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Majority of autistuc men dont have a girlfriend?

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WantToHaveALife
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08 Jul 2024, 2:21 pm

zzyzzy wrote:
I've never had a girlfriend. I am the strikeout king. I'm just too quirky to have a girlfriend. When I knock on the door, my only experience is to get the door slammed on my face. Nevertheless, at 62, for some reason I haven't given up, yet.


why do i get the feeling your a normal looking guy, another angry enraging reminder



WantToHaveALife
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08 Jul 2024, 2:22 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
I'm not trying to change the thread topic or say either gender has it worse. I just want you to know I understand how rough it must be for men. I've seen it first hand when my son has been nearly-suicidal over rejections and breakups. It's awful and I do feel badly for men, especially autistic men, who can't find partners. I only wanted to demonstrate that women experience rejection too whether it happens exactly the same or not, so perhaps that's why many women understand how crummy it feels for men.

When men ask someone out and get rejected at least they know the answer or where they stand. It's not fun, but at least they know. Women who have to be passive don't always get a definite answer. The guy (or other woman) might continue to be a friend / acquaintance but never ask them out. The person might even seem to flirt. Women don't know if the guy is actually interested but scared to ask, if they should keep hoping and wondering, or if they should give up. (That's in addition to being flat-out ghosted by the guy like men are often ghosted by women.)

When we don't know what's going on we start to self-gaslight not knowing if we're reading their cues wrong, if we're doing something wrong, if they're gay, if they don't find us smart / funny / pretty / nice enough, or what the deal is. Maybe we're supposed to ask them, or maybe that would make us seem forward.

Without knowing what's going on it's really hard to make sense of a situation or decide the next steps. I've known women who wait and pine for people for years, thinking something will change and the person will suddenly discover they're meant for each other. I think that sounds pretty awful in comparison to having the ability to ask and get an answer. It's hard to be rejected but at least the person would know for sure and not have to guess.


well it truly does seem far more men than women end up chronically alone and single later than normal, as in, never been with anyone before



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08 Jul 2024, 2:54 pm

I wonder how autistic men would feel if the tables were turned. What if it was culturally normal / expected for women to ask out men, and autistic men had to just sit there watching women choose their classmates, friends, colleagues, brothers, etc., but not them? I wonder if they would feel doubly disempowered 1) for being autistic and not attracting those women and 2) because even if they have a female friend they have to sit back and hope she asks. If they do ask, people will accuse them of being forward (e.g., creeps), and in either event they can still be rejected. Back to square one.

Would men prefer this scenario ^ , or the way it is now?

Just curious - not trying to prove a point or anything.


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08 Jul 2024, 5:44 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
I wonder how autistic men would feel if the tables were turned. What if it was culturally normal / expected for women to ask out men, and autistic men had to just sit there watching women choose their classmates, friends, colleagues, brothers, etc., but not them? I wonder if they would feel doubly disempowered 1) for being autistic and not attracting those women and 2) because even if they have a female friend they have to sit back and hope she asks. If they do ask, people will accuse them of being forward (e.g., creeps), and in either event they can still be rejected. Back to square one.

Would men prefer this scenario ^ , or the way it is now?

Just curious - not trying to prove a point or anything.


I'd much prefer the scenario you described (where the tables are turned).

I have good looks. And I'm pretty high-functioning. I'm confident I'd get asked out in the scenario you described.



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08 Jul 2024, 7:11 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
I wonder how autistic men would feel if the tables were turned. What if it was culturally normal / expected for women to ask out men, and autistic men had to just sit there watching women choose their classmates, friends, colleagues, brothers, etc., but not them? I wonder if they would feel doubly disempowered 1) for being autistic and not attracting those women and 2) because even if they have a female friend they have to sit back and hope she asks. If they do ask, people will accuse them of being forward (e.g., creeps), and in either event they can still be rejected. Back to square one.

Would men prefer this scenario ^ , or the way it is now?

Just curious - not trying to prove a point or anything.

TBH, I get the feeling that any system where it's that lopsided is going to get annoying and frustrating for everybody involved.

Having days where one doesn't want to be perceived is definitely a known phenomenon in the community. Also, I don't know that any of us really like to have that sort of thing sprung upon us.



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08 Jul 2024, 7:38 pm

After high school, I had no trouble meeting women and getting dates.  The trouble I had was in getting dates after the first one.  Then it was a matter of learning how to mask my weirdness interact in 'normal' ways.

My wife and I have been together now for over 30 years.



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08 Jul 2024, 7:59 pm

MatchboxVagabond wrote:
IsabellaLinton wrote:
I wonder how autistic men would feel if the tables were turned. What if it was culturally normal / expected for women to ask out men, and autistic men had to just sit there watching women choose their classmates, friends, colleagues, brothers, etc., but not them? I wonder if they would feel doubly disempowered 1) for being autistic and not attracting those women and 2) because even if they have a female friend they have to sit back and hope she asks. If they do ask, people will accuse them of being forward (e.g., creeps), and in either event they can still be rejected. Back to square one.

Would men prefer this scenario ^ , or the way it is now?

Just curious - not trying to prove a point or anything.

TBH, I get the feeling that any system where it's that lopsided is going to get annoying and frustrating for everybody involved.

Having days where one doesn't want to be perceived is definitely a known phenomenon in the community. Also, I don't know that any of us really like to have that sort of thing sprung upon us.
I agree with you VM. Either extreme could majorly s#ck for both genders. Trying to ask women out didn't work out well for me. However I doubt that the system being the other way with women being expected to ask guys out woulda made any difference for me. The three girlfriends I've had kinda made the first move on me but they realized they kinda had to. They weren't NT & we met on forums so those rules didn't really matter. It's an extremely rare type of woman that would be interested in me. However I do think it woulda been better for me if the system was the other way where women were expected to be the primary financial providers & guys were more expected to be house-husbands than women being house-wives.


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08 Jul 2024, 8:11 pm

The problem for me in that scenario was that I was so reclusive I didn't meet people who might have wanted to ask me out. I didn't go to parties or hang out with friends, and I didn't even work anymore. If someone tried to talk to me somewhere I often went mute. It's a miracle it finally worked for me at a medical appointment.

For those of you men who don't get out much or have a social life, where would you expect these women to find you and ask you out?


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08 Jul 2024, 9:58 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
I wonder how autistic men would feel if the tables were turned. What if it was culturally normal / expected for women to ask out men, and autistic men had to just sit there watching women choose their classmates, friends, colleagues, brothers, etc., but not them? I wonder if they would feel doubly disempowered 1) for being autistic and not attracting those women and 2) because even if they have a female friend they have to sit back and hope she asks. If they do ask, people will accuse them of being forward (e.g., creeps), and in either event they can still be rejected. Back to square one.

Would men prefer this scenario ^ , or the way it is now?

Just curious - not trying to prove a point or anything.


I know i'm in good company for thinking this way, as in, lots of people support and agree with this, and that is, women normally never risk having their social awkwardness or social ineptness be dismissed or perceived as weird or creepy when interacting with the other sex.

because for all time men are the ones expected to make advances on a woman they like and if the advances they make are awkward or in violation of the person's boundaries they are labeled as creepy or weird or stalkerish.

Obviously women will never have to deal with that because their never expected to make advances on a man they like and let's say if the roles were reversed or flipped around.

Women will never risk getting thrown those negative labels because women won't be perceived as a danger or a threat in a man's eyes but obviously it's not that way the other way around because men are typically on average a little bit bigger and a little bit stronger than women. Because of that, men can easily unfortunately be perceived or viewed as a danger or a threat in a woman's eyes.

Yeah sometimes it makes me mad and angry that the hormone testostorone exists, its often argued and said that testosterone is a key critical reason as to why men have always been expected to do the pursuing and making advances



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08 Jul 2024, 10:05 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
I did acting classes in Uni and loved them. I did really well too. We had to learn on our own to juggle four items whilst reciting a soliloquy. It was kind of a side project everyone had in addition to the regular work, so we could learn to coordinate our speech with our body movements and concentration at the same time. I can still do it and still remember my soliloquy from Romeo & Juliet. I didn't know I was autistic and it's not like this skill or acting in general still helps me today because I can't even mask, but I can see how acting lessons would help a lot of people with basic social gestures, body language, and conversation skills. After all, they give stage directions and tell how how to act / appear when representing various emotions. There's also improv where you learn to speak to others without a script. Highly recommended.

"juggle four items whilst reciting a soliloquy."
8O :o and naive me thought that (simultaneously) playing "sailor's hornpipe" on the solo manual (organ), "twinkle twinkle" on the accompaniment manual, and "mary had a little lamb" on the bass pedals was hard. you got me way beat.



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08 Jul 2024, 10:35 pm

It didn’t help that my parents scared off any girl I might have been interested in seeing. Mom would have rather lopped off their head. Dad, on the other hand, would make a first class jackass out of me every time he had the chance. It was so bad, I developed PTSD, especially when the local girl gangs where I grew up tried to get in my pants.



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09 Jul 2024, 1:25 am

IsabellaLinton wrote:
The problem for me in that scenario was that I was so reclusive I didn't meet people who might have wanted to ask me out. I didn't go to parties or hang out with friends, and I didn't even work anymore. If someone tried to talk to me somewhere I often went mute. It's a miracle it finally worked for me at a medical appointment.

For those of you men who don't get out much or have a social life, where would you expect these women to find you and ask you out?
That is a very good point. I don't it's simply a matter of us as autistics needing to put ourselves out there more but rather us needing to be in the right environments & situations for us. It helps to know our niche though there can be lots of exceptions of coarse.


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09 Jul 2024, 8:46 am

The way my brain works might stop me from finding happyness



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09 Jul 2024, 9:47 am

IsabellaLinton wrote:
The problem for me in that scenario was that I was so reclusive I didn't meet people who might have wanted to ask me out. I didn't go to parties or hang out with friends, and I didn't even work anymore. If someone tried to talk to me somewhere I often went mute. It's a miracle it finally worked for me at a medical appointment.

For those of you men who don't get out much or have a social life, where would you expect these women to find you and ask you out?

It gets worse because even though I was going out and interacting with people, I rarely met any women that were single. I learned later that it wasn't just me, there aren't many single women here due to just how many tech workers moved her and just how lopsided the mix is. So, not only were there fewer women out there, but the ones that were could afford to be picky.

In other areas it's flipped, which sucks for women.



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09 Jul 2024, 10:26 am

Fnord wrote:
After high school, I had no trouble meeting women and getting dates.  The trouble I had was in getting dates after the first one.  Then it was a matter of learning how to mask my weirdness interact in 'normal' ways.

My wife and I have been together now for over 30 years.


I myself got a decent amount of dates during my early 20s. Like you, however, I had a hard time keeping the woman interested.

I imagine your wife is ok with your quirks, am I right? I say this because it's next-to-impossible for you to spend 30 years masking.



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09 Jul 2024, 10:33 am

IsabellaLinton wrote:
The problem for me in that scenario was that I was so reclusive I didn't meet people who might have wanted to ask me out. I didn't go to parties or hang out with friends, and I didn't even work anymore. If someone tried to talk to me somewhere I often went mute. It's a miracle it finally worked for me at a medical appointment.

For those of you men who don't get out much or have a social life, where would you expect these women to find you and ask you out?


I can only speak for myself.

In my case at least, despite having hardly any social life, there's still a decent amount of opportunity for me to get asked out:

-Coworkers (Yeah, I know it's taboo to find a date/sex partner at work in 2024. That being said, the workplace used to be one of the most common places to find a spouse. Which makes perfect sense. Put us in close proximity with each other for 40 hours a week, it's inevitable certain employees will end up fancying each other)

-Back when I worked in stores, female customers

-Employees at the cafe I frequently go to

-Neighbors

-Employees in the building where I live (This one is risky, as the employees in this building are prohibited from dating/having intercourse with residents. That being said, the last time I had sex I didn't pay for was with an employee from my building. And another employee from my building made a comment once that sounded like she might have been hinting that she wanted me to ask her out)