Social success with AS

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With all these threads all pessimistic and what not, I thought I'd make a thread about people who are happy off with their social lives despite AS. I know I am, come here and spread your success stories! I know there's lots of AS people who have been able to overcome social awkwardness or at least have gotten better at it

Hello I'll add to this so I can hopefully give people some hope!

I'm 23 years of age, and have been quite alone ever since I hit puberty (last time I kissed a girl was over a decade ago!) i've been without friends for a long time. The last friend I had tried to kill herself, and I took that quite hard (I stopped her, followed by heartbreaking fights with her) -But not all is lost.

Last year I got myself diagnosed for Aspergers/HFA (unsure which since I have a bit of both criteria) but It has helped me learn my weaknesses, who I am and what I should do. I've systematically pushed myself towards people and now, six months later, I have three really nice female friends (I still don't like most guys my age, they're so childish) who trust me and like me. So much that one of them even kisses me when we meet sometimes (on the cheek!) They tell me very personal stuff too. I'm quite happy since I realised they were my friends, and allowed myself to fully trust them and open up. I'm such a different person then last year. I do like one of them a lot, but she already has someone , none the less she's awesome and I rather be a friend than nothing at all.

I'm also pushing myself to visit games weekends at a local warhammer store so I can try and play again, and maybe make a friend or two over there too. We'll see.

I guess if I have any tips;
- Be yourself, don't try to pretend to be someone else (I used to do that to hide myself).
- Take a step forward but don't rush it.
- If you have awkward moments with people that give you a chance to be their friends, explain them about your AS and that is why you sometimes may say something inappropriate or do something inappropriate.
- Try to find ways to turn your disadvantages into advantages. For example: I rarely talk, so instead I listen and I learned tricks to keep people interested in talking to you. Acknowledge what they say by nodding, saying 'yes' and asking the occasional question so they know you are interested in what they say. Even if the topics don't always appeal to you, just listen. It's what friends do , and if you ever have a problem they'll want to listen to you too!
- Keep a social log (tip from my psychologist) if you notice you may have said something wrong, read your log and find out. Don't keep it too long, just write down the topics you talked about or anything you weren't sure about saying.
- Try and be positive. I've noticed that if I feel down, people leave me alone despite me best efforts to hide it. Apparently people are really good at noticing tiny facial and body tell tail signs about it. People will find it a lot nicer to approach you if you smile
- Brush your teeth!

That's all I can think of for now. Hope I can help someone with this.

Guilliman is dead right. It's easy to say it's hard and give up, and you have a ready made excuse but there is so much to experience in life. When I started emulating more, I was worried about what I was supposed to do, I was trying to think NT and it made me nervous, it was hard work and it felt like lying. I came around to the Idea of translating. Body language and facial expressions are a second language and take work and practice but now I translate my actual emotions.

Think of it as climbing a mountian rather then a sprint. I try one new thing test it out and move forward. With practice and gradual progress I have passed NT's socialy in college. Tortaise and the Hair, just keep moving farward. If you mess up you've learned something new.

I don't tell people I have AS. I did tell one girl that I was realy weird with. Asking out and then ignoring a couple of time. Before I know about AS and eye contact and stuff. I felt she deserved it.

I used to think of it a Primatoligy when I was a kid, best obsession we can have. It made it fun, pretenting to be Jane Goodall blending into the Gorilas. I found "How to make friends and Influence people" to be very good. and "How to talk to anyone" by larry kind. I got them both as audiobook on bit torrent.

Remember if you're making mistakes your learning, it's nothing to be assamed of, it's something to be proud of.

I can say that I've had my many social ups and downs. One thing I can tell people is that its very gradual, there is no one solution towards achieving social success, its gradual. That's something that most people don't realize. Especially when you have NT's pushing you and they expect if you just try, you'll achieve NT socialness within a year and that's very unrealistic. Many NTs don't understand Aspergers. Us being social is so often extremely out of our element and in many ways we are forced to learn to become who we're not if we want success.

There will be many steps along the way and many people expecting more out of you then that's reasonable. Despite being torn out of your element, I think theirs some sense of self-identity you have to hold onto. Whatever's important to you.

Here's steps of my story. I was mute till I was 17.

1) I broke out of mutism, started talking to some people. It was very awkward.
2) I went to summer program, I learned more about NTs my age.
3) Senior year, I had my first friends, I found a community amongst my swim team and got diagnosed with Aspergers.
4) Freshman yr of college, I cliqued with a friend who was pretty much my social lifeline for the next 2 years. I got into so much trouble that semester and became suicidal
5) The following spring semester, I befriended this girl who mothered me out of my suicidal tendencies. By the end of freshman year I had my 1st real group of friends.
6) Soph year, I had a crush on a guy which ended badly. I learned what you shouldn't do with a guy you like. And I hungout with a tight knit group of friends, 3 gay guys and 1 straight one.
7) Jr the group fell apart, I ended up befriended a couple of girls.
I experimented with online dating trying to find a bf that year too. Had a fallout with a guy I dated online and my BFF. Spring semester was very depressing
9) I was depressed throughout spring and summer
10) Senior year was truely a year of depression recovery. I met so many new people and got a new friends. Finally had guy friends again so I was much happier.
11) Spring, I liked my 2 friends. Had a whole bunch of trouble yet 1 became a close friends now. Along with that, I made my first genuine close female friend
12) After graduation, I got a job at the supermarket. And I started learned small talk and I'm working hard for emotional stability.

Well there was still a lot I left out. So far, I've counted so many steps within the last 6 years of my life. I know theirs many more to come.

It's great to know other people that agree that AS should in no way stop the need for socialization Even if it's something little that you feel proud of or even if you have only one friend, feel free to post here. Remember, no pessimism allowed.