Anyone else only have a sufice realationsip with family?

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I have a cousin who's only four months older than me. Our mothers are sisters and inseperable best friends. So my cousin Liam and I were basically raised together. We are not only like brothers, but have a twin-like bond. He has always been able to understand me in a way like no other.

And yet he recently said that we only have a surface relationship on my end. That we are very close, but that I am also very distant.

That did not hurt my feelings any because I agree with that.

Do any of you also have only a surface relationship at best with those you are closest to because that's all you are capable of?

Yes. I think I relate.
While I think that I care deeply about my family and friends, people I am or have been close to, the actual relationships have been pretty limited. I'm really not sure that I'm capable of much beyond that.
It's something that's really weighed heavily on me for a long time, and hasn't been any easier or less confusing over this last year since I've figured out that I'm on the spectrum (some amount of an explanation for me).
I love them intensely, but I don't really know anything about them. I don't really know what they like, what they like to do, what makes them tick, etc.

That's the best response I can come up with right now.

My relationship with my family has never been particularly profound.

One can deduce that there is a rather pronounced "surface quality" to the relationship.

I love my mum and dad and talk to them all the time but mainly due to differences in beliefs etc I cannot say I am close with them. I am often distant from them as I am not a huge fan of personal contact and also I am not sure I know how to relate to them on a deeper level. I am not sure it bothers me overtly as that is how am with most people.

Quite frankly, I treat my family like crap, considering how supportive they have always been to me.

I have never really had a blazing row with any of them, we seem to get on well when the family does get together, and there's all the hugs and "love you"s that anybody could want.

"Distant" would be putting it mildly. I have repeatedly lost touch with them for years at a time. OK, I don't drive and I live a couple of hundred miles away (that's considered a "long way" in the UK), so we could hardly be living in each other's pockets. But when I say I lose touch, I mean completely - no emails, no letters, no phone calls, not letting them know when I move house or change phone number. My Mum will leave messages for me basically pleading with me just to say "I'm alive", but it's always something I'm going to do tomorrow.

[I'm sorry. I wanted to try and explain more, but I really need to cry right now. Thank you for making this thread - this has been trying to bubble up to the surface for a long time. I hope you don't mind me leaving this post here - going public is my insurance against burying this again.]

You seem like a good person, Trugluddite.

That is how I am with everybody, even my best friend. It only works because they put the effort in. That does make me feel a bit crap, but I don't know how else to be.

When I was away at uni I rarely ever phoned my mum at home, and never anyone else. But then I don't particularly get on with my family anyway.

Yep it's pretty similar on my end. My dad has a brother who is 15 months younger than him so they've always been close. His daughter my cousin is 6 months older than me. We also have a twin-like bond. I consider her my sister and my first "normalizer" an affectionate term I pretty much keep in my head for people who took the time to get close enough to me to teach me how to function in the NT world but as we've gotten older she's gone on to dating and normal teenage drama and I don't really reach out to her so if she's busy, and she usually is, we don't really talk. The same thing happens with my school friends. My mom says I need friends who are like cactuses. I feel bad about it sometimes but it's just who I am. I don't initiate social interaction. I appreciate it most the time, I just don't initiate it.

All of my relationships are superficial; that appears to be the best I can do.
I grew up in boarding schools, and then spent my teenage years homeless, so in some ways I feel disconnected from my siblings. I pour all of my efforts into our marital relationship, but since getting diagnosed, I find myself second-guessing that, too.

I'm close with my mom and I love her back. But not too close like how she treats everyone else, including my sister. I can always make her open up to me, but I almost never done the same back. Not that I didn't tried, it's just that she couldn't understand like anyone else. Only difference is that she's one of the very few who actually have acceptance -- parental acceptance that is.
Not exactly superficial, more like imbalanced and almost one-sided. I'm very sure it's not how I'd imagine or assume how an adult child is like with their parent.

The rest of my family? I'm rather distant.
Since I don't usually restrain myself around them, it's like they're just being permissive than actually accepting. They see me more as another responsibility than as I'm. They don't truly know me even if I truly knew them.
Culture dictates familial duty and familial relationship -- I'm actually no different from how they'd treat a cross between younger child and hired help. Supportive as they tried to be, they couldn't exactly treat me like another adult in the family.
I barely can get into other familial affairs and discussions. Yet I wouldn't mind that, I prefer to listen to it than being involved in it. I'd be available if they ask me an unbiased opinion, which they had asked a few times already.


I never had any 'normal' relationship with anyone at all.
I never met an 'equal' in real life like how I never truly fit in no matter how positive people may treat me.
I don't know how to 'give' and I had enough with 'take'.

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From the title, I wanted to reply with a big YES. I can sort of get along with some of my family, but it is very surface only. After reading everyone else's posts, I am doubting because I feel so differently than the rest of you. I so much want a deep connection with them, with everyone really. But for whatever reason I scare people away, this has been with my family, too. They don't want much to do with me and any communication from them seems strained on their part.

I used to be close to them, but my rapport with them has deteriorated dramatically over the last 5 years or so. Even my mother, with whom I used to be inseparable.

I last spoke to my mother and grandmother and an aunt over the phone at Christmas. I have not had contact with any of my relatives since. None of them have wished me a Happy New Year, as they would have done in previous years, but to be fair neither have I. If I never speak to or see them again, it would be no loss. There are other people out there I am more compatible with.

Yeah, I never really connected to my family members, or anyone. I've had a lot of friends, and a couple of "bonus-families" who raised me, but once I moved to another country, I pretty much forgot them all.
I have a bit of contact with my family, and I have a couple of friends and a boyfriend, but it's like they make connections with me, while I can't really "return the favour". I've always felt like everyone else knows each other better than I know anyone.

I used to be very close to my mum, she being the only one in my family that I've told that I'm asexual (she took it well). She was also the first person to find out I'm autistic. But now she lives 2 hours away by car, we just don't see each other often.

What's worse is that I have a twin sister (not autistic) who I hardly ever see. People always assume twins are close. Not in our case. We look nothing alike, we have totally different personalities and we like and dislike different things.

Surface relationship only. That's all they want.