Outsourcing/outreaching support

Post Reply New Topic

At Aspie 18, I've taken a different approach to supporting members than all the other Asperger's sites I've used. If they have severe emotional/mental problems they are referred to hotlines and/or websites that have the capacity to respond to emotional troubles adequately.

In my opinion, people with Asperger's syndrome aren't able to offer emotional support to others - it's just not something we are able to do. I'm a person with Asperger's syndrome and I am a textbook example of this, I couldn't make someone else feel better if my life depended on it.

I've observed the same in others on every other Asperger's forum I've been to and in real life situations with other people with Asperger's syndrome. Ultimately, by trying to offer emotional support on an Asperger's site everybody is hurt by it: those needing help and those who make attempts to help.

Those who need help are told advice that they didn't want to be told, usually, and those who try to help are usually plagued with guilt or feelings of inadequacy for not being able to help. Nobody is to blame, it's just a fact that people with Asperger's syndrome are emotionally ret*d.

Usually, I would suggest when people have problems to refer them to depression/anxiety/eating disorder websites/forums or whatever they need to help them. Here is the list of sites I link to and the information I've provided with them so you can see an example of what I've done; if you want to feel free to use them, I don't care about being credited/copyright:

This is only my philosophy. Take it or leave it. I believe it's an honest appraisal of ourselves and what we can and can not achieve by ourselves.

Additionally, there's an important responsibility bestowed on us. Since doctors can misdiagnose people with conditions like Asperger's syndrome and since people sometimes are confused about what's different about them and need some kind of support but come to Aspie sites naively, we owe it to them to offer them some direction by referring them to other outlets to be helpful to them.

This is a philosophy that believes no condition or forum is more important than everybody's conditions and all forums put together. What matters the most must be that every individual has a place they can talk to that is appropriate for them and that nobody is neglected of what they need even if they can't recognise what they need themselves.