Hello one and all

[Surf girl]

I am a NT who has a friend with ASD. I absolutely Love and adore him, he is my world. Now that I have broached the subject , and we are finally talking about his ASD (undiagnosed) I want to learn and understand more, and how I can be the best friend I possibly can.

 

[Nitro]

Hi Surf girl

 

[Surf girl]

Hello to you too.

 

[Major Tom]

Welcome.

 

[Pappy Boyington]

I am a NT who has a friend with ASD. I absolutely Love and adore him, he is my world. Now that I have broached the subject , and we are finally talking about his ASD (undiagnosed) I want to learn and understand more, and how I can be the best friend I possibly can.

Curious, how long have you known each other/ how much are you emotionally invested in him?

The short answer to your question is to give him space whenever he appears to need it and understand that ASD people have sensory issues that are unique to them. Also, people with ASD tend to not communicate their emotions very well but this should never be taken as meaning that they don't have them (unlike a sociopath).

 

[ZebraAutismo]

Hello and welcome.

 

[Isadoorian]

Welcome to the Forums! I hope you make new friends and enjoy your stay in the process

 

[Surf girl]

Thank you for your reply Pappy. Emotionally invested. Totally. Known him 3 years but only been together 7 months. He tells me I am the only person he has every been allowed to get close. He lives away. I visit every weekend or every other. We got to the ILY word 3 months in. He took two weeks to post a card that had those words in reply to me telling him because I totally adore him. He then had his first meltdown two days later. Possibly from the stress of this declaration which we dealt with. He then gave me a house key hours later. I am in a perpetual state of confusion as to what we are but I deal with him periodically saying that we can be nothing more by just giving him space to catch up with himself. The only more we could be is, if friends and family knew about us, which I suspect his parents possibly do. Evidence being that so much of my stuff is in his house. He's gone from being alone without any relationship to having me visit 2/3 times a month. Also. One factor could be that I am older than him. I wonder if that stresses him too.

 

[Surf girl]

Welcome to the Forums! I hope you make new friends and enjoy your stay in the process

Thank you so very much for your kind welcome. I am here to learn and gain valuable support from those who's experience will give me insight and clarity.

 

[Surf girl]

Hello and welcome.

Thank you. Already I feel that this is good place to be and to connect with people who have so much experience and insight.

 

[Isadoorian]

Thank you. Already I feel that this is good place to be and to connect with people who have so much experience and insight.

You're Welcome This is indeed a great place; I've been here for 3 months and enjoy it

It does have its moments where things can get a little out of hand, but the Mods and Admins do their job splendidly

 

[tree]

 

[Tom]

Hi & Welcome,
What is the age difference?

 

[Surf girl]

Hi & Welcome,
What is the age difference?

Hi Tom. Thank you for your welcome. Ok. He is 30 and I am 49 ( that is me a month ago on my profile pic ) He is so much older than his years suggest and I am yet to grow up. We kind of look the same age. Which amuses us both. Just wonder if it quietly bothers him. He says not.

 

[OkRad]

Hi! Welcome. I am always glad when NTs come in and totally love their Aspie! Many come in to complain but you seem to be very supportive. It seems we could all learn from YOU.

I have had NTs who were confused but did not stop at confusion, but got very angry and even abusive. The only thing I would tell you is that I FEEL like a totally different species. The fact that I am trapped in a human body is unfortunate for the NTs who keep insisting I CAN do things their way. I CANNOT do things their way because I do not SEE anything as they do.

The fundamental keys to my functioning are not similar to NTs. THe building blocks are not the same, which means all the bricks on top are not the same which means the expressions of my life and experiences are not the same unless I FAKE and pretend to be NT.

So that is exhausting.

Another place NTs have screwed things up for me is that they assume that because I had differences, then I am stupid and need to be coddled or helped along. No, we have our own thoughts and often think YOU are the ones who need help

Let him change you as much as you want to change him. If you do not want to change him, allow for the fact that he may still be sweating it out, thinking, OH DEAR. I am a [cat/dog.frog/etc] in love with a [tree/flower/fish/etc]. What am I going to do?!

That is how the difference often feels. A tree in love with a fish. Ovid certainly could have made this work. But it sure take a lot.

But I hope you can! Come back anytime. Tell is how it goes. I may learn a lot from you

 

[Surf girl]

Hello.

So good to read your message and Thank you for your kind words. The hardest thing for me to handle is that my Aspie has struggled to fit in for so long. He has gradually withdrawn from the world over the years. There is a sadness that his friends have all dropped away. His parents are very protective over him. I believe he never speaks to them about us and takes our photo down when they visit It was only in a chance conversation with his dad that it finally dawned on my that not only did he not know he had ASD until our conversation on Sunday, but his parents clearly had no idea either.
We now have a foundation where we can move forward.

It is not all sunshine and cupcakes with us. I do struggle to understand him but mostly it is intuitive. If I spend the weekend with him. Monday and Tuesday is time out for us. We text but don't talk and by Wednesday I have him back. He is so worth the adjustments I have to make and for him too and he makes me a better person having him in my life.

I wish I was more like you. I am learning so much about cutting out the crap and just getting on with what is important Being a NT is far too hard, we have far too many stupid emotions. It is such a waste of energy.

 

[Tom]

Hi Tom. Thank you for your welcome. Ok. He is 30 and I am 49 ( that is me a month ago on my profile pic ) He is so much older than his years suggest and I am yet to grow up. We kind of look the same age. Which amuses us both. Just wonder if it quietly bothers him. He says not.

We have many people come here describing similiar situations. 90% after they already brokeup. Yours at least is still intact. It seems to me to have lurched ahead impulsively rather then in measured steps. You may take that in stride and understand the implications. There's a good chance your Aspie friend does not. Relationships take experience to become good at and if he has limited exposure may act like one does in their teens early 20s. An abrupt ending of it by the Aspie, is very common in these situations. I would try and slow it down and focus on communication and underlying understanding of your differences as NT and Aspie. There may be a lot more then you realize.

 

[Surf girl]

i believe what happens over the next few months will be him adjusting to the realisation that he is Autistic. It was the hardest conversation I have ever had. It is such a huge responsibility to open up a conversation with someone and ask them if had considered that maybe they have ASD. We need to spend a while working through these new thoughts. As much as I love him I am prepared to support him as friend. How things develop who knows. I am not going anywhere.

 

[Sloth]

Helo Surf Girl!

Hope you find valuable information and advice on this forum, as others have mentioned, NT/ASD relationship threads are definitely very prevalent here so plenty of info on them. As previous posts have said, don't assume that the relationship will look like a typical NT one, his ideas of the significance of certain things in the relationship as well as his ways of showing affection might be drastically different than your's.

It sounds like both of you are open to try to learn and understand things, which is fantastic (some people react very angrily to the suggestion they might be on the Spectrum). I think in a lot of the breakup posts, it seems like usually one or both of the people is unwilling to change or listen to their partner, and that is the main thing that contributes to the failure of the relationship.

It's probably best try to be open and explicit about your feelings, since you can never assume that he can naturally pick up on how you feel. If something is important to you, but doesn't seem like it is to him, it can be because he just don't realize it. I think what is more likely to be stressing him is the difficulty with relationships and trying to always guess at what the other person is thinking and what to say to not accidentally hurt the other person, stuff like that can be especially hard, and having the emotions directly expressed in words at least makes it less difficult.

Hope things work out for you guys!

 

[MitchM]

hey @Surf girl welcome. I'm going on day two here. As an aspie finishing up his 20's I Don't have the same life experience as others who have posted and they have good points. Ill add in my own for what i have seen.

Anxiety is a big factor in this for everyone not just on the spectrum. As we make things real and official, there is the societal weight added to that officaltorialness. NT's have this ability to tune out some of the background noise causing anxiety things or can handle it better then others, small things can become big and big can become massive. The things you say, friends becoming more distant and dropping off as time progresses makes it harder to have the social interaction you once had while you say "His parents are very protective over him. I believe he never speaks to them about us and takes our photo down when they visit" that's probably because he is trying to keep them out of the life you and him have right now. when i was living at home trying to get freedom from my parents, i needed to have my own life. Even now moved away as much as i care for them, they still want to control aspects of my life, and until I could find the balance i did not tell them about my relationships either. your a safe person and good for him.

Trust that intuition, it seems to be serving you well so far. (sorry i had thoughts but i lost them by getting distracted with other things)