In order to live on your own..

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You need friends, right? These days I feel like more of a burden to my family then as a member of it. I'm years past the age expected of me to move out on my own, but I lack the one thing that everyone else seemed to have when they moved out: FRIENDS.

I have no idea how to make them. The entire community I live in seems to be comprised of only NT thinkers. I don't have a clue how to relate to anyone else. If I do get lucky enough to make friends with them I don't know how to keep them around for longer than a month or two.

Is there a way for aspies (or at least supposed aspies) to make friends with NTs without having to focus all their energy on faking pleasantry or trying to be someone else (normal) all the time?

Or should aspies only make aspie friends? If this is so, I have no idea how to go about it. I feel as if I might be stuck in this house for a very long time...

Also, how do many of you go about finding a job? I'm in school right now, and apparently my schedule isn't very attractive to hire-ers of fast food businesses and markets. What's the best way for me to find one?

Living on your own with no contacts is hard but not impossible; many people do it when they move to a new city/state/country where none of their family lives close-by and they don't know anyone. If you want to be technical, the only thing you really need to live on your own is a means to pay for it, i.e. a job or (what I'm guessing isn't an option for you) someone else footing the bill. Make sure you can sustain yourself, then go about making friends in the area.

I think Fnord's got this one covered. Generally speaking, depending on your needs you will need a support network of varying size. So yeah, supportive friends and family do help.
I wouldn't have made the sort of transformations I have without the help and support from the people around me. I can get by on my own now thanks to them.
If you have good people in your life though don't forget them, as even if you do become able to live happily as an independent working person there may come a time you need to call upon their help again, and a time you may need to help them out too. It's give and take

the best way for an aspie to make a friend is via an interest. As long as u have the same interest as a person u have a good reason to talk to them, and friendship will form from that.

All of you have given me good advice. I'll take each suggestion to heart.

If you're looking to make friends, and be on your own a lot less, there are essentially two things you would do well to consider.

1) Your social skills, and level of social attraction
2) Getting into situations whereby making friends comes more easily.

Now regarding number 1) this may sound difficult, but a key principle here is that when you're talking to people, it's good to do it in such a way to make the conversation easier for them, and give them value. Listen to what they say, and respond by asking questions that naturally follow what they just said. For instance I was once chatting to a guy who had done his degree in sports coaching and was looking for jobs, and I asked as a follow up "so you're looking to be a P.E. teacher?"That's just an example of an educated assumption I could make based upon what he told me. Allowing the conversation to flow in that way makes it easier for the other person, because if you just ask very open questions like "so what do you want to do?" etc its as if you're putting them on the spot a bit, they have to think much harder to answer and they may not even know the answer. There are loads of authentic communication skills you can learn to help you socially but a key principle is to listen carefully and as best you can, respond accordingly, try to use some social intelligence.

As for 2) it's good to recognise the situations that you may get chatting to people more easily, whether it's because you're in a group that shares a common interest, or whether by actually doing something with people, not just talking, you can more easily get a conversation going, make it feel more authentic and it begins to feel more natural to say "fancy meeting for a cuppa."

For me, as a musician, I play to this strength, and I have a number of friends that always want to go out and do open mikes with me, or help them with their musical projects. It's an area where I can offer value to people, and of course by getting to know someone initially by doing something like play music, it's much easier to get into general conversation as you're doing stuff and thereafter.

So if you're really lonely, I would say, think about your interests and types of people you would like to meet, and see what's on in your area, and get involved in something. It may take getting out of your comfort zone a bit, but sometimes we all need to do that when we really want something.

Hope that helps

I don't really have friends and I've lived on my own for the past 10 years. I have had some friends during that period, but I had to move to a lot of different cities for academic/professional reasons so none of those friendships survived the moves.

For jobs, it strongly depends on the type of job you are looking for. For fast-food type jobs, walk in any store that has a "help wanted" or "now hiring" sign and fill out an application/leave your resume. If you know someone that works there, have them put in a good word for you (even if you don't know them very well, it can't hurt to ask)

If you're looking for people who are into the same thing as you, there's probably a group for it on www.meetup.com -- I can't recommend the site strongly enough, it provided me with several social 'scenes' when I first arrived in London. (And no, I'm not on commission -- I genuinely think it's a great resource that could almost have been designed with AS people in mind).

I've just had a look at it, and it does look promising. Thanks for recommending it for me.

I hope it's some use to you. There is an incredibly varied assortment of groups on there, all the way round the planet, so I'm sure you'll find a use for it one way or another.

Even if no personal friendships arise through using it, the experience of having a pre-cooked 'calendar of social events' is very reassuring to have when you're setting out on your own.

Good luck with your ventures.