The only women my age I would be interested in

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Dude! you like go for walks in the park and visits to the pension office for coffee?

No, I got into an interest in the science and entertainment branch and he was well known in the business. I was surrounded by men, most of them old. I do not like coffee, it makes me cough. It stinks and dehydrates the body and gives insomnia. I very rarely drank on special occasions. His best friend whom I talked to won year after year world competitions in the branch. He's got my name and picture in his top works, not that I contributed to it. I had my own I worked on for a while.

huh?

1) If you look up a concept of “ladder theory” and “friends zone”, the popular advice seems to be the opposite. Namely, if you start out from “friends ladder”, you can’t ever go to “relationship ladder” later on. You have to go to relationship ladder from the get-go. Now, to me, that doesn’t make sense: like you said, you have to know the person in order to start a relationship. But that seems to be how people operate. In fact, even if I look at your own advice that you gave me a couple of years ago, you mentioned how I would strike out on the basis of looks and other factors women can see right away. That seemed to rule out the “get to know each other” concept.

2) Despite what I just said, I actually DID spend time looking for just female friends, no strings attached, when it comes to “real world”, outside the internet. Why? Well, I don’t know how to go about finding a girlfriend outside of dating sites. So since the girls that respond to me on dating sites are all far away, my only other option is to make female friends in reals life. So in case of Russian girl and British girl, they were on dating sites, so yes in their cases I was trying to pursue a relationship. But in case of the ones I met in real life (including that female office mate I talked about 2 years ago) I was focusing on friendship. Although it’s true that them being females played a key role in my obsession: I won’t have been obsessing about a male officemate. But you see, I can’t succeed even with making friends. As a matter of fact, I noticed that waitresses and cashiers talk to others more than to me. Now, even if they did talk to me, that won’t be a real friendship, since it would just be them doing their job in a little friendlier way. Yet I can’t get even that. Now if I can’t even get a waitress or a cashier to talk to me for two minutes, do you see how much harder it would be to get a girl elsewhere — for whom it’s not a job — to actually talk to me for half an hour rather than two minutes, much less invite me places? So yes, I would happily take any female attention I could get, even if it is just friendship. But I don’t know how to get it, which is why it is so frustrating.

3) I am not sure you and Kraftie were really talking about the same thing, although I could see how they are linked. After all, there are people who pursue dating relationship right away, and they don’t overanalyze; and then there is me when I overanalyze even when I am not trying to pursue anything (such as the case with waitresses). Although I do see the connection. Even though I am not “trying” to date the waitresses, the whole dating question is on the back of my mind, so that is what makes me overanalyze things. But again, I am not sure whether that’s what Kraftie was referring to. Kraftie, can you clarify one way or the other?

Why are you saying “how dare you”. All I said was facts about my life. I wasn’t attacking your life or anyone else’s for that matter.

If women like older guys, why is it I was told that my age is one of the reasons women don’t like me?

So you are acknowledging that there are two separate needs, you are just stating that they have a common origin. Well, stating that they have common origin doesn’t negate the fact that — as a result of whatever it is — they ended up being separate needs. Well, the fact that they “ended up” separate (regardless of the reason) implies that porn can only satisfy one of them but not the other.

After following this thread for some time, I'm going to suggest that it is likely because you make 'telling you the truth' so darn difficult. If they say, "Because you are acting too desperate and I don't like that" you could turn right around and say, "Oh, I will totally stop acting desperate if you'll just have me!" In fact, I'm sure you'd bat away any objection they offer you - any truth they'll offer you. But you can't do anything about your age - so they say it's your age. Truth is, you probably can't control your desperation either - at least when controlling is contingent on someone else's actions. (her becoming your girlfriend or friend or whatever)

I would say you may have been fed misinformation because women like older guys usually it seems. Back when I was in my 20s, one of the common complaints me and my friends would have is, why do we keep loosing out to older guys. I keep reading it's because older guys have more resources to offer women and they like that. It seems to be true based on loosing out in my 20s as well as other guys I know back then.

Yup.

To QFT:

Given that you apparently have never experienced a deep emotional connection with another person, I would suggest that you not put a priori limits (especially impossible ones) on whom you can have such a relationship with and under what circumstances.

You gain nothing by bemoaning the fact that you'll never find a woman with whom you already spent your youth. To have any chance of finding a deep emotional relationship, you will need to open your mind to the possibility of having one without the personal history you wish you had.

Shared values help. To that end, since you are evangelical Christian and a grad student, I would suggest participating in a group of evangelical Christian grad students, if there is such a group you can join and you haven't already done so.

QUESTION: Regardless of whether that statement is true or not, how do you know it? Are you basing it off of the assumption that people with Asperger are incapable of deep emotional connection? That assumption is very unfair since different people with Asperger are different, and that is precisely what holds me back.

Now, to answer your question: I felt emotional connection with "some" girls, but they happened "not" to be the ones whom I actually dated. The reason I didn't experience the emotional connection with the girls I dated is because I was settling. So it has nothing to do with lack of capacity for emotional connection. It applies to anyone and everyone who settles. Lets say someone doesn't have Asperger but, instead, they are overweight. Guess what: they will settle too. So, accordingly, they won't experience emotional connection either.

However, settling notwithstanding, I still experienced *some* connection, just the wrong kind perhaps. For example, with my second ex, I formed a connection when I was taking care of her while she was sick. As a result of that, I didn't want to break up with her even when I stopped liking her, because I didn't want to betray her. Thats a connection right there.

And as far as the girls from the past, there is a connection too, except that it is more in the restrospect. For example, I was doing homework till past midnight and then I would go home and on my way home go to the grocery store that was open really really late. And I remember the cashier kept trying to talk to me but I ignored her because I just wanted to get home asap. But now looking back I feel stupid for ignoring her and it feels like almost the exact kind of attention I wish I had now. Like when I am stressed about homework and so forth, and then some girl is there for me, it would jsut feel so good. I have no idea how I overlooked it, but putting myself into my past shoes, I like that girl a lot better than my actual ex-s. I just wish I could find her.

One more thing: What I wrote in the OP is more of a wishful thinking rather than the actual plan I am rigidly sticking to. In fact, just this Spring I been talking to two girls on a dating site (to one of them in March to the other in May) that were both 40, and I didn't know them from the past either. In both cases yes I was trying to pursue relationship with them. *BUT* I wasn't happy about it. I kept wishing I could talk to that cashier from the good old past.



I been going on and off to the group of evangelical Christian grad students past 5 years, and they don't seem to talk to me.

I guess "on and off" might be a key word here: if I were to go more consistently maybe they would have. But then again, maybe they wouldn't. After all, part of the reason I was going so rarely is "because" I felt like they didn't talk to me when I was there.

One thing that might have increased my chances this semester is that they had a bunch of new people which I thought gave me a fresh start. But I blew it:

a) A girl A. seemed to have given me positive attention but I was too shy to reciprocate it. Then a month after she stopped coming I emailed her asking if she used to be interested in me, if she lost interest because I didn't reciprocate and whether I can get a second chance. She told me she found a boyfriend and then she came to Bible study and made a big display of her boyfriend.

b) A girl N. didn't talk to me at all and at some point I threw temper tantrum about it. Then when I apologize to her for that she told me she is on the spectrum too, and said she could have done more to make me feel welcome, and then started to send me facebook messages trying to talk to me. Given that it only happened after I got upset, I interpretted it as "pity friendship" so I purposely avoided responding to her until she finally stopped. And yes her facebook also says she has a boyfriend, too.

c) As far as other new folk, I don't feel like they talk to me any more than the old folk did. It was pretty much girl A. that made me feel welcome. So now that A. is gone, I see no point in coming there (unless I want to stoop down into accepting pity friendship from N, which I know I don't want to do).

Based on what you yourself said. Perhaps I misinterpreted. Thanks for the clarifications.


No. I've had deep emotional connections, for example.


In what kinds of contexts did you experience these emotional connections with the women you didn't actually date? (Is the cashier you mentioned later in your message an example of this? Are there any other examples that come to mind?)


I don't suppose there's any way you could possibly locate that cashier again? How many years ago was this?


Groups naturally tend to be cliquish unless they specifically make an effort to be friendly to newcomers. Most people feel more comfortable talking to people they already know.

Perhaps you could talk to the group's leaders about how you feel unwelcome, and ask if they would be willing to consider doing something to make the group friendlier to newcomers, e.g. by using ice-breakers, or by appointing a welcoming committee?

You could also volunteer to help out the group in some way, e.g. by offering to help set up chairs before the meeting and/or put them away afterword. Doing this sort of thing will likely help you be taken more seriously by other members.

By the way, you should aim to get to know lots of people in the group, not just the women you are attracted to. If you appear to be there just to chase women, both the women themselves and the group leaders are likely to find this annoying.

BTW you do know that 95% of young men join christian youth groups for this very reason. Fellowship and spiritual enrichment come 2nd and third in that order.

I believe it.

Therein lies one of your problems. Intimate partnerships are an emotional experience and there are ways to get a girl to reciprocate your emotions without the need to overthink the interaction,

I just attended a university christmas party and I quite easily mixed with about 30 different girls (a mix of single and married) and I met many of them for the first time. I had to be dragged away by a colleague as I was becoming the centre of attention (and of course I am married). The point is when I socialise I take the philosphy I have nothing to lose by being pleasant and nice and the rest flows organically. All of this comes from practice and admittedly I am much more experienced and confident with socialising with females than I was when I was in my 20s.

You just need to keep yourself out there and like a persistent fisherman you will catch a fish eventually.