Exactly! I mean, my son has an autism diagnosis, and my wife has ADS, and my best friend has both, and I work in a field where almost everyone is diagnosed with something, but surely I am normal, because no one diagnosed me. Yet.
Me: "That's not ADHD, that's just being human!"
Her: "No, no, really, not."
Me: "What are you saying? I don't have ADHD."
Her: "You sure?"
Me: "Of course I'm sure."
Me: Joins lemmy.
Lemmy: Lots of ADHD memes.
Me: "Huh."
And yes, I thought I was the only really outgoing shy person I knew of, and I couldn't ever make sense of it.
Huh, funnily enough I thought this was about the opposite. I barely have a social battery, so I don't meet up with people much, and only for a limited time. But when I do, I'm the life of the party.
Ive always referred to myself as a social introvert. Ill go to social events, have fun, but boy is it exhausting and id rather spend time home alone doing nothing
There are a bunch of different definitions people use for introversion/extroversion. "Extroverted introvert" means you're extroverted by one definition and introverted by a different one.
I'm a huge introvert, but if I can get past the initial hurdle of getting my ass motivated to actually meet with people, I have a good time. I've also been in sales/public facing jobs for most of my working life, which blows people away when they realize how antisocial I can be. I mask very well.
Most of the time, it's how much juice is left in my social battery that dictates what I end up doing. I will avoid my best friends of 20+ years if I'm not in the mood.
I was like this. I was diagnosed at 28 years old, and now I'm 39. The last remnants of my extroverted tendencies are dying, though. I recently had two friends ghost me because of trauma influenced behavior that I was experiencing. People pretend they're tolerant of autism riiiiiiiight up until something genuinely difficult happens. Then you get to see how your "friendship" was based on a masked version of you and therefore completely fake.
Someone I thought I had a 20 year "friendship" with ghosted me with zero explanation after I moved 1600 miles across the country to live closer to. My extraverted tendencies cause more harm than the loneliness that comes with introversion. It's just not worth it.
Yes, how you socialize and how much it drains you are affected by whether or not you’re autistic and/or ADHD.
People who are naturally outgoing but also autistic/ADHD have the same drive to go out and interact with people, but due to differences in how they act/perceive the world wind up much more drained from the experience (either from sensory overstimulation or anxiety from people being unpredictable). This often leads to seeking out socialization less, even though they are just as desperate for it as anyone else who is naturally more extroverted.
And instead of typing up a paragraph every time they want to talk about it, they say introverted extrovert.
I am in this, but I got tested and I'm "normal" even though in my 20s I'm pretty sure I would have been in the very high ranges.
I'd still say I have an ADHD brain with OCD tendencies, but I've managed to moderate both through a decade of exercise, caffeine, and sugar.
(Anecdotal, N=1) I think once your brain realizes in some sense that it can be productive despite its neuroses, the extremes peter out once the stress of your failures no longer hang over you.
Kind of, I was always just introverted and finding out I had autism and unlearning the coping mechanisms I made from not knowing wtf was going on made me able to be more extraverted then before, at least briefly.
These days I think of myself as extrovert but most people think the opposite. Sometimes I wonder if anybody even is absolutely one or the other at all times and circumstances.
My cousin is certified extrovert. She basically always „needs“ someone to talk to on family gatherings. I think she’s fine being alone, but if there’s a person she will talk to them.
If there’s someone telling a story and she’s not too invested she will open a parallel conversation.
Sometimes I wonder if anybody even is absolutely one or the other at all times and circumstances.
Well, absolutely not. I thought it's pretty obvious that this is more like a scale were you fall somewhere between one and the other. Also, those words don't really have any rigorous definitions.
What is an extroverted introvert? As a youth I was introverted and its still my nature but I found I liked drama and being in a chorus and debate type things as I got older but Im still more likely and more than happy to quietly sit and read or mess with a device or be with my thoughts in a group setting and ill at ease meeting people.