I'm a 31-year-old female and I don't have any friends. Not a single one. I had one that I had been friends with since grade school but I finally ended that relationship because it wasn't a good one. She couldn't go a single time we were together without making fun of me or calling me a name. I took so long to end that "friendship" because as long as I put up with her verbal abuse, I at least had someone I could go do things with on occasion. I finally decided I was better than that and no friends is better than that kind of friend but now...I'm just so lonely all the time.

I have no idea how to make friends. I've tried volunteering, taking time off work to go to play groups with my three-year-old son, attending outside work functions, talking to other moms at playgrounds...everything. I feel like I always try the wrong thing for each situation in trying to meet/talk to people and I can't seem to just do it right. I seem to either try too hard, not enough...I just can't do it. And everywhere I go it's like all these other women already have friends and are not interested in meeting anyone new. It feels like I have a permanent ache in my chest because I don't have anyone to just talk to anymore. I just feel very unwanted everywhere I go because I don't have any friends or even any family beside my husband and my son.

I have a group of women I'm "friends" with online because we met in a parenting forum and without them to go to I probably would have gone a little insane by now. They're great but they're scattered all throughout the United States and I want a local friend. Someone to actually go do things with. Does anyone have any tips? Have any of you with Asperger's been able to make friends later in life? Thanks for reading.