I have a friend I think he has AS.... what should I do?

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There is a lad I grow up with.

He has poor social life ....

He is obessed with all things military. He is even considered to give up medicen to become a mercenary (The legion of foringness in France in particular)

The fact that he speaks only english and german has stopped him from actually becoming a mercenary.

He doesnt have a finacial problem (as most mercenaries have).

His family is loaded and well connected.(Family means A LOT in Greece)

His interest in things military is purely pathological.

He knows every techincal detail about guns/bullets/ships/submarines/airoplanes/missiles/sattelites/torpidoes/nuclear/etc ....his favorite subject are Tanks.

Please note that the above do not consern just modern equipment. Old and obsolete equipment interests him as much as new material.

His favorite though are CLASSIFIED equipment. The sites his visites all the time to gain information about his interests have got him a deadly virus and had to change computer recently.

He has fights about his interests with his father all the time.He would prefer something more social.
However I think he tries to discourage him from persuing all things military because he feel responsible for it.

See his father was in special forces at a time there was no democracy in Greece.(That explains the families connections)

The military terminology has entered his vocabilary in everyday conversation.And every aspect of his life.
Picture a western Samurai and you will get the idea.

Needless to say I suspect he has Aspergers... as I do. I am one of the few people that he calls friend because I understand him.

Please note that I am a liberal.... he wants to kill liberals.... (or put them in consetration camp!...)

That particular detail makes me suspect that I am his only friend.Even though we dont talk that much.... It is hard even for me to maintain a conversation with him.

I try to convince him to finish medicen.... if he likes adveture that much he can always join Doctors Sun Frontiers or something similar.
He may his interest rather useful there.

How can I tell him that he propably has aspergers?
I doubt that his money will make up for his social problems....

He has seen me carrying a book about asperger syndrom and asked me what is it.

I didnt tell him that it conserned me (or him!)

I told him that it is about neurology .... an form of high fuctioning autism .... I found a very interesting article in wikipedia about it.

I was hoping he would read the article.

He didnt. He hates neurology and has a very busy academic program.

I try to have a conversation about autism each time I see him..... thats as much I dare to go.

Any suggestions???

I think the fellow ought to become a professor of military history.

Well... we aspies are not often very good with hints, are we? Neither giving nor receiving them. So it seems to me that an aspie giving hints to another aspie that he might be an aspie is a recipe for disaster. If I were you, I would just come straight out and mention it:

"Have you ever considered that you might have Asperger's Syndrome? I'm asking this because I have it so I know quite a bit about it, and it looks to me as though you have some of the traits quite strongly." See where that gets you.

Your options are limited. You can drop more hints... Or catch him while alone and talk to him about it... I don't know what laws are in place in Greece, but you could try to have him institutionalized... Or you could brain him with a shovel...

Why do you want to "do" anything?

You don't really need to do anything unless you want to. He doesn't necessarily need to know he has AS--he probably knows he's really different from most people, and might have learned about AS on his own. It probably would neither help nor hurt him if he knew, unless he needed accomodations or something.

But nothing wrong with bringing it up either, I wouldn't think, especially as something that you and he might have in common.

Oh sorry, I didn't read the part of your post where he is unintersted in neurology. I wouldn't bother bringing it up then. If you did show him the article, maybe he secretly read it and saw that it did describe him, but he maybe doesn't care to talk about it or think it's a big deal one way or the other. Like I said, he probably knows he is different.

But suppose in the future he comes to you and said he was having problems getting along with people and it was affecting his career/studies/personal (like for instance, they weren't letting him in the medical program becaue of his lack of social skills, or he wondered why he didn't have a girlfriend or was having trouble getting along with many people). Then it might be a good thing to again bring up AS and how you are Aspie too.

But until then, if he's already shown he's not interested in neurology and isn't asking for help about why he's so different, there's really nothing you need to do or can do, and you don't need to feel bad that you're not doing anything. All you can do is be his friend and you're doing that!

This is a tough problem to deal with.

I had two friends who I think have AS (as I think I do). We all had special interests that weren't the same interests, but one of my friends didn't like the other one. I found out about AS and eventually said to both guys (individually) that I thought I might have AS. Neither of them wanted to hear it. So, one guy wouldn't talk to me any more, and the other one was so obnoxious (he had no filter on what he said) that my family and all of my other friends encouraged me to cut off the friendship. I did cut it off, and I still feel badly about it.

If your friend doesn't get freaky with the guns, then continue to be his friend. I wouldn't tell him that he might have AS. If he sees YOU working through the things you struggle with he might ask for more information.

Z