Making and Keeping Friends

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kraftiekortie
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05 Jul 2016, 8:59 am

Sometimes, I am the one who calls first. More often, though, it's the other person.

Dreadful Dante
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05 Jul 2016, 4:36 pm

I tried to have long-term friends. Many times I forgot I had them, many times I know they're nice to be around but I just don't want to interact with anyone. Some people called me and said ''Hey, it's blahblahblah, when are you free to together?'' and I'm like ''Who is this...? How did you get my number?''.

I tried to work out some friendships of mine in the past. Although they really enjoyed my company, I didn't understand why and I wasn't at all having any results in bonding and/or attaching like they were.

I left them and they were even agressive with me because of my decisions, saying I had played with their emotions.
The ''friendship'' lasted to a bit less than 5 years and I was exhausted from faking an NT friendship. It didn't work for me and as I wasn't feeling anything, I left. ''Fake it till you make it'' isn't that true for somethings.

I didn't mean to offend any of them. I just didn't know how I was supposed to end a friendship. (If someone knows, please tell me).

It was something like this

''Would you mind if I went away forever?''
''What? Are you serious?
''Yes''
''I think I would miss you''
''Is missing a bad thing?''
''I don't know, I think it wouldn't be too bad. I think I would be sad for a few days''
''Okay, thank you for everything. I want you to have an amazing, prosperous, happy and fulfilling life. I wish you well... Bye!''

The end.

And then comes the raging friend texting me ''WTF ARE YOU DOING? WAS THAT SERIOUS?''
I didn't understand why she was mad at me as she had told be it wouldn't be a big deal if I went away forever. I CLEARLY ASKED HER.

If anyone has thoughts on this, I'd love to hear.

Peacefully,
Dante.

nurseangela
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05 Jul 2016, 4:56 pm

Dreadful Dante wrote:

Well you know I've got thoughts about it. :mrgreen:

: - p

Do any other Aspies not get the "bonding" feelings?

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Darn, I flunked.

DataB4
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05 Jul 2016, 5:33 pm

Hi Dante,

'Go away forever,' that sounds so final. If someone said that to you, wouldn't you wonder why? Wouldn't you think, 'Wow, what's wrong with me?' I know I would have.

You said that you wouldn't miss that friend because you never felt close to them. Why do you suppose you never felt close to them? I've never had this kind of one-sided friendship where only they felt close to me.

Also, drifting apart generally involves both people not contacting each other as often, or not at all, for a variety of reasons. That feels more natural than leaving someone forever, no?

Dreadful Dante
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05 Jul 2016, 6:34 pm

DataB4 wrote:

If someone said that to me I wouldn't mind it. I often do it talking to some old friends. (I call them old friends because I usually see them every 3 to 4 years). They know I work and know how being away for even a decade doesn't make any difference to me. I enjoy seeing them just as much.

Angela, I figured out that by these standarts I do have long term friends. But it's not the usual close friends. We meet every few years to have awesome meaningful conversations and then go on separate ways. I don't miss the conversations because I have figured their thought patterns and I can use them to answer my questions without them being with me.

As to the friends:

I told them many times how I was trying and maybe learning to display emotional attachment. I shared personal things with them, I was comfortable to be myself, I asked how they were, talked about anything, made jokes, spent time with them, etc.

Although many seem to enjoy this type of "just spending time with them" I couldn't see any meaning or feel any enjoyment from it. I did feel somewhat morally responsible for them as I was their friend (or at least behaved like I was). We had things in common, many things but I do not miss discussing about any of these things with them.

Peacefully,
Dante.

nurseangela
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05 Jul 2016, 6:38 pm

DataB4 wrote:

Dante told me he doesn't get the bonding feeling. I had another Aspie friend (a guy) who also never got the bonding feeling. He also would forget he had friends and never missed them. He never missed his father after he died either even though it had been a good relationship. This must be more common than I thought and maybe among male Aspies than female Aspies. He said he doesn't wish to be this way - you understand?

My thoughts on this is if he doesn't wish to hurt anyone in the process, but still have friends, then he will have to make a system of some sort to remind himself to contact these people every once in a while.

It's hard for me to understand being bored with someone if they are a good friend - good enough that you want to be friends for a few years then you aren't interested in them anymore. Like Dante said, maybe he was just acting to be friends. He said that his friends got mad at him when he stopped talking to them and that's what I did to my Aspie friend too. I was so hurt that I said some really awful things that I'm sure he will never forget. My Aspie friend was friends with me for 2 yrs before he just stopped talking to me out of nowhere - totally unexpected. My other Aspie friend who said he never felt anything for anyone did the same thing - one day just nothing. That's why this subject is so important to me.

This is why I made this thread - to try to understand and see if this is more common among Aspies than I thought. Maybe male Aspies have it and female Aspies don't.

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Your neurodiverse (Aspie) score: 83 of 200
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Dreadful Dante
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05 Jul 2016, 6:50 pm

If I'm not mistaken, Asperger's is more common in men (someone correct me if I'm wrong).

Angela, can anchoring be mistaken for love? For example, if a man surprises a woman with a gift she likes, she'll instantly and tenderly remember him when she sees that gift. Is this love?

nurseangela
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05 Jul 2016, 8:09 pm

Dreadful Dante wrote:

It could be seen as caring. I have an Aspie friend that I exchanged gifts with at Christmas and every time I see it I think about him, but with him I never got very close because all we did was email and most was from me. So actually to be honest, I don't feel much when I see the picture because I never really bonded with him.

Funny, but I bonded with my Aspie friend of 2 yrs just from texting - I never saw what he looked like, but I would have done anything for him. I did hear his voice once - it was wonderful.

_________________
Me grumpy?
I'm happiness challenged.

Your neurodiverse (Aspie) score: 83 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 153 of 200 You are very likely neurotypical
Darn, I flunked.

nurseangela
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05 Jul 2016, 8:16 pm

Dreadful Dante wrote:

DataB4 wrote:

"I don't miss the conversations because I have figured their thought patterns and I can use them to answer my questions without them being with me."

Is that why you wanted to hear my voice?

I've got a theory. What if you never heard my voice, then you wouldn't be able to make up the conversations and would then have to keep coming back. Does that make sense?

_________________
Me grumpy?
I'm happiness challenged.

Your neurodiverse (Aspie) score: 83 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 153 of 200 You are very likely neurotypical
Darn, I flunked.

Dreadful Dante
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05 Jul 2016, 8:28 pm

"Is that why you wanted to hear my voice?"

No.

"I've got a theory. What if you never heard my voice, then you wouldn't be able to make up the conversations and would then have to keep coming back. Does that make sense?"

It does make some sense, but it's far from reality. My intentions were to build a concrete, somewhat tangible character of you in my mind.

nurseangela
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05 Jul 2016, 8:30 pm

Dreadful Dante wrote:

But then once you knew everything about me, that would be it essentially?

_________________
Me grumpy?
I'm happiness challenged.

Your neurodiverse (Aspie) score: 83 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 153 of 200 You are very likely neurotypical
Darn, I flunked.

DataB4
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05 Jul 2016, 9:02 pm

Wow, this is really interesting. NurseAngela, now I see why you created this thread. BTW, since I haven't been diagnosed with an ASD, please especially don't take what I say as representing any group.

Dante, thanks for explaining in more detail. I can't imagine knowing someone so well that I know all that they'll say. I feel like there's always room for a little something new. It would be boring, so we'd have to find new experiences to share, and take comfort in understanding each other so well.

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Dreadful Dante
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05 Jul 2016, 9:36 pm

DataB4 wrote:

It's not exactly how they think, it's more of their speech patterns, which consists in predicting how engaged and what words they'll use when verbalizing thoughts on specific subjects.

Of course I do not know them entirely, but I can use their previous speech patterns to describe things "from their perspectives". It's my way of dealing with mindblindness. I can't actually verbalize this properly and I'm poorly explaining it right now. I'm very confused with it.

It's mainly knowing how someone speaks. Just like when someone texts you or answers your thread and they have a specific way of writing and a certain timing to answer you, when speaking there is this pattern too.

There are the convencional ways of thinking which consist in an easily labeled and never changing ideology.
It's also simple to predict people emotional responses by studying psychology and psychoanalysis.

Discourse Analysis is the Linguistic study that allows to me to better identify speech patterns.

Remember, this is far from being 100% accurate.

I feel like something here I said might doesn't sense for you guys. If you don't understand it, let me know.

Peacefully,
Dante.

DataB4
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06 Jul 2016, 6:11 am

So, you're saying that although your predictions and analysis of speech patterns aren't entirely accurate, they are enough for you not to be interested in what someone actually says, once you know them well enough?

Dreadful Dante
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06 Jul 2016, 7:03 am

DataB4 wrote:

Yes. It's not as bad as it sounds. Some are always unpredictable (everyone, really, but some are more).

It's difficult to explain this but I'm trying. These are my theories to logically explain it. Maybe is isn't that logic after all. Maybe someday it'll change.

Peacefully,
Dante.

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