A Question To Aspies age 30 and up

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From my experience it gets better from year to year, but was (and still is) pretty hard work.

Most social situations I pass now, but I could not have managed that without help of friends who took me like I am and explained me patiently how to deal in certain situations.
It´s easier because I do artistic work and it´s socially accepted to be a bit eccentric as an artist

But still there is a gap and will ever be.

I hated it as I was younger. I felt like blind. Every year brings more experience (sometimes by try and error), I feel safer in myself and with the ones who "chose" me with all my issues, and every year I find more peace, accept me more as the one who I am.
So: yes, it gets better.

In my experience, it all depends upon how much social interaction I have access to. In my thirties, I had a job where I had to work with clients fairly closely for hours at a time. At first it was horrible, but over time I learned to enjoy it and found myself looking forward to work.

I have a couple of friends who, while introverted themselves, had grown up in sociable families and knew a great deal more than I did about how to easily interact with others. I learned how to eat at restaurants with these friends and even engage in mundane social interaction with strangers.

These friends now have children and this, to some extent, limits some of what we are able to do together. Also I now work at a job where I am alone most of the day. The result is I feel I am losing my social skills and am growing more and more reclusive. It's a habit I need to break, despite how difficult it appears.

So I guess what I'm saying is yes, over time it can get easier, but it depends on some of the choices you make about how much interaction with people you will tolerate. I am beginning to feel I made choices that have lead me to regress in my social skills and now I have to do a bit of work to regain them. I recommend that you try to maintain some minimum level of social interaction throughout your life. Like physical exercise, you can lose tone and have to work hard to rebuild it.

Good luck,

Lars

At 49, I have to agree with this. One can learn to pass for neurotypical, but that's not the same thing as becoming neurotypical.

I will point out, though, that there are major disadvantages to the neurotypical way of interacting. A lot of their implicit communication is actually pretty inaccurate. Two of them may go away from a conversation thinking they agree with each other, but actually believing completely different things. Often there are no consequences, but sometimes it can backfire severely. I think it's more effective to communicate literally and explicitly.

Now that I'm married to someone about as aspie as myself, I have little reason to socialize with neurotypicals, and I like it that way.

depends on
1) insight - how aware are you of your needs/differences/deficits?
2) motivation - do you want to change them,
3) knowledge - do you know how to do it differently?