No friends

I don't have any friends or a relationship.  I struggled for years and didn't know why. after i sought an autism diagnosis and was incorrectly told i was, i gave up socializing entirely.  now that i have confirmed i am autistic, i would like to try again. i have been to one autistic meetup which was good.

Hi I'm 55 diagnosed with autism in 2015 I'm in the same boat I feel like an alien when in company of others. I wish there was a place/website where we could find other peeps to talk to and share stories and share advice. Chin up 

bummer

I'm in my 50s I'm 55

I dont have many friends probably 2-3 at the most not people to hang out with, I suffer with depression and anxiety disorder  low self esteem  plus I'm visually impaired  

I dont have the social skills and am often scared about making friends.

I know how you feel.

Yes I would like to be a friend, my special interests are meteorology, space weather, exo planets, terra forming, science fiction, science fiction/fantasy, DC and Marvel superhero genre.

I can relate to this as I have never had a friend since leaving school.  I talk to people at technical college, but it never developed into a friendship. 

I am 56 years of age and I also have chronic pain and fatigue which is very mentally and physically exhausting.  I do not know how to make a friend and where to friends as I am unable to travel on my own as I need support.

I live in Thurrock and there are no adult autism specific support groups, there is only but it is for activities for parents with autistic children and activities for their children. 

There is a befriending service in Thurrock, but it is only for children and I am too young for the Age UK service.  I have no-one to share my special interests of meteorology, space weather and my interests in DC and Marvel superheroes. 

I got diagnosed with autism at the age of 51 in 2014 and I feel like that I must be the oldest autistic adult in Thurrock. As an older autistic adult, I feel very alone and forgotten about.

In my experience best way of getting new friends is to help more people daily as much as possible. And friends will come themselves. 

I am pretty much the same, I do not have many people at all in my life and inly one "friend"  who I feel OK being around and who can handle my company but he lives a long way off and I am tied to where I live because of the "job" I do so I cannot get out much. Recently I asked him why he bothered with me when no one else did ( rather sad question to put to anyone-I know but I was going through a really bleak period and the one thing I can rely on from him is a straight answer to a straight question) He told me it was because I was weird-he does not believe that there is any such thing as Autism-just degrees of weirdness(?) and I am the weirdest bloke he has ever met)!)  think he meant it as a compliment but I'd rather he had given some other reason because it made me feel trivial.

I never go to pubs because I can;t handle people when they are drunk and alcohol has a severe effect on me which can come on in an instant everything goes black and i just have to get away.

i can't do smalltalk at all, i can chat briefly about football and a few other things but i have my own perspectives on things which always seem to be out of kilter with everybody else, I dont like expressing my opinions because of the slightly emarrassed or awkward silences which frequently follow. This means I just have to shut up and this makes me boring as company.I could go on citing examples of how most of my interactions ended up pretty much the same way but it won't be any different to what others on this thread have already described.

Nowadays, it seems as if I have given up on that side of life but am reasinably OK about it, i have developed my own interests, I have 3 guitars which i can't play well because of sometimes violent involuntary twitches and that goes for my piano too but I do derive great pleasure from trying and occasionally it comes out OK. I read a lot , draw, paint.and am really seriously thinking about trying to get some qualifications in science-based subjects, we have to create our own worlds

It is obvious that none of this is of any use to anyone-i am explaining why being alone is the only way I can fget by, people make me feel alien, differences are amplified in company and the peace of mind which i need so much to hang onto is snashed into a thousand pieces.

I spent years alone and friendless as a child, maybe the self-sufficiency this drummed into me formed a sort of barrier to new people which may  account for my present inability to form relationships but then, I did not have anyone to practice "being friends"

There was an older boy who did befriend me and e was good-he taught me how to rede a bike, play football, rugby etc, and we would have great adventures togethr but now i remember being dropped like a stone by him whenever other boys of his own age were aound.I owe him a lot because my father would not even acknowledge me as his own, let alone do any of the other stuff that dads did with their sons. I suppose my friend pitied me.=shudder! Anyway, I decided to try and get in touch and we did meet up nut he did not want to know really-I told myself that it would be graet and that our friendship would be rekindled but I was deluding myself-I am still hopeless at evaluating tjhe reactions of others to me that I believed he would want to but the onemeeting we had was the last and he did not answer my phinecalls and kept on breaking arrangements we had made to go for a pint before I returned home. I was devastated and ashamed that I was still useless at reading people. It still hurts but I am a survivor and everything will pass..

believe it or not, I was married once-how did that happen? I believe I love her ( actually, although we have been divorced for more than 25 years, my feelings for her are pretty much tjhe same but I know we could never be together again but she was a brilliant mum and we have two daughters of whom we are both proud).and that this was reciprocated but when i look a t her nowadays it just seems so improbable i wonder sometimes if it was real-it was and we have two daughters, we are divorced though, she discovered that my "weirdness" was not a childish phase which I would grow out of with the responsibilities of maintaining an adult relationship.With my frequent faux pas and general awkwardnes in "polite society" I was an embarrassment to her and I lnow shw shared the pain of my failures, I would have left-for her sake- but in the end ,my wife ended it-there was no acrimony, we both knew it was "the end" and as I lived in constant fear of turning into my father who used violence and pychological torture to keep us all under his control, it was a great relief in many respects

.Since then < i have had a few relationships but I usually ended up getting dumped-no problem, I just do not get lonely and I still felt that my primary committment was to my ex-wife and kids so would cancel any arrangement I made with a girlfriend at the drop of a jhat if they wanted anything.

Oh crap-this is all about me again, i seem t feel that I have wisdom to impart but always end up describing the contents of my navel instead!

I have nothing to offer, hang on-I do,there is no alternative, you will find friends here who truly know what you are goinfg through and we will help fill the voids as best as we can, I feel as if I am amongst friends here-it is the best I could hope for and it is real-that is such a good feeling.

If someone would like a friend - me, let me know, please!

I am waiting for a diagnosis, in a few months I have an appointment to be assessed.

I agree that friendships are difficult, having to keep up my "mask" of normality all the time is draining. I have not had any friends for quite a few years now, and feel no need for them. I find it more enjoyable being alone, going for walks in the countryside and spending ages looking at things that I like, with no concern of how it may appear to NTs. Maybe when diagnosed I will look for any groups that meet, never actually met an Asperger's person before, be interesting at the very least and may have some common ground, even just a moan about general life.

The main thing is to be who you are and accept that you are different and have talents and skills that others don't. Another good thing is not being a sheep, following silly trends etc. Would despair if I followed all the soap operas/reality shows etc. That's all you sometimes hear the "sheep" bleating at each other about LOL.

I have recently been diagnosed with Asperger's last year. My childhood friendships were a bit like yours, I find it difficult to maintain friendships. When I was in the middle of senior school (year nine) I spent most of my breaks and lunchtimes walking around school on my own, if you add all the those lunchtimes I would have probably walked for miles. The way I describe it for me is 'being between a rock and a hard place' I want to socialise but I feel inside like I'm not bothered, it can be hard work. A good word I would use when it comes to socialising struggles is connecting to people, I don't have that 'clicking' feeling inside me. I do have a banter at work with colleagues. For me, I have accepted this as part of who I am. I have a family who understands me and the way I see the world.

It is strange to hear that a lot of autistic people do not have friends. They desperately want to find a friend.

But here, where all desperate friendless people met, autistic people still cannot find friends.

I also find it hard to make friends.

hi hope, i find it hard to make friends too.

i have had four friends in total since 13, none of whom i can talk to: 3 are just people who insisted on following me around and have since been diagnosed with autism, none of whom i can talk to about how i feel but i can hang out with them occasionally and none of whom is emotionally attached to me; the fourth is someone i've stayed in touch with online, to whom i can talk about what i can't to the other three (cultural stuff - the others don't know what 'philosophy' means let alone want to discuss Diderot) but no discussion of anything else eg emotions. He's not autistic but gay but comes from a country where that's very dangerous, so he detaches emotionally completely from everybody, a sealed room (he has intimates, but i'm not one of them). I don't personally call one facebook message every 3 months or one meetup every six interrupted by shouting matches much of a friendship, but i am exceedingly grateful to their existence at all and work hard to keep it, although the emotional attachment is low. I've never been in a relationship, autism made me frigid and i can't show or discuss emotions, so that's never happened. 45 now, for survey purposes nb youngsters get help so this shouldn't affect people diagnosed under 26

Naivety seems to be a common trait in autism/aspergers. I have been and still am quite naive in relationships and have definitely got myself into some sticky situations in the past. I'm just so used to being non-dependent on others apart from family members it almost feels normal to not have friends. But recently I too have been craving having more friends and miss having people to talk to on the phone or meet for coffee etc and its getting worse as I get older, I'm becoming more and more cut off. I panic sometimes about what I'd do if something happened to my partner and I was alone. I'm sure I'd cope but I know that its not particularly healthy to only have your partner as your friend. However I do find as I get older that I accept myself more and more, for all my funny ways and odd behaviourd and feel less and less compelled to fit in with the NT way of doing things. Why should anyone feel ashamed of who they are in this day and age where there are all kinds of weird and wonderful types of people And eespecially with autism its being talked about more a more which is brilliant! 

That's very sad. When I was younger I made friends to please my Mum and as I got older I made friends as 'normal person camoflage' Some of these people were horrible and treated me badly. I'm quite naive and got myself into some difficult situations. I'm alone now but I still wish I had relationships and friendships even though I find them difficult and every interaction with an NT is like a car crash. I wish I could accept who I am but I don't think I can. 

I can really relate to what everyone is saying on here about issues with making friends and maintaining friendships. So many of the comments bring back memories for me of being at school and feeling miserable and lonely. I remember when I first started at secondary school I clung onto one girl at the start and didn't have any other friends and one day she turned around to me and said "I don't want you to hang around with me anymore" and marched off leaving me standing there alone in a big scary corridor. And off I went wandering the playground like a little lost puppy. Kids can be so cruel. And adults just as cruel. I can think of many a horrible experience in any number of my many jobs I've struggled to hold down. And I can relate to the comments about how it gets to the point where you begin to feel dirty or tainted or diseased somehow because thats how people sometimes treat you just because you're very quiet or different or quircky. I have learnt over the years to wear a mask to appear 'normal' but those memories of loneliness and rejection over the years never leave you.

Hello,

I just found this as I was Googling 'Autistic adult no friends' I was diagnosed one year ago (I'm forty this year) The few friends I had and saw very infrequently don't want to see me anymore. My family don't want to know. I am married and my only friend is my Husband. If it wasn't for him I would be completely alone. I do worry about being so alone. I don't want to turn strange! I don't really want to confide in people or attend social events but I do feel envious of their relationships. I am very conflicted! 

I have lost count of the times I've been told I'm rude. I am actually an incredibly polite person. It's something to do with lack of small talk and eye contact. I find being around NT's exhausting. Keeping up the charade is an ordeal. In the past year I've learned not to tell people that I am autistic. I struggle to hold down jobs. I have one after another each for a few weeks or months so I don't make friends there either. 

A lifetime of wonderings, thoughts, feelings and experiences. Reflections. Friend - "ship"; a vessle, the deep feeling of movement within...yet stillness, likened to the eternal moment. I have no friends, or should I say no friends have me? Yet, everyone is potentially my friend. In our deep sense of compassion and caring who would we deny? Trust is the biggest obstacle to that spiritual feeling of connectedness we desire and need to feel with other human "beings". I feel first to know ones' self and be a friend to the self makes way to be a friend to other. I have many friends, but to the depth of relationship that I may feel the freedom to sit in silence and have the inner knowing and be totally confident in that friendship eludes me.

It has been a long hard road, but one I am gratefull I have journeyed. I believe as auties and\or aspies have an incredible gift of feeling and experiencing the living of life at the core of our being and beyond. We make wonderful friends. I listen to everyone hear share and it is on a very intimate level full of caring and compassion...love. I have gone the camut of making myself over, reinventing myself to no avail. I have come to love and appreciate the different of myself. There is a certain feeling of joy in coming to have the confidence and belief in yourself that you may do things on your own and enjoy meeting new people that are in the least where you want to be doing what you want to do. I often hear people speak of what they hate, and it is inhibiting. Where is the potential for friendship in that? I would love to one day meet someone that I may truly bond with on all levels. I feel the greatest eperience of living life for me is to walk this road in love with other.

To Hope...you are already a wonderful loving friend to somene, they just have not realized it yet. It is very heart felt to communicate with all of you, a long time searching. Thank you.