I need to categorise and I find it hard to connect.

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Shocking, I know.

The ASD evaluating psychiatrist I saw recently was already convinced I'm AS in the first half of the interview. I had provided the tests for her in preparation and so she just needed to go through and clarify what I meant, etc. She says that she thinks there's a 90%+ chance that her colleagues will agree so we're expecting a diagnoses.

While I'm happy that my suspicion seems to be correct, I became distraught today. I'd like to copy/paste and edit a FB status I made to some of the people I know. I don't know if anybody can help and to be honest I'm concerned I'll be mocked. It is hard to follow, I think, and you might have to skip further down if you get bored.

Summary: I'm upset because I don't understand what friends, best friends, and other labels are supposed to feel like. I don't know if I'll ever have them because I don't even have family bonding.

Either way, here goes (I prefer Asp to Aspie):

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It's stupid but I suppose there are a few things on my mind. I'm going with this one since it's been a long-standing upset of mine.

Since it's almost positive that I'm an asp (please, no snake joke, please) this probably makes sense. It at least should explain why categorisation is so important to me and why I find it hard to form attachments.

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Romantic ones usually begin straight away with sex. This is not something I am going to do any more. Either way, it felt like it was the only way to form a proper bond and in my naivety I thought I saw meaning in it.

With [ex] I thought there was an actual spiritual connection. People tend to think my ideas in those realms are bizarre but he would sit and listen to me, then discuss and positively affirm a lot. That hadn't happened before. If there's anything I miss, anything that still hurts and will remain hurting, it's the lose of that. Everything else can be cut away - in fact it almost has been in my robotic manner - but that will always hurt.

I know spiritual bonds don't have to come from shared ideas. They're deeper than that, they transcend words. At least, that's what it felt like with [ex friend]. We didn't do the whole freaky deaky occultist dance, yet there was something that intertwined. We were never in a relationship though we had sex. He hurt me a lot.

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As for friends... I think I only ever really had one "best friend" and that was a childhood one from nursery to primary five. It still aches when I think of [friend A], as I have been a lot lately.

[Friend B] and I had something I can't explain. We'd call each other best friends but I couldn't keep up with the parties, get out the house, or compete with all the others she knows. Apparently it's theorised that humans can keep up to 150 actual bonds with others. Considering the average FB user has 300+, it makes me wonder what chance I have?

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[Flatmate and carer, also an ex] and I have a strange relationship. For ease, I call it best friends. Really I have no idea. Perhaps I'm too dependent on him for it to feel like that or maybe it is our differences. The latter won't mean we can't be friends, of course, it's simply something I don't understand.

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What ARE best friends anyway? Past what they do, what does it feel like? If it is explained and I understand, does it mean I can't have them? I don't have family blood bonding after all. What if I can form higher attachments outside of romance and odd set ups like [carer]?

Really, I'm serious: what are best friends?

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People seem to either have all these colourful labels and others see everybody as friends while not caring about it.

I want a best friend. I want to re-meet souls or form that kind of attachment. I want to... get outside. I want to be at least a little "normal". It's not only Asperger's that harms this, trauma plays its part too.

This year I became unsure of what even friends are. They don't work how I thought they did.

I'm not sure how I'd categorise the ones I consider close. A few I have romantic feelings about, in most cases inappropriately. The others are extremely caring and kind and it wounds me when life tries to crush them. A deep stabbing or stomach drop. I have similar empathy for the stories of strangers though, simply not always as strongly.

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When I was younger I thought all I had to do was try hard enough and it would happen. I'd make a best friend, somebody who would link arms with me and I'd be on par with all the other most important people in their life. It... mostly hasn't felt that way.

Feelings never made sense and were hard to describe. I thought that was how it was or maybe it was other issues in my head which would possibly lift some day. Autism never goes away.

It's probably alexithymia. Maybe I have best friends and soul sisters/brothers/aliens and I don't know it.

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I don't know how others categorise me. Descriptions are nice enough but they don't make sense in my head. They are a jumble of beautiful words which lack an anchor, robbing them of some of their impact.

At least something in my interpersonal relationships is doing well in terms of naming aspects because I've been allowed to do that, even structure out what it means, and it hasn't been taken as freakish or wrong.

That situation has me hopeful for change in areas and could assist with some of all of this madness. A slow and nonconforming scenario in extreme early stages but one I am optimistic about. It might go towards me separating out... certain feelings and thoughts. [My carer and I are not courting but we are both courting a mutual friend; everybody knows and we're like a happy little group at the moment, taking it very slow]

There's actually ways of teaching aspie kids how to understand emotions versus thoughts. I wish I'd had that.

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If I do get the diagnosis I might take No.6's "Late Diagnosis" course thing. It's for people who got diagnosed in teens or adulthood. It runs for about ten weeks and teaches you about the syndrome. I've read and chatted a lot. I'm not sure how much it could take me beyond what I pick up from research and communication.

I've never really thought about what 'best friends' are. I know it's different as an adult than it is when you're school-aged, I found it easier then. I have 3 close friends, who I can be certain don't see me as a novelty, or a charity case. 1 has been my friend since we were 4, I think the long history helps, 1 is on the spectrum (ADHD) so we 'get' each other, and the other is a total misanthrope who offends people all the time.
It 'feels' different with all of them tbh. The first two I don't get to see very often, so I'm always excited to talk to them/see them. The third I speak to at least 3 x a week, and that feels like.....you know when you're sitting quietly and processing everything that happened during the day? It's like that. I don't know if it's the same for other people.

I have plenty of '.....friends', who might invite me to group things (that I can't endure) but they don't fall over themselves trying to hang out with me one-on-one.

Are you lonely?

First, thanks for sharing your experience.

Second... I don't think I'm lonely in a straightforward manner. I have friends on the spectrum, a few just don't contact. I don't take it personally in their case because I can't imagine there's any reason other than getting on with their own thing.

I think it's a loneliness from feeling "apart" from everybody. The ASD friends I talk to more regularly are not as distant in terms of me understanding them but I still mess up. There's a feeling that I don't fit anywhere. The categorisation issue merely amplified it, I think.

Luckily, a friend said something in the passing about making a family from friends. I decided that since I never had blood ties but I can comprehend what family members are meant to feel like, I could box people into those areas and have it make sense. It was almost immediate relief.

It's a bit tricky with my flatmate/carer. We had a year long relationship then he decided to stay because of all the assistance I need. It's been several years and it's sort of like an asexual and aromantic marriage. For now I think a close and older stepbrother fits. The kind who may as well be blood-related.

Close/Best friends are siblings. Friends who near that but either aren't there yet or you don't feel you deserve to "sibling" them are close cousins who you'd always hang with as a kid. Acquaintances are the family members you meet only at holidays.

I don't know if that would help anybody else in the same position as me. For now the model appears to make me calmer.

In terms of romantic relationships... Special Friends is courting when you've agreed to get to know each other first and it's not somebody pushing you away, Dating isn't a relationship and is just more serious wooing, and a Relationship is a relationship.

I started babbling and need my carer to help with my blocked ear so I'll leave it at that.