When friends don't believe you may be affected by AS

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Hello, I'd like to ask if anyone can identify with what I'm about to describe

i'm a 35 year old male, and have a high autism quota but tend not to talk about it. But last week I really offended my closest friend

I don't know what it was I said that caused the problem - and feel bad about that in itself. Maybe it was my manner. But my friend was talking about something at our workplace that upset her. I was aware of this - I knew that when I saw her she'd probably be upset; I even said a prayer for her. when we met, I did my best to comfort my friend - but she said the next day it had been clear to her I didn't care.

Honestly, I do care and feel absolutely horrible at making my friend feel worse when she needed me most.

Here's the main point of this post: I tried to tell my friend I'm not always good at communicating, and sometimes I believe AS may be the reason, She angrily said I was talking nonsense and trying to make myself the victim. I can take that, though I am hurt by what she said. Right now, all I want is for my friend to feel better, even if she can't forgive me - though I badly hope she will forgive me, because i'm hurt about that, too.

The reason I'm posting is to do with a broader question. I've often been laughed at and sometimes bullied in work because of my 'odd' routines and my clumsiness and daydreaming. On very rare occasions when I've suggested to colleagues that maybe I have AS, they'e dismissed it. I feel as though neurotypicals are effectively telling me 'No, WE will decide what you are - you're weird and we can all have a laugh about it - don't spoil it by getting serious''

The nearest analogy I can think of is: It's as if my suggestion to others that I have AS is a bit like me trying to give myself my own nickname - AS - when they want to give me their own nickname / label, as someone strange and clumsy who does not deserve his problems to be taken seriously, and certainly not excused or explained.

Sorry this is a long post - but are any of these experiences familiar to anyone else?

Yes.

And I interpret them exactly the way you do.

If you said you tried to comfort her then you probably did. Although if you want me to be 100% sure then you'll have to run by me what you said to comfort her.

I think that the general public has a very limited, and poor understanding of what AS is. I have tried to explain to people at work before that I have AS, and many of them don't even know what it is! And I work in in a Hospital! I think that most people don't even understand that there is a huge range in the Autistic Spectrum, and they think, if you aren't rocking and stimming (not that they know it is called stimming), and you are verbal, then you aren't Autistic. All of this sort of thinking is incredibly outdated and obsolete, but the average NT doesn't know that. There have been times when I wish I wasn't verbal, because of the many misunderstandings that have occurred as a result of my less than ideal communications skills. As for the rocking and stimming, I always do that in private...

I'm still debating whether I should try and explain certain things to my friends about AS. I'm afraid A) my friends will start to act different and won't be themselves around me B) they will say I'm making stuff up/being dramatic or C) Use the information against me all the time

Nonautistics can't really use information like 'autistic'. It's meta-information from outside the social narrative they use to interpret the world. If you try to explain why you aren't making them feel better it'll always sound like a copout. So never do it. Let them believe (without saying it, ffs) that if you aren't cheering them up it's because they haven't deserved it. That makes sense within their narrative, then they'll be angry with themselves and try harder to make you like them.

Friend: There's an autistic guy at my work but he isn't smart like you.

Me: Really? There's a neurotypical guy at my work but he isn't stupid like you.

THIS. You'd be surprised how much the general public even knows about autism, let alone AS....

With that being said, you need to be as concrete as possible explaining how AS affects you, because no two people with AS present the exact same way. You need to explain how it affects the little things you do throughout the day. In the specific situation you've described, you need to explain how you could appear as uncaring to the girl when you are really not.

Explain it along the lines of..."When I am trying to comfort you, I may not do it in a way you expect because I am not sure of the 'right' ways to do it. This does not mean I don't care about you, it just means I just do so differently."

From his explanation, Jimmy clearly had the intention and the desire to comfort his friend. I think it's quite uncharitable of you, and her, to reject his own word. I too have had many experiences like this, including from clinicians!

Of course, I doubt hardly anyone knows what "neurotypical" means. I had a lot of trouble with this same thing this summer...I tried to tell people that I thought would understand. One is a counselor; she told me I had good social skills and that having Asperger's was trendy right now (yeah, like she's ever known me to follow trends.) She seems to have come around, though...the other night at her daughter's birthday party, she basically told me it was ok with her if I didn't want to sit at the table with everyone else.

The other was the pastor who did my wedding...I guess she prefers to think of me as weird NT comic relief. I haven't spoken to her about it again, and she's recommended me for a job. It's been four months since I figured it out, and I think I'm getting closer to telling everyone, though.

You don't need to prove yourself, or your Autism, to anyone.
People who would discount you when you took the plunge and mentioned your Autism,
let alone make fun of you,
aren't people you should give a damn about.

This.

Seconded! Clinicians are the worst (IMHO) because they are sooo certain they know what a person with an ASD looks like.

It can sound like a copout if it's mentioned right after there's a problem. Maybe it's just my own traumas from school kicking in (I once had a teacher who pulled me aside to tell me not to use a [theoretical] diagnosis as an excuse for misbehavior - when I was one of the best behaved students in the class!), but I never mention ADHD or AS right when someone's upset at me about something. I explain the problem in other terms ("I can be a little klutzy when expressing myself," for example) and save any clinical explanations for some later time when everyone's calmer.