Life & Social Skills

Life & Social Skills

Ages: 22+

Developing Friendships as Adults: Safety Issues to Consider

Developing Friendships as Adults: Safety Issues to Consider

Many people need help navigating how to develop friendships and issues to consider like social skills, who is appropriate to be friends with vs to be polite and kind to, and potential challenges like safety and bullying.

Depending on your interest in friendships and relationships, here are some tips and information to support you. There are different levels of friends and different places to meet friends.

It takes time to develop friendships, to move beyond acquaintances where you just say “Hi, how are you” to a co-worker or neighbor. You may meet potential friends in different places like at an activity you both enjoy.

Conversation Basics

You may find it helpful to practice and think about these conversation basics with your therapist, social skills group, family or friends.

  • Practice conversation starters. What comes in the middle? How do you close?
  • Take turns talking and listening to the other person. Know when it’s time to stop talking and when the conversation is coming to an end.
  • Learn how much to share in a conversation depending on who you are talking to.
  • Learn how to not misread the social cues. Social skills training -- looking for body language and words being used. This may vary depending on culture.
  • Understand the challenge of literal thinking and perspective taking. Learn cues for how the other person is feeling.

Understanding and Developing Friendships

The following are essential skills and issues that professionals or family can help you with.

How to understand who is a friend vs acquaintance and that friendship takes time to develop. Is this someone you can depend on and confide in safely? Or are you friendly, saying “Hi” when you see each other at work, in your neighborhood, day program or doing a particular activity in the same group?

Moving from an acquaintance to a friend you hang out with and share deeper thoughts with takes time. It involves getting to know each other well, sharing experiences and having some interests or other things in common. Maintaining a friendship means talking regularly through whatever way you’re both comfortable with and seeking fun things to do or talk about that you both enjoy.

Think about different people you find interesting and how you might ask them to hang out or do something together. You could practice conversation topics like asking about an interest that the person has. Consider what type of activity or interests they have that you might like to do when you get together.

Friendships bring companionship and fun, but may also involve hurt feelings, such as a friendship ending or someone angry or frustrated with you.

It can be hard learning how to handle it when someone doesn't want to be your friend but it is a part of life. Sometimes you may not want to be someone's friend who approaches you. Know how to respond politely and directly to someone who wants to be friends with you, but you don’t want to be friends with.

Who Is and Who Is Not a Potential Friend

Where we work is a natural place to make friends. Many of us spend so much time at work whether in person or virtually, that co-workers are who we talk to a lot. Over time you may find that you really like and have things in common with some co-workers who you would like to be friends with.

To gradually become friends, you can go out for lunch or have a chat about things you have in common. Watch for signs that the other person is interested in that kind of conversation. If they seem to change the topic back to work issues, they may be more interested in being friendly than being friends and that's OK. If they respond enthusiastically and bring up other things about that topic (for example sports, video games, a concert or event you went to or are interested in) that's great. It's important to keep a friendly, polite relationship with your co-workers regardless of how these situations work out.

Boundaries can be tricky sometimes between our personal life and work or other aspectives of our life. Friends can sometimes turn to dating partners. You may consider dating a co-worker or be approached by a co-worker to date. It is always your choice whether or not to date somebody.

It's easier to not date a co-worker because it can become challenging to do your best at work and not have dating interfere with the workplace. It is not a good idea to date your boss or get involved with them since they have a work relationship with you that includes hiring, firing and evaluations. Regardless of your personal relationship with co-workers, it's important to have a good professional relationship. If a friendship or dating relationship with your boss or co-worker does not work out, it can be very difficult to interact with them at work.

Having a friendly, professional relationship with your boss is important, but you will not be friends with your boss. Similarly you want to have a good relationship with your landlord since you will need to ask them to arrange fixing things or taking care of things for you. However, your landlord is not a person to be friends with. Neighbors can be great people to be friends with if you both want to. Neighbors are often friendly because it's nice to have a warm relationship with people you live near but may or may not be interested in being friends.

Safety Issues and Friendship

Discuss safety issues with people you trust like your family about what to do if your friend suggests something that you are not comfortable with or makes you feel like you are being taken advantage of. How should you respond if someone seems inappropriate?

It is helpful to know your triggers - things that are difficult, stressful or upsetting for you. Let your good friends know how they can be helpful and what those triggers are. For example, if you have some triggers (ie if you don’t like country music) your friend can be helpful in avoiding a country music restaurant or concert when you're out together. Or if loud sounds and bright lights are your triggers, maybe you can all go out to have dinner somewhere quieter not at the most crowded time, and then you can go home while your friends go to Dave and Busters afterwards. Ideally your friends will understand and be willing to meet at places that have easy to find parking, and not at happy hour or other peak times.

If you use social media, make sure you understand safety issues like not giving your address. If you’re meeting someone online in person for the first time, bring someone with you or let someone know who you trust that you are meeting someone and where you’re meeting as a precaution.

There are people on pornography or other online websites that are targeting you for purposes like money that may appear to be or act like your friend. You will find more information in the Safety at Home and Safety in the Community articles in the Milestones Autism Planning (MAP) Tool. We will be adding articles about sexuality, dating and relationships to the MAP later in 2022.

Bullying

Bullying is an incredibly difficult challenge to go through. While we think of bullying as happening to kids, sadly it happens with adults, too. Bullying takes many different forms. For example, not being invited to a party that your fellow co-workers or neighbors were; someone making you feel uncomfortable focusing on a behavior they may not understand is part of your being autistic; or even something as minor as a negative emoji on your Instagram post.

Cyber bullying is when it happens online, such as someone making fun of you on social media.

You are not alone. Get professional help from a counselor, therapist or clergy who you feel comfortable with.

Just as we don’t want to be bullied we need to watch that we not be the one bullying others.

Additional Resources on Bullying

An Autism Perspective on Bullying: Creating a Culture of Acceptance

Other Additional Resources

Building Relationships page of the website

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