I feel free.

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I'm sure a lot of you have read my posts on here the past few months about my frustration as it relates to not having a suitable girlfriend and being a virgin.

The past couple weeks, I've been doing a lot of soul searching, and I'm finally at a point where I can say women are just "any other good thing" to me. They aren't a priority whatsoever.

As those of you who've been in relationships know (even short-term relationships), the honeymoon phase is a natural high of sorts. It feels good to meet someone and have that "chemistry." But what I found, and from what I hear from people with a whole lot more experience, usually that chemistry doesn't last and there has to be more to the relationship.

What I also realized, is that a lot of us Aspies are intellectually older than our peers...and we crave a meaningful relationship. We want a boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife that will love us for us and be there in the good and bad times. A lot of people in the 18-28 range just want to party and have a fun time, and if they're in a relationship, they just want someone with a vacant mind and a beer in their hand. If the person were to get serious, they'd get dumped for someone more "casual."

With all of this in mind, as good as it would be to have someone besides my family to care about me, this doesn't happen until an older age. I think a lot of women in their 20s say they want love, but they just want the fantasy of love, not the actual relationship.

I also realize that basically what I'm looking for is a female version of myself, only more outgoing and not with carbon-copy interests. I don't care that they listen to the same music as me, just that they've heard it before and don't mind it. I'm a man of the 50s through 90s living in the 21st century. If I had it my way, I'd be 36 now, not 26 (as long as I still had a full head of hair.)

I know I haven't met every attractive 20something woman (attractive by standards) but I feel 30s anyway. I check out women that are 30 plus, and when I see a woman that's 22, I feel like "Oh she's a little girl."

So as good as it would be to find the Debra to my Raymond or the Daphe to my Niles, it isn't necessary, just a bonus.

Hi,

I just found out about this website and asperger's been a topic for me and my family for well over a year now. At first my younger brother was diagnosed, then I heard it could be a genetic thing and that possibly my father had it too. I didn't want to hear it, to know that I was... handicapped somehow. After a while I eventually had myself tested and was positively diagnosed to have asperger's syndrome. By that time I had already accepted the fact that I would probably have it and didn't see it as a handicap anymore, more of a 'both a blessing and a curse' thing.

That's a little bit of my backstory in a nutshell, as for why I'm posting here is because I was checking some random topics here and thought this one stood out. For some reason it felt like I was reading my own thoughts, as the things you said in your post mirrors how I think the exact same way, the only difference being that I'm only 19 and you're 26. I also can't find a suitable girlfriend and, even though it's trivial, am still a virgin. You have experienced more than me in life so your perspective on things is probably more developed than mine so I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be able to relate to your story but somehow I did.

Your statement about the majority of 18-28 aged is true to me, as in my close environment, everyone does exactly that wich you said. Seek love but are simply, while not knowing this, now ready or willing to commit themselves to 'true love'. Then comes me with my delusional view of how it'd all be so great if everything would just work out. I also want to meet that 'female me' (also thought the exact same thing here, not kidding).

What I found remarkable was that you said that while it would be great if it'd happen for real, it would just be a bonus. To me it's the biggest thing playing in my life at the moment, even more so than being unemployed and out of school. I dunno how you managed to get that way of thought but I'd almost kill someone to think the same way on that too, yet I simply can't. Whether this is due to my young age, some stupid obsession in my head or anything else I don't know.

Recently, me and my best friend who had been hanging around rather frequently because we truely felt connected started to become more than friends. It felt great at that time, and it came from both ways and we had some great fun together but eventually she told me (cliché incoming) that things were changing, she didn't like losing her best friend and wanted to have it stay that way, to be friends. I took it the right way and we're still hanging out but I'm left with this horrible urge to want to finally meet someone that I can stick with for a good while. Sadly, where I live there aren't many people who respect other people their differences and have to make fun of or insult minorities with a particular religious faith or mental disability to compensate for their own flaws and so I'm extremely glad I have the friends I got now as I had none a couple of years ago during my teen years. Or does being 18/19 still make me a teen? Meh! The obvious solution would be to head over to other cities to check out what kind of people live there but I don't really see a major pro to going out and visiting clubs and pubs and whatnot. Not to mention that I'm not exactly an optimist on these kinds of things either.

After typing all that I'm not too sure if I even want to submit this post or ask what I want to ask, but I'll do it anyways.

How do you manage to live your life, do your things whilst being single and then be able to put love on a lower priority? It's been raging on and on in my head nearly non-stop for quite a while now and all I can do is have patience, and then some more patience. Is there a secret I don't know about?

Bleh, my apoligies for any errors or other inconsistencies/mistakes if there are any. I'm typing this at 6:35, couldn't exactly sleep so my mind is a little blurry at the moment. ;D

I'm not expecting an answer to all my problems whatsoever by the way, I just wanted to hear more of your story and how you handled the things you did in that area. Hope it's not confusing, provoking or simply rude somehow.

Anyways, I'm gonna get some sleep. Sorry for the long post.

Cya,
~Stone

Welcome to WP!

What helped speed up this thought process was having a bad relationship and seeing how low I got when the relationship ended (or rather when she ended things and I wasn't ready to end things at the time.) I was desperate, and addicted to her for no good reason.

It clued me in as to how ugly a disagreement can get with a person that once had feelings for you.

Even after the relationship, I just wanted to believe this was an exception, not the rule, but from talking to other people, most 20 something relationships sooner or later end up this way. Mine just happened to end sooner.

You probably have this built-up fantasy in your head about what it would be like to fall in love. While I'm sure the right relationship can have aspects of whatever fantasy you have, there's a reason it's rare to find.

Something else...to the new poster...it might get worse before it gets better. At your age, your hormones are going crazy. Only at 26 have I noticed mine decreasing.

@Tim_Tex

Yo thanks!

@therange

Hey, thanks for the reply. Yeah, I kinda had the same thing, though not entirely. I once had a girlfriend on the age of 15 and on the age of 17, having that special feeling for 'em that eventually ends up being nothing more than some simple silly illusion that brings more knowledge and pain than the good things you shared at that time. Both relationships ended up with the girl telling me it's not going to work out, and yeah, I was totally devoted, pretty much addicted to her and also completely unready when they told me the bad news. I keep asking myself "how does this relate to a situation of a mature guy?" as ofcourse, being young and 'stupid' with all the raging hormones that come with it providing me with a delusional vision of life at times, how could it possibly similar? And yet, it seems to be so.

Heh, you got the fantasy bit right though, having played tons and I mean TONS of different videogames, watched loads of movies/series and read some amazing books I've learned of non-existent fantasy worlds where everything was epic, not always happy but at least far bigger than life. I already kinda had a discussion with myself in my head about how I'd probably be unable to find this perfect fantasy girl, and how she wouldn't even be perfect anyways if she'd exist as, well, it just wouldn't seem real to me. I need an individual I can relate to, yet has to be different and similar to me at the same time. How does that work?

And yeah, hormones, damn them all to heck! Blueballing ain't alot of fun either.

@Sinsboldly

Yeah, the rushing bit I learned not to do not too long ago. The stuff about me and my best friend hooking up, that's exactly it. I was on a 1 week holiday and halfway through I got a phonecall from her, during wich we both started to claim to have feelings for eachother and whatnot. Ofcourse, doing this over the freakin' phone and not having an actual conversation we started to build something up with would collapse within an instant. So it did, and I'm glad we handled it the right way as we're still friends, nothing weird going on and I got someone I can truely open to whilst also having alot of fun.

I kinda used the pain I got from her calling it quits so that I could 'unlove' her whilst at the same time try not to think less of her as a friend. It seems to have worked.

Bah, was hoping the secret would be something else but it would seem it's not. No worries about not being able to give me other advice, it's probably the exact same thing I would've told you if our roles were reversed.

@Everyone

Thanks for the replies people, somehow it's sortof a relief to know that I'm not the only one and sharing your experiences and thoughts about things, no matter how small or big and similar or different to what I've felt and learned, helps me learn to understand more and more of what I actually truely want and how to pave the road towards this one goal.

I ought to check out this forum some more it seems.

Cya,
~Stone

Love is a human religion in which another person is believed in.
- Robert Seidenberg

by Dorothy Tennov

The limerent reaction (referring to the state of being "in love") begins, usually at a point discernible at the time and later recalled. Sexual attraction as such need not be experienced, although (a) the person is someone you view as a possible sexual partner, and (b) the initial "admiration" may be, or seem to be, primarily physical attraction.

Once limerence begins, you find yourself thinking about the LO (the Limerent Other: the current love object) and receiving considerable pleasure in the process. There is an initial phase in which you feel buoyant, elated, and, ironically, for this appears to be the beginning of an essentially involuntary process, free. Free not only from the usual restraints of gravity, but emotionally unburdened. You may be attracted to more than one potential LO. You feel that your response is a result of LO’s fine qualities.

With evidence of reciprocation from LO, you enjoy a state of extreme pleasure, even euphoria. Your thoughts are mainly occupied with considering and reconsidering what you may find attractive in LO, replaying whatever events may have thus far transpired between you and LO, and appreciating qualities in yourself which you perceive as possibly having sparked interest in you on the part of LO. (It is at this point in West Side Story that Maria, the contemporary Juliet, sings I Feel Pretty.)

Your degree of involvement increases if obstacles are externally imposed or if you doubt LO’s feelings for you. Only if LO were to be revealed as highly undesirable might your limerence subside. Usually, with some degree of doubt its intensity rises further, and you reach the stage at which the reaction is virtually impossible to dislodge, either by your own act of will, or by further evidence of LO’s undesirable qualities. This is what Stendhal called crystallisation. The doubt and increased intensity of limerence undermine your former satisfaction with yourself. You acquire new clothes, change your hairstyle, and are receptive to any suggestion by which you might increase your own desirability in LO’s eyes. You are inordinately fearful of rejection.

With increases in doubt interspersed with reason to hope that reciprocation may indeed occur, everything becomes intensified, especially your preoccupation with percentages. At 100% you are mooning about, in either a joyful or a despairing state, preferring your fantasies to virtually any other activity unless it is (a) acting in ways that you believe will help you attain your limerent objective, such as beautifying yourself and, therefore increasing the probability that you will impress LO favourably during your interaction, or (b) actually being in the presence of LO. Your motivation to attain a “relationship” (mating, or pair bond) continues to intensify so long as a "proper" mix of hope and uncertainty exist.

At any point in the process, if you perceive reciprocation, your degree of involvement ceases to rise — until, of course, you become uncertain again. The timid partners may attempt to conceal from each other the full nature of the reaction that has seized them, preventing full reciprocation in each other’s eyes and allowing the intensity to increase.
To summarise, these things are needed:

A person who meets your criteria for an LO. (The basic requisites appear to vary, and not always represent what you might consciously define as your criteria. On the other hand, the similarity between limerents and LOs with respect to broad categories of gender, age, socioeconomic status, educational level, ethnicity, et cetera, suggests that criteria exist.)
A sign of hope that the person might reciprocate.
Uncertainty.

For those who wish a cure, the most certain course is prevention. Once you are in its grips your emotions are directed by the external situation, and the only effective action open to you is destruction of any opportunity for reciprocation to occur.

Limerence for a particular LO does cease under one of the following conditions: consummation - in which the bliss of reciprocation is gradually either blended into a lasting love or replaced by less positive feelings; starvation - in which even limerent sensitivity to signs of hope is useless against the onslaught of evidence that LO does not return the limerence; transformation - in which limerence is transferred to a new LO.

Source: from Love and Limerence: the Experience of Being in Love by Dorothy Tennov

I think most ASS males have their patience tested early in life. What makes you guys kinda geeky in High school and college is actually a virtue later in life somehow. Also aspies tend to look younger which is good for us females (men usually find younger women attractive) but bad for you males (women usually find older guys attractive, even the older gals)... I too am attracted to older males. I'm 29 and I find myself being physically attracted to guys from 40 up to about 55..... sorry