Aspergian Empathy

Gavin Bollard is my favorite Aspie- viewpoint wise that is... (Of course my hubby & sons are MY true favs!) Here is his latest post & an excerpt on how he views showing empathy in the light of his recent loss. ******************************************************************************** I know that now I'm in danger of confusing emotion with empathy, so I'll try to clarify. Crying at a funeral doesn't necessarily mean that you are feeling empathetic towards others. Often, we're simply crying over our own personal loss - a person who was special to us. What such crying does do however is; 1. Paint us (aspies) as human beings, not monsters. 2. Enable us to understand how others may feel. ...... Concluding I guess that the main point I wanted to make here was that next time an NT starts complaining about the aspie lack of empathy being the cause of their relationship break up, spare a thought for the aspie in the relationship who can't lie about feelings they know are there but which don't appear until conditions are right.

Their inner conflict causes them just as much pain as the outer pain that NTs display only since they lack the facilities to convey the message, they can only watch in stunned silence as they are treated like unemotional serial killers and their relationship collapses around them.

Sometimes too, it's the aspie experiencing all the emotion and the NTs who are lacking in empathy.

Genius! Thank you Gavin, once again for a "map" into the Aspie minefield that is emotion.