Xmas day arguments- Is DH somewhere on the spectrum?

[NotBabiesForLong]

I am just venting. Grrrrr. I have long suspected DH to be somewhere on the spectrum, but he chooses not to probe for diagnosis.

Christmas (and life) admin falls to me. He can't see what needs to be done without a list. And what isn't on the list is missed.

Xmas day ended in a blow up as I was the only person doing EVERYTHING, and not a soul had offered to get me a drink, help set table, help wash up. Etc etc.

I did call them out on it. And they did start to help slightly. But DH simply doesn't know what to do to help. It doesn't come naturally to him in the slightest. But given precise jobs (put cutlery out. Now put glasses out....shouted over my shoulder whilst I am cooking) He is happy to do...but that job doesn't prompt him to think "put salt and pepper out" etc.

Is this just our house? I don't think he is being a rubbish man, I think it is simply more. I do try not to enable it by calling him out on it. But, it does grind you down and spoil the Christmas atmosphere.

He lacks empathy, and is very very matter of fact, and doesn't like to ask for help or be told, yet doesn't know. Grrrrr.

Xmas will soon be over, yay!

This attitude of its never asd if the behaviour is a bit shit - when frankly it often blatantly IS is really fuckibg irratating especially when you live with it and see asd behaviours everyday that are shit to love with.

This in spades. There is always a real lack of empathy by some posters on here that declare themselves autistic when behaviour someone describes doesn't fit their black and view of what autism is.

OP we go with really specific lists. Christmas/holidays/things that are outside of the normal are always trigger points for dh so we breaking down into small bullet points.

OP, I know you’ve said he doesn’t want to seek diagnosis, but that refusal is directly fuelling the problems you are experiencing: the burden for navigate difficulties becomes yours while he is essentially picking and choosing the bits he wants to focus on. Looking at the sum of it all and seeking a more comprehensive answer would be more meaningful for him AND mean that you’re not carrying so much of the burden yourself.

Bluntly, when his struggles are having such an impact, then the decision about whether to seek a diagnosis may not be solely his to make if he is expecting you to keep picking up the pieces/facilitating his ability to manage at the expense of your own.

Some people manage to find strategies without needing a diagnosis. Others need the diagnosis to signpost towards useful strategies and help them and others understand themselves and what may help.

(If you’re thinking that he might be autistic or it might be something else like ADHD or dyspraxia or something else, it might be easier for you to use the term ‘neurodiverse’)

@luinagreine

This attitude of its never asd if the behaviour is a bit shit - when frankly it often blatantly IS is really fuckibg irratating especially when you live with it and see asd behaviours everyday that are shit to love with.

This in spades. There is always a real lack of empathy by some posters on here that declare themselves autistic when behaviour someone describes doesn't fit their black and view of what autism is.

OP we go with really specific lists. Christmas/holidays/things that are outside of the normal are always trigger points for dh so we breaking down into small bullet points.

This comments raises the ableism bar spectacularly on this thread.

It seems like you, and a few other posters, are the ones with the black and white view of autism - you are struggling to see beyond the out-dated, inaccurate stereotypes.

If an NT is a arse and someone posts on MN, the. It’s just accepted he’s an arse. If the poster says they think their partner is autistic, then of course this is just explained as typical autistic behaviour. The double standard here is shocking but sadly indicative of the prejudice we face in everyday life.

Do YOU have any empathy for autistic people? Or do you lack such empathy as your post suggests you are devoid of such empathy.

I apologise again for the upset. I admit to not knowing the terminology or the outcome, but believe it is one or more of the diagnoses referred to on this thread and I thank everybody for their constructive suggestions.

@NotBabiesForLong do you realise how contradictory your behavior is when you're here complaining that your husband lacks empathy when you clearly lack empathy for your husband and the general autistic community. Look up the double empathy problem.

It sounds like your knowledge of autism is really poor, hence, why you've written such an offensive post. Autism is currently diagnosed using the The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). Up to the 1970s the DSM was used to diagnose homosexuality as a mental disorder but when society began to accept homosexuality as a natural difference rather than a 'condition' it was removed from the manual. Yes society currently labels all autistics as being disordered and as having a condition but this doesn't mean it is true, in the same vein that being a member of the LGBTQ+ community in the 70s didn't automatically mean you had a mental disorder.

Please take 5 minutes to think about how your post might come across and whether you're peddling outdated stereotypes before you post in future.

If you know you want things doing in a specific way and your husband wont behave like that playing the martyr card wont improve the situation. You don't want to do the work, neither does your husband. Next year go out for your Christmas dinner instead, have a buffet or behave like its a normal day - you have lots of options.

As someone who is autistic, I'm sick of reading threads where all aspects of shit behaviour are blamed on the person "being on the spectrum".

Being on the spectrum doesn't mean you can't also be an arse, though. Some people seem to think that if you're autistic and an arse, the autism has to be to blame. Why can't the person just be an arse who happens to have autism?

Yes, some people with autism may well be difficult and frustrating to live with - I'm not denying that at all, but many NT people are also difficult and frustrating to live with.

It's so important that shitty behaviour isn't constantly blamed on "autism" or "ADHD" or any other number of diagnoses. You can be a shitty person with a diagnosis, just as you can be a shitty person without one.

Do YOU have any empathy for autistic people? Or do you lack such empathy as your post suggests you are devoid of such empathy.

Of course I do. That's why I make adjustments to our everyday lives to accommodate my autistic dh and ds. Unlike a lot of the autistic posters on MN they struggle with some day to day tasks and unlike some of the autistic posters on mumsnet I don't think that makes them an arse, I think it makes them human. The OP wasn't describing an arse like a lot of the autistic posters on this thread seem to think. She was describing someone who struggles some day to day things.

And just to add it is great that lots of autistic posters don't struggle with aspects of family life but that doesn't mean that every autistic person is the same. I find it really insulting that people would down play the struggles of some people like my dh and ds and simply write them off as being an arse because they don't fit their idea of what an autistic person looks like.

@luinagreine

And just to add it is great that lots of autistic posters don't struggle with aspects of family life but that doesn't mean that every autistic person is the same. I find it really insulting that people would down play the struggles of some people like my dh and ds and simply write them off as being an arse because they don't fit their idea of what an autistic person looks like.

I don't think anyone is doing that.

People are objecting to the fact that if an autistic person behaves badly, it's automatically blamed on the autism - therefore perpetuating the idea that all autistic people are badly behaved.

That's not to say some autistic people don't struggle with basic tasks - but it needs to be taken on a case-by-case basis - it shouldn't be an automatic assumption that the reason for the poor behaviour is the autism.

Unlike a lot of the autistic posters on MN they struggle with some day to day tasks

To get a diagnosis of autism you need to demonstrate that your traits are causing you a “clinically significant impairment on everyday activities”. I don’t see any autistic posters here saying they aren’t struggling. We will not all struggle at same things, but if you think that we don’t all face struggles in navigating a world very much designed for NTs then, again, you are showing your ignorance.

unlike some of the autistic posters on mumsnet I don't think that makes them an arse

This is an incredible statement. I haven’t seen a single autistic poster berate another autistic person on this thread because they struggled! Wow - we have enough NT people accusing us of behaving like arseholes without starting to round in each other. Don’t get me wrong, I find some autistic people really annoying but that’s because they are people and not because they are autistic.

I am sympathetic to you having difficulties in your home situation, and I’m sure in many cases an NT/ND relationship is challenging. But the way it is presented is almost always that the problem partner is autistic. But that doesn’t mean all such relations ar e problematic and it certainly doesn’t mean that it’s always the autistic person’s fault.

Maybe we can’t put ourselves in your shoes, but you most certainly can’t put yourself in ours. And I think you do have a lot of (unconscious) bias against autistic people given the two statements I have highlighted above.

That's not to say some autistic people don't struggle with basic tasks - but it needs to be taken on a case-by-case basis - it shouldn't be an automatic assumption that the reason for the poor behaviour is the autism

There you go again 'poor behavior'. She is describing her husband struggling not poor behaviour. I am also presuming that the OP knows her husband and isn't basing her asd query on this one thing. I thought my dh had asd based on a million little things, some of those things people on mumsnet would say were arsehole behaviour but they were just him struggling and being embarrassed by the fact that he was struggling to do things that some people would regard as basics. The OP knows her dh better than random mumsnetters even those with ASD.

@luinagreine

That's not to say some autistic people don't struggle with basic tasks - but it needs to be taken on a case-by-case basis - it shouldn't be an automatic assumption that the reason for the poor behaviour is the autism

There you go again 'poor behavior'. She is describing her husband struggling not poor behaviour. I am also presuming that the OP knows her husband and isn't basing her asd query on this one thing. I thought my dh had asd based on a million little things, some of those things people on mumsnet would say were arsehole behaviour but they were just him struggling and being embarrassed by the fact that he was struggling to do things that some people would regard as basics. The OP knows her dh better than random mumsnetters even those with ASD.

But struggling can lead to poor behaviour - IMO I don't think it's wrong to point it out.

I know that my autism DOES lead to me behaving poorly at times - that's just a fact. Is it because I'm struggling due to being neuro-divergent? Yes, of course - but that doesn't mean it's not also poor behaviour.

Yes, you can have autism and struggle (which leads to what looks like poor behaviour), but you can also have autism and be an arse who can't be bothered to do what needs doing.

So you know that a change in routine might vex him so why not pre-empt this by giving him a list of jobs?

Autism isn't an excuse unless he's non-functioning .

Autism seems to be the go to excuse for lazy, entitled males.

Autism or not, there's no excuse.

I haven’t RTFT but came on to say that my DH is exactly the same when it comes to daily household chores. He does not think to do things unless he is specifically told to do it and how to do it; it used to drive me crazy.

Until our 3 DSs were all diagnosed with ASD followed by DH diagnosis of ASD.

To the posters saying it’s just shit behaviour, it is not always down to laziness, it can be down to a different way of processing things.

Mines a bit like this when it comes to cleaning and tidying but is happy to do as he’s told. But I don’t mind because he does all the cooking, laundry, bins and feeding of cats. So our jobs are split fairly evenly and he works while I’m at home with baby. I used to get annoyed at having to think for him when it comes to things like this but actually I’m really lucky because he does a lot more than a lot of partners do and will literally do anything I ask him to.

He's on the Lazy spectrum

Does it matter if he's on the spectrum or not? You love him, value him and don't want to leave him, you just have a problem with organisational issues on big occasions. Initially it will be hard work for you to write all the lists but you will be able to reuse them, and add to them. And anyway, I'm NT and who doesn't love a list.
Ignore people on here. You know your husband and if you say he's struggling rather than lazy, then that's good enough.

This is an incredible statement. I haven’t seen a single autistic poster berate another autistic person on this thread because they struggled!

We obviously have very different definitions of 'incredible'. Just read the amount of people calling him an arse.

I don't have any struggles at home thanks 🙂 Like I said we have made adaptions so that we don't, I have no idea where you are getting the 'blaming the autistic person' from perhaps you are addressing the wrong person or perhaps you are projecting your own situation on ours?

The OP has a problem with her dh struggling to help, she needed suggestions to help adapt so that he doesn't struggle not a pile on of people calling her struggling husband an arse or suggesting that he is lazy or denying that asd could possibly be the cause for this struggling.

We obviously have very different definitions of 'incredible'. Just read the amount of people calling him an arse

1. There is no diagnosis. The OP has just speculated that poor behaviour- letting his wife do all the work - is because he is autistic. Calling his behaviour poor is justified.
2. There is little sympathy for the partner in the OP’s opening post - the talk was very negative. This was not a concerned spouse - this is a spouse who is frustrated because of her husbands behaviours (and I genuinely empathise - I would be furious as it’s deeply unfair - and injustice is something which bothers many of us a lot btw)
3. There will literally be millions of households in the country where the wife has done virtually everything and the husband has done fuck all. You can see this from so many posts on MN - in the opening post there is simply not enough information to possibly indicate autism rather than other conditions.
4. She described him as having no empathy - which is another classic myth that so many people trot out thinking that makes them knowledgable about autism. This is not true. We are completely fed up reading that we are cold-hearted creature who don’t care about others.
5. It was not just autistic posters describing his behaviours as poor - but you have saved your criticism purely for us - demonstrating prejudice against us.

Ableism against autistic people on here is absolutely rife - often through ignorance rather genuine bigotry hence the reason why many autistic people will call out unfair posts and comments on threads like this.

We are humans and deserve as much respect as NT people.

You say that he chooses to not get diagnosed. Who has suggested that he gets diagnosed?

Do you believe that a diagnosis would alter things?
It won't.

You need to discuss a way forward.

A piece of paper saying that your partner is or isn't autistic isn't going to change anything.

Far too many people are using an autism diagnosis as a trump card.

Many, many people have autistic traits.