Are your friends losers/social outcasts?

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Not counting my wife, there are a handful of people I consider friends (all of whom I have known for > 25 years).

One of these friends (who is also my age), recently attended his friend?s daughter?s graduation party. The friend proceeded to get drunk and ultimately got sick.

Afterwards, my wife commented, ?I cannot believe [your friend] a 50 year old man got drunk and sick at a teenager?s graduation party. Sorry, Rocket, but your best friend?s is a loser. By the way, your other best friend [who is stoned all the time] is also a loser?.

I sort of laughed as she said it. Because it was both funny and true. These two friends are sort of like me, 50 year old men who never really grew up (emotionally). My other two friends? One is a blatant narcissist and the other is an undiagnosed schizoid. I don?t have any friends that you would consider normal. I don?t believe I ever have (had normal friends).

So, I am sort of curious how you would describe your friends? If they are normal or somewhat ?off? like mine.

I know one "normal" person [outside of my family]. the rest have their problems just as I have my problems.

Yup, all my friends are "off."

There is the single welfare mother (except she's too proud to apply for welfare, so she and her kid live on $400 a month) with a horrible tendency to judge people and herself. She's also a hoarder, and very likely has OCD. She's really smart, and really nice, and a really wonderful person-- when she's sober.

There's my best friend, the sociopath. Or schizoid, or something. He's a good guy and I like him. He's actually been really kind to me, and I feel more comfortable around him that almost anyone I've ever known. You just have to always ask yourself what his angle is, what's in it for him, and stand your ground. He WILL weasel you out of your beer. Also your meat, whatever cash you have in your wallet, and whatever else you have that he wants. Unless you just don't let him.

There's The Total Aspie. Most people can't stand to listen to him talk. He's 33 and still lives with his folks. He has never been on a date. He still tries to rules-lawyer tabletop RPGs and, other than me and the sociopath, has no actual friends. I think he's pretty cool. He has been there for me more than once when the SHTF.

There's The Protegee. She carried straight As in grad school for an MSME, had three kids under the age of 12 at home while she did it, and landed a $75,000-a-year job right out of college. She's been divorced twice, got accidentally pregnant two times in the same year (WITHOUT having an abortion-- she found out she was pregnant with the second one at her follow-up appointment after having the first one), and is autistically dedicated to her work (although I'm not all that sure she's an Aspie-- just a perfectionist). She's really, super-duper smart, and has a huge heart, and she's a lot of fun to hang out with, and I'm glad she's my friend.

There's the Crazy Old Lady. She's old enough to be my mother, and the moniker pretty much says it all. Her friendship alone was worth moving halfway across the country; every time I talk to her, I want to move back.

There's the Dead Peckers Club. Most of them are dead now. I think there's one left. A bunch of guys, some old enough to be my father and some old enough to be my grandfather. I'm pretty sure they were all in the Klan when they were young and stupid. But they took a shine to me and my kids, and we used to hang out in the local gas station and drink coffee and talk about the news. They're mostly dead now, and the gas station collapsed under the load from an ice storm last winter, and I live 1000 miles from there now. I cried when I said goodbye to them, and I treasure the memories.

Then there's My New Friends. They are all rednecks and hippies, because as far as I can tell rednecks and hippies are the only people in the exurbs north of Pittsburgh who will keep company with an Aspie. They're certainly the only people here I want to hang with. I don't know all their quirks and foibles yet. One of them is bi-polar. One of them says she's bi-polar with ADHD and OCD. One of them is getting their younger kid evaluated, because for some reason he's really, really, really shy and prefers to play alone. His dad says there's nothing wrong with him, really-- he's just not a social kid, just like his daddy.

I ain't sayin' a word. 'Cause I know I'm hypervigilant. And I think I could really, really like these people, and I don't want to mess it up.

Yeah-- I like my odds and ends and freaks and geeks and losers. I don't think I would enjoy being friends with "normal" people, even if they would have me. They're uptight. And boring. And mean. And boring. And stuck-up. And did I mention really, really boring????

Looking back at my school days, every single friend I had was off a little. Let's see:
Andrew: Probable learning disability, very impulsive
Christopher: Too many to mention. Today he is a cross dresser for one example.
David: Learning disability, lazy
Jonathan: Probably OCD and ADHD and possible ASD, VERY possessive and controlling of his property
Jessy: Paraplegic, probable learning disability
Matthew: Stuttering, immature, lazy, constant victim mentality
Ex: BPD, Learning disability, immature

It wasn't a conscious decision but the fact that nobody else (i.e. "normal kids/teens/young adults) would give me the time of day. Every single one of them to my knowledge is underemployed and not living up to their potential. Misery loves company I suppose. Even though I am reasonably 'normal', with a stable job and a car, none of my recent friends could meet any of these three categories.

When I had friends, my counselor likened my social circle to the island of misfit toys. We were basically all the kids nobody else wanted to be around. It was a lot better than my current social situation...

Oh, forgot my husband. The most normal person I like to be around.

ADHD, undiagnosed and untreated. Emotionally abusive father. Poor self-esteem, consummate geek.

OMG!! My grandmother actually SAID that!! "My granddaughter always did have such a kind heart! She always befriended the ones no one else wanted!"

To my BRIDESMAIDS. And ALL MY FRIENDS. At my WEDDING RECEPTION.

I was so completely humiliated I went mute. The girls had to take me outside for a cigarette. Where I apologized about 70 times.

God love that woman, she is positively SWIMMING in DeNile.

I am not certain why, but the responses in this thread reminded me of my 18th birthday. My parents, for whatever reason, decided to throw me a surprise birthday party.

I suppose they thought that they should invite more than just the handful of people I considered friends. So, they proceeded to invite a bunch of people I barely knew (essentially people I had spoken at most one or two words with). At the time, I felt (for lack of a better term) humiliated. I knew I didn?t have a lot of friends. And this was simply a reminder of my social inadequacies.

Most of my friends are nerds, outcasts, and abuse survivors, and almost all are thoughtful people. They are also either unconforming, or not strongly conforming to society.

The one person in high school I actually visited in his home would fit your description.

Later he got married and was boasting how he and his wife had used their positions to smuggle an artifact ( a medium sized terracotta earth goddess statuette) from the country they were in. This was the last time I spoke to him and his new wife.

The blatant narcissist who I put in the "friend? category? is sort of a weasel as well. He has a business and was bragging about ?hiding? money from the IRS. Which, to me, is wrong. And is one of the reasons I don?t really talk to him much anymore.

After thinking about it, he probably is not that much of a friend. He is more a friend of a friend (i.e. I associate with him, when he is with one of the two "real" friends I have).

Last edited by Rocket123 on 07 Jun 2014, 11:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

This whole description brought to mind "Shaun of the Dead" and "Hot Fuzz."

I don't have any really, really long term friends like that. I put all my emotional energy and time into my relationship with my wife and did not have any extra emotional bandwidth. That, and I just suck at relationships.

But I do have some people I think of as friends for life who I met as an adult. Two of them responded to my telling them about my diagnosis with a total lack of surprise and the information that they also suspected themselves to be on the spectrum--again, I felt like a total idiot. In any case, I think they are seen as odd people, but not losers.

My wife is much more NT than me, but probably not actually neurotypical--just her set of issues doesn't stop her from being social. Most of my friendly contact with humans is mediated by her. A problem there is that I have a hard time recognizing faces and don't remember names. Fortunately I am very sensitive to the individual qualities of voices, so I can usually work out who someone is when we talk, but before that it's always a bit uncomfortable.

But, yes--I seem to have an easier time connecting with other "different" people.

Most of my friends are late bloomers or 'losers/social outcasts', and I sure am a loser,outcast. And I forgot to mention, all of my family are 'off' and 'have their problems'. Among the close family 'problems' are severe ADHD, anxiety, depression, learning blocks, dyslexia, clumsiness, narcissism, dependent personality disorder, rages. Among the extended family as far as I know is autism, Asperger syndrome, Bipolar, Conduct disorder, antisocial disorder, drug abuse, alcohol abuse.

All the close friends I've ever had (and there haven't been lots and lots of them) definitely march to a different drummer. There are some who are losers, some who are not. Some who function reasonably well in the mainstream, but (like me) it exhausts them. All have been super-bright, but a little "off." Probably Aspies or borderline Aspies, in retrospect.

I have a really hard time dealing with "mainstream" people, always have. They all seem somewhat shallow to me, and their priorities pointless.

I wouldn't label my friends losers. I am attracted to quirky people. I despise anyone who is "normal" meaning they do not have a glaring problem (such as being ugly, poor, mentally ill, trauma survivor, ex-convict). I knew society was full of s**t well before I hit high school. When I read my first Kurt Vonnegut novel, I started seeing reality for the first time and have never looked back since. What does this mean? If you haven't seen the light, we don't have much in common. Our experiences of reality are just too different. I like rebels and non-conformists and pessimists like me. I am kind of like the goth kids from South Park.

Outside of my wife, I have no friends. Sad I know... To be honest, I don't know how to make friends. I haven't really had any since college.