Am I the only man that is focused mainly on emotional aspect

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Well, at this point my psychotherapist would have reprimanded me for indulging in this negative, depression-generating (or depression-perpetuating) kind of thinking; but, as I remarked to rdos above, you may not necessarily welcome recycled psychotherapy that was really aimed at me, not at you! Still, I'll stick my neck out a little further and suggest probably the best thing to think when you hear a woman talking quietly is that you can hear a woman talking quietly, and then stop right there! Maybe you could allow yourself to think she has a nice voice, if she happens to have a nice voice, or wonder where she's from, if you can't place her accent: those would be safe enough sidetracks to wander down; but if you begin to reflect on how sad it is that a woman isn't talking to you like that right now and probably never would anyway, this sounds to me like a recipe for self-pity and diminished self-esteem and bitter unhappiness, and why would you put your own time and energy into following a recipe like that?!

From about 1979 to the year 2000ish, I was a world-class champion at self-pity and self-loathing and bitter unhappiness. Indeed, once I'd realized my own already superhuman aptitude for these things, from the mid-1980s I really put huge amounts of energy into developing them even further, so that by 1988 I was ready for my first actual suicide attempt, and by the end of the 1990s I all but had my own reserved parking bay at the mental hospital. So I am not, repeat not about to reproach anyone for thinking in a negative way, because I appreciate it is habit-forming, and a difficult habit to kick, too.
Well, your loud voice (if it is loud: I'll have to take your word for that, never having personally heard it nor witnessed you in an actual conversation) could be perceived by some as overbearing or domineering or threatening, so yes, I believe that could lead those people to assume you're arrogant and insensitive and unemotional, as you fear. I seem to recall when the professionals diagnosed my Asperger's they identified "lack of voice modulation" (or some such) as among the manifestations of the condition. So maybe it goes with the territory. This is easy for me to say, of course, but if that's a problem you have, then remembering to make the effort to keep your voice a bit quieter could do you some favours, and with practice it may become easier to achieve consistently.

I like to believe perceptive, sensitive people can see the good in us anyway, irrespective of any glitches in our social functioning. Unfortunately, perceptive sensitive people can be pretty thin on the ground, sometimes bordering on non-existent, like taxis in the pouring rain (I am not an affluent person who travels in taxis, that was just an impulsive metaphor).
I think I can identify with that pain. Unfortunately, even if I can identify with it, you'll still feel it anyway. I believe you're highlighting some of the reasons why A.S.D. and other Neurodivergent conditions are now referred to as "hidden disabilities" or "invisible disabilities", and you're also perhaps underlining the popular misconception (clearly disproved by many posts here) that people with A.S.D. are all, automatically, incapable of emotion or sensitivity or intimacy.

I am not clear (and it is none of my business, ultimately) what your formal or suspected diagnosis may be. And in any case my faith in the mental health profession is so low that if a psychiatrist told me it was raining, I'd go outside and have a look for my damn' self. So a diagnosis, or absence of, can be of limited value. But if you have A.S.D. in any form and to any extent, then difficulty in coming across as the person you truly are does simply go with the territory, and this is something we can all, respectively, endeavour to work on over time, but it isn't going to go away. By the same token, difficulty forming relationships can go with the territory. The most positive thing I can think of to say right now is that "difficulty" is not the same as "impossibility".

I've had a few relationships, almost none of which lasted as long as they could or should have done (I could even point to one or two which perhaps ought to have continued indefinitely), and my Asperger's was a major factor in most of those untimely disasters. By virtue of the Asperger's I have, plus various other factors I needn't bore you with, after seven years single and lonely, I'm now looking at possibly living out the rest of my days single and lonely. This is what a former colleague of mine was wont to call A Run-DMC Situation, i.e. "it's like that, and that's the way it is!" I spent thousands on psychotherapy to learn (among other things) the knack of serenely accepting things are as they are, and it requires a certain amount of effort (sometimes all the strength I can muster, actually).

But even so, I'm sure there is actually some hope for me yet, and I'm equally sure there must be some for you. We can always keep working on ourselves, and that can help one simply to feel more comfortable in one's own skin as well as, simultaneously, making one in some subliminal way more attractive to others. If you see what I mean.

Sorry, may have overdosed on the caffeine slightly here!

I don't think you talk about the same thing as we did.

In my experience, when NT girls whisper between themselves it's almost always a bad sign, so you should take that as a "red flag" and be careful. Most likely they are gossipping about somebody, possibly about you, and the reason they whisper is so you would not hear it. You DON'T want to hear this at all since it is not about intimacy.

When I talk about silence I mean it literally, and I certainly don't mean using a quite voice or whispering!

My impression was that QFT was alluding to conversations in which a woman is talking softly and tenderly to a man, and the understandable maudlin feeling which can (if one permits it so to do) then arise from the fact that one is not in a situation where one can enjoy that kind of intimacy.

But that was merely my impression.

Could be so, but that is in a private situation, not in a group of girls.

Besides, I've heard about this "whispering thing", but I have actually never experienced it, and so I think it is confined to NTs only.

I think your psychotherapist would be right about that. My love interest doesn't like negativity, and neither do I and so when one of us has negative thoughts or feelings then the other one would typically poke with happy feelings. It works great because I'm almost always positive nowadays even when things don't go as I wish they would.

She was one hell of a psychotherapist, to judge from what I've heard in real life about other people's experiences of psychotherapy, and from my own unbelievably dismal experiences of the mental health profession in general, and now also from posts on Wrong Planet too!

Over a period of roughly 15 years (1998/1999-2014, from memory) I got to a point where I could make a good guess at what she'd say, so she still talks to me every day but I don't have to drive for 75 minutes to get there and I don't have to pay! In fact, since 2014, I've even managed to work with her on stuff that, in real life, she wasn't able to fix while I was still seeing her in person. So sometimes I can say something that can help someone else, but I try not to fall into the trap of assuming that because I know how to handle my own problems I automatically know how to handle someone else's problems.

In some other threads, there are some glib and oversimplistic posts from people who appear to believe advice which might have helped them will automatically be useful and welcome to someone else who is in a totally different place; also posts from people who have obviously never known suffering as bad as that of the person they're glibly and oversimplistically addressing. This glibness and oversimplification upsets me, but as the people doing it are evidently Veterans in good standing, I suppose it's for me to learn how to cope with that myself, instead of attacking them for their brutal insensitivity. Meanwhile I hope not to fall into the same glib oversimplifying trap myself!

I'm well aware of all the sometimes severe problems that autistics have in this area, but that's not my focus. My primary reason for being here is to offer alternative ways to approach relationships and to question advice to adapt more to how NTs do it. It is my belief that many NDs will benefit from this approach in the long run, but it is not a quick fix.

Ooops, really sorry, Dr Diplomacy strikes again! And this time he's even sober! Apologies. I most definitely did not intend to suggest you were in any way unaware. Too much caffeine maybe (on my part, I mean).

I wasn't talking about wispering, I was talking about speaking in quiet voice. There is a difference between quiet voice and wispering. And also I wasn't talking about a group of girls, I was mostly talking about situation with just two girls. And usually I CAN hear what they talk about. For example, they might be talking about exams and how tired they are. But the fact that they talk in this voice implies the level of trust they have for each other that they don't have for me.

The advice my therapists gives me has to do with not being so argumentative, controlling my voice, not staring at people so intensely, etc. I am yet to hear a therapist EVER talk about depressive thoughts. Which makes me wonder: could it be that my emotions are so hard to see that even my therapist doesn't see them? But then again, since I want to change my situation then maybe the advice that I do get is the one that I am looking for. So I guess I have two separate thoughts:

a) I am glad my therapists is telling me what to do differently as opposed to what to feel since this advice is more useful

b) If I analyze the motives of my therapist and put it side by side with how everyone else acts towards me, then I begin to wonder whether the fact that I am capable of having emotions is being hidden from both therapist AND everyone else -- and, if so, could this be why others don't ever try to socialize with me?



Nice to hear someone other than myself putting dates year by year. I do that a lot too. I was born at the end of 1979. Up until 2001 I was blissfully unaware I even had any difficulties to begin with. I was assuming I was just choosing not to socialize since it would take time away from math and physics, and the moment I "decide" to socialize then I would just magically speak friends, girlfriend or even a wife into existence. Then, in 2001, I learned the hard way that it was not the case and the other thing I learned the hard way in 2001 is when people don't talk to me its not neutral its negative. So from that point onward I started to obsess about those things and the more I obsessed the more I pushed people away. Well I guess before 2001 people didn't talk to me that much either, but I remember a few striking examples of people that tried -- and whom I simply ignored -- but the moment I actually began to care, nobody ever tried any more.

In any case, when you were talking about mental hospital, were you speaking literally or metaphorically? Have you ever been hospitalized?

You also mentioned that the reason one of your relationships ended was due to some condition besides Asperger which you didn't want to mention since its Asperger message board. Can you mention what that condition is now? If you don't feel comfortable sharing it publically you can always PM me.

In my case, I have been officially diagnosed with Asperger's -- and this is the only diagnosis I have. I have been diagnosed with it in 1995 and I was told about my diagnosis in 1997. But between 1997 and 2001 I was thinking that this diagnosis simply makes me "not want" friends and the moment I would actually want them I will instantly make them. I only learned that this diagnosis takes away from my ability to make friends only in 2001 which is when I actually wanted them.



Well, the fact that it is loud is what others been telling me. As a matter of fact, I been told that I have loud voice back in the 90-s too. But the context was different. Back in the 90-s I was told that when I was arguing with my dad about physics -- or with someone else about something else -- and my mom was trying to get me to shut up since it was disruptive to everyone else. On the other hand, in more recent years, I am not engaging in this behavior (on the contrary I avoid approaching people and wait for others to approach me) and then, in response to my question "why don't others approach me" I am either being told

a) why don't you approach them yourself

OR

b) because your voice is too loud

OR

c) Other answers I am too lazy to list.

So answer "a" seem to contradict what I was told in the 90-s, while answer "b" seems to go hand in hand with it. So I would think answer "b" is more honest answer, while answer a is just a blame shifting: they know I am not going to approach people anyway, so they can stick me with that advice so that I won't be complaining.

But in any case, they didn't say "b" as a brush off. On the contrary, they say it as a serious answer to my question. For example, I had some guy in the bible study group agree to meet with me for an hour to discuss my social problems, and he pointed out how I been talking to somebody and he heard my voice louder than the voice of the person he been talking to even though I wasn't in the same conversation.



But why should you accept it as it is instead of trying to fix it? If you said yourself that your past relationships SHOULD have lasted longer, doesn't it imply that you should try to achieve what you think you SHOULD have, a lifelong relationship?

In any case I don't want to accept things as they are. I want to marry and have kids. And simply having mental piece is not worth that sacrifice. Unlike you, I am not suicidal and never have been, so maybe our situations are different in this regard.



I am not sure I am understanding you correctly. You said in the previous sentence you gave up on the whole prospect of having relationships, and now you are saying you do have hope? So can you explain what you mean?

Not much. As for when it happens in a group of girls, I'd say it's the same context. They just keep their voices low enough so nobody is likely to hear, which in turn depends on the context.



Two is still a group, and the dynamic is still the same if it is two, three or four.



Me too, but that's because I have very sensitive hearing. I often hear things that people think nobody else would hear.



I don't think it is productive to "hang-up" on this. It's not so that if you manage to do this with a girl that she would automatically want a relationship. It's more a side-effect for NTs. And as I already mentioned, I've been married for a long time and had some other "things" going with girls too, and this is not something I ever have involved in. What I desire is to skip small-talk, and actually talk as little as possible, and not to talk quietly.

No need. You seem to be a guy that has lots of experience in the ND relationship area, and I like that. You seem a bit too eager to take NT advice in the relationship area, but that is ok. People can take whatever advice they like.

I never cared much to adapt to NTs, and I got no relationship advice as a teenager, which I'm actually very happy about. It allowed me to experiment instead of trying to fit into the dating culture. I can't say it's been easy, but the reasons for that are different than for many other NDs.

I know it won't automatically mean I would be in a relationship, but it "would" mean a friendship. A friendship with a female is still a lot better than nothing. Don't get me wrong, I want relationship too. I guess I want a relationship with one woman and friendship with other ones. But, unfortunately, I can't have either.

Not really. I've had a few female ND friendships, and none of them had this. Talking quietly doesn't mean you are friends, and you can be friends and still talk normally.



I think it might be easier to find a female friend than a relationship, but then I don't value friendships that much. My friendships are often based on mutual interests & benefits, and are not unconditional like my love interests tend to be.

I find that highly unlikely. If you can get depressed it means you have emotions.

Also, the problem with emotions and ASD is showing them with facial expressions, talking about & describing your emotions, not having them. I find it likely that many autistics are more emotional than the average NT.

Yes, in my experience, it really actually could! Some mental health professionals still fall into the trap of believing the old stereotype that those of us with Asperger's don't have emotions, or not emotions of the deeper, more spiritual variety anyway. A large proportion of mental health professionals, moreover, are not blessed with the kind of sensitivity and perceptiveness and empathy that we, the patients, would prefer to be able to assume that the professionals would possess. And maybe you, for your part, do keep your emotions deeper below the surface than most of the people your therapist is used to; if you don't tend to talk about your emotions, for instance, or manifest them noticeably, then your therapist may assume emotions are not a thing that needs addressing in your case.

I've been told my facial expression can very impassive and unemotional, for instance. This is classic Asperger's. In social situations I have to remember to try to actively mime how I'm feeling, for the benefit of those around me, but it's exhausting, which is among the reasons why I seldom socialize now.

On the one hand it's good if you have a therapist who can give you practical advice about things you could try doing differently in your life. This sounds pretty useful, the way you describe it.

However, in my experience of psychotherapy, a good psychotherapist won't tell you what to feel: a good one will ask you what you feel, and explore the reasons why you might feel that way, and see if it might be possible to control those feelings and channel them in a different way so as to enable you to feel more comfortable and more at peace and, hopefully, happier. For me it was partly like an exorcism, as there were many bad experiences and bad feelings from the past to be got rid of, and then new ways of feeling to be arrived at; but it was always collaborative, and the decision as to how I wanted to feel was always ultimately mine, not hers. My psychotherapist revealed to me that I could actually take charge of the thoughts and feelings in my head, and change the ones that were distressing me, but all she did was teach me how: she didn't tell me what changes to make, she only pointed out some thoughts and feelings which I was so used to that I didn't even realize they were causing me distress. It's over five years since I last saw her; I'm still using what she taught me now, to control my thoughts and feelings and prevent them from distressing me excessively, on a daily basis (and also on a nightly basis, because I sleep very little and it's often at night that I'm prone to freaking out). Clearly it is not she who is deciding how I ought to feel, but I who am using what she taught me, to determine for myself how I feel.

It takes a lot of effort, and I certainly don't always achieve 100% success; for instance, I was drunk for practically all of last week because I was struggling to combat a really bad bout of depression (possibly seasonal), but I fought it off in the end, and with no medical help of any kind. Psychotherapy taught me how to do that.Yes! But it appears I disagree with the gentleman immediately above, on this particular point. I think I'm assuming your therapist is concentrating on the more obvious, surface stuff, and either overlooking or not prioritizing the emotions implied by your depression. I will let the other gentleman speak for himself, which he is eminently capable of doing.Maybe partly an A.S.D. thing, helps oneself to get one's thoughts in order. However, I try to bear in mind that people may want to put whatever I'm saying in the context of whatever my actual experience may be, so they can make some sense of it and establish its relevance to them and their situation. Maybe sometimes I am over-sharing or giving "Too Much Information", which would again be an A.S.D. thing! But sometimes here, quite a sweeping statement can be made in someone's post with nothing to back it up or explain it, and I find that unhelpful.Yes, a not uncommon vicious circle, I gather. Been there; got tee shirt!Literally, so far as the hospital was concerned; metaphorically, as to the parking space!Ohhhh, yes! Off the top of my head, let's say, er, 1995, 1998, 1999, then more recently 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015; but the more recent string of admissions was for somewhat different reasons, and had it not been for the cruel welfare system in England and some lousy mental health interventions, the 2011-2015 admissions need never have occurred: they were caused by an exceptional concatenation of avoidable stresses, or at least stresses which ought never to have been imposed upon someone known to be prone to extremes of anxiety and depression. My truly existential depression was back in the 1990s.Well, to be fair, Asperger's may have been a part of it, but it was not my Asperger's behaviours that freaked her out, as she shared quite a few of them and had other A.S.D. traits of her own! For instance if we were driving along, we both liked to read out the road signs and the names on passing trucks, like a couple of 6-year-olds showing off their literacy prowess. Briefly, it was insecurity arising from my childhood that she couldn't handle, as she needed a lot of "space" (another possible A.S.D. feature of hers) and I wanted her with me more often than she sometimes wished to be. We could spend 3 weeks together non-stop without a cross word, but then she might want a week to herself, and she wouldn't commit herself to a specific date for her return, and I couldn't handle that back then. I could now; in fact I might prefer it! Professionals have labelled me with terms such as "personality damage" and "emotional abuse in childhood": those are what I would categorize as non-A.S.D. issues.Yes, well again it's that old stereotype that those of us with Asperger's are self-sufficient and self-absorbed and don't want friends and don't miss having them. Unintentionally and unwittingly, you bought into that stereotype, or were sold it by witless mental health workers. In fact, as you and I and many others here prove, we can have emotions and we can crave friendship and love!

As you very rightly say, Asperger's can be an impediment to forming friendships and relationships, and indeed to understanding quite how they work, but doesn't actually render us incapable of desiring or enjoying them. It is possible for someone with Asperger's to have friends, to be considered a good friend, to have romantic and sexual relationships, to be considered an affectionate lover, etc. It's just harder for us to get into those friendships and those relationships, and also perhaps more likely we may inadvertently screw them up!These answers are not mutually exclusive: it could be (a) sometimes and (b) other times, and maybe sometimes it's actually (b) which has led to (a)?! People can interpret shyness as rudeness, and they can interpret diffidence as aloofness. It's a minefield out there! From what you said above about the kind of advice your therapist gives you, he or she can probably tell you better about this than I can, as I'm still kind of experimenting and practising myself at the age of 46!That's nearly a philosophical question, as opposed to merely an Asperger's question! I think what I was getting at is, there are some things about Asperger's that no amount of therapy nor medication can fix, it's just the way you were built at the factory, so there's no point agonizing over those things because they're just there, and it's better to shrug your shoulders and accept them than mope around wishing you could be different. On the other hand of course there are always ways to work on yourself and make your life, as someone with Asperger's, just as comfortable as it possibly can be. And I certainly did find psychotherapy amazingly useful for that. I struggle with anxiety and depression and exhaustion, but those things can go with the Asperger's territory plus I did have a somewhat-less-than-ideal childhood; and then again, thanks to a combination of those factors, I have had some pretty traumatic experiences in adulthood from time to time, so life in my head now can't be expected to be easy, yet I am in an infinitely more serene state than I was twenty years ago, so hooray for that, yeah?

Had I only known then what I know now about my Asperger's, and indeed about myself generally, then relationships which went wrong before I'd had so much psychotherapy maybe needn't have gone wrong, and of course maybe I could have got myself into a few more relationships with slightly greater ease. I am now, not least after having my heart broken in 2011 by a very special relationship which I thought was about to happen but suddenly didn't, somewhat ambivalent about whether or not I want a lifelong relationship. The good news is at last I can stand on my own two feet so I no longer feel that I need a lifelong relationship. If the right one presents itself, I'll be delighted; if it doesn't, I'll be just about O.K. with that.Yes, it does sound as though you and I may be on different pages here. However, as soon as I realized my world would not actually end if I never had children after all, that eventuality ceased to seem as awful as it always used to. And in a small way, preparedness to accept that you may never find someone can actually increase your chances of finding someone: desperation is not attractive to women! Whereas a semblance of serenity and acceptance and inner peace may be.Who said I made total sense?! I am actually pretty unstable, even if I'm a whole lot stronger and more stable than I used to be. My mood is up and down, albeit at least I know now how to prevent the downs going as far down into darkness as they used to. I eschew the medication because it would tend to limit the extent of the highs as well as the lows, and I enjoy my highs, thanks!

Admittedly I am ambivalent now about a relationship. It would have to be a very special and magical one for me to feel it was worth pursuing; by definition, that kind of relationship is rare, and as I seldom go out (partly for reasons of money, partly for reasons of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and partly because too much interaction simply freaks me out anyway), plus the acknowledged difficulty anyone with Asperger's has meeting people and getting into relationships at all, I have to face up to the fact it may never happen, as I'm already heading for 50. For me, being single is definitely better than being stuck in the wrong relationship, as many people are, or else in a boring, uninspiring sort of relationship, which many people are happy to settle for. So the degree to which I can accept my single status and my limited relationship prospects cheerfully is subject to some variation!