I never understood the term “being lonely”. Ive tried to cognitively grasp its meaning and clear impact it has on tons of individuals, Autistic or not.
I told some guy I was lonely once, but that’s because I was trying to emotionally manipulate him. The tactic was logical: I was trying to assess his feelings for me. I wanted to hear how he’d react to that phrase I learned is a sign of vulnerability. He told me to get a dog. Ok. Platonic it is.
It seems loneliness is a desolate place. One that goes beyond the need to be around people, but has the additional ask of being seen. A lot of my friends have cited loneliness in a deciding factor to date or find a partner and this for me dovetails into how I don’t get wanting to be in a relationship.
For decades I believed I was deficient and/or traumatized to be so closed off to what everyone valued as much as breathing air-but traumatized by what? A few meh boyfriend experiences does not trauma make. There’s a core inability to understand why people want to be coupled. It really just seems like a nuisance to me. It weighed on my mind so much a few years ago, it was a constant topic in therapy.
“Do you want a relationship?” my therapist asked. Dripping with frustration tears, I stumbled over my words “I..well..yea..I think…I should”
“You don’t have to”, they said.
I ruminated on that afterward. I don’t have to? You mean, it’s an option to not have a partner, like, actually? It’s ok not to want it? Because for so long other people had commented on my walls, my guardedness, my pathological fear of being close. In retrospect, I wonder if this was just a case of mistaken identity. If I’d had the language to say “Im Autistic, I struggle with romantic connection” Would people still give the advice to let my guard down?
“You’re afraid to be vulnerable” said every insta-therapy post. Ok, so that’s my problem then and I need to get over it. Issue was whenever I tried, I couldn’t speak. Literally, to push the words out is so distressing, I’d rather not.
All these unsolicited, bullshit lines have been flung at me completely messing up my own ability to tune into my thoughts and feelings regarding it.
I don’t get lonely
is what I keep circling back to. Its like no one listens to me when I say: “I don’t want it” No, that lack of desire must be pathologized or me lying to myself.
Just practice! Go on dates that don’t mean anything, strike up a flirt. Shouldn’t I want to do these things? I don’t need them to survive, it is so last on the list. Because I have Jiu Jitsu to train, art to draw, things to think over and over. Inviting someone in-honestly?-drains my time and resources. There is no value in it for me. But that’s incredibly hard for anyone to believe.
I desire being alone as much as others desire relationships. I have human connection, I love my friends and they do know me. But I don’t experience this cavernous void that is discussed on the subject of Loneliness, or feel the curiosity that drives my friends to date as a means of connection.
With late-diagnoses now being identified, I see lots of talk on “Autism myths" and “stereotypes”. But I think this needs to be done additively because I am one Autistic who fits the stereotype. Not just in regards to romantic disinterest, but many, many things.
We need to allow for expansion of Autistic experiences without dismissing what some regard as Tropes—this trope is my reality. Feeling lonely was never a problem and continues to be an irrelevance for me.
It sounds troubling to have such pain regarding loneliness and it definitely deserves platforms for sharing and discussion. This is where the phrase of “if you’ve met one Autistic person, you’ve met one Autistic person” needs to be at the forefront of everyones mind. Because well known Autistic traits are not “Top 10 Autism myths” to bust-they are some peoples lived experience.
And it’s ok not to be lonely.