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this post was submitted on 09 Oct 2023
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Autism
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A community for respectful discussion and memes related to autism acceptance. All neurotypes are welcome.
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Given that the overwhelming emotion that I've seen expressed by most other people that are also on the autism spectrum is loneliness, I'd say: most people. You don't feel lonely? Good for you, I'm happy for ya. Most people that are high-functioning autistics--formerly Asperger's--express feelings of isolation, of loneliness, of wanting to have some kind of romantic connection. Not being able to find people that care about them for who they really are is a serious problem.
I'm going to make a guess and say that you've never had the moment of realization that you cared deeply for someone, that you loved someone, but that they simply didn't feel the same way about you. ..And then repeated that experience countless times.
It's like, if you're straight, then roughly 48% of all the people that you meet are at least theoretically in your dating pool, because right around 48% of people are the opposite sex and are also straight. If 1:1000 of those people would be suitable a suitable romantic partner for you, then there are roughly 163,000 suitable romantic partners in the US for you. Heck, roughly 8, 500 of them would be in metro NYC alone. So, in theory, it's 'easy' to find a potential romantic partner. If you're gay or lesbian, that drops to roughly 2% of all people to start (roughly 4% of all people are gay or lesbian, and it's a roughly equal split by gender), which means that your potential nationwide pool is 7,000. If you're trans? Well, that's even lower then.
If you're on the autism spectrum--which is about 2.8% of people in the US--you're going to have a much, much harder time finding people that you can connect with in the first place, just because you're outside of the acceptable range for friendship for most people. Yes, there will be some people, but far, far fewer, and consequently harder to find. If your constrained interests are not a 'popular' one with people that are on the spectrum? Well, good luck then; you may never find someone that you can share a deep connection with.
So, yes, if I had been given a choice to have been born neurotypical, I absolutely would have taken that.