Friends

lostmyway said:

Memories can be both beautiful and painful It's a question of balance once again, I think.

Agreed, and sometimes i think the beauty isn’t possible without the pain. Just one inherent paradox of being alive. 

I may have remembered wrong but think I read somewhere else that you are not officially diagnosed? Is a diagnosis something you would think about pursuing … your last paragraph makes it sound like a diagnosis might make it easier to really seek out what’s beneficial in life? Of course it’s a very personal choice though and I know people can find validation and comfort just as much in a self identification process….

That's true. We often get steered into what’s seen as ‘normal’ relationships before we even figure out what we actually want. To some extent, this reflects the interests of those in power, as it helps maintain the status quo. Much of business relies on the traditional family setup, and any major societal shifts could potentially threaten and destabilize the financial foundations of such enterprises. Think of the millions made from having kids, going on holiday, buying school supplies, baby and toddler items, car insurance, house insurance - medical insurance - the list goes on and on.  And yes, society is gradually changing, so what might be a good business today could be driven by different trends in the future - who knows?

Look at the boom in personal computers and smartphones. Nowadays, kids expect their parents to supply these items at a young age, making it just another thing to add to the list. Then there's fashion - but I won’t go on, since I’ve made my point.

I hope to find happiness, but so far I haven’t, and I’m not feeling optimistic, sorry to say. Still, thank you anyway.
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I think there are certain pressures that make people think they have to have a typical relationship, where as companionship is actually what some people want more, and then there are those that don't need anyone at all, and just saying hi to the postman is enough. 

I'm having to support my theories with fiction, but I'm sure there are stories with say 2 sisters that have never married just living together all their lives, or like you parents and children, or sometimes it's siblings where one has a traditional family and then an aunt or uncle live with them. 

There is a growing trend in Japan in the young to be asexual -I think friendship means more to them then physical relationships. 

When you have a loss in whatever you do have, it can really be destabilising. It can take quite a long while to work out moving on from or and what that might even look like. 

I hope you can be happy in whatever that is for you.

Well, yes, I guess the development of merchandising, not only in cinemas but throughout society in general, has changed the environment in theatres from what it was decades ago. And as younger generations are born into it, it becomes accepted as "normal." As you said, a lot of this originated in the US and gets adopted over here.

Of course, what makes it worse, particularly for people with sensory issues, is the enhanced 'experience' of going to the cinema, like the extremely loud ultra surround sound (or whatever it's called), which is meant to add to the general excitement. I get this, because people, especially the young, look for exciting outlets – I did when I was a teenager. It does mean, of course those who have autistic traits need to be careful what they experience.

To be honest, when my mom was alive, I can’t say I yearned for a girlfriend. Naturally, I had the usual sexual impulses, but I didn’t really want a romantic relationship. It's only now that she's gone that I feel a sense of isolation I've never experienced before, especially when I'm alone in the house, which is often since my brother is either at work or at his girlfriend's place.

I mean, to be honest, I don't really know whether I could actually sustain a close relationship with a woman as I've never had one before. Maybe I could, especially now that I’m on my own, but I wonder. It might just be a case of wanting something I don’t have, only to find once I get it that it’s not as wonderful as I imagined. They say you should be careful what you wish for, and there’s probably a lot of truth in that.

I guess Shakespeare also meant that even when you suffer a loss, you still have the memory of something that was once wonderful. Memories can be both beautiful and painful It's a question of balance once again, I think.

Yes, you're right about knowing yourself, because unless you do, you'll never be in a position to tailor your life to reflect what is most beneficial to you. And this, of course, is why it's so important to get diagnosed if you truly believe you are on the Spectrum.

I think you’re definately right about the etiquette change over time. I’m not old enough to have experienced smoking in cinemas but old enough to remember when people didn’t talk and they certainly didn’t eat nachos with cheese dip on the side. Last time i went to the cinema the person next to me ate a chicken burger and chips with a knife and fork off of a china plate… the staff served it to them half way through the film. I suppose I probably should have checked to see what the standard procedure was for the cinema before going. Drinks service ran throughout the film so the staff were constantly walking up and down serving drinks. Seems to me a different cinema culture has swept in (maybe from the US) and it’s starting to happen in theatres too - that really gets my goat! I really don’t like it when people laugh throughout films or plays that aren’t funny…. I do still go once in a while, I think to remind myself of my own inability to tolerate the environment. So it’s not just you! If you’re grumpy I am too. Although we could also just be experiencing different sensory needs and attentional priorities which a person without those different needs might find it hard to understand…. That’s what I might say to myself on a kind day. 

The love between a parent and child is incredibly precious. She is gone physically but the experience of the bond between you remains in you; as does the sense of being loved by your mother and you loving her. 

It’s only my view but I wonder if society conditions us to place too much emphasis on having a significant intimate relationship and a certain amount of “friends” and then maybe some children… and all these expectations make it so hard to tell if our loneliness or feelings of not having flourished is our own or if it is projected onto us via subtle stigma about being perceived as “outside of the norm”. Some people who have the relationship and the children etc. probably still wonder if they only did it because they got swept up in social constructs about how we should live. And I know that lots of people who are married with kids still feel intensely lonely. 

In my personal experience sometimes a bereavement, whilst devastating, is also an opportunity to grasp what life we have left a bit more firmly. That might not be grasping relationships with other humans though, it might be more about grasping more time spent doing what you really want to do… it’s up to you.

I suppose at 76 you could have not many years left as you say ….or actually you could have quite a lot of years left …. Choices for what to do next are limited but not completely outside of your control. I bet there are lots of people who would love to sit and moan with you about how people behave at the cinema these days for example! That sounds very cathartic.

I suppose the risk of trying to connect with others is distress or rejection of further loss and grief…. So that barrier you describe that it’s hard to get through could be a very sensible and understandable protection instigated by a self compassionate part of you that wants you to be protected from pain. One option is to decide that you can survive that potential outcome (pain), it will be horrible but you can survive it. That’s what Shakespeare seems to be implying but I guess it is easier said than done. And then the barrier is more of a practical one of where and how to find people you actually want to interact with …. Probably not at the popcorn counter at the cinema ️… but somewhere…. 

However it’s likely that if you are not of a predominant neurotype that barrier was also created by external forces, a less friendly world full of stigma towards people who are different. In which case I suppose all we can do is look for friendly places that we are able to feel accepted and at least a little understood in. And try to change world… if we have any energy at all left after trying to survive in it…. 

Okay, I wouldn’t say I had the worst parents in the world. My dad had a low-paid job, and my mom was the 'traditional housewife', which was the generally accepted role for her generation.

Sure, probably no worse and maybe even a lot better than what some kids had, but looking back it felt like a pretty lopsided experience. My mom was fine, but there were plenty of arguments with my dad, who came across as rather cold and distant and would often make disparaging remarks about me. These were framed as ‘jokes,’ but some of the comments stung and I think they chipped away at my confidence and probably played a part in my general lack of self-esteem, even now.

He never went out much and I can recall that when we had visitors he tended to withdraw to leave my mom to do the socializing. To his credit, he did nightwork for many years to benefit from the extra money since he had two kids (me and my sister) to take care of so it can't have been very easy for him. But I did get the impression that he resented me, and I never felt I could be intimate with him like I could with my mom.

When it came to education - forget it. There was no interest in it at home, and I never took any exams, just wanted to leave school as soon as possible and start earning. I left at 15, and in the 1960s there were plenty of jobs around, so it wasn’t hard to find something. My parents appreciated the extra income since making ends meet wasn’t easy, like for many other families - so I’m not complaining. 

When I was a kid, making friends was never a problem - just join in with football, tennis, or whatever the local kids were playing. But I don’t think I ever really had a “peer group,” which I’ve read is a typical part of growing up once you hit puberty and start spending time with other teenagers your age. Supposedly, it’s a way to practice social skills, test boundaries, and gain life experience you can draw on later for things like jobs or long-term relationships, even marriage. At least, that’s the theory. Again, I guess I was pretty attached to my mom, which made it harder for me to start becoming more independent. I’m not blaming her; it’s just how things turned out.

My teenage years were mostly spent going to work, coming home, and watching TV, with the occasional holiday in between. I always went on holiday with my mom and dad, never with anyone my own age. The only 'mate' I had in my later teens and early twenties was a bloke nobody else wanted to know. I think he came around because he was short on friends, but it turned out he used me for betting money, which I never got back, and he was actually well known locally as a bit of a "tealeaf."

I remember one occasion when his parents were on holiday at the Isle of Wight, he suddenly wanted to visit them just for something to do. He persuaded me - much to my regret - to accompany him. We went, but when it was time to head back to London, he decided to stay for the rest of the holiday with them, leaving me in the lurch. I was very inexperienced at traveling and had to find my own way back to London.

This was bad enough, but because I had to start out late, when I reached one of the main train terminals in London it was very late and the trains had stopped running. This was in the 1960s, remember. I had to hang around until the trains started up again, and during that time this bloke appeared out of nowhere and started chatting to me. I thought at the time he seemed nice and friendly, so we started talking. When I explained my situation, he seemed to take pity on me and offered to take me back to his flat until the trains started again. I went along with this, and when we got back to his flat, we chatted some more before he showed me where I could put my head down for a few hours. I was lying there thinking what a nice chap he was when suddenly he hopped into bed with me! I was shocked and asked what the hell he was doing. He said something about it being better than going back to a drafty platform, but I couldn’t wait to get out of there!

The reason I mention all this is to show what kind of ‘mate’ I had, someone who let me travel back alone in a strange city as a naive kid, with no real-life experience and at risk from sexual predators.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, my so-called friend was at my house one day, and after he left, I noticed money was missing. Knowing about his gambling addiction, I immediately suspected him, and although I can’t prove it, I felt pretty sure he took it. After that, I couldn’t continue being his friend and told my mom that if he called again, she should tell him never to call for me.

This is all well and good, but the problem was that although he was dodgy, he did at least take me out. After I packed him up, I never made another friend with whom I could go out. So that’s my life.

I get the ruminating, it's easy to keep things spinning in your head, and they can especially tumble together, so as soon as you start you can spiral badly. It's one thing that has actually gotten better since I accepted my diagnosis, I haven't ruminated as badly as I say to myself, well I was always going to be bad at that so I think I've let go of worrying about some of those past sadnesses. It's not fixed everything, but I'm kinder to myself about my failings.

I was lucky I met my husband at my peak of confidence, and I think I can credit a lot of success to having that stability and support. But try not to overthink, honestly, if you had a great relationship with your parents most of your life, I think it would have carried you through -some people don't even have that. I knew someone who got married, had children but then she lost her husband very young in a traffic road collision. So even those people that do find people to love, don't always get to keep them, or worse they turn out to be abusive. Life can be hard, but we keep moving forward, and if you can have a routine and accept happiness in it, that's sometimes all you need.

Yes, it's frustrating when a girl seems to like you, but you're not sure how to handle it and the opportunity slips away.

I have to say, in my case, what really put me off sexual relationships was when I suddenly found out how babies are made. As a kid, I naïvely thought that when a couple got married, it just happened naturally. But one day on the playground, a kid in my class blurted out the truth in a very crude way, which I found shocking at the time and, I swear, has affected me to this day. My parents never told me anything, and I think this has created a stigma around human relationships that may have caused my shyness around women.

Have you ever worked in an office environment, surrounded by both men and women, where you don’t need to make small talk to get to know people - just interacting through doing your job? This is often how many relationships form, because working with the same people day after day inevitably leads to getting to know them quite well, and sometimes a relationship might be on the horizon.

One of my biggest problems is my tendency to take offense too easily and overthink remarks that weren’t really intended to be as hurtful as I took them to be. I’d dwell on things said for days, and it often spoiled relationships at work when someone said something that deeply offended me. They probably didn’t really mean it, and I suppose it was just the rough and tumble of everyday life.

I get what you say about becoming a familiar face when seeing the same people again and again and I'm not sure why I couldn't do this. Partly, it might have been because, as I mentioned earlier, someone would say something I took the wrong way, which put me off seeing them again. Overthinking again. I’ve tried sitting in the local library a couple of times, but honestly, I found it pretty boring. Still, like you say, you have to keep at it to get to know people. I think I’m too tied to my home setup, where I have all the comforts and my own bedroom that doubles as a study, letting me be on the PC as long as I want without annoying distractions.

As I get older, I look back on my life and think about the lost opportunities I had to form relationships, and one in particular stands out. My first job was in a small office at London Airport, just the boss, me, and a typist. She liked me, but I didn’t pursue it because I was immature and nervous. I’ve always thought that maybe something could have happened if I’d been a bit more proactive. Or maybe not - I'll never know. We were just a couple of teenagers, and it probably wouldn’t have gone anywhere, but you dwell on these things, thinking it was a rare chance to move forward. Especially since I’ve never had many situations where I could have formed a real relationship with someone.

This might come across as whining, and maybe it is, but only because I feel a bit short-changed by life and think things could have gone better for me.

Yes, that makes sense and has been suggested to me before. Watching a movie when there aren’t many people around would be better, but even then, it would only take one or two incidents of noise to set me off, probably because I’d be anticipating it. And then I think to myself that one of the pleasures of going to see a movie, play, or whatever is the atmosphere created by being among a crowd of people enjoying the same show, and I can remember one or two occasions in the distant past when it truly enhanced the experience. Over the years, something happened that turned me off, and I suspect it was the growing bad behaviour of people who just don’t consider others - a general lack of social etiquette, I suppose. Then again, is it really that, or have I changed and become less tolerant and grumpier over the years? Maybe not having friends and relationships I just turned into a grumpy old man before my time! Could be.

I feel like I’ve reached a point in life where I’ve mostly given up and accepted that things will stay this way until the end, which at 76 probably isn’t too far off. Looking back, it’s the feeling of isolation that stands out, as if there’s always been a barrier I could never quite break through. Maybe that's just an excuse to mask a lazy pattern of behaviour I established. I don’t get it - many people seem to form relationships, whether close or casual, and I haven’t, like I have some strange disability. I know relationship go wrong but what was it that Shakespeare said? "It's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?" He was a clever man. I think the only person I really loved was my mom, and that may be part of the reason I never moved on, left home, or fully grew up. I was tied too much to the apron strings, and now that she’s gone, my support system is gone too.

Yeah, you can hope! Sometimes going to see a film right at the end of its run can be good, as then they might have moved it to a smaller screen, and there's hardly anyone there, so you get lots of space and relatively quiet. 

I also got an email from my local library, and I was hoping to add they can be a good place to go for quiet groups. My local one is doing loads to try and get people to use them, so they have the usual book groups, bits also knitting groups, groups that do puzzles or just having a chat. It sounds lovely, and on during the day so might suit retired people better, those looking for somewhere to go and say hello to regulars. 

When my kids were little, I found it was a great way to get out -I'd go to groups and as I'd go every week, your become a familiar face and gradually get to know people rather than having to make friends instantly. 

If it sounds scary, you could make a thread where your document going and we could give you moral support, as it is scary doing different things! 

And so lovely to hear your voice coming through, it's really brightened up my evening a lot and brought a tear to my eye! 

The trouble is, it's a neurotypical world!

The thing is, I’m not sure if it’s because I was less sensitive in my younger days or if the culture was different back then, but I don’t remember dealing with the kinds of problems you get in today’s cinemas. Sure, there was smoking, I’ll admit, but at least it was quiet, and honestly, I didn’t really mind the smell of nicotine.

It would be nice. I guess they can’t cover their costs whilst removing the trailers and banning the expensive food and drinks. I’d be happy to pay extra for the ticket if they banned food and (non essential) talking though. 

It would be good if they did two types of screening, one for people who need to move around and make noise, and one quieter with no food noises.  I wonder if that exists anywhere?

I read that you can now access autism friendly screenings in cinemas - and I quite liked that idea. I had presumed it would be that talking and food (and all its associated smells and masticating noises) and drinks are all banned and maybe the volume of the film turned down slightly. However when I looked into it was that the lights are turned up (i really don’t understand why) and everyone can make as much noise as they like and move about. Eating and drinking is still allowed. They do get rid of the trailers (which I would appreciate) and turn the film down (only of use to me if people aren’t talking). 

I guess this may suit some autistic people who have vocal stims and need lots of very broad movement for regulation but I was left feeling I would be better off in the regular screenings which are at least dark. 

SunshineDrive,

It's easy to make online friends because you don't have to work hard at finding things in common through small talk. If you join a group that shares your interests, you can just exchange posts without worrying about non-verbal communication. Basically, there's no tension.

When you’re in the company of a very attractive woman, it can be tough not to feel a little overwhelmed, get tongue-tied, and start looking for any hint of rejection. It becomes a bit of a spiral. Even if you tell yourself you just want to be friendly, the sexual tension is hard to ignore, and it naturally amplifies everything.

The nearest I got to having a girlfriend was when I belonged to a chat group and became friendly with a woman who lived in East Africa, having emigrated there from an abusive partner in Belgium. She was a lovely person, but I’m afraid that after we agreed to meet in London, I simply didn’t fancy her. It was a pity, as she was determined to form a loving relationship with me, and I’m embarrassed to admit she must have felt really let down and went back to Africa. That is the danger of online relationships - you can never really see who it is you are talking to.

Making friends, whether with guys or girls, feels almost impossible for me since I hardly ever socialize. It’s like a “catch-22” - I don’t have anyone to hang out with, so I never end up meeting anyone new to hang out with. I've never been much for socializing and often enjoy my own company, but taken too far, it can leave you feeling lonely and unloved, wishing you had formed some kind of personal relationship, especially after close family members have passed on.

Even going to the cinema annoys me these days because of people eating crisps, talking, and all the other various noises you hear now. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t remember having this problem when I was younger, as I think people were better behaved back then. Also, as one ages one tends to want to a quiet life and not rush about so much. 

When my mom passed away several years ago, I felt completely adrift, as she had been my emotional anchor and might even have been the reason I never formed a relationship with another woman. I’m not entirely sure.

To be perfectly honest, I can’t really say I know I’m on the spectrum, as I’ve never been tested, but I definitely feel a strong connection with people who post here (or maybe that’s just wishful thinking). It might be that I’m looking for some kind of label to explain the way I am, and for all I know my problems could lie elsewhere. I don’t know - I’m no psychologist.

I definitely had a terrible time with noise when I worked (retired now) for a few years when our environment changed, and we were expected to work, at least partly, in a noisy and scruffy area. This triggered panic attacks for me and, from that day on, made going into work a nightmare, as I was never sure whether I’d be required to stay in that place. To this day, it has left me with noise sensitivity, especially when staying in a hospital, to the point that I have to take noise-canceling headphones with me. I still reckon I have PTSD from that experience.

Anyway, sorry if I’m boring you, SunshineDrive, but I just want you to know you’re not alone. My advice, as a 76-year-old, is not to waste years without at least trying to make friends, because one day you might find yourself wondering where all that time went!

BTW, this is definitely not AI-generated; it's all me!

I feel this way to! 

Yeah I would rely on people to give me feedback , if it’s different for them as In they don’t want me to text early or don’t want to chat as much over messages then I would 100 percent expect them to give me that feedback and guidance in the first place. The hard thing is when people have random expectations that don’t align with your norms but won’t give you the feedback and want to equally chastise you for it …. Not the usually way but something that has deeply cut me in the past