Does anyone else feel like they don't relate to most Aspies?

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Sometimes. I find myself relating to people on this forum way more than other places.

I remember making up my own disorder named after me where I only had it. The criteria involved having AS, but also other things that possibly no other person meets.

I can relate for the most part to other people with autism, but this doesn't mean I always have the same at that moment.

There are just a few people who i've met in my life to which I can really relate and have a autism diagnosis. With most of the people I know who have an autism diagnosis are just partial matches.

I like WrongPlanet because my way of thinking fits better here then in other places.
But it is all about the overlapse areas, that is the way to relate with anyone.

Cheerfully,
Wallourdes

This and this. I feel much more capable of relating to people on the spectrum than people not on it, but I do not relate well to all of them, perhaps even most of them. There are a few people around here who I think of as being like me, others, not so much, though I may relate to individual characteristics and experiences they have had.

I sometimes have difficulty relating to other aspies....although I think I have even MORE difficulty relating to most of the NTs that I know. I think I fit all of the criteria for AS (although I was diagnosed when I was 13 and am not SURE if I still do). However I am not/was not a "textbook aspie" , In fact I am VERY different from the textbook aspie. For example I am actually terrible with computers (although I do enjoy spending a lot of time researching topics I'm interested in online and browsing internet forums I am hopeless with programming computers or fixing computer problems) and do not have any mechanical aptitude. I am also NOT a visual thinker as I have terrible time with anything involving spatial/perceptual ability , including just finding my way around the city I live in! This is due to my nonverbal learning disability. In addition when reading about how youngsters with AS spent excessive amounts of time accumulating facts relating to their special interest , I still feel quite strange about the fact that I spent most of my young life engaged in repetitive fantasies (i.e. daydreams or imaginative play) relating to my special interests. For example I spent months enacting the same fantasy sequence over and over again of being an octopus! That is why my nickname is "daydreamer". Also although some of my special interests have been eccentric and esoteric , many were quite typical of peers my age , except in terms of their intensity and narrow scope. For example I became obsessed with being a gymnast as a young girl and at one point was obsessed with the "Babysitters Club" books, very common interests for children my age. However, I would still engage in repetitive fantasies regarding these things, they would consume my time and interfere with my life (i.e. school) and I would happily pursue them on my own. I have many other examples of ways in which I exhibited/exhibit all of the symptoms of AS but in atypical ways , but I digress.

On the other hand I have even greater difficulty relating to some of the experiences of NT’s in my life. For example when my mom or my sister start talking about celebrities and reality shows or fashion , it’s like they are speaking a foreign language. When NT’s discuss the opposite sex or sexuality with me I feel very uncomfortable. My experiences are so different in this regard that it is quite impossible to relate.

I'm not sure I know what it means to "relate". I'm never quite satisfied with the company of others. I always feel irked by people, or don't feel like I can be comfortable being myself, or feel like I don't really know what being myself is. I think I'm much more severely depressed than most aspies. If there's nothing to interest me or give me intellectual stimulation I just fall silent and think to myself. Even among aspies I'm always the quietest, though I don't feel like being quiet is necessarily a part of my personality or anything. I mean, I often have a lot of activity going on in my head and there's always an emptiness in all that I can't share. But when it comes to putting anything to words I feel clumsy and inhibited. Either that or everything just seems so banal that I can't conjure the energy to open my mouth.

i can relate to many of them, but some of em seem not my type.

I've never fit in with any group of people anywhere I've ever been, why would I expect to fit in with aspies who don't even have the social skills to know to pretend not to dislike me?

I think it all comes down to our different issues. Some have sensory/touch issues that I don't have while others struggle with social emotional mental issues. We view the world in our perspective and sometimes we are the only ones with that one view. It is hard to find common ground with the thousands of others on here. But to me I think this site can be useful for everyone in some degree. But to each their own.

I feel pretty much the opposite of the OP, after only a few days here (reading the boards and discussing) I felt already at home. Yes we are all different, but NTs are also all different, I think none of us has All the same issues, but I can relate to many of the issues discussed here, and even when I don't, I still like the fact that we can discuss about them and many other subjects as much as we want.

I'm happy here

I can relate to many aspies (and auties too) and a lot of the subjects discussed here on WP are things that I can relate to. Of course nobody is exactly like me and there exist many aspies who I don't relate to, but when I came to WP it was the first time ever that I found a group of people that I felt I could relate to for the most part, have something in common with and have mutual understanding about various ASD-related things. A lot of people here seem to have similar experiences, issues, personalities and opinions as I.

I do feel somewhat like an outsider here though, not because I can't relate, but because of not knowing anyone here. I thought this would be a good place to get to know other aspies, but to my surprise I haven't gotten to know anyone here yet or had as much as a conversation with anyone.

Unlike other kinds of forums that I've been to, I feel like members don't talk to each other much here or comment on each other's posts much (with some exceptions of course). People usually just answer according to the topic that the OP started and don't discuss things further or comment much on other posts, so I don't see as many flowing discussions/conversations here as on most forums. Sometimes I wonder how many people actually read other people's posts here, because at times it feels like talking to the air.

Hi

I notice the same to some extent, sometimes people start discussing but I do notice people seem to pick-up posts. Just a little internet fact: 90% of the thread viewers don't react to the discussions (link).

I guess there is a general hesitance here, taking the intiative might help.
People do seem to read entire threads most of the time because the discussions seem to run coherent most of the time. I think we have a chat on this site too, don't know where though

You could try the special interest sections and politics for more intense discussions.

Cheerfully,
Wallourdes

The people here on WP are the people that I relate to, the most.

Yeah, I think this is probably an aspie thing. It may be difficult for many here to take the initiative and I suppose we don't have the greatest conversational skills either and are not very good at getting to know new people. I'm not very good at this either. It's just interesting to see this clear difference between the WP forums and non-aspie forums. I would have thought we'd be better at communicating with each other and getting to know each other than with neurotypicals, but we generally seem to be rather hesitant here for some reason.

By the way, you can find the chat by moving your mouse over "Community" in the top left corner of the page. There is a drop down list that includes the chat. I haven't tried the chat here yet though. Maybe I should try it sometime.

I seem to have both AS traits (social awkwardness, difficulty reading "between the lines," intense special interests) and NT ones (I don't seem to have any sensory issues, and my social awkwardness is not nearly as pronounced as it was.)

I can relate with the more "high-functioning" aspies on this forum, but I can't really relate with the lower-functioning ones.

I feel I can understand a lot of what others on WP are talking about when they discuss problems or interests. I am often surprised at how familiar most of these posts sound. Some of what younger members are dealing with sounds so much like what I went through at those ages.

But I don't always related to specific details. There are some here who have a lot of trouble with anger. I've never been an angry person and so I can't really relate to long simmering resentments and grudges. Also most of the problems I have relate to social issues so those are the things I relate to in others. I have always been able to hold down a job, so I don't understand those problems as well.

Of course I have long thought that if I met a twin of myself, I would probably find him really really annoying. I don't think I would get along with myself very well. I suspect he would be a bit pedantic, self interested and hard to carry a conversation with.

Edited for spelling plus:

Then again, maybe I just think I understand what others are talking about. Maybe I'm just so clueless, I don't realize I'm clueless. But if I'm so clueless, would I question my cluelessness? Perhaps I understand way too much. But if I'm too understanding, doesn't that mean I probably cannot relate to people who have trouble understanding people? Maybe I understand so much that I understand nothing at all.

I'm one of the happiest autistic people I know, and most people who know me (heck, even most people who don't know me well) would never call me "higher functioning" or even "high functioning". Professionals who worked with me never have, at least not that I could find in print. I personally reject functioning labels as inaccurate in general for me or anyone else, but I tend to attract labels of "low functioning" or at very best "mid functioning" except by people with extremely restrictive definitions or people who want to prove I can do things I can't. 

I always try to call people on the assumption that happiness is linked to having only mild impairments (by most people's definition of such -- just assume when I talk about severe/mild I'm talking about conventional definitions of severity and impairment/disability/etc. -- my views on disability are closest to the "radical model" of all standard models (my way of thinking tends to defy models of anything, so that's why I keep feeling I have to qualify every other word I use), so suffice to say a lot of concepts that seem self-evident to most people, I tend to question. 

But by conventional definitions I am severely disabled/impaired/etc. (I'm not just autistic, a slew of other stuff and love in bed except when occasionally using a motorized tilting wheelchair) and it's been actually shown, the thing that many disabled people already know -- happiness seems more linked to an internal "set point" than to whether a person is disabled or not, no matter how "severely". Some people assume it's their condition making them unhappy, but usually that's no more true than people who think if they just had larger breasts, a bigger house, more expensive belongings, etc. Sometimes you can change happiness by thinking differently (why cognitive therapy works for a lot of depressed people) but not generally by removing an impairment.

It matters to me because people are always doing one of two things. They judge by my happiness that I must not be "very disabled after all". And then they remove vital supports, or try to anyway, or just totally disregard my life experiences, or claim I'm faking because a "real" disabled person would be miserable, or totally reject my views on disability as something I can't choose for myself. Or else they see that I'm "severely" disabled, and they judge my life unworthy of living, that I would be better off and happier dead. This has resulted in substandard medical care that could limit my lifespan, results in assuming that it would be best for everyone if people like me were never born, ensures that if I were murdered in cold blood then the murderer may well get charged only with manslaughter if anything (and sympathized with), and makes it so that people uselives like mine as a horror story rather than what it is, just another life. These range from mildly irritating to life and death issues.

So, I try to let people know when I can. It's important. I don't judge people for believing something they're taught their whole lives, things I used to believe, but I do try to get alternate information out there. Even when it's just an offhand remark.

As to "aspie pride", I differ from a lot of people who believe in that, too. Mostly because of their reasons. Many people have disturbing reasons for believing in it. They may think they're better than other people. Than nonautistic people. Than autistic people like me, who have a lot of embarrassing difficulties they want to distance themselves from. They may be aspie supremacists (people who think "aspies" are better than other autistic people) or "autistic supremacists" (people who think autistic people in general are better than other people). Or that autistic people are better than other disabled people (the above link on the radical model of disability mirrors my views on that). I have no room for thinking I'm better or worse than anyone else, and that essential equality of value is the foundation for all my ethical views.

I don't mind the sort of pride that means not ashamed in the face of a society where people like you are not valued, though. People who are literal about pride don't always notice that's what it means to many -- standing up to devaluation. Similar with celebrating who you are, as long as you don't put yourself above anyone else then why should I care. Nothing wrong with positive views unless they're fake-positive but based in hate underneath. Hate has no place in my life, it's wholly destructive and a person who hates others in a sense puts themselves in a state of hate that colors their every action.

As far as feeling different than most autistic people, absolutely I do. I've met a small number of people I can really relate to among autistic people in general. Also among some people for that matter with other cognitive issues stemming from intellectual disability, epilepsy, learning disabilities, dementia, etc. People who relate to the world in terms more sensory than intellectual, and have done so long enough to get very good at it. Whose sensory awareness shines out even when others sometimes see "nobody home". Who go to the vast realms beneath words, ideas, actions. Whose abilities fluctuate moment to moment based on a complex shifting web of factors. Who had a large part of their lives where language didn't exist to them (but who may or may not have used sensory patterns to harness echolalia into plausible speech). Who instead of taking the usual path of understanding words at the expense of other communication, understand other communication at the expense of words. Who find language mode, if they have one, unpleasant and taxing and foreign. Who store a lot of sensory data but can't access it on command, only when triggered. And who have similar voluntary vs. triggered issues with movement and thought and writing and socializing (the last resulting in being labeled "passive" by people who believe in the three/four social types). And many other familiar traits.

Taken all together, this is a small number of autistic people (among a few nonautistic people). But generally any two autistic people have at least something in common. So with people here I can always relate to at least something. Often can relate a lot to individual traits. It's the combination of traits that is rarer, especially among autistic people who use words (though not as rare as you'd think, even among "aspies" who technically spoke young but oh hai echolalia). So yeah I have trouble totally relating to most autistic people, but I can at least relate a little to just about anyone. Oh yeah, and the whole combination of traits I describe transcends all the usual categories -- autism/AS/PDDNOS, HF/LF/MF, etc. People like me may be labeled any one of those, often more than one by different doctors or at different times. Whatever we are, it crosses over every standard category out there it seems. And any one of us won't easily relate on a cognitive level to others in "our" diagnostic category.

There's also relating based on what we think rather than how, or on life experiences. My life experiences are different from most but not by any means unheard of among people here. The way I think about disability though I barely share with anyone here or among autistic people in general. Because even the social model isn't the most common and it's somewhat different from how I think of it. There's exactly one person who shares my sensory and cognitive differences, life experiences, and way of thinking. And neither of us expected that or expected to like it if it happened. But it is delightful. So is connecting to people utterly different than you. Different sorts of delight.