Pity Friends

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Oh no, I don't dislike him at all; I hope he's OK and wish him all the best. I just can't hang out with someone if I don't enjoy it, it feels like a lie that way.



He was a purely platonic friend, not the dating-type. I used to think I liked him, but the moment I realized that our relationship was based on only pity, I drifted away. When he tried to contact me, I sent the letter.

And Greentea, so much WORD. I've never had that happen, thank God (knock on wood), but I agree with you that it's nothing short of mental cruelty. People who do that are a**holes and deserve to be permanently tarred and feathered. If you come across another such %$&@#, let me know and I'll hurt them. Badly.

If anything, a "clean break" WITHOUT communication is by far the worst. That's what's refered to as the "cold-shoulder" technique, or "silent-treatment". Mainly because it's reserved for someone who you really can't stand (in the NT social context). And if the AS person doesn't know what they did wrong, it can really mindf*** them. Luckily, with the exception of one incident, this hasn't happened to me since middle school.

"Drifting apart slowly" is okay, because if it's slow enough, you'll barely notice it. It's probably the best thing to do if you don't dislike someone, but don't particularily like them either. Just start seeing them less often, and don't treat it like a big deal. There have been plenty of people who eventually drifted away from me, or I drifted from them. When I see them later, there are no hard feelings. It's just how things turned out. They went with different crowds, I went with different crowds. Less opportunities to see them, that's all.

The problem with making a note for him, and telling him that you don't want to be friends anymore is that you're kind of making this a bigger deal than it has to be. For all you know, this could make things worse. He might be really worried about doing something to offend you, or making you dislike him. When in reality, you just don't like him that much. It has nothing to do with you hating him, and never wanting to see him again. But he might not understand that, because usually when people break off contact, they do it BECAUSE they hate someone and never want to see them again. Even though they might lie, and say otherwise.

Just out of curiosity, are you 'dumping' this guy as a friend because you have NT friends now, and feel that you no longer 'need' him? Do you kind of want to distance yourself from your past to avoid being labeled as having AS? Just consider that this 'dumping' may be more about you than about him.

I know that this guy is the kind of person, who likes clarity and wants people to be honest with him. I knew that if I tried to "drift apart", he would have continued to contact me until he got an answer. So that would only be dragging out the hurt. He used to be friends with a girl, and then she disappeared somewhere and he did everything, even wrote her a letter by snail mail. He didn't care about seeming stalkerish; he needed to know why she's avoiding him.

I made it clear in the note that none of it is his fault and that I don't dislike him personally and wish him the best of luck.

No, I'm not doing it because I have NT friends. I had NT friends before I met him, so it's not like I was using him so I wouldn't be completely alone. As for your second question...ashamed as I am, yes, that's one of the reasons. I didn't like it how my mom and grandma got so excited that a guy was showing interest in me and I need to seize the opportunity and be his friend, so that we wouldn't be lonely. Also, whenever I was with him, he'd always complain about his lonely life and what a loser he thinks he is. It depressed me and I had no idea what to say, since I was in kind of the same situation myself before. I told him that he shouldn't tell people so bluntly that he has Asperger's and that he doesn't get invited places if they barely know him. I don't know if he listened to me, though.

Well, if someone stops responding to someone's e-mails and calls, that isn't really "drifting", that's a "clean break without communication". And yes, that approach can be pretty infuriating.

It's very hard to drift properly, if you still frequent the same areas as the person or you were particularily "close" with that person (you saw them at least once every two weeks). Appropriate drifting is easier if you move away, switch schools, or you didn't know the person that well and haven't communicated with them recently anyways.

In a theoretical situation, if one of your childhood friends moved to a less accessible part of the city and you manage to contact them, they would respond. But, due to the distance between your two houses, you eventually see this friend less and less and eventually find new friends. Five years later, you see this friend at the mall. You may say hello, and catch up on old times, you may not. That's what "drifting apart" would be.

My problem isn't with you dumping a friend. Everyone looses friends from time to time. My problem is with the letter.

Let me ask you something, Do you break up with all of your friends with a letter? Or is this the only friend you ever felt the 'need' to break a friendship up with a letter.

Seriously, people with aspergers are not idiots, if someone stops hanging around with us. We are smart enough to know that the friendship is probably over. Why rub in a friendship being over with a letter?

I'd say the same thing to you if you broke up with a 'normal' friend with a letter as well. I don't know anyone that 'breaks' friendships with letters.

It's pretty lame to do it with significant others as well for future reference.

It's not moral to have pity friends.

That not only puts strain on the pityer, but your feeling of strain and unease lower the quality of the friendship, thus rendering the pityee without a proper friend.

These relationships can often become abusive (I've seen this) as the pityer becomes aware of the pityee's need for friendship. The pityer is often tempted to take advantage of said need for friendship and because he doesn't like the pityee, the pityee is often used for money, material goods, food, a place to crash, rides. The pityee is often verbally, or sometimes physically abused by the pityer in front of others, or is "secret best friends with pityer" to avoid embarassment or humiliation in the eyes of "normal peers".

The pityer expects the pityee to be a servant and earn his friendship, because the pityer feels inconvenienced by feeling morally abliged to befriending the pityee.

It's so sad.

Be honest.

Prevent a case that could possibly result in an abusive relationship.

Black tea: Are you aware of what happened here? A person with AS replied to your query by referring to their own experiences, and you corrected them based on some data you learnt somewhere. That is absolutely ridiculous. The ex-friend is much better off without your patronising and stifling influence.

I have never officially broken up with a friend before, but if I did, I would write a letter if they expected to hear from me and it seems too sudden for me to just stop contacting them out of the blue. If one of us switched schools or moved, however, it would be much easier to slowly drift apart.

Like I said before, the reason I wrote the letter is to make things clear to him. If I just stopped calling him, he may think that I lost interest, but wouldn't be 100% sure. And even if it was obvious that I don't want to be friends anymore, he wouldn't know why, which is, in my opinion, the most frustrating thing of all. He'd think he did something wrong instead of knowing that none of it was his fault. And I said earlier that he's the kind of person, who would keep demanding a reason, even at the price of seeming stalkerish.

I think that breaking off a friendship like that is pretty hurtful, but allows the dumpee to get over it more quickly. It's impossible to deal with the unknown, but it's always possible to find a solution if you know what the problem is.



I'm not correcting them based on data, but based on my own feelings. There's nothing ridiculous about disagreeing with someone.

I don't want anyone befriending or dating me merely because they feel sorry for me.

I was best friends with someone for nearly two years, then I broke friends with her for a multitude of reasons, then she's saying that I "need a friend", so I started to get the impression that she was only friends with me out of pity, which pissed me off. That's worse than what I started to suspect before that, which is that she was hanging round with me since she got kicked out of the popular gang, which she is now back in. But hey, I don't really care either way.

I think you did the right thing, don't let the others who disagree get to you, we often suspect NTs doing things for the worst and most selfish reasons even if you don't.

I've been both in all of those situations and know that if you don't drift appart (this requires two in order to work) the way I prefer is to simply tell them somehow.

You have my respect for doing it the hard way. Of all people here you know him best (I guess) so you knows best.

If someone wishes to end a friendship with me, they need to say so explicitly. Silence won't work with me.

i totally agree.

i had a friend that i trusted almost completely. after i told him i have AS, he started treating me like i was worth less than dirt on his shoes. he insulted my intellegence, acting like i was so severely mentally challenged that i could not understand simple english, picked on my insecurities, considering i had very recently been diagnosed, and turned some of my true friends away from me. i ended up having a total meltdown in front of him then he told me "this is why i was only friends with you because i felt sorry for you."

i think that being a pity friend is not fair for either side. the pityee needs true friends, someone who will stick with them and help them no matter what. the pityer will, unless they end up becoming a true friend, inadvertantly hurt the person they felt sorry for more than if they hadn't been friends at all. both sides also lose the chance to find real friends during the time the pity friends spend together.

There was someone that I found clingy. My mum thought I should at least talk to her. It was at a church and I don't go there anymore. She's texted me a couple times but I've never really wanted to meet up. I don't usually hang out with people that don't interest me, so I probably don't feel that close to them or consider them a real friend. Those people I do meet up with I can never see myself not wanting to be friends with.

Or maybe I'm just a bastard with the emotional capacity of a teaspoon.

I just can't bring myself to say I don't want to be friends anymore with anyone. Maybe I can with my ex-boyfriend if he continues his bastardly ways, but that's more of a 'I hate your guts' kind of thing.

I stick with people and I am always loyal, but sometimes I sense that people feel pity for me, even though I'm not certain on that.

I've always wondered why it's ok to break up with a boyfriend, but if you end a friendship everyone else tries to make you talk to them again even when you clearly don't want to. What is up with that?!