Friends When You're Autistic (A Chat With My Neurodivergent Friends)

I was diagnosed with autism at 30 this year a few months ago and I've struggled with friendships all my life. I always have one or two really close friends and a lot of acquaintances. I don't know if anyone else experiences this but oftentimes my friendships become a bit one-sided. I wind up always being the one having to reach out and initiate visits. It gets really draining and I don't know if it's just the culture these days and everyone is just super busy or what my mind tends to lean is "Was it something I did?" or "Did I say the wrong thing?" This was great hearing from you three ladies, thank you for sharing!

I'm autistic and I don't know if it's the autism or just me but I feel like I've grown out of friendships, like I don't need them anymore. I have my husband, my mom, and one good friend that I talk to, and anything more than that feels like too much. I'm always in my own little world and stay so internal with the things I want to do alone that it's hard to make time for other people.

The misfits... I love it. That is how I made friends. I ended up hanging out with the other people who didn't really have a specific friend group. And they became my friends by default.

It was lovely to "meet" Cathy and hear from someone who doesn't have the official autism diagnosis. There are lots of people who think that unless you have a diagnosis, your neurodivergence is somehow less authentic. I listened to the 3 of you with a smile on my face. Thanks for a great video.

Being the "maker of plans" is such a valuable asset to a friendship or group of friends. I've NEVER been even remotely close to that role due to my executive functioning difficulties. Recently, I've had a lot less going on socially. I've realized that it's because the various makers of plans that I hung out with have moved away and the people around me also struggle a bit with that role. It's like everyone misses out when people who can make plans and decisions for things aren't around. It's certainly not for a lack of wanting to do things. I'd been thinking that I've become "less social" lately, when in reality, the people I relied on to make things happen just aren't around to provide those opportunities.

This is very helpful. I have always struggled with navigating friendship's since I was a child....I am now 34 and still struggle. I don't have any friends but I would like to learn how. Thanks for sharing!

The part where Ella says "Do you want to be in control, or not?!" I so relate to that. Thanks, I shall remind myself of that next time I'm feeling sorry for myself! 🙂

I will watch this later. However, I pretty much given up on making friends. They just dropped me and stop talking to me. Sometimes it really hurts because I don't know what I did. I am 56 years old - I've had a thousand jobs and a thousand friends and some wives. The world has never been ready for me but I'll keep smiling and doing my best anyway. Thank you for your videos. You are very down to earth involving the autism spectrum and relating the struggles in a language we can all understand.

I see that you all have two different drinks! I was made aware that that is a common thing in neurodiverse people. To have multiple drinks to choose from.

You are all SUCH beautiful, wonderful people. I wish I could be your friends or at least find a group like yours. Thank you for sharing your experiences 😊💖

When I saw someone I knew from school living just across the street, we made plans to get together, and do some things together, and we ended up being best friends I have autism (Asperger's), and it turned out that he had ADHD, so maybe that's why we clicked together the way we did. When it comes to girlfriends though, I don't understand how that works.

That was a cool video. Would definitely love to see this become a kind of a regular show. As a freshly diagnosed autistic, I don't have any ND friends and it's going to be difficult to find them, since adult autistics are practically unheard of in Croatia. I'll try to contact the place that did my assessment to see if they organize some kind of get togethers for grown ups.

I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was ten years old. I have six close friends who I’ve had since middle school and high school. Four of them are also neuro divergent and we all can just be our normal selfs. Two of them are clearly Nero typical. Sometimes I get weird faces I say weird things but they just accept me for who I am. With saying that I’ve been trying to watch videos of people who were diagnosed with ADHD and autism. I’m pretty sure I have both. I’ve really only started on this journey because of my son. I have got him in early intervention he is 3. It’s hard at 3 to be fully diagnosed with anything. I hear the people who help with his early intervention bring up traits he shows with possibly having autism. I see a lot of traits of ADHD. All my family say awe he dose all the little quirky things you used to do at that age. I just found out this year my mom said I didn’t start talking until I was 3 1/2 years old. I got my son in early intervention because he also has a speech delay. Watching videos though of other people on the spectrum has opened my eyes a lot of other things. I have always masked depending on who I am around definitely when I am in work mode or when I was in schooling I didn’t know that was a thing until this year and a lot of women and girls go undiagnosed until they are adults because of masking and I’m just mind blown. Many times I ask my husband if I said anything that was mean or too blunt to my mom. She has said many of times I don’t think you meant to hurt me but you did. In those conversations I always feel blindsided because I really didn’t mean to come off that way. I thought she was just asking me a honest question which then I would give a honest answer. I can only handle my mom for so long wearing a mask for so long is exhausting honestly. My mom always says I wished we were closer. I feel like she just doesn’t understand me and how my brain works. Sometimes I will ask my husband was I too blunt or is she just too sensitive??? I really do have social issues. I tend to gravitate more towards people who can be very blunt because I don’t have to double guess who they are what you see is what you get that honestly relaxes me because I know I can be my true self because they are there true self. I feel like that’s probably weird to say but feels like my truth. I always feel like I’m weird around some people.

Loved watching this, related in so many ways. I envy the relationship you have each other, one day I hope to have a friendship like this

So lovely to see Roz again! She is so honest and open and just seems like such a super person.

omggggg friend spreadsheet is suuuuuch a good idea, as I find it soooo stressful havin too many friends lmao

I am 42 and have been a SAHM for 17 years. Now I have 3 kids with Autism, AHDH and other chronic pain disorders I'm really realizing now how much I've struggled in my life and just didn't realize that it wasn't normal. I school friends and work friends but that was all really. Now my kids want friends and I realize that I don't know how to really make friends. It's kind of sad. My son still talks about kids he saw one time at a playground as his friends and he didn't even know their name. I was going to try to put him in Scouts or something before Corona but since the whole family is high risk he has been homeschooled and just never had any opportunities to make friends. Basically we all need friends but it's hard when people aren't understanding. My house will probably never be clean enough that I'll invite them over. We will probably cancel 3/5 times because of pain and doctors appointments. We aren't available in the am because my pain makes me not able to sleep. We don't have money for outings because I can't work. Half the time my car isn't running because I don't have money to fix it. So many issues all stemming from poor health that people don't understand. I'd love to be pain free, go to work, send the kids to school and join the PTA. It's not like i choose to use a cane and barely be able to walk. Noone wants to live like this.

I'm so flustered because I have a ton of issues that present at autism. Honestly, I'm not sure if I'm masking or not half the time. I'm a INFJ Myers-Briggs type. I have PTSD from early childhood trauma and I'm a highly sensitive person. I don't have any close friends at all. Nonetheless, I read social ques very well, even if I am occasionally overly direct. I relate to your friend as appearing VERY okay in front of people and inside being very NOT okay. I also relate to you in that feeling that rejection is the end of the world, but I'm also an Adoptee who was rejected by her adoptive mother as well as her birth mother. Honestly, lucky to be alive with all I have going on inside of my head and heart. Doctors and therapists seem clueless when it comes to me. I suppose I just keep on doing the best I can, even though it's quite lonely at times. I'm also an obsessive researcher. I mean I will research something that interests me for days and hours on end. 😅 I'm totally open to suggestions. I'm okay alone, but it seems like life could be better with people in my life.

This is my favourite video of yours I think it's a really great way to discuss different internal perspectives of autistic people. But it's also great to watch such a lovely friend group and to see the different personalities to break down some of the stigma in the autism world.

I love Bristol