Dyspraxic Adults

Hi everyone,

I'm wondering if anyone else has the same pain in the arse dyspraxia personality I do and if so how do you tone it down?

So I'm a very bubbly person which is great for my work in hospitality but not so good in relationships. I'm told I flirt a lot, all the time in fact, but I don't see it. I talk and treat everyone one the same way from the guy across the road to the old lady down the street. When I interact with someone I smile a lot, I run my hands through my hair, I laugh I'm very exagerated when I speak, my tone goes up and down and I get very excitable. I'm often called a flirt and worse!! I'm sick of explaining to people I'm not 'flirting' it's just me personality. Well I'm in a new relationship with this guy I've been friends with for a while now, I initially said I didn't want a relationship, I know it's hard for guys to be with me because of my personality but he said this is one of the things he loves most about me. So over the weekend we had a massive fall out where he said he doesn't like the way I am and asked me to 'change' I obviously lost my temper and stormed off which didn't help the situation because then I was accused of over reacting. I'm getting mixed advise from our mutual friends, some saying he knew who I was before we were together and he is out of order, other friends say they see why he wouldn't like it and maybe I should try to change. I'm 26, I've always been very aware of myself and get the same social anxieties other dyspraxics live with. I've been bullied, I've been in social situation that I have though have gone well just to be told later that I did such &such or said this or that, my brain to mouth filter is very dodgey. I got my diagnosis 2 years ago. I've also been diagnosed with PTSD as a child after a difficult childhood. It took me a really long time to except myself and I suppose I feel I'm taking steps back.
Sorry for the big rant, is anyone else like me?

So he told you that he loved your personality and the next thing you know is that he's asking you to change it?

This guy is bad news.

MissCaswell wrote: . . I know it's hard for guys to be with me because of my personality

Hi and welcome,

Please consider this a safe place to have a rant. You are who you are and you sound like a thoroughly warm and friendly person. So not everyone is able to handle that, they could at least try to be a little more sensitive to your feelings and more accepting that you are who you are and they might not exactly like it if you told them they had to change. There's a fine line between constructive criticism and nit picking and the line isn't necessarily fixed.

Maybe your ex somehow felt increasingly jealous/insecure. He knew what you were like so yould could it is equally a reflection on himself that he couldn't handle that.

There's a quote which I believe is attributed to Marilyn Monroe. Loosely it is,
"If you can't handle me at my worst, you don't deserve me at my best"

I once went on a couple of blind date things to do with some thing on my old mobile service provider, but neither went very well.

You don't see it because you don't intend the conversation in a sexually charged manner. Many people are only exuberant when they are flirting so they project that you are behaving as they do when they are attracted to someone.

I have had this issue a lot. What I consider to be finding out more about someone, is perceived as trying to seduce them. Both by men and women. When younger, I apparently sent out "seduction/flirting" signs to guys and then had to explain that I really, really was just trying to get to know them, as people. It became a lot safer, having long conversations with women at social events, even if that was not great for my romantic life.

Sometimes it is projection, as Alessandro has pointed out. Often I think it is not just dyspraxia but typical behaviour of an introvert. My introverted personality in social situations, overreacts. As I don't like or do "group" chat, so I tend to end up having unusually long, in-depth exchanges with one or two people.

Have a pretty good treasure chest of being socially awkward so the dyspraxia is in play too. Challenging, but variety is good, even if it can be disconcerting to discover you were the variety show!

Please bear in mind that a lot of the time, when guys say to girls that they think the girl is flirting, they're only saying that to try and initiate a relationship.

And in many cases not a long term relationship!

Tom fod wrote: ↑Thu Aug 16, 2018 4:57 pm And in many cases not a long term relationship!

What do you mean, Tom?! You're corrupting my mind with these un-Christian practices!

Most humble apologies. I meant Long enough to get meet his or her parents, propose and get married in order to consumate the marriage in a manner that is acceptable.

This process can be accelerated with wine cider or alcohol for anyone not pure of mind and spirit!

The bigger issue is that although it is not often considered - ultimately we are all animals and cannot prevent ourselves - to varying degrees depending on our individual natures having animal urges.

Fortunately we mostly (for social convention and social order's sake) can control our expression of these urges/ and responses to the approaches of other, even if we cannot altogether conceal them due to the importance of non-verbal communications - which are somewhat out of our control.

DCD/Dyspraxia I think causes us to "read" situations differently to neuro-typicals and also affects how we communicate.

I was 15 when I met my later to become wife - in 1964 - I guess it was raw animal attraction and social convention to find a girlfriend - that brought us together - we mostly got on ok and one thing led to another - neither of us were more attracted to anyone else thereafater and we married in 1970 and are still together.

Between 1973/5 I undertook a social work training course that introduced me to all sorts of information about human growt, relationship building and breaking, and sociological/psychological factors that contribute to human behaviour. Around me I saw contemporaries falling in and out of relationships and was forever grateful that I found my lifelong partner whilst I was still intellectually immature - consequently I did not give much thought about matters beyond wanting to be with her based on her apparently wanting to be with me.

I am still astounded she puts up with me - but I guess the most important thing is that we are all able to be our true selves within our closest relationships and simulataneously allow our partners to be their true selves.

Compromises are obviously involved - but I am very glad I discovered a life partner - without actually looking for one.

I suspect these ramblings do not add anything - but there they are nonetheless - I have written what developed from what I read, which began: -

I'm wondering if anyone else has the same pain in the arse dyspraxia personality I do and if so how do you tone it down?

So I'm a very bubbly person which is great for my work in hospitality but not so good in relationships