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danum
Raven
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Joined: 18 Feb 2011
Age: 61
Gender: Male
Posts: 123

18 Oct 2015, 9:28 am

I'm a member of an autistic group and we meet on Monday nights in a town centre pub; attendance of this group is limited to people with autism and their families or carers. I also meet up with some of my non-autistic friends on Thursdays in the same pub. There's a bit of a problem starting to develop though - my autistic friends are turning up at the other meetings assuming that I've invited them, when I haven't. This is causing me some problems because I talk about completely different things with my non-autistic friends and it's not always easy to include the autistic friends in the conversation...there are other issues too.

This seems to be an issue of people not understanding that there are group boundaries; different types and levels of friendships and relationships, both personal and professional, and also that I need to have access to the mainstream neurotypical world - a world I so much wish to be a part of.

I'd like to know other people's thoughts and experiences.

Cheers


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izzeme
Veteran
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Joined: 4 Apr 2011
Age: 37
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19 Oct 2015, 2:32 am

This is a common effect, especially under the "lower fuctioning" (for lack of a better term) autistics.
The best way to handle this is to flat-out tell them that you'd prefer it if they didn't join your other group on the other days. (and keep this information by never inviting them for an exeption, that might be confusing)