Published on 12, July, 2020
My autistic son wants to be like everyone else and have a partner, home etc. he encounters women at the gym and work and he goes headlong into building relationships with them but he is clumsy, direct and full on. Unfortunately he comes across as inappropriate and a little odd. How do we advise him to take a step back. Whenever we approach the subject he just accuses us of interfering with his friends. We are worried someone will not understand him.
Well maybe he needs to understand that some girls just want to be friends and just because they are nice to him it doesn't mean that they want to marry him. Maybe he doesn't know how to tell the difference between someone who's interested romantically and someone who isn't. Maybe he doesn't realise when he's being rejected? Or doesn't realise when he's being invited. Maybe ask him in more details about his experiences and figure out what he's doing wrong to help him do it better next time. He should also know that it's harder for him than an NT when it comes to relationships so he needs to stay optimistic, motivated to search for love. I think it's better to set his expectations differently as to tell him that it will take time, lot of unsuccessful experiences before he cracks the code. He shouldn't be comparing himself to NTs who get these cues fairly easily.
Maybe ask him in more details about his experiences and figure out what he's doing wrong
When I was that age I would sooner gnaw my own arm off than ask my parents about this stuff, especially to critique my style. I think that is pretty common.
If there is an older, more experienced person (preferrably of the same gender) to offer to be a sounding board then this is the best chance of him learning from it rather than continuing to flounder in lack of clueness.
I think this may be a male thing - with the testosterone post puberty comes all sorts of urge to move beyond the nest, compete, win a mate, be stronger than your father etc - a minefield for offering help sometimes.
If there is still that chance to speak with the parents then that is great, but the impression the OP gives is that he is like millions of other teenagers out there.
Iain said:If there is an older, more experienced person (preferrably of the same gender) to offer to be a sounding board then this is the best chance of him learning from it rather than continuing to flounder in lack of clueness.
I've got to be honest but I think it'd do a lot of autistic people good to hear from autistic people who have been successful in sex / relationships as to how they did it. The internet is full of so called pick up artists but few can really analyse and break down a process like autistic people can. If an autistic person who'd been really successful in dating / hook ups told me 'this was my method' I'd be much more likely to believe it.
I have had such relationships, the longest being 15 years until I decided to make it non sexual.
I hope you never manage to find a relationship as based on your comments here it's certain you would be abusive. I'm not being mean that's just a fact.
A) you know nothing about me and what I do and don't do in my personal life.
B) the 'advice' you are referring to is mostly yours and you don't meet my criteria (eg a person successful in forming casual / long term sexual relationships) I'm not being mean that's just a fact. You've been very vocal about not wanting sexual relationships on this forum, you are not well qualified to hand out advice on the topic.