Do you ever feel this way?

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Do you find in social settings even with friends you have known for years you always seem to be left out and unonnected to them?. Its like even if you try and make a connection or just general conversation you just fail to make a meaningful two way chat with an NT person and even if you do start talking it only last for 20 seconds.

Its like you see your friends bond really well with each other and your always left on the sideline wishing you could make that same connection but you can't and you just feel awkward and really out of place.

As an aspie i find people with dyslexia easier too talk to than NT's

Like many aspies i find it easier having a deep conversation with people younger or older than me partly because older adults 'fake' interest.

I communicate with my friends mainly through sarcastic, belittling comments, or rants on 'the topic of the week', so I find it easy to fake a sort of connection with them.

If you asked them I doubt any of them would say that - from my end - we had a close relationship. I often find it hard to figure out their motivations, and it's easy for me to suddenly feel like an outsider for no reason whatsoever.

The majority of my friendships have been very intense, and when conversation dissolves from a meaningful topic we have melted into mutual acceptance of abuse towards each other (from their end) or ourselves (from my end, though we often mimic eachother's subject in this abuse). Either that or doting and sarcasm to the extreme.

Now that I am trying not to abuse people nor be used as a punching bag myself, I have no close friends. Go figure.

I can make a pretty good connection to a few people. Most people, I cannot connect to at all. I really wish that I could understand this better.

Yeah, for sure, big time, Jamesy. There's always this feeling that I can't shake. I just don't feel like a part of their world. I may be with them, but something is missing. I don't share the same connection they feel with each other, no matter what I do. Whenever I mention this to people irl, it tends to annoy them.

Friends?

What friends?

I find it quite sad and at the same time very fustrated that i cannot make a meaningful or good impression on my NT friends. I just never really seem to completely 'click' with my friends.

Really i just watch my friends joke and laugh with each other and take a good interest in what they have to say but with me they just blow me off only after a few seconds or if i do say something it just sounds, stupid, irrelevant and dumb. It could be partly due that i do not share the same interests as them so have less in common to talk about.

I should be grateful that my friends actually do stick by me and have not left me yet.

Are they friends you've had since early childhood?

I felt EXACTLY that way my first year of highschool i started realizing how different i was. It was several years before i found the reason for this difference however. I started seeing how people interacted with each other, and noticed that i found myself mysteriously incapable of interacting in the same way, and especially initiating interaction. I was so puzzled as to what on earth people ever started conversations about, normal ones anyway. In my numerous attempt i realized that the things that occurred to me did not issue much interest from prospective conversators. The most frustrating point was i realized i saw and thought about things in some way different, but i could not come close to placing why. Still dont understand really the mysterious social systems that illude me, but it makes a world of a difference to know there is a reason in it all, and that i by the same turn have unique mental experiences in place of normal socialization. I occasionally find myself feeling envious towards the normal ones and their normalcy i will never know

Not really I have only know them for 9-8 years now. one of them i knew when i was a very young child but we were not really close friends.

Exactly.

The reason I asked is childhood friends will often want to stay friends no matter what.

Yes, this has always happened to me all my life...except in the case of two very special friends. They aren't AS but they have other issues (bipolar and paranoid/depression) so maybe we can relate to each other better than most.

Because I always feel like I'm on the sidelines I tend to make myself into the entertainer of the group. I turn the whole experience into a comedy show, me being the star. People like this. It's easier to do when drinking.

i find it a lot easier to socalise when i am drunk and i also show a lot more emotion since i can be quite cold and aloof when i am sober.

Y'know, I thought I was the only one who felt like that...

I've had the same 3 friends since middle school, (so about 8 years now), and every time we get together as a group I feel left out still. They will all be sitting there together, and I'll be sitting away on the sidelines because I feel that every time I say something, I say it wrong or I say something mean on accident. Sometimes I think I'll be saying a joke, or agreeing with something in a joking manner, but I find out that it was rude..

Idk, I just know I feel like that a lot and you're not alone.

I'm stil making a pig's ear of conversation....hardly ever get that to-and-fro thing, hardly ever remember to ask questions, can't think of questions when I do remember, can't focus on what they're saying, anxious that they'll realise I haven't really been listening, can't think of anything to say, anxious that they'll get bored because I'm not stimulating them. Even with the same people I've done quite well with before, I can fall right back to square one.

One of the hardest things is that I don't see why it's all so difficult. Why don't questions occur to me? I've known for years how important it is to engage in conversation as a sharing thing, and of course I want to know the hopes and fears of my friends, and how they're feeling, and who they are. I can even advise people on what to say, if I get a bit of time to think, but when it's me in the hot seat, all I want to do is survive till home time without goofing. Actually getting on with it is always something I'm meaning to do next time, but next time never comes.

But I don't notice others getting it together better than I do. I used to notice that a little, but most of the people I hang about with are Aspies and oddballs, and their communication skills aren't that great either. I've got a feeling that the social skills I'm interested in learning aren't really done very well by most people.....the alternativists and eccentrics I used to live among were the only people I''ve known who were even interested in empathic listening and relating. So if NT's really do relate well, I've not seen it.