I think most people worry about what other people think of them at least part of the time. As an autistic woman who struggles to perceive unspoken information, I used to worry about it a lot. I worry less now because I’ve grown comfortable with the idea that it’s OK if someone doesn’t like me or get me or if they misinterpret me.

However, the idea that this occasional concern about what other people thought was a common experience was dispelled by an article I read by a despondent extrovert complaining that after COVID, the “extrovert/introvert script got flipped” and now all of a sudden she was “mismatched” to “the world’s expectations.”

I know. You’re laughing. I’m laughing. I mean, I could end this post right here, right? But that wouldn’t be any fun.

Starting with the obvious, suddenly finding oneself mismatched to one’s social environment is not unique to this poor little misunderstood extrovert; it happens to everyone at some point in their life. So you’d think there might some space in here for a bit of empathy on her part. You’d be disappointed. Instead, she writes “one thing the introvert memes taught me was how irritating it is when extroverts attempt to draw introverts out and I’m loath to be that person” and then, in the next sentence, insists, “once you put yourself out there, you’ll have more fun than you imagined.”

The event that occasioned this ill-conceived diatribe? The writer had gotten together with a large group of friends for dinner at an outdoor restaurant, the first such gathering since the pandemic, and the first where “things felt almost back to normal.” But upon saying goodbye, a couple of people “announced” (whatever) that “although they’d had a wonderful time, they wouldn’t make it to another planned gathering three weeks later; they needed at least a month to recover.” The writer was so traumatized by the idea of needing a whole month to recover from a social event that, well, here we are.

So at this point I’m thinking this must be a joke. I’m looking for a punch line, a blatant exaggeration, a cartoon, some indication my autistic brain might have missed that this is tongue-in-cheek. But there isn’t one. This woman is serious.

At the risk of being wrong about that, moving on. There is no such phenomenon as “the world’s expectations.” But even if there were… Um, get over it? Seek out new friends who share your proclivities? Try to understand someone else’s point of view? Make an effort for the first time in your self-obsessed life?

Alas, none of these thoughts occurred to her. Instead, she frets that she’ll “have to adapt to a society that expects different things of me than I expect of it.” While members of the world’s neurodivergent community collectively roll their eyes.

She digs in deeper bemoaning a seemingly sudden onset of people not showing up at gatherings they had previously said they would attend. And we’re not talking plain no-shows, which are a bit annoying, but people who would actually call to apologize for not being able to come. The horror! She then gloomily portends “an unhealthy descent into solitary confinement.” As though choosing to spend more time alone was a slippery slope to turning down every future social event and spending the rest of one’s life without any contact with other human beings.

As I often say, it sounds stupid because it is stupid (ISSBIIS). Most people don’t mind if a friend chooses to limit their attendance at certain types of events (and even if they do, they don’t write a several-hundred word pity party about it in a national publication). There are too many potential scenarios to list that explain it, but off the top of my head, here are a few: Maybe the friend works a grueling job and a weekend of quiet is necessary for her recharge. Maybe the friend has kids and would rather spend time with them instead. Or maybe, she just doesn’t like going to that particular type of event, heaven forbid, and only went to see friends she hadn’t seen in a while, and the rare appearance at such things is all she needs to feel fulfilled.

Valid reasons notwithstanding, I suspect that what at least some people needed a month to recover from may not have been the party but the writer. She’s obliviously self-centered and not the least bit interested in what her friends want or need. Who wants to hang out with someone like that? I’d definitely need a month off from this woman. If not a year. If not forever.

Because if big parties at restaurants (and who doesn’t love it when a loud group of people hijack their favorite restaurant?) aren’t someone’s jam, good luck convincing her. She actually writes that “if it’s true that introverts are…more thoughtful and sensitive people, then we desperately need those people at the party.” (Why? To make up for your total lack of thoughtfulness and sensitivity? Because I don’t think introverts can fix that for you.)

And then…I’m trying to keep it together here while I’m writing this…she claims, “It’s okay if they just sit on the sofa arm eating chips.”

I know. I know. Tears. Give me a second.

Back over here in reality, what COVID did for me was show me which social gatherings I can live without and which ones I missed. Once I started venturing back out, this clarity helped me prioritize gatherings I enjoyed over those I didn’t. I no longer think of my social life as a series of obligations, but a series of things I like to do with a person or people I like to do them with. Aside from special life events (birthdays, weddings, etc.), I now guiltlessly turn down any social invitation that my autism or general state of mind will make difficult and/or unpleasant. And sometimes, whether this woman would believe it or not, I genuinely want to do something and suddenly find out I cannot and have to bow out.

It’s pretty hard to get through life without realizing any of this, but the writer has somehow managed, if not endeavored, to remain blissfully unaware, and even with all that’s happened, is carrying on without slightest shred of self-examination. COVID has ruined her life and the only possible explanation for her friends’ baffling lack of interest in returning to their former social calendar was that they were victims of a sudden societal shift towards not showing up for things.

Hopefully, one of this woman’s friends will pull her aside at some point and try to explain that a willingness to put one’s personal needs above others’ social preferences is not a shift in “the world’s expectations” but an acknowledgement that life is short. That a full life and a fulfilling life are not the same thing. That COVID didn’t change anything.

It just taught us the difference.