Having no regular social life = fewer hours sleeping

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I recently came to the conclusion that my lack of sleep is being partly driven by the fact that I have no social life at all.

The last time I went out and did something with another person was to go on a very short hike with someone from work for a bit of exercise which lasted all of 25 minutes.
That was over a week ago and before that there was one day I actually went kayaking with someone else from work. That was a few hours of time on the water.

Outside of those two instances which were roughly a week apart, I haven't been around anyone socially for probably several months, although it may be longer if I'd stop and really think about it.

Anyway, my typical night goes something like this...

Work nights: I get off work at 11:30pm and sit in my dark room in the lab where I work. I have one little lamp on and the computer screen. I shut the door and open up iTunes and play my music (Audioslave currently) loud and do computer solitaire, surf the web, or sometimes I actually keep working on work-related stuff off the clock.

HAHAHA... my daughter just got up to go potty and told me I should be in bed!... it's past midnight

So... I hang around work alone in my little batcave until 2 or 3.. sometimes 4 in the morning.
I have ventured out on occasion to see what's happening in the E.R. and I'll spend a few minutes getting into conversations there, which usually peter out when everyone turns away to other conversations.

When I finally get home, I usually grab an electric guitar, bass, my ukulele, my trombone, or jump on the drumkit, and play on those for a bit (I don't have any close neighbors ). I will also get on the internet for hours.

This leads to my getting to sleep as the sun rises or every-so-often... one of my long staying-awake runs of 30+ hrs.

Non Work Nights: If my daughter is not with me (staying with her mom), then it's just as bad. I just hang around the house by myself. Sometimes I don't even go outside whether it's for a whole weekend or just a day. I have no one to call and chat with, no one ever visits. I'm not really sure what I'd ask someone to do if I wanted to get together with another person (the two incidents related above were both initiated by those people).

I will wind up on this computer knocking around the internet.
This is where the reality of my social life comes forward....

I spend so much time on the internet chasing down forums to read and/or participate in which makes me feel like I'm actually being social.
Once I'm online it's very hard for me to stop; I don't want to stop interacting with people.
Even if I'm only reading posts, say on a forum for bass players, I feel like I'm 'in the club' for the moment.
I drop by here and read posts, but for almost a year now I haven't felt like I ...eh... let's just say I don't have much to say I suppose.

I miss interacting with people on a personal (instead of professional) level that I wind up spending my sleep time on the computer trying to create this pseudo social circle/life instead of being outside my house with 'in-the-flesh' people.
Not that I haven't enjoyed my internet connections... here and elsewhere... but often times these seem to fall off rapidly, where the real-world interactions just don't happen at all.

Hmm, perhaps this belonged in the rant section?

I guess I just found it interesting when I discovered that I go overboard trying to feel like I am socializing by spending so much of my sleep time here on the internet reading other people's posts and making some of my own.

Is it a bad thing? Certainly for the lack of sleep I have been getting over the years.

Anyone else?

A different job and I work regular hours, but quite similar to me. You mention 2 events in the last couple of weeks, after a long time of no social contact. Does this mean your social life is actually improving or were these totally random?

Outside of work, my contact with people is predominantly through my children. And I generally avoid having anybody else along. Next is that I play in a couple of bands and teach guitar. Very occasionally I'll have a quiet drink with another band member or two. I notice when this happens I tend to babble on continually because it's been weeks or months since I sat down to chat with an adult that I actually like!

I'm not sure that lack of social life directly affects lack of sleep, though. I generally struggle to wind down and go to sleep anyway, but it's actually worse when I've been with others. It's like I need a couple of hours of solitary time to wind down - and check WP of course - so I end up going to bed even later.

It's possibly affecting it indirectly as I suspect that while I know my social needs are low, they are not non-existent. And, similar to what you're describing wsmac, an event every 2 or 3 months (or less) is too low even by my standards. I've pondered much on this as there were times when younger when I was with friends almost every night. At the moment, I just don't meet people that I'd like to spend time with. Since late 30's/early 40's most people just seem uninteresting to me and they're not interested in me as from their viewpoint I appear totally weird. I'm wondering if several years of this isolation has caused a low-level but continual depression. So low level I don't even notice it and wouldn't say that I'm depressed if asked, but the giveaway is this total negativity around the possibility of being able to connect with any of those I meet in my daily life. And this is also the cause of the sleeping problems.

In contrast, there are many on WP who I like, find interesting and would love to spend some time with, leading me to believe this is an AS thing. It's such a shame that we're scattered all over the world, though.

And then there's the question: can the internet provide you with a real social life? I don't know, but like you I'm finding it is at least some kind of substitute. We're people as real as the people you meet, it's only the means of communication that's different. I know what you mean about WP and internet forums in general taking up so much time it *feels* like a social life!

Overall, I think it's a huge feedback loop. For whatever reason, you drift away from social contact. Maybe the trigger is moving away, having children (most of my good friends were childless and disappeared rapidly after my first child was born over 10 years ago), or maybe you hit a depression. So you meet less people, depend more on your own inner world and then it becomes even more difficult to tolerate others as *they* live in a kind of shared *out there* social world that I feel excluded from. And now seems less interesting (and more painful, too) than my own world.

A while back I met with some good friends I've known for 10+ years, I really looked forward to it as these were people I liked and found easy to talk with, although hadn't seen for a year or so. However, I was shocked to find that my world of work, kids, bands, WP does not coincide with their world any more. I really didn't know what they were talking about. All of their cultural references to TV shows, music, current events etc meant nothing to me.

It feels as if I'm cast adrift heading god knows where, and with no way back now.

The two events were pretty much random. The kayaking one was something we had discussed a while ago about maybe doing someday. It's one of my female co-workers I went with, and a friend of hers... they have three kayaks between them.
The other thing was a totally random event with a guy at work that I just had a confrontation with Friday night, so I'm not sure our plans of getting together to do this hike each week for exercise is going to pan out.

Actually, now that I think of it, I did find a running partner on craigslist several months ago and we ran once together, but I've had no contact with her since. It's not like we did much talking, and she did bring along her running coach (she runs competitive trail running) with whom I spent most of the time actually pacing with and talking with.
I emailed her back afterwards saying I enjoyed the run, but haven't heard from her since.


HA! That's me! I have a 15 year old daughter who's WAY into music at school (band and chorus), which provides us with extracurricular activities when the band/chorus is performing outside of normal school hours.

It's a bit sad to say really, that my daughter is my only regular social contact. I say 'sad' only because she should have her own life to live also. Not that I command all her free time for my own needs, but just that I have no one else to communicate with.
Luckily we like the same sorts of shows on tv/dvd (we don't have t.v. we just rent dvd's) like Carnivale, Supernatural, MONK, etc.
and we listen to a lot of the same music.

When I was married, my wife and daughter comprised my whole world practically.
I realize now that it was through my wife that I kept up a semi-regular social schedule.
The close friends we had, although they still know me and seem fine with me, were getting together with us at least every month I'd say.

Yeah... if it weren't for my daughter, I'd have no contact at all outside of work.
I'm not sure what I'm gonna be like once she graduates high school in a couple of years and moves away to college.
She's already threatened me with a restraining order if I show up at the dorms to be the RA.. hahaha....


I would love to be an a band. For a couple of years while married, we would have these potlucks at our house and have several musician friends over. It was great! We played music and ate. I would try to get into the conversations, but usually migrated to the kitchen to clean up or elsewhere around the house.
Like you, I do tend to blather on when I feel excited and happy to be around some people.
This usually turns folks off and away from me; I'm just not very good at group discussions.
I also do not drink alcohol except for the very rare attempt at finishing a glass of wine or a bottle of beer.
I just never like the taste much so I don't finish a whole 'anything'.
I fear that if I did drink enough to 'loosen up', I'd be even worse at communicating that I already am.

The thing is, there have been occasions when I am one-on-one with a person and we have some really good, deep conversations.


I do think part of what I'm doing when I close myself off in the drawing room at the lab, after my shift, is the winding down thing.
It's pretty weird for me to just jump in bed 10 minutes after I get off work.
And if there was anything stimulating/exciting happening like in the E.R., I may still be wound up over that.



You write this better than I could have... it would have taken me several paragraphs to say the same things, LOL.


Well, I'm one of the small pool of ADD'ers here... no AS according to the docs, so you're situation may be different in it's source than mine, but the whole experience sounds familiar.
And yes, I do find people here interesting. I have met three members here (already knew one even before finding WP), but I have little contact with them now, for various reasons. I do miss the contact I had with EvilKimEvil before she and I had a bit of a shake up, but it seems that is history now and there could be a possibility of us remaining friends.
But both her and another member here I met live hours away and I'm not sure how easy it would be to get together with them even occasionally.

The other member I know, is someone I like a whole lot and I value the friendship we have, but I have had to learn a lot about her AS and how not to be around her. I was pushing things way too much for her comfort level.



Yes, I agree... places like WP do provide a new source of socialization for me, but after a while it starts to tax my emotions a bit.
I really miss direct contact with people in a manner much more intimate than dealing with patients and their families and my co-workers on the job.
Also, I let it get to me sometimes when I post places and seem to get little response back or no response at all.
There have been many times it seems a thread dies out after I post to it... dumb luck or is it me?
This certainly brings up my own self-image issues, which then makes it hard to return to the internet and connect with folks.
I start lurking again... feeling like I'm a stranger on the outside just peering in, wishing I could be part of the crowd.

To tell you the sad truth.... last year... I quit posting as much as I had been, for a while, just to see if anyone would start one of those threads... "Where's WSmac? He hasn't been on here in a while!".
I suppose I was just feeling a bit depressed and was hoping that I had made some sort of impression here (and a couple of other sites) to the extent that my absence would be noted.. hopefully with a bit of worry and sadness


Yeah, there's that whole thing of becoming a parent and exchanging groups of friends because of that.
I like what you've written here... I'll be thinking about that a bit, thanks.



I've never shared too many interests with the general population, and those people I associated with either in high school or afterwards were only in my life because of clubs (in high school I was in the German Honor Society.. language club, and my girlfriend at the time was also), or work.
My brother is the only person aside from my daughter with whom I can spend vast amounts of continual time with.
I've tried the old, 'go back and check out the old friends/co-workers thing and it has never worked for me at all. I pretty much instantly realize that without the bonding structure we had of school/work, we don't have anything in common.

As I have looked over my life, from time-to-time, I now understand that I struggled hard to fit in with folks, usually at my own expense.
In school, as a kid, I found that if I acted the part of the Fool, I was included in the group. Of course, this left me feeling a bit bad because I had to bear the brunt of jokes and/or make myself out to be a laughing stock in order to feel included.

At work, the jobs I lasted the longest in were ones where I didn't have to be with someone constantly... I could go off on my own to do something.
At my current job, I can move between parts of the lab and the rest of the hospital.
I get that quality time with my co-workers of 5 minute intervals that way so I don't have to work at coming up with decent conversation that is interesting to others, and it's too short for me to start bouncing around on topics in a manner that confounds the others while I'm having a grand ole time myself.
I do have moments when I can carry on for a good while and forget I'm at work.
Short and quick... that works best for me.. but it leaves me feeling incomplete.




I have felt like that all my life as well, but recently I started thinking something different.

I always have had this 'youthful' attitude that people have commented on.
I'm playful and never as serious, in general, as the other people my age.
What came to me recently is that my mind feels as if it is stuck at a certain maturity level and my body and the rest of the world progresses in a manner I cannot relate to.

Although I am intelligent, my actions and interests seem to be stuck in the same mode they were in when I was half my age.
Nothing seems to have changed.
I find the world of younger people so fascinating, yet I don't belong because I'm this old 48 y.o. guy with greying hair.
I know it's not the desire to 'remain young' like some older people have which leads them to dress and act like teenagers all over again.
I just have never changed.
I don't worry about getting older... it literally doesn't exist as a concern in my life... well, except that my physical health does remind me about the aging process from time-to-time.

I just can't contain my child-like enthusiasm and interest in new things, which includes music.
I love so many new bands that my daughter and her friends are listening to, which throws some people off when they get to know me, I think.

I can't go hanging out with teens... that would be weird... and I don't have any attraction to teens anyway.. as far as inappropriate types.
I just find that this static sense of.. eh.. I don't know.. maturity?... about me is part of why I don't connect with people my own age. They are pretty much set in their ways by the age of 48 and I'm still flittering around checking out all the new stimuli that appears on the horizon.

What a life!

Same here. One of the big causes of my split with my wife is our different social needs could never be fulfilled together. Usually she organised stuff and I got burnt out keeping up. Part of my problem may go back to moving out if the city to a rural backwater. In the city, there are more 'bohemian' types, more crazy musicians. And somehow these people tolerate me. I lost touch with the last of my close friends when moving from the city and the country folk are rather hmmm ... "narrowly focussed". My wife made many new friends here, who were 'not my cup of tea'. It was so awkward sensing their complete bafflement at my attempts to be 'chatty'



I tend to blather on WP, too It's so frustrating that it's never just right in real life. As well as the 'blathering on' that seems to disturb people, there's the 'total verbal blank'. Sitting there knowing I should be saying something but the mind just freezes and can't think of anything. One-on-one is fine with me, too. That's when people occasionally say "I didn't realise you were so interesting". When in groups, most people seem to change and become unable to consider what one person is saying. They alter their opinion to 'group think' and can show contempt so long as others back them up.



My social ineptness is my specialist subject and I must have written thousands of words on it by now here



A lot of what your describing sounds very like the inner experience of AS, though.



Happens to all of us...well it happens to me too, anyway. Maybe it's only us? And everyone else is off having a great party somewhere so hasn't got time to reply to us?



I've found that too in most cases, probably only 2 exceptions where we seem to be able to 'hit it off' after months or even a couple of years of not seeing each other.



I can really relate to that. Apart from I tend to hide that 'youth' away because of fear of negative consequences from the Norms. One of my best friends now is 20 years younger than me - he's just spent a couple of months living with shaman in the Amazon. Now that's the sort of person I can connect to.



They're interested only in looking young, not behaving young.

I find it very awkward balancing it all out and knowing how to be behave. When they say 'be yourself'....my self has no real interest in nonsense like career ambitions, paying mortgages, dinner parties with high status people etc. I know I'm supposed to be interested in that stuff, but I'd rather spend the afternoon making Lego robots. Finding a stream and making dams out of sticks. Inventing a new guitar chord (I call it 'H Minor'). Crawling around with my son re-enacting the D-Day invasion in the hall using toy light sabres. But the grown up's around act real *funny* if they see you do that stuff. My ex-has this well honed 'eye rolling' gesture that communicates more utter contempt than a thousand words ever could.

I guess if you're rich and famous you're OK, they'll tolerate anything to get a piece. But a low status middle aged nobody 'should have grown out of that by now'.

So I hide it away, put my serious face on and talk about the mortgage rates and then I'm dull as dishwater. There is a very strict set of rules, it appears, on what is 'fun' for an adult.

The problem with friends is that my low tolerance is such that I would be happy to see them once every month or two. However, I think for most people that is not friend behaviour. It has to be once or twice a week with phone calls in between. They can't see any point of having a friend you see once every 6 weeks.

I have no social life, and sleep poor. Maybe there is a correlation. Or maybe it's just because of AS.
I had to take an extra sleeping pill last night. Seems like it usually happens on the weekends, when I am not forced to be social at school.

You're in high school or starting college? Just going by the age you have listed.
I really enjoy getting up early in the morning, especially before the rest of the world is zooming around like ants scurrying from their hole-in-the-ground to points beyond and back.
I grew up in West Texas, so I had the deserts and their beautiful sunrises to watch when getting up early.
I don't remember having quite the same sleep issues back when I was in high school, except for trying to read a whole book or write a whole paper Sunday night because it was due Monday.

I think it's too bad that you have to take sleeping pills to get to sleep, but if that's what works best for you currently, then you should do what you can to get real sleep I think.


I've lived in some serious redneck towns before and in places like Austin, Texas and L.A., so I know what you're talking about there.



Yeah, I've taken the quizzes and generally I find a lot of what people write about here relates well to my life.


I only try to 'hide' this aspect of me when I'm around certain people, but in general I am thought of as the guy who won't grow up.




You sound like a fun dad! Yet, a child does need to see that the sort of stuff you are talking about enjoying is a valuable part of life!

At parties my former wife and I would attend I would eventually gravitate to the kids or pets.
I can remember more than one party where the host(s) said I was a great babysitter.
I also find children much more fascinating that adults anyway.
Finally being a parent has brought this whole new perspective on the human mind than what I appreciated before.
I have done nothing but marvel at the way my daughter's mind has developed over the years.
Whenever I have played with kids, I tend to not take on that goofy adult-speak, basically talking down to them.
I have had a couple of experiences (both in a Safeway Grocery store in different cities.. strange as that was) when my daughter was younger where some stranger would stop me and say something like, "I really like the way you talk to your daughter.", and the like.
I just see them as little people.. kids, yes, but people also. To watch them explore a toy, or their shoelaces, or react to a sound or the dog brushing past them... it's almost mesmerizing to me.
I've been watching my daughter from the moment she came out into the world to today and the sheer amount of information that she has absorbed, integrated, and reacted to in her life is amazing!
We all do it... we just take it for granted most of the time I think. But having the opportunity to see it from an outsider's perspective has been a wonderful experience for me.

Anyway... so with kids, I just love feeding them information and watching how they react to it.
This can be reading a book and showing them the pages, pointing out the words and pictures to see what they make of it all, to building some quirky tower thing precariously balanced until we both get that 'evil' grin and find some interesting means of disassembling it... usually by bashing it or poking at some critical juncture.

Eh... so I have MUCH more fun hanging out with kids than the adults... with their serious discussions and ego-inflating boasts along with the alcohol consumption.


HA... rich and eccentric! What a way to live!




I'm right there with you on this for the most part.
While I do feel the same way about my friends and family in general, I would like to have a bit more contact with a select few in my life.
My brother and I were practically joined at the hip for so many of our young adult years.
He's in Texas and I'm in California, so we don't actually talk to each other even every month, but when we do or when we get together... it's like we just saw each other yesterday. Works for us... but like you say, most folks don't seem to be like that.
I find it hard to reconnect with most people if we have a lengthy lapse in our connection(s).

According to my kids, a fun dad, yes. According to my ex-wife, simply awful choice of husband, though



! !! !! I've been told exactly that, too! And if no children or pets handy, gravitate towards the bookshelf or CD collection...



I've found that a few years of state schooling has dampened much of that initial spark, though.



Hey, you sound like a close-to-perfect dad! I was going to ask if you've ever read anything about AS parents allegedly causing lives of utter misery for their kids? But then you may not actually have AS.

This is one part of the AS 'symptom list' that never applied to me. I've invariably been able to intuitively connect with my children. Whats odd is that many times I've picked up on things that my uber-NT-ex totally missed. For example, son comes down to breakfast and straight away I notice he looks ill. My ex would say "no, I don't see anything wrong. ". When asked he's say he felt fine and me ex- would say "see, nothing wrong with him". Next thing, he's vomiting buckets in that way that small children do.

I can pick up in emotional aspects, too. No magic involved, it all seems obvious to me. However, other people such as my ex, grand parents, teachers etc are missing it totally.

I also get this with animals sometimes, but that's another story or two....! What I have difficulty with is NT adults.



And property prices...property prices....celebrities...celebrity property prices. "Self Aggrandization" is the term, I think. I suspect one reason they don't like me is because it doesn't 'impress' me as they'd like. Or I could just be a miserable frump.


In absence of riches, maybe poor and eccentric is worth a look, too?

WP is my family, my friends, my neighbours, my coworkers. I sleep fine, but can't go to sleep if I don't spend some time on WP, same about getting up in the morning. I've been having times from hell in the last few years, especially the last few months, and I've discovered how very strong I am. But if I don't have internet access one day, I break down completely. I think if I didn't have internet forums I wouldn't have survived this social isolation I live in.

I've found out lately that, by force of all the rejections, betrayals, abuse, disappointments, etc, I've lost the desire for friends and the enjoyment at spending time with people. At the very best, they bore me to tears. And mainly, now that I know that there is all this social subtext that I'm missing and that I'll be rejected unavoidably, and that I'm supposed to suppress my spontaneous behaviors in favor of the "socially appropriate" conventional conversations, I don't foresee any fun in spending time with people anymore. Back when I didn't know you had to behave a certain way, I'd have a lot of fun with people (then they'd reject me, of course).

But the other day I was invited to join a few colleagues of mine for lunch (I always eat alone, ostracized at work), the food tasted much better and I felt a general sense of well-being that I hadn't felt in a long time. I guess I slept better at night too.

Well, hopefully she doesn't tell you that you are a poor parent also.
I can live with the fact that I wasn't the husband my former wife thought I was... or better... the husband she imagined me to be - with a little help from her, but it grates my nerves when she starts taking little jabs at me trying to say I'm not a very good parent or at least not as good as her. Hell, I pretty much raised our daughter and she's turned out really swell. I must have not done too much damage.


Hehehe... like minds!


That's sad to hear.
One of the issues my former wife has with my parenting of our daughter is my resistance with certain school policies and teacher's demands that hold little or no logical use in the education of our daughter... heck... for any kid.
I speak my mind on these issues, albeit as diplomatically as I can most times, plus I have always been around our daughter's schools enough that folks there got to know me pretty well.
High School is a bit different in that I know a couple of her teachers well, but the others I haven't really even talked much to.
I need to establish some contact with them before this year is out.

I know what you mean though about the dying spark in a child's mind... I've seen it many times especially when I worked at the local elementary school.



Well... thanks, but I never take comments like that too well... nothing about you, just that I'm not good at hearing those kind of things about myself... but I'm trying to get better about it
Oh.. and I wouldn't say even close-to-perfect... I'm just pretty much doing what feels like the right thing, and then I go back and explain/apologize when I make a mistake, which is not too unusual an event


Yeah, although I feel I can definitely relate to some of the traits/characteristics of AS, I am too gregarious, for one thing, to be AS according to the standards and the professionals.
I'm not really trying to be AS either.... I'm definitely ADD/HD, and that's a handful as it is!


AS like any other classification of the human psych is not a static thing... not a finite list of symptoms that only appear one way, every time in every person... or so I think


Your social consciousness has risen above the average adult to the degree that pursuits of higher intellectual stimulation in a group setting among the other adults is stymied by the slow maturation and stagnation of the broad thinking capabilities of these other adults...
... that, or you could just be a miserable frump. LOL

[/quote]

Oh yeah! That's right where I'm at today!









I can agree with you about these forums offsetting the loneliness and depressive potential of not interacting face-to-face with other people.
It's just when places like this create a resistance-free avenue through which we live our lives, seemingly free from all the trials and tribulations of personal contact outside our doors, that I think this may have gone a bit too far.
I'm not blaming the forums or the internet at all.
In my case (the only experience I am qualified to speak of), the draw to log in and tune out the rest of the world has become so prevalent at times that I hardly think about what I am doing as I turn on the computer and bring up the internet.
It's almost a sleepwalking phenomenon.

Do you think there could eventually be a time, Greentea, when you would be able to find a satisfactory median between behaving your way and appeasing the rest of the world by compromising with their standards when it's convenient and easy for you to do so?

Glad you slept well.
Sounds like you just had a revelation about your experience... think you can replicate it?

I don't even succeed in appeasing anyone when I try my best at the expense of everything I am and enjoy, so no, I don't think there will be such a time. I spent my life trying and it never worked...

Over the years, I've come to realize how much of a drain on my life it is to work hard at pleasing everyone else at the cost of my own self-esteem, personal needs, and general happiness.
The idea of creating a happy life by gaining the acceptance of other people through my own 'demise', as it were, has finally been laid to rest in my mind.
I still fall prey to old habits, but I'm getting better over time.

I'm sure our two differing lives/worlds make it hard for me to fully appreciate what you go through where you live.

Still, glad to have you here!

It's not any different, really. Here we live the American Way, with a Middle Eastern flavor. My colleagues try as much as possible to reflect the Sex and the City values in behavior and dress, and the one who can spend 11 hours in the office on the highest heels wins.

Apart from that, being like everyone else is a must, because it's a tiny community, so whatever dissonance is likely to be heard of by a big portion of the community and most of your work field community. Like in any small community, your public image is your biggest asset.

Funny thing is, I live in the gay capital of the world, and we got number 1 place in the worldwide statistics of sexual freedom. We beat Sweden. Gay couples walk hand in hand among the kids in the park and the beach, no one bats an eye-lid. But if you're in any way oblivious (by neurology or by choice) to the values of a consumer herd (shallowness, petty competition for status and financial dominance in the community), then you're dangerous to be seen with and outcast.

Funny thing too, before Albert Einstein died, he left up to his last penny (in past and future royalties of any of his work) and research papers to my university, but I never heard him mentioned by anyone.

Still, I go out alone no matter what people say about me for it. If I gave up on going out alone, I'd never go out again and that'd be reason enough (for me) to leave this world for good. I have the best time in my solo Photography and exploration trips. I like to take the bus to Jerusalem on Fridays and sit at the place where Jesus was crucified or on the Mount of Olives where he used to sit and ponder, and feel that I haven't been the only "dangerous idiot" around here.

That pretty much sounds like me, except I don't have any kids

I think connecting with people, even if just for a shared meal, releases endorphins (the happy chemical in the brain that also causes us to sleep well).

That conjures up such an amusing image of your workplace



Maybe AS acceptance is a possibility if the people are capable of that increasing their level of acceptance to that level. I guess it all depends on whose running the marketing campaigns for each lifestyle.



You can Be Yourself. Especially if you're the same as everybody else. Either way, we should be better at 'being ourselves' than acting as someone else. After decades of 'being other', perhaps we lose sight of what our self actually is or was?



Only if it is stress free contact. If stressful, then the nasty stress chemicals get released (cortisol is it?). I've seen research about the very real abd very negative bio-chemical effects to the organism due to the stress of being lower in the pecking order than those around you. Sometimes think opting out is the best option.

With social contact I think the quality is more important than the quantity.For example, spending 8 hours a day in low quality contact with people at work. It is low quality (and somewhat stressful) because these are mostly not people who would choose to spend time with me and vice-versa. It is a working relationship. When you can't relax, let go and stop worrying about what you say, it is stressful and exhausting. I'm not saying the inability to let go is wrong, in some work situations, you really do have to watch every word and even every muscle movement.

Ahhhh, concise and spot-on!

Greentea, I think I would find your area quite fascinating to just wander around and look at.
When I was in the military, I spent almost all of my free time alone, wandering the property with my old Pentax ME with motorwind.
Not that I have ever been a very good photographer, but I think the time alone in nature was what helped offset my loneliness.

ScottF, do you have any pets? Dog, Cat, Bird, Reptile? I have one co-worker who is AS and from what I gather, she does enjoy her time with her dog. She has relatively easy access to the beach for walks with him, which sounds nice.

Associations with other people seems so complicated an issue sometimes.
When I just sit and think it through in the context of my own life and needs though, I really believe I don't need someone around me even 12 hours out of every day.
It's just that there are times when I would really like the feeling of security from embracing another person (cuddling and spooning while sleeping, also... and sex from time-to-time), and the feeling of, umm, I don't know... validation perhaps?... by sharing my own ideas and/or passions with someone and having them respond correctly to it in a manner that says, "Wow! That's really neat WSmac!".