Am I alone in being alone? It feels that way even on here

It’s not so much the dying that frightens me, as decades of being completely alone and unknown (after retirement) then utterly vulnerable and dependent on strangers when I become unable to look after myself.

It has been a simple blunt assumption for much of my life, that I will have to take things into my own hands before I decline too far and can’t.

Re: the future decline aspect, I do recall finding the following blog post helpful for perspective on that https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/living-single/200901/the-ultimate-threat-single-people-youll-die-alone 

Hopefully it can give you comfort too. There are pros and cons to every scenario. How 'the end' looks for each of us is no exception...

It’s not the status as such that bothers me, most of the time anyway. People I work with have repeatedly assumed I’m married.

I just want someone to keep me company, to talk about life with, to do things with, to give a damn about me, to sit on the sofa and watch TV with me!. And I’ve cared for other people (not all of them furry) all my life and feel that as a gap in my life now too.

I’d also be dishonest if I said I’m not fearful of the future. I watched both my parents decline and become completely dependent, and in just the last few months the same thing happened to my neighbour across the road. I’m really worried about what would happen to me with no one to advocate or care for me.

I do understand the point about another person being intrusive or time consuming. It’s another worry I have, but based more inertia and my current position. I’m sure I’d cope.

I am 'single' - whatever that means! I do wonder, and have always wondered, why the relationship status of a person counts for so much? Surely there's more to each and every one of us than that? And if you're single, you may well attract sympathy, or even pity, for not hitting the bar, or achieving the normal state, which apparently is being part of a couple.

I think I would find someone else too intrusive and time-consuming. They'd be in the way. 

I didn't always feel like I do now, but through many trials and errors, I've developed my own life, which suits me. I have lots to do, some freedom to do it, and I don't have to compromise for somebody else. 

It's not bad

That's a really good positive mindset to have. I've been trying to make friends with myself since I was a teenager but I feel like I'm a really difficult person lol. Friend me first then hopefully it will be easier to make friends with other people...

Hard work but hopefully it will lead to good and better things in the future.

I'm not sure I agree with the 'easy' bit... but I endorse the 'making friends with yourself' part. Have had to work very hard on that, but it's worth the effort. 

...and the spirit in which I started the thread. In that sense, you are far from alone :-)

I think it depends on the therapist. There are good and bad performers of every kind of job. There can also be people who give great advice to others but can't manage that for themselves - and I've a lot of empathy for that!

Watching other people intuitively pull that off feels like observing a magic trick, doesn't it? Two realities lived in close proximity but it might as well be parallel universes. I have a very small number of friends ( which of course suits me!) but that's only a plural situation thanks to one friend who stayed the course, and brought them to my door so to speak. Otherwise I'd be entirely friendless... offline anyway. Each of us is pretty observably neurodivergent (though I'm the only one to have sought and attained a formal diagnosis), which just shows that we rely on those 'oddball' (as NTs would see us) clusters to mutually forge - more through luck than design- and sustain any kind of friendship bonds and ongoing communication.  

"So if the rest of the world runs on "playing games" and you personally have neither the inclination or the skills to "play games" then, my frneds, expect to be at the back of every fricking queue!!"

That's so very well and impressively succinctly put, and I feel like that all the time in terms of how the world works. I think most of we autistics need to converse on the level of text, not subtext, but the vast majority are hardwired for exactly the opposite. 

My own circumstances have changed since I started this thread two years ago, as I'm in a lovely distance relationship with a wonderful person who somehow puts up with me... well the 'somehow' is of course that we are kindred spirits in many ways, and I'll say no more about that at this time! But I'm still glad that the thread occasionally resurfaces from dormancy, as the statistical stuff's capriciousness in not quite ever aligning to the anecdotal in a way that would bring hoped for comfort never truly resolves itself, and yet... many 'me too' sentiments have indeed provided solace in this thread, thanks to people kindly taking the time to raise their hand and 'speak' their truth...

I Sperg said:

Now you might BE a real nice guy inside and your therapist can see that, but does your daily presentation reflect that?

That’s the thing - I get along with people at work just fine. I get asked for a pint after work, people will wander out at lunchtime with me. I have no problem having chats with people around the office.

It’s not that I’m “not likeable”. I just can’t convert those surface level interactions into a real friendship or relationship.

Thanks for that much needed insight.

I can see now how difficult it is for some of us to believe that we CAN exceed our previous limitations.

I can only testify that in my case by teh tie I was 11 I was a basket case. Anti social, violent , only emerging from my room to steal something, (the only thing I showed any real promise at) and generally so messed up I could see it myself and I decided to do something about it. 

There are some people here who are a lot better functiong than I am admittedly, the 1% as Judgedredd calls them, but there are people who's posts call out to me as a reminder of where I come from, adn whos posts show me that I have travelled some distance away from who I was. 

It took me 16 years of self reflection and learning and practice (with many errors and false starts along the way) to become reasonably functional, but I know what I did that actually worked now. Some skills are innate and known as "talents" but many skills are in fact teachable and transferrable. 

One thing that stands out in my memory is how quickly my life changed when I read ONE particular book, which for me was a revelation about how people really work. After reading it I coudl see clearly how I could improve my relationships with the rest of the world, and withing maybe two years my life was very different indeed. I ended up with a LOT less "friends" than I had before reading it, as I stopped trying to be a "people pleaser" but those who I did keep, were the sort who are more helpful and less of a drain on me. 

It appears to me that it really IS possible to change the trajectory of your life, and sometimes people will help you in aspects of that, but the journey starts with dissatisfaction with your lot, and a determination to fix it yourself.

But you still need tools. 

There is an old saying that goes: "When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything tends to look like a nail" which suggests that the tools I've used may well not work for everyone in every situation, but some tools are pretty universal and useful across the board. I try to indicate teh tools that have worked for me.

It is relatively easy to "lead a horse to water", but he is only going to drink it when he is good and ready.

My ex remarked one day that; "People talk about changing themsleves but you are one of the very few people I've seen actually do it".  

I tend to credit myself and my own efforts and good fortune in finding the right tools, but I do have a sneaking suspicion, that my prayers and Christian training might be largely responsible for the improvement I experienced, but that is SUCH A HARD SELL these days, (and very unwelcome indeed with some people) that I don't push or credit the Christianty very much, but is worth looking at the various societal models that dominate the various parts of the world, and see how a Christian based cultrure compares to other ways of liivng... OR even how our culture was when it was largely Christian based compared to now, where it is Christian in name only, but something else in practice..   

I get it. When you've already been 'trying' repeatedly for decades, and have suffered the resultant burnout, there comes a realisation that you either give up or a radically different approach is needed.

As the famous saying goes, insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

Thanks for the thoughtful reply Autonomistic.

Autonomistic said:

What I struggle with is the expectation that everyone can be successful if only they were to try harder, learn social skills, get out more, get therapy, read a book, etc.

Yes. I feel like a deaf person who’s told I can hear if I just try harder.

Autonomistic said:

People should not end up feeling inadequate on here of all places.

And that was the crux of my post.

A said:

Sorry for digging up an old thread but this is the single biggest issue I have with the forum.

I appreciate you reviving this older thread. Seeing my own words from over 2 years ago has jolted me out of deep hibernation. The reasons I have been absent lately are many and complicated but this is certainly one of them.

When I first joined here I naively expected that other late diagnosed adults would be just like me, friendless and eternally single. However, as you have found, we are in the minority even on here.

It's great that so many autistic people have been successful in finding friends and partners and I'm sure that did not come without a lot of personal struggles. 

A said:

And I hoped this forum might be a place where I felt solidarity with people experiencing the same problems, but instead it's a constant reminder that even here, I am just less.

What I struggle with is the expectation that everyone can be successful if only they were to try harder, learn social skills, get out more, get therapy, read a book, etc. That sort of attitude is precisely the kind of neuro-normative ableism that I come here to escape from. People should not end up feeling inadequate on here of all places.

Remember "different, not less".

I've spent most of my life feeling like I was at the end of every fucking queue. 

Money, women, popularity, happiness, acceptance, life experiences, EVERYTHING. 

For some strange reason however I'm not wired for "envy".

Instead of resenitng my position in life, and envying others, I resented my position and wondered what the hell they had that I did not! 

And more to the point, how could I get some...  

I'm almost glad that I did not know I was Autistic, as lacking that diagnosis and being unaware that I had hard limits that others do not, I was super motivated to get better at the things others seemed to do so easily.

Now someone asked me the other day if I felt that this forum has helped me, and to be honest, apart from giving me a better idea of why people react to me the way they do in the real world, (It's been liek having an imperfect but functional mirror for the first time in my life, I do not think it has. 

But having solved for myself (or at least found "work arounds") to some of the really upsetting issues that Autism seems to bestow, even though I still swing in an out of depression fairly regularly, I try to help others here with the things that have worked for me.

Apart from the Autism, I'm physically small, not good looking, "attractive" is the best feedback I've ever got, "money" really does elude me (although to be fair I'm sometimes not prepared to do the things that might ease my financial position) and I'm carrying a shedload of autism ADD PTSD type issues. 

But I am able to acquire and sustain a relationship, simply because I know how they work, and what I have to do, to play my part. In my case I had to learn it from a book in my twenties, and back that up with a lot of observation and practice of the required skills.

BUT. Am I happy? DID it solve my essential loneliness? Well, partly... 

The "thing" about us 'spergs partly seems to be that we really don't like "playnig games" (Except when we do, but that's not as often as the NT's manage, and usually badly learned behaviour from trying to interact with them, the majority, more sucessfully) 

So if the rest of the world runs on "playing games" and you personally have neither the inclination or the skills to "play games" then, my frneds, expect to be at the back of every fricking queue!! 

Worse, as many peoeple here report, who live with an N.T. when the original infatuation part of love wears off, and you fail to play enough of the right "games", you are in instant relationship trouble, right when you finally thought you had things sussed... Then if you can't play "relationship games", you are toast, In my limited experience. 

In the neuro typical world they say there's "someone for everyone" and "you can't hurry love" etc..

In the Autistic world unless you conciously acquire the neccesary knowledge based tools and use them effectively, there isn't a very big pool of "someone for you" AT ALL. 

In truth, learning to "Play Nice" does seem inauthentic, but in practice (after a lot of "practice"!) it starts to stick and become a part of who you are.

Now you might BE a real nice guy inside and your therapist can see that, but does your daily presentation reflect that? US Autists get an awful lot of criticism and by the time we hit adulthood all of us have HAD ENOUGH, so it's a big ask to expect people to see themsleves as presenting as "Not particularly nIce" especially after the abuse that most of us have suffered, and we alkl all hampered by teh mantra often repreated "it doesn;t matter what otehr peopel think" but it does. AND you can change how they think about you, simply by playing (and sometimes initiating) the right games. 

My approach won't solve all your problems, magically, but WILL give you more tools and options. 

Some of us have cats in our lives. Now unless you imprison your Cat, your cat always has the option of relocating if they don't like their situation, and they do.I've seen it. And to my great shame, experienced it with my first cat when after ten years I ended up in an impossible situation that meant I could not liv in my own house and could not take her with me. A situation that I tried to solve by getting her looked after by tenants whilst I tried for a better solution, whish wored well with my fiorst tenant, tbut she didn't like Ernie it turned out, and one night when I visited she refused to come to me, or seemingly recognicse me, and I never saw her again... The point being it that you have a RELATIONSHIP with a cat, and it kind of validates the supposition that you can have what it takes to have a relationship with a human, too. 

I hope there's some useful takeaway for someone in all these words I've just typed. 

I don' think you're lacking. Each of us has individual circumstances. There will be a reason you've found it harder to find romance than some people. Autistic people relate to one another better, perhaps, than to neurotypical people but we are still all quite unique. Some have great childhoods, others were abusive, some have known harsh poverty, others are rich, some have brain damage or physical illnesses, all families are different too, the area you've grown up in has an impact, even random things you wouldn't think of.

(raises hand) yes happily single. Making friends with oneself before attempting to do so with others is like putting your own oxygen mask on first. If you are friends with your self the self sabotage will end as you would then have your own back. Also once you are friends with your self it is an easy extension to be friends with others.

It was my social difficulties that led to my diagnosis. I thought if nothing else at least I’d found an explanation, but apparently not. Autism isn’t the explanation. I’m just lacking.

nah your not. i never had a relationship either and likely never will do.... infact i dont think i want one anymore... im 34... every woman my age has children and made terrible life choices, if a woman had a child and has been passed around does that woman truly understand love? would she truly love you or is she just going person to person not understanding love or feelings? .... i doubt the sincerity of the feelings of people who relationship hop so much or has had many relations or had kids...i doubt such a person truly loves. so i dont wanna get into relationships with such people as i doubt the sincerity of their feelings or their desire for the relationship.

and yes, therapists and councillors are not helpful anyway... my sister trained to be one and got a qualification... she isnt a good person to listen to as her life decisions are aweful and she only pursued that because she didnt want a real job, she saw it as a easy benefit style life, in the end she needed more qualifications for it which she couldnt get and she couldnt be arsed so stayed on benefits and is now lying about certain things to maximise and game the benefit system, things which kinda mock the trauma and experiences wed go through she is using now for free life and money.... but yeah, councillors are not good people in my eyes, they are just lazy people who didnt want real jobs and are not a good source of information or support as they have terrible personal lives themselves and their motives for going into that career are by in large based on them being lazy and not having their life together themselves... not a very good place to turn to help or advice for... this is why counselling doesnt work.