figuring out if an Aspie male likes you?

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First off I'll start by saying I don't have Asperger's Syndrome. I met a guy on New Year's Eve who is indeed an Aspie (he doesn't know I know) We've gone on a couple of dates and I see him when his band plays. At first I just thought he was EXTREMELY shy but his friend told me he has Asperger's. On the first date, we went to the movies and then went bowling and played pool. He didn't make a single move. So all we did was hug and ended the night. Then he didn't call me for a week. I ended up seeing him at a Club where he was playing and we hit it off more this time. We held hands and made out for quite a while and he was really into it. Of course he stopped it. But then he gave me a goodbye kiss and left. He called me the next day and asked if I wanted to go out again. Well we went to the movies again and I made the move to hold his hand and as soon as I did it was like that was all he was waiting for. I tried to kiss him in the theater but he pulled back. When he took me home we kissed for a while when he walked me to the door. Anyways a week passed with no phone call so I called him and he seemed happy to talk to me. Is this normal for an Aspie male? to not call? Do I have to make ALL the moves???

It is, indeed, normal for a person with Aspergers to be a little too... Reclusive and withdrawn. The reason, you ask? Firstly, we are terrible socially. Due to this, many of us somewhat fear that when we say something it'll all go wrong or that we won't be able to find the right words to say. In a friendship, it's casual enough that making social mistakes is okay, but in a relationship? That's what petrifies us.

Secondly, I would consider myself very lucky if I were you. Although you may not know this, those with Aspergers tend to... Well... Somewhat fuss over the likes of physical contact unless they incredibly deeply know the person. When taking someone with Aspergers on a date, they may react to your romantic gestures (however, I said you're "very lucky" because some of us actually won't react positively), however, you'll hardly ever see them initiating until (I assume) engagement or marriage. Simple things like holding hands, for us, may be a huge fear. Although we truly, dearly want to do so, we can never find the "right moment" etc. to do so. I, myself, don't know whether it's the texture or whether it's the fear I'll do something incredibly clumsy to ruin the romantic interaction.

Hi. It certainly sounds like he likes you, and enjoys your company. I wouldn't advise reading too much into the week-without-a-call. Some aspies (mine!) find telephone calls disconcerting. Mine also will get absorbed into something. I sometimes forget how difficult that was for me in the beginning, I really grieved not being able to chat with him and it created a feeling of disconnectedness in how i related to him at first.

Do you have an email relationship with this person? If not, that may be a good idea. Email would allow him time to respond, and consider his words, and go at a different pace than the sense of immediacy in a phone call.

My own personal experience is that I had to be "easy" with a lot of things and consider the rule book out the window. Be careful about making a judgment on what his behavior means, based on experience with other men (for instance: He doesn't call, ergo he's just not that into me).

Take it easy, and ask for what you need. Probably 6 weeks into dating my now-husband, I said to him: If we plan a date for next weekend, I would really enjoy a phone call or email during the week because I miss you. His response was, "But I have nothing to talk about until I see you again." Very different way of thinking!! But he did begin to send an email mid week, because I asked and it was a reasonably easy thing for him to do.

Good luck.

You haven't specified your age or his, but I'm guessing you're both twenty-somethings. He may just not have a great deal of experience and be hesitant to jump into a situation in which he sees tremendous potential for misreading cues and embarrassing himself. Or he may have plenty of experience and just not want to mislead you into thinking things are more serious than they are. Since things have not gotten any more physical than making out, I'm guessing its the former.

As far as his reactions to physical contact, that can really vary from one individual to another, some are much more sensitive to it than others, personally, it very much depends on mood and just how relaxed and comfortable I feel in that moment. A touch that's very sensual when I'm ready for it, can be grating and intrusive if I'm not. People who just walk into a room and start hugging folks they barely know will always baffle me. Why would you want someone else's scent clinging to you until your next shower, unless you had some intimate emotional bond with them? Yeecchh! Oh, and keep in mind that many of us have a hypersensitivity to perfumes and colognes as well. Go verrrry light on the body sprays...

I agree that keeping in touch by email might be easier for him, it is rather common for Aspies to find phone conversations every bit as awkward as face-to-face social interactions (and sometimes more so). I won't answer my phone at all until I recognize the voice on the machine (or the number on the ID) and sometimes even then I wait until I'm ready to return the call. With email and thread posts we have more time to compose our thoughts and communicate clearly without the awkwardness of having to process external stimuli like multiple people, background noise, body language, facial expressions, awkward pauses and eye contact while trying to decide what's the right thing to say under the current circumstances. As I like to put it: We think perfectly well, we just don't think rapidly.

If he didn't like you, he wouldn't have kissed you on more than one occasion. I'm with them.

I'm 21 and he is 31. He's not very experienced and he doesn't socialize at all. He flourishes in playing the guitar. He gets on stage and plays, but leaves after the show. He doesn't stick around and socialize. He is sensitive to cigarrette smoke. I happen to smoke cigarrettes, and he actually still hung around me the first night I met him. He didn't say anything about it. Later on, his friends told me that he doesn't like smoke and they were surprised that he hung around me. He stayed at the club until 4am that night. They said it was very unusual. He started staying after the shows whenever I started coming to them. I don't smoke when I go out with him and if I do it's menthol. I really like him alot but I'm very confused sometimes. I'm not used to having to initiate everything. It's making me shy and I'm really very outgoing.

Quit smoking! It will make you old and that happens soon enough already. And most definitely lose you some good guys, potentially this one!

Well, leaving immediately after the job is done and not sticking around to socialize is certainly very Aspie.

On a side note, I've been a smoker for years and recently switched to a lithium battery electronic cigarette, and I highly recommend giving it a try - you still get your nicotine fix, but there's no actual smoke (it heats a tobacco-flavored nicotine liquid into water vapor) so there is no tar-filled smoke to gum up your lungs or smell up the room or your hair and clothing. I wasn't sure whether it would be a reasonable substitute, but I've been favorably impressed - it actually recreates the sensation of inhaling smoke into your lungs, including the puff of 'smoke' (water vapor) when you exhale, but the vapor immediately dissipates into the air without leaving any odor, or cloudy haze in the room. And if you want, you can get the nicotine liquid in all sorts of flavors, including menthol and various fruits. And you can puff water vapor in establishments that prohibit tobacco smoke.

I recommend the Joye 510. Startup cost is less than most smokers spend in a month on regular cigarettes, and they're rechargable for months before you need to replace them. The cartridge that holds the actual liquid can be refilled manually many times before it needs to be replaced.

FYI:

E Cig Demo

SmokeyTreats

AwesomeVapor

Seems to have been covered pretty well by the first replies, but for reiteration, yes you'll most likely have to make the vast majority of the moves. Or, if you want to speed things up, be logical and direct, IE;

Flat out tell him your feelings, your intentions and ask him his. No subtlety, no indirectness, no insinuations or entendre's. When you feel inclined to be physical either do it, or (this is probably prefered) ask or say you're about to do it. You're lucky your Aspie seems to be physically comfortable, at least enough so that you haven't mentioned him pulling back or seemingly adversely uncomfortable. If he had tactile issues like a decent amount of us you'd've noticed a lot sooner. However, it would be good to ask him any sensory issues, because although touch doesn't seem to be one, scent, sound and light could still be.

Definitely recommend email and IM's for communication when you're not physically together, or if you're more computer savvy, ventrilo. Phones are almost as bad as face to face. And don't be surprised if when you switch to electronic communications that they come from him more often.

His behaviour is quite common for people with aspergers. In time, and with a lot of patience he may make some moves on his own, but as Vyn says, you will probably end up shouldering most of the responsibility in this relationship. Good luck.

One of the things you have to understand, and this has been alluded to by several posters already, is that most people communicate with more than words. Most people are not even aware that they do it, or that they are listening to this subtext, because this nonverbal communication is second nature to them.

Many aspies, however, have difficulty reading this subtext. In some cases, they may be aware that this communication is happening, but are unable to translate. In other cases, they be literally blind to this form of communication, and are only academically aware of it because it is described to them by others.

Because of this, aspies often appear to be 'weird'. What is actually happening is that you are communicating to them, and simply assume that they detect this communication and are responding to it, while they may not be aware of what you are attempting to communicate, or even that you are. Further complicating this is that aspies are not stupid, and so they are aware that they have social difficulty because of this difficulty with communication. As a result, aspies are often nervous about unfamiliar or overwhelming social situations.

The advice to be explicit is good. It will also help to ask him to be explicit in his intentions as well. My wife, who is not an aspie, and I have found that this helps to smooth communication somewhat. Be aware, however, that socializing naturally is not necessarily something he can learn to do, and compensatory skills are both difficult and draining to use.

easiest way to find out is to ask.