friendship with another aspie? / *terrified*

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background: the only aspies i have been friends with historically have been mutual friends of a "group friendship" -- i haven't had too much pressure to interact with them one-on-one.

when i have interacted with other aspies, we usually stink at reading each other and the convo ends shortly and awkwardly.

i tend to have a slightly better track record with NT's (unless they just think i'm too weird and avoid me).

but anyways i made friends with this guy online and we started texting each other, and all was fun and well. but when i talked to him on the phone i realized he is probably also aspie (he has speech patterns identical to mine which freaked me out), and now i am terrified i can't maintain the same friendship face-to-face.

i don't even know if he knows he's aspie, and i don't want to offend or hurt him by mentioning it....

does anyone out there have successful friendships with other aspies? do you have communication problems / hard time reading each other? awkward silences? help?

But you might be able to read each other very well, because you may be of a similar neurology/psychology. Maybe it's just "NTs" you can't read well.

Just give it a try. It isn't a tragedy if you end up not being for each other; there are plenty of people who are AND who aren't Aspie who will be suited to you; you just need to find someone with the same values including about communication.

when i was 21, a 61 year old (sixty one) in Structural Engineering 110b: Solid Mechanics class, at ucsd. had the nerve to tell me that he read a book about AS and he diagnosed me with AS and he diagnosed himself with AS.

one year a priori, a neuropsychiatrist diagnosed me with AS.

so i told the sixty one year old to get a professional diagnosis, go to counseling, get a support group. he acted like psychologists do not know anything. (b/c psychology ain't an STEM subject).

in some ways, we were similar. for example, we were socially awkward. had no "friends" or very few. gorged.

we were different political parties. i am trans and he was homophobic. (that was 2004, before the Gender Identity Laws. before Caitlyn Jenner won the arthur ashe courage award.)

he was on Atkins. while i was nearly a vegetarian. he was great at driving. i am terrible at driving.

but he was just so. judgmental. he had an opinion about everything and he could not just accept something he did not like.

at first, it was refreshing to interact with him. but his ego was just so large. it was just too much.

"i have a lot of respect for you. anyone that hurts you should be shot!", he told me.

(what?) living things have to hurt other living things to continue living. driving cars causes pollution. some vegans claim that "meat is murder". some cosmetics involve animal testing. sweat shops and child labor sew clothes.

it is not possible to live, without hurting anyone or anything. it is not possible to know all of the results, of any given action.

chaos theory

seriously though.

he had a BS in Physics and he was an electrical engineer. he told me. something like that.

his IQ score must have been much higher than mine. he was much older than me.

but he acted so morally innocent.

like. he. had. never. done. anything wrong before.

seriously he had a big ego.

and i felt like i was selling out just by interacting with him. he had the nerve to refuse to call me "he". he told me that he would avoid pronouns altogether. (and he did).

At school several years ago, i befriended (or they) a suspected aspie or otherwise but i just felt out of place, walking in pace with another doesn't feel right to me aspie or not, i was typically disinterested in their topic of conversation, a genre of music i disliked and the way he expressed himself disturbed me. He somewhat looked like he had drugs prior to us meeting up the way he recited all the lyrics to a popular song that I hated at that time but we didn't know each others tastes in music so I stayed silent and let him trod along - although he does sort of hang out with a suspicious crowd whom i've seen deal drugs and whatnot.

Other times like as recent as 2014 made acquaintances rather than friends through employment agencies who might be on the spectrum, approached them but the reaction was the opposite, I was the noisy disruptive one in comparison to the quiet timid person I was trying to make conversation with. I never asked anyone if they were diagnosed with anything, i'm always thinking in my mind how to approach them and make the right decision.

short update, bc why not? i was worried about nothing XD hanging out together, was like way more comfortable than I had ever felt around a lot of my friends. i'm super glad i didn't freak out and bail XD

I hope you enjoy each other's company, for a long time to come!

I have had successful friendships/relationships with two Aspies, of which, have been very different from one another. The first Aspie friendship was with a childhood friend, which blossomed into a long-term relationship. He and I were very alike, and we fit together, perfectly. The other, a friend, for the past, two years, and, conversely, we'd experience some turbulence, between us. Despite this, we seem to recover bits of our friendship, or, at the very least, remain friendly with one another, enough, to enjoy each other's company, from time to time and I will, always, adore him, beyond measure.

Don't give up, if things become contentious between you/within your friendship. Instead, spend time, apart, to gather your thoughts, your emotions, and simply allow things to even out, on their own. And, always, always stay positive! ~That's all I have.

edit: Sorry, am probably not the best one for helping out here... I Truly wish you the best of luck and hope it works out for you both!

Last edited by 1Biggles1 on 28 Jul 2017, 2:34 am, edited 1 time in total.

yay.

it's a good feeling, knowing that dread and worry has been futile for things have indeed gone smoothly.

haven't met anyone in meatspace who has had speech patterns identical to mine. if i did i think i wouldn't pick up on it quickly, though.

my only aspie friend exists on the opposite face of the world so i haven't had the opportunity to interact with her face to face yet, but even then i can tell you that clarity in communication is of the utmost importance.

we've had our shares of awkward "silences", silences in this case meaning periods of no contact, but those were almost always started by unclear intentions conveyed, conflicting messages, and an unwillingness on one side (usually me ) to reach out to the other. which has always proven to be displaced and reconciliation has shown itself to be a beautiful thing, even if it's preferable to not have to do it.

anyway.

what did you two do together? are you gonna hang out again?

My best friend had Bipolar. She had frequent panic attacks and self harms often. Her ECT is destroying her memory. One of my closest friends has anorexia and Borderline Personality Disorder. She frequently starves herself. She has a hard time with family. I sometimes have to put up with stuff, but they have to deal with me. I wish them the best. I enjoy every second talking with them. I have another close friend that at a point couldn't leave her house from anxiety.

Kiprobalhato, thank you for the pointers, i really appreciate it! we grabbed coffee, walked around a park, then had lunch (nothing super crazy) XD. yeah, we're gonna meet up again in a couple of weeks