"It's healthy to have a social life"

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What I say to bugging family members is the simple truth: "I have a social life, it's just that I live it online. If that's a problem, get lost." And it often works.

I agree it's difficult for others to understand our non need for all the absurdities involved in long and contrived relationships with other people. Granted I am a weird aspie and have very supportive friendships in my life. However, as one dear friend pointed out recently, all of the friends in my life serve a purpose. they support me in some way that I am incapable of doing for myself. They care for me in ways that I trust only them to do. So, even in my friendships as with all other things in my life, they serve a utilitarian purpose and I don't really have much usefulness for them outside of that.

I'm reminded of my son in a premedicated state of AS. Phone interactions often went like this (and sometimes still do):
"Hello, friend."
Friend babbles mindlessly for a few minutes.
"Didn't I see you at school today? Well that was enough interaction for me for today. Thanks for calling. See you tomorrow. Bye"

Just because you don't interact with others the way that your sister does, doesn't mean that there's something wrong with you. It just means you do it differently. It's not wrong, just different. Not needing as much interaction with other people doesn't make you a loser either.

I would be tempted to ask your sister why she is so insecure that she needs to constantly be attached to others to confirm her status as human. I actually remember asking my sister that at some point during our lives. My sister actually told me that the other weirdos I hung out with didn't count as friends. It just made us weird as a group. Hmmm...you go out with your friends and get trashed and throw up together...we just do it without the alcohol...so I guess that makes them all conformists as a group....LOL.

Hello,

I have Asperger's syndrome, too, but I concur that socializing and having friends is necessary for one's mental health. I know many of us here romanticize our social deficits as independence, self-reliance, strength of will, and freespiritedness; but socializing plays key roles in human psychological functioning. At the most pragmatic level, socializing can provide the individual with valuable information about happenings, warnings, and advice. At a more psychological level, social interactions can provide a sort of sanity check. Without this, a person's ideas and perceptions can slowly drift from the original to the frankly bizarre. This can play a role in the onset of psychotic disorders like schizophrenia.

My family pretty much accepts that I like my alone time, and I get it.

As for social interaction, I used to go out a lot in the summer with a small group of friends. But more recently the group got bigger with new people arriving. New people just adds discomfort. This last summer I spent more time doing other things on my own or with less people, and I feel better for it.

I go out to certain shops or stores where I know the people and can talk to them for a few minutes. A good example for me is on Saturday nights, I go out to get a pizza. I do this because the telephone is a horrible thing and I like the owners and their daughter, and would rather talk to them in person than on the phone.

I'd certainly say that complete isolation will affect you for the worse. Look what happened to the character played by Rik Mayall in the last episode of The Black Adder. Mad Gerald, so mad he made a key (Mr Key) to his cell out his own teeth, but never bothered to try it, and then asked for the door to be shut in case someone rescued him.

I'd just kindly thank her for her concern and remind her that you can't turn an apple into an orange.

I enjoy social contact - especially with people of the same hobbies and interests. I do belive its good for you, humans are social animals after all.

My response to this kind of thing (which ticks me off) is something like “fine, get me a social life, get me friends and I’ll go spend time with them”.

I fit into the “don’t need as much social interaction as most people, but would like SOME and have none” category.

I'll be your friend

I was having a discussion with my therapist about my not getting out more often to interact, the poor woman’s brain was clicking away trying to think of ways I could get out of the house. This also brought up the issue of my getting a formal diagnosis, (More on that in a couple of weeks.) But I don’t see what the big deal is with having a social life. I am content sitting at home. I don't feel the need to have loads of friends I can go visit, they just get in the way of what I want to do anyway. I take an occasional outing by myself if I feel the need to get away for a day, but to interact with people face to face everyday, I can’t see myself doing it. It wouldn’t be healthy for me in the least bit. The only unhealthy part of my isolation is that I have people nagging me about getting out and that doesn’t do me any good.

Hans J. Eysenck said:

That is to say, very large external stimulation Under the circumstances, who can feel outward stimulus. Compared to them, who, even more sensitive to stimulation. So outward talent likes to noisy places, like excitement, and to the people who already feel that too much stimulation, so would like to bring in a more quiet place, a person or a good friend and intimate. Strangers often stimulate their very large, which makes the people to be shy in front of strangers, with people afraid to speak.