[em-bee]

i haven't, but thanks for your thought. i have only recently begun to understand what the difficulties i am facing are and how they affect me, and how they were caused growing up, so i haven't been searching. i have also been coping reasonably well, in part because for a long time i was not even aware, which kept me from wondering to much. the only thing i noticed was that i had difficulties making friends, like some others here. so in a way HN is my tribe so far.

as for the challenge of making friends, for some reason, growing up, i didn't feel the need, but saw the benefit of not being submitted to peer pressure. i took my outsider status and relished in it, doing things that few others of my classmates did. i distanced myself and sought friends in after school activities. and as i was able to make a few friends once i joined university i felt that, given the circumstances, things didn't go that bad.

the making friends problem i am addressing by moving out of europe and living among people who are more welcoming than the average europeans, and also by applying this key understanding:

being a friend means to care about someone. you make friends by showing that you care.

i show that care to everyone who crosses my path, and with repeated interaction some of these people become friends.