Published on 12, July, 2020
Bit of a ramble but hope someone understands? Two possibly related issues:
Number one
I'm so grateful for the fact that I've come to understand what exhausts me about social interaction, and I've given myself permission to minimise this. So, I've cut down on face to face meetings, I'm saying no to travel, and I'm finding comfort in my routine.
However, success in this is leaving me feeling isolated and lonely, and probably under-stimulated and bored too.
There doesn't seem to be an easy answer to this tension.
Number two
I have great difficulty in being able to work out whether I have any friends or not. I'm happy with my own company (see above) but I do enjoy the mutual support of a friendship. I offer my support to quite a few people (gently) and I have a couple of people who seem to value it and say that they count me as a good friend. However, I haven't found *anyone* who I would say frequently reaches back to me; if I don't put the effort in, I'm alone. It's like I'm always the one chasing.
I find this with family too; I feel that I'm absolutely exhausted feeling obligated to make my parents happy & support my children but no one seems to care about me. If I challenged anyone on this, I can guarantee that the answer would be "But of *course* we care, you're our number one, you're so special, we love you to bits." but no-one does (or rarely does) anything that helps me feel that.
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I relate to one and two. My solution ~ I learned to love what is and when I feel a bit bored, I simply acknowledge it and do something, such as read a book, go for a walk or do a guided mediation or something or just accept I'm feeling bored and if the feeling continues for more than a day or two, I take a look at my life and see what needs changing and I change it.
Spending more time with autistic people and less (almost zero) time with none autistic people has really helped as well. I saw an autistic guy I have previously met once, in a cafe today, with another autistic guy and they invited me to join their quiz team on a Thursday night. They're all autistic in their group so next Thursday night I'm gonna join them! Who knows, I might even enjoy it!
But also, you might want to get clear on your love language so you can tell your friends and family how they can show their love for you in a way that's meaningful to you. You can find out here ~ www.5lovelanguages.com/