Do I want to be with someone or do I just think I should?

[simplyme]

for a long time I'd never been interested in other people. I knew I was gay around 15 (which i think makes things more complicated) but never been attracted to typical people I meet. Now I've started getting crushes and found them inconvenient as I think one way but feel another. I see people in relationships and it looks very nice but also seems dangerous cause I've seen how hurt people can be by it. If I'm honest with myself I feel that i would have to give up a part of myself and make myself weaker in order to be in a relationship and I don't want to 'need' someone or be crushed by having the relationship end. I also worry that I would not be able to love someone the way they deserved. I sometimes feel guilty for not being with someone but I don't know if I truly want to be with someone or just feel that I should because that is what 'normal' people do. what is your situation and what advice would you give me?

 

[King_Oni]

If anything; I think you should want to be with someone if YOU feel comfortable with it. I don't think you should be in a relationship because everyone does so.

All to often I've seen relationships fail because it's "normal" to have a significant other. Those people end up pressuring themselves in keeping together for the sake of staying together and in the end get hurt way more.

I think you're the best judge on when you're ready for it or when you meet that special someone you think you would want to be around more closely than any others.

 

[Bay]

I agree with King_Oni. However, I would add that having relationships has helped me to learn about myself, as it has helped me to identify what traits in others are and are not important to me. I also think it is possible to have relationships that are not too serious, where you know going into them that they are not going to last forever. Such relationships are capable of making life richer.

 

[Divrom]

Don't do it.

Relationships suck. Relationships with Aspies suck even more.

 

[gailt915]

Relationships totally suck. I'm married to my 4th husband. This is my 4th failed marriage. I have never been so miserable in my entire life. I'm too poor to get out of it. I have 6 animals....I can't even take care of them very well, and I could never leave them behind. I always enter a relationship with such high hopes, such joy..........then the bottom drops out and we see each other for who we really are. They stop loving me (if they ever did). And I hang on and on and on. Until the pain becomes unbearable and I finally leave. Only this time, I can't leave. I have no job, no money, and nowhere to go. If I could just end it all right now, I would. I already feel dead inside. But how does one go on in such pain and despair, day after day. Knowing the next day will be the same? I'm in a very dark place right now. And I can't see my way out.
So be very careful and be very sure about entering into a commitment with another person. We never really know someone, who they really are, what we really mean to them, until it is too late and someone gets hurt. The damages cannot always be repaired. We Aspies can get broken so very easily. Handle yourself with care.
Ok, that was morbid. But still something to think about.

 

[simplyme]

thank you all. there is not much i can do much about things right now and its hard to step out my comfort zones (and boy do relationships make me uncomfortable) but I try to take your advice to heart and it's good to know that I'm not the only one who struggles with things like this, it makes me feel more normal (even when you know your not the only one its good to actually see your not alone)