Giving up on trying to have friends altogether
I sometimes give up although I believe that continuing to try is more rewarding. I think it's also valuable to work on being well and alone. I have some acquaintances and it has taken a long time to get there. I go to a social mental health place and also a soup kitchen place and talk to people there.
Yeah after I left college at 18 I only had two friends left and I knew that the friendship wouldn't last, since then I haven't been anywhere or done anything that would enable me to gain friends. At this point I don't have the social skills or life experience to talk to people, if I saw an old friend it would just be awkward.
I haven't given up but one of the things that I have decided to do is not be overly friendly with people because I have the tendency to want to be everyone's friend along with doing things that bother the other party. However, I am finding that the ones who shut you out passive aggressively like that aren't the type of people I want to associate with anyway. For one thing, if they aren't willing to communicate with you on the first day then they would not be a good friend who you can rely on, to begin with.
I have learned to find people who you do connect with even if they aren't the cool party people. You just have to know where to find these kinds of people. I just learned that one last weekend when a whole group of peers who let me down by shutting me out of their posse or rather where I felt invisible.
Anyway, here are some videos:
"Why can't I make friends?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIiPqnUMjGs
"Why you should not try to hard to make friends."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F48PJFtdoxI
Not exactly understanding why I have given up on trying to have friends a long time ago. Only three months ago after being diagnosed with Aspergers I begun to comprehend the reasons.
At this point I am too terrified, awkward and withdrawn to try but I would really want to. Maybe one day I will be ready. For now I have a lot of things to process.
At this point I am too terrified, awkward and withdrawn to try but I would really want to. Maybe one day I will be ready. For now I have a lot of things to process.
Just enjoy the journey and things you enjoy doing
if i make friends with someone, then they go from 100 to 101 friends and i go from 0 to 1 friend. if/when he/she ghosts me (or vice versa), he goes from 101 friends to 100 friends. and i go from 1 to 0 friends. thus, inherently, there is a significant power disparity.
in the past, with precious lil "friends", i have regretted passive aggressively tolerating whatever they did. while they did not do anything close to reciprocating the gesture. and later they ended up dumping me anyways.
even for incidents that happened five, six, seven years ago, i still obsess over them. every. single. day. since the climax.
on the other hand, whatever. even when they told me they were my precious lil "friend(s)", they treated me condescendingly.
"you wear your pants around your knees!" "you bit the sticker off the apple!". "you wiped your mouth with your sleeve. eeewww!".
"that's mean", when i pulled her dog's leash. wtf? "sit on this chair and she probably won't bite you". "probably won't"? she cared about the dog (that was not even hers) more than she cared about me.
numerous cancelled meetings. sometimes not even 2 hours notice. sometimes zero notice.
instead of saying "excuse me", those precious lil "people" had the nerve to say "huh" and "what". that appears a bit calloused, abrupt, rude, inconsiderate.
and then whenever they had a thought or emotion, they acted like it was the latest greatest scientific invention.
they interrupted me when i talked.
no.
it's like there has to be a written contract a priori. covering what each party will and will not do and say.
I've given up for the foreseeable future. Dating & friendships. There are one or two people who are "friends" that reach out and talk about catching up, but it always flames out after telling them when I'm around, so it is what it is.
I'm miserable largely without consistent friends, but most of my life I didn't have consistent friends and never a "best friend" or similar in connection, so while difficult it sometimes is necessary. I get tired of the process, heal up and calm down, usually try it again after a little while.
I have given up on having friends. I moved here from the other side of the country over 8 years ago, I've been in a relationship for 7 years and pretty much everyone I know is through my partner. I don't have friends of my own here.
I have a childhood friend that lives in another state that I would consider my best friend and a bunch of people on Facebook that I would have otherwise lost contact with by now, but that's about it.
I don't think I have the capacity to be anything other than an acquaintance. I don't read body language. I don't understand nuances or looks. A lot of NT conversation goes right over my head. Then people decide I'm not really being open and honest with them because I can't communicate with them on that subtext level with them. For me, if something isn't explicitly communicated to me it will usually not register with me. My partner has learned to deal with this but I imagine most people are oblivious and would rather just avoid me.
I didn't know I was on the spectrum or that any of this was going on until I was in my late 30s so there were a lot of years of me trying to relate to people and failing miserably. Now, I think it's best for everyone if I just intentionally keep my distance.
I have a childhood friend that lives in another state that I would consider my best friend and a bunch of people on Facebook that I would have otherwise lost contact with by now, but that's about it.
I don't think I have the capacity to be anything other than an acquaintance. I don't read body language. I don't understand nuances or looks. A lot of NT conversation goes right over my head. Then people decide I'm not really being open and honest with them because I can't communicate with them on that subtext level with them. For me, if something isn't explicitly communicated to me it will usually not register with me. My partner has learned to deal with this but I imagine most people are oblivious and would rather just avoid me.
I didn't know I was on the spectrum or that any of this was going on until I was in my late 30s so there were a lot of years of me trying to relate to people and failing miserably. Now, I think it's best for everyone if I just intentionally keep my distance.
This is basically my story as well. I'm your age but male. I consider my wife to be my best friend and vice versa. I have not had an actual friend other than my wife for over fifteen years. I'm not opposed to making friends, but I work full time and support a family. That keeps me more than occupied. Plus, other than interacting with my family, in the evenings I require my "me time" to recharge my batteries that get drained from the work day, interacting with others, etc. Many would find my situation shocking and horrible. I'm ambivalent. I do acknowledge that I would probably have more of a longing for friendship if I were single, but then again, I'm not so sure. Before I met my wife I lived alone in an urban setting and walking to the grocery store and being around people was enough for me even if I didn't interact with them directly.
I've mostly given up on friends for now, but maybe not forever. I'm very isolated and very rarely leave my house. Usually, I only leave my house when my SO is with me. He's my best friend and for now, he's the only friend I need. My attempts to make friends have never really ended well, but I do alright with casual acquaintances when I have to.
Every once in a while I'll do some reading about how socialization is important for humans and that social isolation can lead to an earlier death, then I'll force myself to try to go somewhere or interact with people. I joined this forum in an effort to create some socialization opportunities for myself. I come here and make a few posts if I feel like it's been too long since I spoke to a human besides my SO and that works pretty well.
Sometimes I feel like I'm becoming too much of a shut-in, but I have come up with a solution. My SO and I love to sail, even though we live in a landlocked state. We plant to move to the coast in a year or two so that we can live on a boat a sail all the time. I feel like this will end up being an ideal solution for me for two reasons. One, because we will probably end up in a Marina, I'll be surrounded by other Marina people and will, therefore, be forced to at least have a loose circle of acquaintances to interact with so I'll get my socialization quota. Secondly, by living on a boat I can travel and see new places while never actually having to leave my home behind. I'll be like a majestic sea turtle, taking my house with me wherever I go!
Disclaimer: Although I really love the comparison I made to a sea turtle about taking my home with me, I feel like I should point out that unlike other turtles, sea turtles do not have the ability to pull their heads back into their shells, so their shells aren't really a "home" like we would think of a regular turtle's shell being a home. A sea turtles home is the sea, and I think that's good enough for me too.
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