Giving up on friendships

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Have you give up on friendships? Either your current ones, or attempts to make new ones? I'm trying so hard and nothing is coming over it. I feel like giving up.

Yes, many times.

... But I'm a love and friendship addict so I always end up coming back to it, in a way or another.

Usually they give up on me.

I had one friend who I sort of gave up on. I thought we were friends. However, she was bad when it came to e-mails. Neither of us were phone people, so we usually communicated via e-mail. However, I was nearly always the one who initiated contact, and she didn't always respond. I mentioned this, and she said she'd try harder to stay in touch. Well, I guess to her that meant only by an e-mail newsletter her fans subscribed to (she was a singer/songwriter at the time) or by posting something on her blog. I felt that if we were really friends, she'd want to stay in touch in a way that was more meaningful than grouping me in with her fans and sponsors.

Then it happened. I got a very brief e-mail from her. Basically, it said that she was busy and couldn't say much, but wanted to let me know she was thinking of me. I was touched that she would take time out from her busy schedule to say hi. Then I read her blog. In one of her posts she said that she had just spent the last few hours mindlessly surfing the Internet because she was bored. I noticed the date and time of her post. I took another look at the e-mail she sent. Using my keen detective skills, I realized she sent me the e-mail (when she claimed to be busy) during the time she said she was mindlessly surfing the Internet out of boredom.

Now, I suppose there could be a legitimate explanation, but on top of other things she'd done (like posting about planning a business trip to the city I live in, but never once mentioning it to me to see if we could plan a meetup), I decided I had to do something. So I unsubscribed from her newsletter and blog. That was it. If she really wanted to be friends, I figured, she'd get in touch with me directly. That was over 4 years ago and I still haven't heard from her.

I have one friend right now. I've known her 8 years and in that time she has stayed in touch, done everything she could to be there for me, and made me feel special and cared for. And I've always tried my best to do the same for her. As long as she wants to stay friends, I will.

However, I've pretty much given up on seeking new friendships. It can get very lonely (my friend lives a few hundred miles away and I don't get to see her very often), but I'm just fed up with people who make all kinds of claims about how much they love me, how much they care about me, blah, blah, blah, only to let me down when I need them. If someone new actually wants to take the time and effort to know me, to try to understand me, I might reconsider. Until that time, if it happens, I'll just be grateful for the one true friend I have.

"Friendships" (more like "acquaintanceships") over the years have just fizzled out, because I really don't know how to be a friend. I don't know what's required of me - how often am I supposed to call/text/email this person? I have to go on assumptions, because I've got no way of knowing. If I go overboard, I feel like I'll probably be seen as annoying; if I slack on the contact, I'm sure I'll come across as not caring about the other person or the relationship. Lose-lose situation, pretty much. I've had almost no friendships with other females, mainly because I have little in common with other women.

A case in point: a girl I'd met in '08 at a now-former employer (via casual chatting here and there, we'd discovered that we'd both been g0ths, liked similar music, etc.) seemed to want to be my friend. I thought that was cool, and was flattered in a way, because most people don't bother with me at all, or only do so in an impersonal, cursory, or hateful manner.

This girl and I had a couple of meals together, and saw a couple of "girly" movies together as well, since her husband had no interest in either movie and had refused to accompany her. Well, I learned pretty quickly that she has a serious drinking problem, and that her husband is abusive (mentally and physically). I could only try to be sympathetic when she'd regale me with her tales of woe, because I couldn't relate to her problems, and I have a difficult time putting myself in another's shoes, as it were. I explained to her that I have severe social deficits, and that I tend to "lose" people over time/along the way - and that she mustn't take personally any seeming neglect on my part.

This girl's also a member of the gym where I work. Fast-forward to this summer; I hadn't seen her for months because of my wonky work schedule and because of a film training program I'd attended. I had a weird feeling that something was amiss, though. I texted her at the beginning of September to find out how she was doing, only to learn that she'd crashed her car whilst drunk, and that her husband's abuse had increased as a result. I asked her how I could help - to which she replied that she needed "a friend, not a mom."

I haven't heard from her since. I feel like I've failed her as a friend...that a "normal" female would've known the "right" things to do or say. I tend to forget about people when I don't see them regularly (even my own brother!) - it's not out of any hatred or animosity toward them, it's that I've got so much crap in my head that there's no room for other people unless they're in my day-to-day life and I interact with them regularly. I hope the girl in question's ok, and that she's getting help (she'd been seeing a therapist)...but I really don't feel like I should contact her again. I dunno what I'd say, and I have no idea if she considers me to be a friend anymore, or if she wants me in her life at all.

I give up on friendships couse I can not see the point of them . I mean. I have very high thought of what is considered a friendship and also I have a problem with the everyday stuff part of a friendship. To maintain that is killing me. So I often just stop the friendship after a while.

The ones I do have a friendship with that works is other aspies couse they are more logical and say things clearly . Gives me less anexity . its just works better.

I didn't want to give up on friendships but when I did I became a lot happier in general. It relieved some of the biggest stressors in my life. Stressing over how I was being perceived, stressing over how often to contact someone when they weren't really responding to me, stressing over wondering if they might actually call me this weekend to do something. The list goes on and it's all gone now. I do sometimes miss my old friends but they clearly don't miss me because I never hear from any of them. Occasionally I'll try and contact them but if nothing comes of it then I try to just let it go and move on.

I have many times, because 99% of the time, they are never beneficial for me. Who needs people...

I've gradually drifted apart from a lot of people, including the really close ones.

I feel bad at the start, but with time, I think less about it and get on with Uni and my special interests.
They don't try to contact me but I occasionally say "hi how have you been" etc to them on Facebook or by email.
If they don't want to respond, then that's their problem, not mine.
I've already made some effort.

I don't really want to make any more friends at Uni apart from the few that I already have coz I know I'll have trouble maintaining contact with them later on. I know my limits.

I've recently given up on one, I just don't feel as if I fit in with that person anymore.

I have hardly had any real life friends over the last decade anyway... all mine were on the net, and drifted away or I simply lost interest.
I have hit a point where in spite of feeling acutely lonely, I have lost all interest in even trying to talk to other people, so it is instinct now to respond to others in a defensive and aggressive way if they show any sign of interest.
However, a man who goes in the same subway as me for coffee after shopping the same store as me, recently approached me to ask why I read my magazines so close to my face and if I need glasses. Then he came and sat nearby and started talking about random things that werent small talk.
I am pretty sure he is aspie as well, to be honest.
He said he had felt intrigued because on monday I stood up and turned to him and gave him a look of daggers, that could have frozen a person.
I tend to look at anyone like that now who I catch looking in my direction.

But, now we talk whenever we see one another, and it is nice really cos I have not had anyone to talk to in this city for a long time, and also because he talks to a man who I have liked for 3 and a half years, but who will not talk to me, lol.

It is funny how the world works.

But yes, it is odd, to be lonely and envy others for their families and friends, yet at the same time, to have no desire or motivation to even try.