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Last night I melted down in front of my best friend (she's NT). Why?

Because for the second time in two weeks, a person I trusted said something along the lines of "you're an a**hole" and cut me off. It complicates matters that my best friend is friends with both of them.

My best friend says it's only because the two of them don't understand what it means that I am autistic, and that if it was explained to them, it would fix the problem and things would be better and they would be my friends again.

That is so not my experience. My experience is that the friendships are over. There can be no reconciliation because no matter what, they're going to hear anything about my autism as just me trying to excuse bad behavior.

I'm remarkably good at imitating NT, but I hang out with geeky people - which means there's a buffer. Socializing rarely includes small talk. (I despise small talk.)

But I'm still autistic, and not being allowed to explain what I meant - or worse, being told what I meant when it is absolutely not what I meant - and not being allowed to clarify makes me immediately distrust the person who won't let me clarify. That's what happened both times.

My best friend says "But it's just a miscommunication, it's just a misunderstanding." Yeah, but there's no fixing it. Forgiveness would mean forgetting, and forgetting means making it possible for them to hurt me again. And there's just no way that's happening.

I need to know if my experience with this is typical or not, and what to say to my best friend, who is very upset about this because she needs me to not lose people in this way, and I can't promise I won't.

I don't know if it's allowed to post links here, but if I can, I'll post a link to my blog post where I talk about this a little more.

"Your friend is right.. to an extent. I do not know what happened to end the friendship. I don't know what behaviors you exhibited to make them call you out as being an as*hole. But I do know miscommunications can be reconciled if both people are willing to work on what caused said miscommunication..

Forgiving isn't forgetting. It's just a figure of speech when someone says "Forgive and forget" because in this figure of speech, "forget" means never bring it up in conversation again. You're going to remember what happened and both of you are going to learn from it, not repeat the mistake and grow as (insert noun describing co-existance here) together - because if you learn from it, you don't let them hurt you again."

That's not what I mean.

In the first case, the friend (let's call her Friend 1) made assumptions about how I teach, from posts I made on Facebook, and told me that I was being cruel to my students. When I tried to talk to her about it, she stopped talking to me and contacted my best friend in chat to vent about me. The best friend, with the best of intentions (she hates it when her friends fight) sent me the transcript of that conversation with Friend 1's permission. I wish she hadn't, because even though Friend 1 supposedly figured out that she hadn't been compassionate and had triggered some old abuse issues in me, that happened at the end of the conversation. At the beginning of the conversation, she said "He's just an *ssh*le who uses his autism as an excuse."

Now I know what she thinks of me. I'm supposed to let her back in my life, now that I know she thinks that about me? I don't see how that's possible. Best Friend says "But she doesn't think that any more, didn't you see where she said she hadn't been compassionate? Can't you tell that means that she's sorry?" I saw where she said it, but I didn't see her say she was sorry, and even if she had, I couldn't believe it. People tell the truth when they're angry, and Friend 1 was angry. She can lie now and pretend she doesn't believe that, but how can I know for sure that it isn't still how she feels? Obviously, I can't.

I am not comfortable giving the details of the other conversation, but it has to do with identity. I said that a certain identity really threatens me because it's ambiguous, and Friend 2 then dropped the bomb that she has that identity, (except she doesn't, not in the way I meant it). I asked her what she meant by that identity and offered to tell her what I meant when I referenced it, and she said "You don't get to tell me what my identity is. I am not talking to you now because I'm too angry with you," and went offline.

She would not even let me explain what I meant, which really offended me. I shared that conversation with Best Friend, saying "What the heck happened here??" and she said "Friend 2 is talking about roles, and you're talking about identity. It's a simple misunderstanding and I'm sure she'll apologize when she's had time to cool off."

But it doesn't matter. I can't trust Friend 2 not to blow up at me again. I can't trust her anywhere near me now.

Even if I let them back into my life after this, I can't trust them any more. Even if I forgive them for what they said, what they said can't be erased. It's echoing in my head every time I see either of their names on Facebook (or, for that matter, the names of their partners). It doesn't fade or ease off. I remember hurtful things said to me over 30 years ago with the same pain as the day they were said.

So if I let either or both of them back into my life, I'd have to walk on eggshells. I'd have to assume that this will happen again, and that the next time I say something that they misinterpret (which they both did) they're both going to tell me the REAL meaning of what I said (in other words, what they've decided it means). I have to assume that when this happens, they won't listen to me when I need them to hear that it is NOT what they thought it meant, and it's not going to go well.

I wouldn't even bother thinking of this any more, but it's killing my best friend. She cannot handle that this is how I have to handle it when someone hurts me. I went to bed last night very frustrated and upset after writing this because it's hurting her. I don't ever want to talk to either of them again. Both episodes caused me to melt down for the better part of two hours and the recovery from each was very slow. It derailed me from work obligations and several other things that HAD to get done.

How exactly am I supposed to let them back into my life, when what they said is still just as loud as it was the day they said it? Best Friend says I should think about all the good memories I have of their friendships, but I can't think of those memories as good any more. Now I wonder if the one of them who took my wedding pictures was laughing at me behind the camera. The other one was at my wedding too, and she's in the pictures. The memories are toxic because these people are in them. My best friend's goal last night was to make it so that I could be friends with them and my wedding photos wouldn't cause me pain. I told her bluntly, "That ship sailed, foundered, and sank. That's not going to be fixable." She started to cry because she couldn't handle that, when to me it was just... obvious.

To me, my reaction is perfectly sane and normal. My best friend can't accept that. I need help either understanding how to get past this with these two people and somehow trust them not to hurt me again (which I really don't think is possible) or to help her understand why it isn't possible.

If my reaction is not normal for an autistic, I need to know. I don't trust anyone any more once they hurt me; haven't since I got my official dx in 2001. You can fool me once, but that's as many chances as I ever give anyone any more.

But if it isn't the autism, then I need to know.

I do not think it is true that "people tell the truth when they are angry."

My experience is that people say whatever they think might be hurtful when they are angry. Often things they don't believe or feel, but think might be useful weapons for the moment. They see a wound, they look for salt--but these are people who are not sadists and would not behave this way when not angry.

I think strong emotions such as anger can be like a transient mental illness and do not reflect the true nature of people.

[quote="Adamantium"]
I mean that what a person normally or typically does is more indicative of that person's feelings than what they do in some extreme state. Drunk people, drugged people and angry people do things that are out of character.

People hold you responsible for everything because they are irrational. That doesn't mean that being irrational is an effective or useful strategy for engaging other people.

(from another response) One vicious verbal assault by an irate person who later realizes they were wrong does not undo 500 positive interactions with that person in other circumstances. [/quote]

Doesn't it color your entire experience of who they were, when they do something like that? It does for me. I now wonder if their friendship actually meant anything or not. I now have to wonder if I should have ever trusted them at all. For me, one vicious verbal assault totally undoes the 500 positive interactions. I can't stop thinking about the assault. It colors all the previous interactions with doubt.

Congratulations on obtaining your PhD.

What would be your "special interest"?

I hope you feel better soon.

Make an effort with these two friends and see what happens, try it for your best friend.
You might be blowing this up in your mind.
Your friends 1 and 2 can also be triggered and lose control and say bad things when they are angry.
It's normal for friends to fight and be nasty to each other once in awhile.