I agree, I don't really want to talk about autism in my free time. For a couple of reasons. First, I'm just tired and I want to put my mind on something else. Second, I don't want to feel so personally defined by autism. I need to feel like I have a separate identity. Third, it's not a huge mystery where my kids got the genetic component of their condition :) I find making new friends kind of exhausting and most days my bucket is empty, I don't have more socialness to give.
Also, and this isn't always forefront in my mind but there are also some pretty deep divisions in the autism community and I just can't have another cure vs acceptance debate or vaccine debate or whatever else.

I do not think it is people not being friendly, I think it is more of that we just do not have time to socialize at all. We spend so much time with our children and taking care of what they need, that when we do have free time we just want to be away from ASD all together. We find we have a very hard time finding time even for play dates between the Dr appointments and therapy. We take the children to the sensory gym and speak with the other parents there but we are still spending most of the time following the children around that we do not have that much time to even relax.

Yes for sure I do. I find it hard to separate our lives from autism since my situation doesn't allow me any time away from my children.
For me it would be a blessing to find other parents outside of online communities that get it. I am just now even finding groups that are autism related, hopefully it won't be so hard to connect with the parents involved in these groups. I find it varies wether or not I connect with people in general. I believe though that I have some slight characteristics of autism in myself that relate to social skills, so that might be why. So far I have connect with two people who get it. One runs a play center geared toward autistic children, which is very far from our home. The other is a personal friend who I met through other reasons, but also lives far away.
I usually am successful at connecting in the beginning of relationships, but then have trouble maintaining them for reasons I'm not sure of.

I'm not saying all I wanna do is talk about Autism, it's just nice that if something came up, I wouldn't feel embarrassed to talk about it or even for them to witness it. My life isn't defined by Autism nor is my son's; I have a separate life which I love. I don't wake up thinking about Autism, I plan doctors appointments around certain times to not consume our life including therapies. I'm a very social person and I don't allow Autism to consume us. It just would be nice to have like minded friends. And yes, I know about the deep division in the autism community as well as judgement towards one another which to me is stupid but it is what it is.

No one is my life fully understands Autism, they get it enough not to judge my son and they all understand his quirks and teach their children. I just was asking if anyone else found it hard to meet other parents just to speak to and feel comfortable around from time to time.

This is why I am here (o: