I'm ugly

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People here often say that physical attractiveness makes it better to find friends. I hardly have any friends, never have had.

Also men prefer the look of my female cousins. A guy who lived down my road who I used to play with when we were children, developed a crush on my mum when he was grown up. I heard he liked older women, so that was fair enough. He kept trying to ask her out, although she wasn't interested. But then I heard he dated my cousin, who's the same age as me. It didn't last, but the girl he's with now is younger than me. He's never looked at me in that way.

I look like my dad too much. He's attractive, but his face on a woman's body, not so much.

Maybe I should get plastic surgery. It might help me make friends. I don't even know what my boyfriend finds attractive about me, but I think he is more attracted to inner beauty. That's all well and good to have inner beauty, but it still doesn't make me feel confident about how I look.

Surgery isn’t worth it—trust me.

How about sending us a picture of you? I bet you will get many compliments. If you don’t want to, that’s okay, too.

You’ve always said previously that you are pretty attractive. What brought on this notion that you are not attractive?

People here keep saying that physical attractiveness makes making friends easier, especially for women. It hurts when people say that, because I don't have many friends, and as a teenager I had none for a time, so it must be something to do with my looks, as other Aspies seem to have more friends than me.

I don't want to post a picture of me on the site but I'll be quite happy to send you one via PM.

Below is some feedback/advice. If you don't want this, please ignore. I don't mean to intrude on your thoughts, and relate to your pain.

***

1) Many here are painfully single, and you're not. So at least one person finds you attractive, and I'm sure there are more. So you can look at the attention you don't get, or focus on what you do get.

2) I've often been oblivious to indirect signs of attraction, only to have friends tell me years later some NT was attracted to me. So, perhaps more men are attracted to you, and you don't know it. If you miss their signals they may back off, thinking you're not interested.

3) If people are drawn to you from physical attraction, this can be dangerous. They may also like who you are, but they may really just like parts of you, or who they want you to be/think you are. I try to remember Shakespeare's Sonnet 94, when I've felt like you do:

They that have power to hurt and will do none,
That do not do the thing they most do show,
Who, moving others, are themselves as stone,
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow:
They rightly do inherit heaven's graces
And husband nature's riches from expense;
They are the lords and owners of their faces,
Others but stewards of their excellence.
The summer's flower is to the summer sweet
Though to itself it only live and die,
But if that flower with base infection meet,
The basest weed outbraves his dignity:
For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds;
Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds.

It feels good when people like our appearance, or an ability we have, but that isn't the same as liking us--and it can draw many unwanted, dangerous people. The whole world wants to be famous and beautiful, but look at how damaged and erratic many of these people are--Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, for example. You have a good enough life right now, based on your posts, and many qualities others don't share. Though you wish to be NT, most of them don't appear nearly as reflective or observant as you are. Remember what you are, because it includes a lot of good. And we all have limitations.

If he is honest, ask him what he thinks about you physically.
We would be interested in what he says.

You have a boyfriend that loves you and intends to marry you. You are over 30. I'm surprised it worries you now.

I still like to feed attractive even if I am in a relationship. And I'm in a relationship because I'm good at reading subtle signs by guys (to answer another question here).

I'm talking about friends though. If one has to be physically attractive to make friends then I must be ugly because I don't have many friends, or whenever I try to make the effort with other females it just ends in failure.

Thanks, Joe. I’m looking forward to it. I won’t post it in the general forum. Or anywhere else.

Last edited by kraftiekortie on 05 May 2022, 6:44 am, edited 2 times in total.

I must be the ugliest dude around if making friends and relations IRL are based on looks.

With your BF, some guys truly don't care about looks, rather personality, and yeah, that can be a blow to self-esteem in this world full of "healthy" levels of narcissism, but it shouldn't, as it just means to him, you're attractive in the way he sees such. Friends don't really care too much about looks if it's anything. Likely Autism doing the trouble with friends. You're lucky to have a BF though if Autism hinders your ability to form any type of relation, so there's a positive to your negative here.

I think that oftentimes we are poor judges of our own beauty. There can be that nagging insecurity that clings on and tells us things that aren't always true. Mine tells me that I look like an overgrown twelve year old. I remember sitting down with a friend and showing her a picture of me as a teenager and she remarked how different I looked. Hearing that was a sigh of relief.

Not too long ago, a cartoon came out with a female protagonist that looked a lot like me. Men complained that she was too masculine looking and not feminine enough. That it was unrealistic. Yet, here I was, looking like her. So clearly it wasn't as unrealistic as some people claimed. Female beauty standards tend to go in and out of fashion. Broad shoulders are common on runway models, yet narrow shoulders tend to be thought of as the feminine ideal. I dropped out of ballet fairly early on, since ballet tends to be very specific about the body types they favour. As puberty hit me, it became increasingly obvious that I was not that body type. My feet were no longer narrow and dainty, I grew tall and no longer fit the petite expectation. So I went on to study other forms of dance instead. My build actually worked in my favour in other forms of dance.

Perhaps my build, when viewed in its individual parts, could be seen as masculine leaning. However, I know my body type is actually not too dissimilar to that of an average female swimmer. If I put on a little more weight and worked out, I could probably look almost athletic.

My androgyny doesn't bother me too much. I'm often labelled a femme or a femme tomboy, so clearly I'm still being perceived as feminine. Some days I lean into a more feminine presentation, other days I dress a little more androgynously. There are ways to make more masculine traits look feminine if you wish. Personally I find that women's shirts can be a tad ill-fitting on me. Where my size fits my hips fine but it clings too snugly on my shoulders and I look a bit silly. So either I go up a size and have too much room on the hips and chest area but it fits my shoulders, or it fits the hips and chest but clings to my shoulders too much and looks ill-fitting.

V-necks, square / bridge necks or t-shirts with bohemian / gothic style sleeves fit me a whole lot better than T-shirts with a round neck. I also really like button-ups. Sometimes I like a dress but it's too short on me, so I just end up wearing it as a T-shirt. This works well for shirt dresses that just end up being shirts on me. Some places do taller fits as well. People still find me attractive enough though I'm not dainty. I'm hit on by men and women. So I wouldn't get too caught up on looking masculine if I were you. Chances are you're probably more attractive than you think.

He says I'm cute, which is probably only something certain men see. It's a form of beauty but not the sort of beauty that attracts female friends.

Autism shouldn't interfere with making friends, as a lot of people with autism seem to make friends with their NT peers. I don't lack that many social skills, sometimes I can stammer or feel shy and don't know what to say, but that's just about all my social awkwardness, and some NTs with social anxiety can have this kind of social awkwardness. Otherwise I am usually chatty, easy to talk to, make eye contact, pleasant, interested in people, and I don't monologue on about a special interest (I don't even have a special interest). Empathising is my most highest social skill so I have no trouble with that, I always listen and I avoid criticising people or making them feel bad.

im certainly not ugly but i have lots of people hating me.mostly male colleagues they even bully me and say nasty things

a lot of women laugh at me but the women i know are nice people so they like me and because they know my husband

I'm usually put in the "cute" category, too......

Is this...a thing?

Personally I have male and female friends. Beauty is not a factor in deciding who I befriend. I have female friends who I don't think of as all that attractive, but they're fun to hang around since we have shared interests. Yet they are in relationships. Beauty is a subjective thing. I also have female friends that I do view as attractive, many of which are also in relationships, I'd say I'm a third wheel but at this point I'm what? The seventh? Still, I don't mind it, more people to hang out with I suppose.

Physical attraction and making friends... Has little to do with looks I have found.
I was always told I was hansome etc, etc. Does not make a difference with making friends.
Also hardly makes a lot of difference to get a boyfriend or a girlfriend as this has not really worked a lot foe me because somehow I miss the hints when women found me attractive and get told off by others asking why I did not do anything about it. Usually by the time I am told I am too stunned and overwealmed to know what to do so I would do nothing about it simply because I did not know what to do or had too mny nurves to approach them etc.

I never knew physical attractiveness drew friends until I came here. Unless it means that being unkempt and unhygienic is a factor of people being put off by you, which I can understand. But not how you look otherwise, like if your eyes are too close together or something.


Also most of my brother's male friends tell him his cousin is sexy but nobody's ever told him that his sister is sexy anything.