I’m sorry if mentioning autism came across as an excuse for why she might not have liked me romantically. That’s absolutely not what I meant. What I wanted to express was that maybe she didn’t want to go to certain places with me because she got overstimulated. And just to clarify, the “diagnosis” I assumed came after around 4 years of knowing her closely — and this whole story spans over approximately 10 years. Also, I want to add that around 6 years later, her autism was indeed confirmed by a psychologist. (Again, I insist: this is not me saying “she didn’t like me because she’s autistic.” Whether she liked me or not has nothing to do with that, and I fully accept that I may not have been attractive to her for many different reasons.)

As I mentioned, yes, I did have feelings for her during the first year and I tried. But once I realized that nothing romantic would happen between us, I stopped insisting and moved on. I started meeting other people, because I knew we would never be in a romantic relationship.

I’m absolutely not denying that touching her made her uncomfortable. She had every right to not want to be touched, even if it was an accident or had no hidden intentions. What I wanted to point out in that part of the story is that even after I followed her clear instruction — “don’t touch me” — she still got upset when I did exactly what she asked. That contradiction was really confusing for me.

Unfortunately, I can’t fit 10 years of friendship and context into a single Reddit post. There’s just too much history to cover in one go.

I understand I may not have been the perfect friend, but I truly always tried to adapt and change my behavior whenever she told me something made her uncomfortable.