Who wrote the social rule book?

I see exactly where you are coming from and the language "struggles with" could be more helpfully phrased as "doesn't require" or "see's no worth in". However, I don't really take it too personally. I have been masking for forty plus years so I have tried to act in this more socially "normal" way, and struggled. Now that I know I am autistic I can, to some extent, let the struggle go.

I see the dramas of people's relationships and the gossiping and the bitching behind people's backs etc and I don't understand it. It's alien to me and I couldn't imagine wanting to get involved in it. I have friends that I have known for a long time but these are more people that I have been thrown together with through circumstance and we have a shared history but I don't have expectations of them and I don't put any work into "nurturing" our relationship, something you occasionally hear of as being something it's necessary to do.

I like word puzzles and I think I am pretty good at them but someone who wasn't good at them would probably have less interest in doing them so wouldn't bother. It would therefore be true to say both that they see no value in them (which is a perfectly valid viewpoint) and that, if and when they do them, they struggle with them.

The language around ND will evolve over time and maybe it will be decided that "struggles with" is not appropriate any more but unfortunately everything non-typical will always be viewed through the prism of what is typical to a large extent and I can't see that changing any time soon.

I know you were just venting a bit so apologies if I have taken you too seriously!

McFrost said:

the language "struggles with" could be more helpfully phrased as "doesn't require" or "see's no worth in"

While this may be the case for some autists, I do see a great many posts where other autists either want to or need to engage socially so they clearly will fall into the "struggle with" camp.

I think those who are in the "see's no worth in it" camp are far fewer. Those who have suffered trauma around socialising would make up the largest part of this group based on what I have seen as they have developed a coping mechanism of avoiding the thing that caused the trauma.

I'm sure there are some autists who never developed the instinct to want to be part of a pack which is a primal survival instinct, but I have yet to meet one. When you think of it, such a person would be unlikely to reach out to an online community such as this.

Are those people struggling because they really want more friends etc, or because they think they have too? I think it's a very fine and difficult line, I think we all want the right sort of people around us, for some that will be 1 or 2, for others that will a couple of dozen

I do tend to see things from another angle much to the tuts and head shakes of others, I call Christmas a Christian holiday for non Christian’s and make comments on how proud Jesus would be to have a chocolate Easter bunny when he comes back. All these holidays and I never understood just why? As a kid you go with the flow but when you are allowed to think more freely none of it makes any sense. Families can get together at any point of the year, why wait for the fat man in red to come down the chimney that’s been bricked up for 50 years. I know I sound like sour grapes but it’s the truth of the situation. 

TheCatWoman said:

it would be interesting to see if only children share more autistic traits than those with siblings, or even if only children are more likely to be autistic

I don't believe so. Bring autistic seems to be something that is determined by the time you are born.

After this having siblings may help you to adapt and mask better, or you may be more overloaded or overlooked, but your brain wiring and sensory issues are different from the outset. 

Does adapting better come at a greater or lesser cost, I don't know. Perhaps fitting in a bit better may help to avoid bullying and associated issues.

I'm not sure my counselling training is much help with this, some might talk about disassociation and stuff like that, but I don't think thats right.

Before I was diagnosed, I wondered if it was to do with being an only child who only played with one other child before school, just shy of my 5th birthday. I still think that has quite a bit to do with it, it would be interesting to see if only children share more autistic traits than those with siblings, or even if only children are more likely to be autistic?

In a nightclub I feel very much a stranger and can only intepret what I see through an almost anthropological lens, I see groups of men on the prowl for sex, I see women who feel mixed about the attention, some wanting it, others not, it feels feral and like I'm not part of it, but watching and commenting internally.

A lot of the time I see people going about their daily business, with friends, family etc, all seeming to move with purpose a purpose I don't really understand, I don't know why it's important to them. Once I came back from a 6 week stay at the retreat house I used to work in and found all the xmas advertising so funny, it was so blatent and obviously cynical, one friend got really put out with me for laughing. Sometimes It's been sheer loneliness thats made me feel like my own ghost, haunting life at the margins when everyone else has loads of things to do peole to be with. It was bad when I was newly single for the first time in 15 years, bank holidays and weekends were really difficult, everyone else seemed to be off playing happy families where I was alone, back in the toy box until Monday. I did eventually come to see this as a societal con, many people were just as unhappy as I was and would love to be alone and not out playing happy families.

I think being around to many people and NT people in particular makes me feel like my own ghost, it's almost like I get thinner, all the questions and unceasing noise, the need to be doing all the time and rarely thinking about what or why they do things.

I'm not sure my counselling training is much help with this, some might talk about disassociation and stuff like that, but I don't think thats right.

Before I was diagnosed, I wondered if it was to do with being an only child who only played with one other child before school, just shy of my 5th birthday. I still think that has quite a bit to do with it, it would be interesting to see if only children share more autistic traits than those with siblings, or even if only children are more likely to be autistic?

In a nightclub I feel very much a stranger and can only intepret what I see through an almost anthropological lens, I see groups of men on the prowl for sex, I see women who feel mixed about the attention, some wanting it, others not, it feels feral and like I'm not part of it, but watching and commenting internally.

A lot of the time I see people going about their daily business, with friends, family etc, all seeming to move with purpose a purpose I don't really understand, I don't know why it's important to them. Once I came back from a 6 week stay at the retreat house I used to work in and found all the xmas advertising so funny, it was so blatent and obviously cynical, one friend got really put out with me for laughing. Sometimes It's been sheer loneliness thats made me feel like my own ghost, haunting life at the margins when everyone else has loads of things to do peole to be with. It was bad when I was newly single for the first time in 15 years, bank holidays and weekends were really difficult, everyone else seemed to be off playing happy families where I was alone, back in the toy box until Monday. I did eventually come to see this as a societal con, many people were just as unhappy as I was and would love to be alone and not out playing happy families.

I think being around to many people and NT people in particular makes me feel like my own ghost, it's almost like I get thinner, all the questions and unceasing noise, the need to be doing all the time and rarely thinking about what or why they do things.

I do tend to see things from another angle much to the tuts and head shakes of others, I call Christmas a Christian holiday for non Christian’s and make comments on how proud Jesus would be to have a chocolate Easter bunny when he comes back. All these holidays and I never understood just why? As a kid you go with the flow but when you are allowed to think more freely none of it makes any sense. Families can get together at any point of the year, why wait for the fat man in red to come down the chimney that’s been bricked up for 50 years. I know I sound like sour grapes but it’s the truth of the situation. 

TheCatWoman said:

it would be interesting to see if only children share more autistic traits than those with siblings, or even if only children are more likely to be autistic

I don't believe so. Bring autistic seems to be something that is determined by the time you are born.

After this having siblings may help you to adapt and mask better, or you may be more overloaded or overlooked, but your brain wiring and sensory issues are different from the outset. 

Does adapting better come at a greater or lesser cost, I don't know. Perhaps fitting in a bit better may help to avoid bullying and associated issues.