An Aspie with no friends and a distant family? That never happens! No really, do go on...
My name is Damien. I came across this site in a desperate search to find people to whom I can actually relate. I have difficulty getting along with pretty much everyone; either they get on my nerves, or they find me overly straightforward, blunt to the point of rudeness, and a bit too divided in my patterns of behaviour.
I haven't spoken to my mother in many years; in fact, I doubt that she even knows that I've moved over one hundred miles away from the last place I lived. My mother has several severe personality disorders; throughout my childhood, she was alternately abusive and neglectful. I've gotten over this, and it no longer bothers me to talk about it, though I can't say I'm adult enough about it not to blame her for her behaviour.
As for my father, he and I get along much better on a friend basis than we ever did as a parent and child, which I've heard is true for most father-son relationships. We haven't spoken in quite some time, either; he has an extremely busy life--that's not an excuse; it's actually true. I have six siblings, all younger and living with him, and they're just the first of many things that occupy his time.
That's beside the point, though; I didn't join just to complain. I do enough of that already.
I write. Music, novels. No poetry. I don't sing, and I don't play guitar; I play a lot of other instruments, and I own a studio program with which I'm able to do some pretty fun things. I would post a link here to my music, but I prefer not to self-promote in my very first forum post; I consider it bad etiquette, and I think I recall something in the terms of use about that, as well. I also draw; I would post links here to my "art" to prove that it's not just anime--which, please excuse me, is staggeringly easy to draw--but again, I'm not self-promoting this early.
There really is a lot more to me than that, of course. I'm not the sort of person who, when asked what I like to do with my time, replies with the standard "Oh I dunno, I like to you know hang out, listen to music, party and I dunno chill with my mates." I consider myself an explorer, because I couldn't stop learning if I tried. I can spend hours engrossed in a single activity, even something as simple as watching the hands on an analog clock. I do much more interesting things than this, though. Inconveniently enough, they always manage to slip my mind when I'm expected to discuss them.
I've been diagnosed with a number of things, by a number of doctors, so I really don't know what it is I can say about myself in that respect. According to my most recent doctor, I'm somewhere between Asperger's and high-functioning autism, which I find odd, because I was told that they're two different things, rather than different degrees of the same thing. I've also got a few other "issues" that I don't consider problematic in the least; like autism, they're just part of who I am.
To avoid being even more long-winded than I've already proven myself to be, I'll wrap this up already. Essentially, I'm just looking for someone to, as dramatic and pathetic as it sounds, ease the loneliness. It's been made clear to me that the primary reason for my lack of social gratification is the fact that I don't try, so this is my first try.
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Men are but flesh and blood. They know their doom, but not the hour.