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I'm a fifteen-year old male. I live in a country in Central America (so English isn't my mother language, Spanish is, so please excuse me if I make any mistakes), and as such, please, have at least some minimal, recent Hispanic cultural background if you're going to answer, since I'm sure what I'm going to talk about is pretty much a culturally-driven situtation. I'm in ninth grade of high school (in my country, elementary school comprises from first through sixth grade, and high school from seventh through eleventh/twelfth grade).

Regarding my background, I was born into an upper-middle class family. My mother had, since her own birth, from retinits pigmentosa, a chronic, degenerative eye disease. At my current age, she was already completely blind. I inherited the disease as well. However, my "edition" of it isn't chronic, and has (supposedly) already stopped deteriorating. As such, I was left in a kind of limbo state, as I'm able to differentiate and describe with some detail most enoughly-large objects at an appropriate distance. However, I have problems differentiating certain colors, and can't, for example, guess someone's eye color. To me, everyone has black eyes. This seems not to apply to digital displays for some unknown reason. I'm completely blind at night, and as such can't be outside a well-lit space after 5:15p.m. My ophthalmologist provided me with glasses. They, however, don't help that much.

As can be expected, and as is common for us, autistics, since a very early age I was regarded as either "different" or "weird" or "special" or... you choose the term, the concept stays the same. I never (I mean __never__) really had any close friends of any sort at school. The time that I wasn't at school was spent messing around with computers. I still don't know why, but I've since ever had this particular attachment with machines. I started to know quite a lot about them. I remember owning a more-than-a-decade old computer when I ws six years old, with Windows 98 installed in it. A random day its motherboard just bursted in flames. However, that machine gave me a sense of curiosity that persists until today. Since I was seven, no computer technician has been called to fix any issue in any of my household's devices, since I became such "technician". By age eight, I started learning the basics of computer programming. Projects came and went over the years. For my seventh grade science fair, I devised a prototype machine (using an Arduino) that would recognize a national currency bill and its denomination by pattern recognition. Then, a speaker (that I took "borrowed" from my father's computer) would beep in certain ways to indicate to a blind person the bill's denomation. I won first place, but didn't developed the project further. The next year, I demostrated some "radical" concepts regarding artificial general intelligence that I came up with, and won first place again (I've lost the demostration program). I wrote missing Linux kernel drivers for an obscure netbook I own, and have done other minor stuff. Also, I've been known to crack my school's wireless network and computer equipment multiple times... just for fun.

(Just for clarity, in computer afficionate circles, "hacker" means "anyone who is interested and/or is enthusiast about computer programming and related subjects". The usual meaning of "hacker" as a computer criminal is transposed to the terms "black hat" and "cracker" instead.)

My social life, whenever somewhat existant, has rotated around some "flaw" people perceive on me. In primary school, I was insulted more often that I wasn't. I was called "gay" or "idiot" for no apparent reason. The kids who repeated some grade abused physically of me, such as pushing me so I'ld fall onto the floor. This only resulted in catastrophic relations with my classmates. For instance, when I was twelve and in sixth grade, some random female classmate of mine showed a note her parents sent to the teacher. Later on, that same teacher told me that her parents were legally threating me because, they said, I "constantly and repeatedly harrased her sexually". I didn't understood it, neither then or now. I didn't even talk to the girls on a daily, even weekly basis. How was I even supposed to harrass one of them, and in a sexual way? Basically, from that day on, my classmates started threating me the same way they'ld threat a sexual pervert. On classes, some (but not all) teachers, specially females, would talk about "the issue" in an indirect but obvious voice. I've always attempted to be the as honest as possible. I feel horrible when I lie, and do it only on extremely dangerous situations. However, no one care, of course, as I was attempting to defend myself and explain to everyone my point of view of what seemed to me to be a non-sense issue. The principal was yelling at me. I was crying. That happened about twice or thrice a week. The trauma was such that I can't remember not even a single of those "conversations". My parents frequently doubted whether the teachers were right and I was lying. I almost attempted suicide, but nobody ever knew about that. The girl's parents did almost really took legal actions. Luckily enough, my father is a lawyer, so he decided to get me out of school until I finished sixth grade. That is, I would only go to school in order to do the tests, then I'ld immediately go.

In the meantime, I was sent to visit a psychologist who diagnosed me with Asperger's syndrome. That kind of explained everything, or at least it seemed to do so. It explained why I had no friends. It explained why I loved computers so much. But it didn't explained why people hated me so much. I still don't know what I did (or didn't) so wrong.

When I moved to another school in seventh grade, _all_ of my female classmates from elementary school moved to exactly the same high school. Unsurprisingly, rumors about me spread quite fast in social circles. Fortunately, most people took it in as a kind of joke and nothing more. Those particular girls that were with me in sixth grade, however, still hated me profoundly. This year, I found out that the "harrassment" I "commited against them", was supposedly that I "looked under their skirts and used my poor sight as an excuse". What the f__k? I mean, that really never happened. That would have been something quite obvious. What did really happened? That is still one of my biggest personal questions.

For two months, between November 2015 and January 2016, I stayed in San Diego, California, in order to visit some cousins who I had sen only once before. Some days after returning, I found, by matter of coincidence, one of the girls I mentioned above. Let's call her XYZ for the purposes of anonymity. For some odd reason, XYZ said "Hi, {my name}! I really miss you!", something that neither of those hatred girls would have ever said to me. It happens, I actually liked her just a little bit in sixth grade, but was furious with her more for the things she and her friends made to me, of course. Anyways, that day, I returned home in a kind of trance. However hard I tried, I could only think about her and felt what people often describe as a "strange feeling". Anyone could guess I was feeling love for her. Over the course of the next three months, I would, each time I could, buy her stuff at the school's cafeteria, pay close attention to her conversations so I could know her, buy her more stuff, etc... At times, I would skip lunch in order to have enough money to pay for the stuff. Sometimes, she would herself ask for those things, and answer "thanks, I love you" back once I bought her the stuff. All I wanted was to make her happy. I prefer to be spiritualistic over being materialistic. However, she seemed to prefer material stuff and so did I followed accordingly.

Some strange patterns were always present in between those three months. In particular, she never gave me absolutely anything back for what I did for her. Nothing. Just the usual "thanks, I love you" that I thought was more than enough. Plus, had I done something wrong, whatever, out of my inherent physical clumsiness, she would be angry at me and I would feel really bad about it. I didn't want sex. I wasn't even contemplating a typical two-week "relationship". I was just seeking some love and affection from someone.

Some random day at the start of May she told me that "Stop creeping on me, {my name}! It was just a joke! Get over it!". I know I have issues interpreting colloquial languages and social rules, but I really can't call that a "joke" in any interpretation of the word.Then, I thought to myself, "this must be because of something I did wrong, and I'm going to fix it". Two weeks later, I came to know that everything I was gifting her was being thrown to the trash or exchanged for something else.

Since that moment, I suffer from spontaneous emotional breakdowns from time to time, and I can't seem to completely let it pass. Most of the time I'm okay, however, and I wrote this in a moment I'm sure I was okay. I'm ashamed to know that almost everyone my age in my school has a girlfriend/boyfriend, or at least has had one at least once, but I the most I've had has been a "joke". I'm not sure if it's a matter of over self-consciousness, but I've noticed people often call me "ugly" or "dumb" at times. I'm not posting here because of any particular problem, but because I don't feel exactly great about all these memories, and just can'tseem to let them pass. Just wanted to talk to someone about it, and have been shy on doing so, until now, I guess .

I find what you are enduring is universal to many fifteen year olds of many ethnic groups--whether they are autistic or not.

I live in a city with many Hispanic residents. I have had Hispanic girlfriends.

I was the recipient of those kinds of "jokes" myself when I was a kid. I think I can understand what you're going through.

However, you have a special talent in computers. And you should be proud of that.

You shouldn't let the idiotic behavior of other kids cause you to think less of yourself.

Because you are a very viable person, and will be able to earn a decent living some day with your unique skills.

When you get older, the girls will come to you!

Thanks a lot for your response. However, I think you considered my situation with romantic relationships as my main issue, which it may have been three or four months ago, but isn't exactly right now. I forgot to write on the last post that, right now, I feel really depressed in regards of my entire life. Every day, after school, I cry alone in my room, as silently as I can so nobody notices.

For some reason, the age differences between members of my family are quite strange and suspicious. For instance, when my maternal grandfather died at 95, my mother was 48, thus he had her when he was around 47. My sister was born in 1990, and I was born ten and half years later, when my mother was 38 and my father was 43. This has led me to doubt if my birth was an "accident". I've never found any two siblings whose age difference surpasses ten and half years, or even anything near that. Naturally, my sister and I have always been quite distanced; our ages didn't allow for us to behave as siblings. She would often abuse me physically and verbally, making fun of me in front of other people whenever she had the chance.

When she was 22 (and I was 12), she was about to get her bachelor's degree on law and human rights. In the meantime, she was working for the government in a part-time job. One day (namely February 14th, 2014), she told me, in private, and before our parents, that she was pregnant. I stood in shock for the next two weeks. When she told my parents, she confessed her boss to be the father. For the first months, I was okay with the situation. However, I was worried of a major issue that seemed to lack any solution in the near future. Namely, neither she or the father had any stable economic income, house, or apartment of their own, and so my house would have to hold two more individuals. Some day in September (2014), I attempted to talk about this with my parents. My father all of a sudden, and for no apparent reason, started to yell at me about how I was "psychiatrically ill" and was in need of "intense treatment". Then, he held me against a bed and punched me in the head several times. That same month, my sister's baby was born. I wasn't particularly happy about it, but my fathers seemingly were. When they went to the hospital, my sister got both of them out of the delivery room (I can't remember why). The last two years, my parents have increasingly separated from me, spending almost all of their free time with the baby. I have talked to my mother about this, but she has only responded me back that "I treat her badly". Also, she has said I'm "too cold and aphatic". This is because I, personally, hate very young children and see them as nothing more than a nuisance. I've never understood why people see so much "love, happiness, and innocence" in them. At times, my parents don't talk to me for several days straight. They don't care me and forget about things I need. They love their granddaughter far more than they've ever loved me.

I don't feel particularly bad about not having any friends at all, or not having any social life whatsoever, or not receiving any affection, even from my parents. What I feel worst is that, I think, I somehow managed to waste and mess up my life without even noticing. I feel like it's all my fault. I have suicidal thoughts every single day. In most of them, I plan the situation in great detail, and involving fallback strategies for "just if something goes wrong". I also lend towards describing with immense precision not only how would I kill myself, but my parents, sister, her daughter, my classmates, and all those people who have ever harmed me so badly. I don't want to die, I just want to stop suffering, but can't find no way to do so but to end my own life.

In practice, those feelings go away when I'm at school, but come back once I'm at home. Thus, they're at their peak on weekends. I feel that my life is not worth it, and that the best thing that I can do to everyone is to end my life, as they would be free from the nuisance I've always been to them. I've wasted my whole life with computers. They have brought me no friends, and, I suspect, alienated those few who I might have had. I don't know why, but I really feel like it's all been my fault. Almost everyone I know have never been not even by a single one of these problems. Then, why would I have to? I definitively wouldn't call this a "life".

You are in my prayers, anon42.
I hope things will get better for you soon.

You're a very intelligent person, and still quite young.

It's not your fault that your sister abused you, instead of being like a second mother to you, like many older sisters are.

Pete Seeger, the famous singer, has a brother who is 16 years younger than him: Mike Seeger, another singer.

You're right. You isolate yourself too much, similar to how I was at age 25. I also wasn't as intelligent as you.

Yet I still have made it to age 55 1/2.