Origins

I'm certain my paternal grandmother had it and my father has it. All three of us have had a pattern of odd quirks and socially awkward behaviors. I don't think any offense was ever intended yet somehow people have always been hurt by our behavior.

I can't speak for my father or my grandmother but I can tell you it distresses me that things I said with no harm ever intended caused hurt to others. From some of my earliest recollections there were people having what I perceived as irrational reactions to things I said. One time I had a girl from school yell at me and hang up the phone when I called to ask her what the homework was because I missed school that day.
I had a hard time understanding that even if someone said something derogatory of themselves or their possessions that I wasn't at liberty to use those same terms. For example, if someone called themselves fat that I wasn't allowed to call them fat even though they had described themselves as such. I wouldn't use such terms to be mean but as a descriptive term not realizing the offense. Or if someone called their car a piece of junk I'd say to someone else that maybe the person was late because their car was a piece of junk. I didn't mean it in a condescending way, just a factual way, yet that was not how it was taken. Too many times events like these ended up with me in tears because I didn't understand what I had done wrong and didn't want people to perceive me as a jerk but clearly many of them did. Usually, by the time they were screaming at me there had been a history of offense, to which I was oblivious, prior to the current one.

Even now that I'm actually aware of some of the proper norms of conduct, it still doesn't mean I recognize them on the fly and act appropriately in the moment the interaction is occurring. Sometimes I have to review the interaction and go back to the person later to clarify, apologize, etc. But, again, that's if I even realize it. Sometimes, in an effort to try to have appropriate conduct I'm overly cautious to the extent that once again my behavior is called into question. The truth is, I just don't quite understand complex social interactions. I can joke, have fun, talk about stuff, even talk about relationships...but I need it concretely said not implied or left to be interpreted. If I'm supposed to read in between the lines forget about it, not likely to happen unless it's a cliche I've heard before.

Even when I explain this to people and they grasp how my mind functions it still doesn't mean there won't be plenty of misunderstandings anyway. A lot of times it's very lonely to know even those closest to you don't really understand you.