Need help helping my best friend ..... ( a little long )
Ok this may seem a bit odd but here goes... So yeah anyway like 4 years ago I met one of my best friends in middle school who also has AS ( i don't know for sure but judging how he acts compared to my signs of it , it seems pretty obvious.) However if you barely knew him you'd never be able to tell , He is very smart and inquisitive, takes some AP Classes but also participates in the Ecology-Science team and is a starting lineman on the varsity football team. However outside of school he does NOTHING but play video games ( im positive its all he does cause he really kicks my ass at Super Smash bros. ,Street Fighter or any game for that matter ). Anyway long story short he will not usually leave his cave (room), unless his dad forces him to or if he has to do something school related, though he does have a good amount of free time. Another issue is that i am his only friend, which is ironic considering he spends 5 hours a day with the same 25 poeple daily , so there must be some connection..... but no, sometimes i can force him to go outside to see a movie or soemthing but not often. Also , he has no problem talking to new people or people he knows at all but sometimes when he talks to people he just makes a fool of himself in an attempt to amuse himself and me, which utterly fails and creeps the person out ( for example one time he found a shoe somewhere but then put it back down and he asked a random guy 5 mins later "do you want to buy a shoe, lets work out a price , c'mon buddy..." which made the dude walk away ) ,and i can tell he does this because he doesn't know how to converse confortably with most people, when really he can come across as a cool guy if he'd talk seriously like he does to me. So............................ ok if you read this far my REAL ISSUE HERE....since i've already hit my "revelation" a while back ( when you realize its no big deal afterall , going outside making friends and you just gotta do it ya know...) , it's really sad that he cannot see his revelation and that he can make friends im really sure of it, but he isn't clicking yet. So I wanted to sit down and discuss how it affected me and how he can change too , but i don't know how to go about doing it or what to say without being super akward....
Suggestions ??? anyone do something similar???
?Perhaps he only wants to be with people he knows he can trust?
He could also be happy as is or could be afraid of change.
You may feel really happy with your revelation but he may be happy as he is at the moment. I'd say just being there for him as a friend would be good (try not to push him towards a 'revelation').
If there is a revelation for him it will come in it's own time. If he starts to talk about that kind of thing on his own, do what you think is best then. You know your friend, you probably know how to talk to and understand him really well.
Six thoughts:
1. Enjoy your friendship.
2. Your friend may be uncomfortable around you if you start pointing out his social inadequacies.
3. Don't assume that having a "revelation" will solve his social problems.
4. If he truly has Asperger's then he may be completely spent after a day of going to school and attending football practice. He may need the alone time, focusing on his own interests, to unwind by himself after a stressful day.
5. Your friend may be perfectly fine and happy the way he is. You told us what you think and how you feel, but you haven't told us anything about how your friend thinks and feels, which is the real issue.
Oh right.. his feelings, well pretty much , he is "content" or bored ( maybe depressed since i always used to hide it when i stayed inside all the time ) mostly , he calls me randomly saying "man i've been playing Age of Empires all day and im super bored, this sucks so much...." and stuff similar to that , also it's not like he's always exhausted , after all football is only in the fall so in the spring time its the same problem , besides being a former soccer and lacrosse player , i personally have the energy to pal around with people afterward, also he gets more sleep than me too. Also don't get me wrong he's one of my best friends we usually have lots of fun together but still since is very limited on what he does it is ( in a sense ) impeding our ability to maintain our long-time friendship. His father ( who is oblivious to this issue BTW ) is also very strict about school work and the Ecology-Science team and has a routine for him to do even on weekends , he however is able to choose what times he wants to put things at but always puts it during the day. Anyway I'm almost certain his depression and guilt is building up even though he seems MOSTLY fine , after all i did the EXACT same thing and eventually it built up and came out as an violent outburst that caused damage to myself, my mother and my house , if it happened to him we'd all be screwed cause he is after all a starting lineman and near 6 and a half feet tall lol. So i just want to make sure he has all the options open to him , its not like i'll forcehim to choose what i'd like , but i'd like him to be aware of his choices.
I’m thinking of BYPRODUCTS.
The accidental kind.
Sometimes they do more good than deliberate acts.
For example, you do something that’s good for yourself, such a use him as a sounding board. You talk through your own “outburst,” the who, what, where, when and why, how you feel about it now, what you have learned, where you are going. Don’t be fake. Be totally selfish and focus on yourself, the truth, and issues that are relevant to you.
Just make it a habit. An on-going process. Your explanations and understandings will evolve over time as you work through them.
If your friend is helped as a byproduct, great. If not, you still got a free shrink out of the deal. And even if you can’t see a benefit to him right now, maybe something will sink in five years later.
Did this make any sense, and could it be helpful?
The accidental kind.
Sometimes they do more good than deliberate acts.
For example, you do something that’s good for yourself, such a use him as a sounding board. You talk through your own “outburst,” the who, what, where, when and why, how you feel about it now, what you have learned, where you are going. Don’t be fake. Be totally selfish and focus on yourself, the truth, and issues that are relevant to you.
Just make it a habit. An on-going process. Your explanations and understandings will evolve over time as you work through them.
If your friend is helped as a byproduct, great. If not, you still got a free shrink out of the deal. And even if you can’t see a benefit to him right now, maybe something will sink in five years later.
Did this make any sense, and could it be helpful?
Um , if your saying it won't sink in at once and that if i do things similar to this but not have it as my main intention it may work ,i kinda understand ,besides someone sat down and discussed the exact same thing to me and slowly i saw the puzzle pieces go together, but it did hit me all at once about what i had to do. I'm not exacty sure what you mean by use him as a sound board but if you mean i want to act a certain way then i do understand but also it's not like i wanna totally change him by any means afterall im friends with him ,not the perfectly-socially-adept guy who i want him to be sometimes. This is a little helpful ( though confusing lol ) so thanks.
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