? I like the ps2 the most simply because I love to play Shrek The Third on it.
Click to expand...
My favorite console is the Xbox. I also do enjoy PlayStation games, but I have over 400,000 gamer score on my Xbox tag.
 
tumblr_af3160391f07b5cfef415f98dfbef05c_e65f0d23_1280.webp


It's basically like that for me, and I dont try to hide it one bit.

And the way I see it, if someone else has a problem with it... it's THEIR problem. That, to me, is actual maturity.

And that's really all there is to it.

Just be yourself instead of trying to be someone else.
 
Matthias said:
Is this classical conditioning?

Pavlov's dog associated a bell with food.
You associate certain music with positive experiences.

Pavlov's dog salivated (a normal reaction to seeing food) when it heard a bell.
You smile (a normal reaction to positive experiences) when you hear certain music.
Click to expand...
Perhaps,...or,...I am just returning to a time when I was most happy, in general,...putting myself in a certain "state of mind".
 
So you do something that entertains you. Who are other people to judge the value of it? You aren't robbing banks.

There are a lot of weird obsessions out there. You sound pretty normal.
 
Most of my interests are really grown up, adult stuff like crime drama books, poverty and history, ohters are more childish like dollhouses, play grounds and children books.

Some like music is more inbetween.

But some of my adult interests already started in child hood (i started secretly reading about world war 2 when i was 9 ), so i dont even know if they count as adultish

I sometimes feel like a 30 year old and 80 year old and a 7 year old are sharing my brain and body
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

New Threads

Top Bottom