Preparing an aspie child for happiness

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If there's one regret I have in life it's that I wish that for the last half century I had invested my resources (time, energy, money) in myself rather than in relations with other humans. I only started becoming wiser in my forties.

But alas, we are raised by NTs (parents, counselors, teachers, the media) and for THEM investing only in yourself and not in relations with others is the worst that can happen to a human, so they raise us to waste our lives trying (and failing) to fit in.

This misguided attempt by many parents is, among other things, caused by the wrong assumption that the more the child learns to behave like an NT, the more accepted she will be in society. It's misguided because it's not a gradual issue. There's a threshold for acceptance, which we do not reach. However highly functioning an aspie, we don't pass that threshold and we remain on this side of the door to society.

The big difference is whether we were prepared to live happily on this side (by investing our best in ourselves during our productive years), or to consider this side a disgraceful worst-case scenario to be escaped at all costs and to fall into with shame, self-blame and despair.

When I was a child and misbehaved, my parents' worst punishment was to yell at me "When you grow up, you'll always be alone!"

I disagree that we will always be on the other side. I've managed to cross that barrier. It takes a delicate balance to be yourself, but work on the parts of you that, quite honestly, suck. I worked on myself for years, reading books, listening to audio's, going to seminars, watching videos to understand what I believe to be one of the most fundamental skills: Communication.

It can be done, but at the same time, am I ever going to act like an NT? No! But can I make myself better so that I can communicate effectively? Yes!

Communicate effectively? No, I'm talking about a stable social life.

I agree. I kind of got the rough end of the stick when my mother was upset, usually it was thrashing out that my attitude/personality or how I look was what drove people away - that I wanted to be different or difficult. In other words, being myself was always a bad thing. Not sacrificing myself for other people's gain was selfish. You start to be able to function less in society because your own self worth is utterly destroyed. And granted, I don't really "care what other people think of me." I am a low conflict type of guy, so if someone wants to think of me as something, then fine, I will not argue.

NT's take social interaction for granted when there are so many other aspects to it. Is life supposed to be about other people? Or is it supposed to be about yourself? And we are all naturally selfish creatures, but we have the illusion that spending effort to please everyone else is the way we are supposed to live. "We can only be happy if other people are." And parents, so worried that their square child won't fit in the round hole will chip away at them until they do. It's a warped kind of love I have never been able to understand.

I do believe in investing in relationships. With all my heart. Just not for aspies. For us, it's a dangerous way of wasting our resources, which we'll need later on in order to survive in this world, and it yields us nothing in return to assist with survival.

I'm one of the obviously few people with ASD who are also loners and don't feel a need to change this trait or to become someone else. Why would I need all those social skills unless I would be odd enough to choose a job that forces me to interact with humans? There are other jobs, much better choices, where I can work by my own for the most part.

Unless a person would strive for a career as politician or artist, i.e., a profession that thrives on publicity and sympathy, it just doesn't matter.

What your parents told you was stupid and also illogical because we were born alone and we're most likely gonna die alone, and people are basically alone, that's a fact.

Many NTs also feel lonely, one can feel lonely in a marriage or relationship, a family, a whole crowd of people. The physical presence of a person or the fact that you can call them doesn't mean anything since you can never be sure that they are not distracted, that they don't fake interest and then go and talk behind your back. Someone can sit right beside you and even hold your hand, but at the same time his thoughts and feelings can be light years away. People even manage to fantasize about another person while they're having sex with their spouse so I think the fear of being alone and in turn the conviction that a person can make sure they're not alone if they pay attention to others and try to be social, sensitive, whatever, is just an illusion.

IDK, I don't think that social differences between NTs and AS are an all-or-nothing thing. I think it's important for people with AS to learn enough social skills to be successful at whatever kind of life they want. I think, also, that social differences and different needs should be respected by NTs, though explaining that may be difficult.

However, I think you do need to develop some social skills because I don't believe there is a totally asocial way to live (for one thing, almost all jobs require some social interaction.) I do think there are lifestyles and job choices that limit social interaction and that, of course, is up to you.

On the flip side, while I think it's important to play to your strengths, I also think it is important to keep working on your weaknesses. I don't think I will ever be a social butterfly, but I do appreciate being able to handle more socially now as an adult than I did when I was a teenager.

Again not the topic of the thread - my thread is about investing in people, not in self-improvement.

Please clarify what you mean by investing in people vs. self improvement. Do you mean that you were forced to be selfless and to be taken advantage of?

But I think that a common misconception is that all aspies are the same and that they don't want or need friends. This is not true of my son, he yearns for friendships and so, he needs to learn how, simple as that. If he was the type of person (and sometimes I think it would be preferable if he was) who would be content to be on their own and not yearn for these relationships then I would agree with you completely.

I can appreciate part of your view. I spent way too many years of my life and way too much of my energy trying to fit in. Or at least this is how I see it now that I am in my 40's.

But I do not agree that this realization means that I should not have been investing energy into relationships.

It means I should not have been investing energy into relationships with the wrong people. People who judge me for being who I am and expect me to be someone I am not.

I would have been much better off investing my energy into relationships with people who were the right kind of people. People who appreciate my quirks, forgive me for my annoying traits, and accept me for who I am. I do know such people, but it takes sifting through literally hundreds of people to find the very few who fit the bill.

I have learned throughout the years that I have much less need for human interaction than I thought I did for most of my life. But having less need for human interaction does not mean that I have no, or little, need for human interaction. My personal opinion is that people who believe they have no need (or very little need) for human interaction feel this way because they have become jaded by all the wrong kids of experiences. When you develop bonds and relationships with people that are based on mutual respect and true acceptance, I think that what you find is that you do, indeed, have a need for the right kind of human interaction. I still do not have a daily need for such interaction like some do, but I still have that need and it needs to be fulfilled according to the schedule that is "right" for me in order for me to experience true happiness in my life.

I think it is truly tragic that so many people have not had the right kind of human interaction, and that they therefore conclude that they do not need it. I think everyone needs it, but sadly, not everyone gets it.