Alternative(s) to Typical Relationships

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I was friends with benefits with an older man, three years, ago. I had to break it off with him, because he had no concept of hygiene.

It sounds like your really independent SideKick like in an emotional sense & doing your own thing. It may be good for you to be with a guy who is also very independent & does his own thing alot like maybe running his own small business, or spending time with the fellas. Some Aspie guys here would like that kind of relationship; they want companionship but not all the intense emotional stuff & need more alone time.

The kind of relationship I desired & am in might could be considered slightly alternative because it's interdependent. I'm kind of clingy, a tad needy, & dependent(thou I am better than I was in my last two relationships partly because I screwed those relationships up partly because of those things, I grew/matured some, & I'm on a med for anxiety & another one for OCD) I also love being affectionate, & am very emotionally supportive. & my girlfriend is also dependent, affectionate & needs emotional support & we do love each other.

You might be dreaming, but you're not the only one.
This is exactly what I wish I could have, but yes, it's probably unrealistic
but I do think you can have something close to it...only it takes a lot of time to build a relationship like that.
You'd need to trust the other person enough to be able to keep your distance without being afraid of them leaving you;
I like being on my own, same as everyone here, and I tend to run away from people if I feel they get to close;
But I also need a lot of reassurance, maybe because I find it hard to believe someone would actually like me enough/find me interesting enough to stick around. So even though I want the kind of relationship you described, I want it really badly, I'm not even sure if I could handle it; do you ever feel that way?

Oh no, I'm starting to whine about myself again, sorry

I like that OP.

I'd definitely want a relationship more like that but I think I would need a little more interaction that what your post described.

I would be cool with having my own room but I'd want her to come and snuggles with me at night.


I like being cuddles and snuggles'd.

My favorite living experience was living in a dorm, the one where I knew all my friends were going to be in from the previous year. While I enjoy my privacy immensely, I really liked being able to leave my room and be able to interact with someone that I felt comfortable with, without having to plan to meet up and make it a thing. Houses and even apartments, everyone's so sequestered from everyone else. I mean, people are right there, but in order to interact it's still 'I'm making a concerted effort to talk to that person'.
That I'm not working right now, and that I just live with my husband, I miss generic social interaction terribly. Which is ironic because I can't stand a lot of people and hate a lot of social interaction.

I know this all isn't about a romantic relationship, but I feel somehow excluded from the rest of society by being married. Because with marriage there's the expectation of having your family be your social glue, and I don't even know if I want kids. It really, really sucks that as a 'mature adult' I'm supposed to have a house and a steady job and a family and for that to be my goal. Even though I was seriously depressed for most of it, I still view my time being a university student as ideal for me. Surrounded by people who were eager to learn, professors eager to teach, plenty of social interaction, open-mindedness was the expectation, not the oddity, yet I had enough alone time to keep my thoughts together. I guess I really like the idea of being forced to interact with people who are like minded because at this point in life I utterly fail at finding and keeping friends. Unfortunately, lifelong student isn't a feasible permanent life choice. Guess this is also why one of my dream jobs is professor...I could live vicariously through the students.

Sometimes I think I'd be happiest joining a free-love commune somewhere, if any exist in this day and age.

Another thing that doesn't help my idea of communal living is that I wouldn't trust myself to share a kitchen with people who ate regular, gluten-filled diets.