to think ASD husband and ASD daughter could have a better relationship?

[Whatonearth9]

12 year old ASD daughter keeps asking me to get her dad to leave.
She said he makes her feel like she’s living with a stranger 😢
For context, we also have a 14 year old NT daughter who idealises him however she is very sociable so does a lot in the relationship without even knowing.
Our youngest struggles to make conversation and show her feelings so I tend to constantly do these things now for her without thinking and he can’t.
He suspects he is ASD and I would massively agree - in fact we split when the kids were young for a year because I felt so emotionally unsupported but lots of promises of change and for a while things seems led to have improved to some degree.
Last night it all came to a head as the youngest offered to go with him food shopping and seeing as this is so unlike her ( she has lots of food issues and social anxiety ) I thought he would have bit her hand off.
Instead, he listed all the logical reasons it wouldn’t work.
In reality, it’s because he hyperfocus’ so much whilst shopping that he can’t stand anyone around him hence why he’s done the shopping largely alone for the last 20 years.
This results in DD crying, saying he rejected her offer because he doesn’t love her.
I think she has RSD as reacts like this to most people for things that others might perceive as small but in this case I completely see why she feels like that as I often have.
I have lost count of the times I have burst into tears over something and he just stares before saying “ I’m not sure what to say now / there’s nothing I can say to help “
I had no idea he would be like this as a parent and now I don’t know what to do 😢

Doesn’t sound like you are very happy with your husband even putting this issue completely aside

No I can’t say I am but I can put aside elements of his behaviour that I don’t like to see the good in him which my daughter can’t so it leaves me really unsure of what I should be doing

My dh and ds are on the spectrum.. Life is difficult at times... Today ds came and put his arms round dh's neck as he was sat down and sang Happy Father's Day.. Was quite lovely as it's usually a different scenario..
Dh def needs intervention in his relationships with the dc..

It sounds like you would be happier apart and are perhaps looking for validation.

The fact that he recognises he is probably ASD is your lifeline here.

If you can discuss with him that within emotional relationships (eg family and friends) being logical is not the best approach and it is possible to make people feel rejected and hurt if they reach out emotionally and you react logically.

Also he needs to understand that his job as a father is not just to provide things, but also teach the children life skills, so taking the children to the supermarket is a good way to satisfy the child’s emotional need for connection with him and for him to teach his children the life skill of shopping.

Having sad that, he may find supermarkets overwhelming and doesn’t want the children to see him having a near panic attack.

so you are unhappy

i think you need to explore that unhappiness more

is it possible that your daughter senses unhappy you are too? hence asking you to leave him?

I have both .. it’s a challenge. I have had to learn to step back, and leave them to navigate their relationship. I will sometimes say to him “might have been nice to …. “
She is 18 now and I would say that they are just about there

It’s quite normal for someone who is ND to trigger another person who is ND and for them to really struggle to get along. I think you would do better to accept that and give them the control over their relationship.

How do I accept that and not control it though when a 12 year old is asking me to divorce him?
I am unhappy yes but really because of their interactions rather than him and mine

Would your partner be open to family therapy or even personal therapy with someone who has an understanding of autism?

Absolutely not.
The thought of talking to anyone ( about any problems at all ) makes him shudder.
Sadly, this is a trait our 12 year old has too which has been very difficult as they’re both so closed it makes it very hard to help and advise at all 😢

You don’t enter into a conversation about it … with any 12 year old, ASD or not. I’ve been through the same thing.

When DD was 14 (before she was diagnosed) she told me she hated me, and wanted me to die .. ASD in teens can be hard. We are fine now.

They need to find productive ways of discussing feelings. Mine started with a therapist, which made a massive difference

Does he understand the impact his behaviour is having on you?

He can refuse therapy all he likes (it's personal choice after all) but ultimately if he's not willing to try and make things better, he needs to realise he could lose you - and his DD - if he won't at least try.

I guess because she doesn’t seem to feel like this about me ( we are very close although she can be sharp with me and leave me feeling upset, I am very aware of her feelings and try to always keep them at the forefront of everything which I think deep down she’s aware of and therefore feels quite settled with me ) it’s hard to think of this as a problem she has and easier to see it’s a problem with him as I’ve totally been left feeling upset / rejected / not understood through the massive although not prior to having children tbh but I think that’s because I wasn’t needy and had a big busy social life so didn’t need as much emotional support from him
as I do now.

I am going to start therapy with or without him I’ve decided.

DD said to me last night “ He’s had over 20 chances to make more of an effort, you’re wasting your time and mine “ and I hate the fact that she’s right - I’ve told him in lovely ways / horrible ways that he is going to lose us and I genuinely think he can’t see what’s going wrong 😢

J

Bump for any extra advice

Your daughter has no business telling you how to conduct your relationship with your husband. You are the adult, the parent, she is the child, the daughter.

There are two issues here.

1. Your relationship with your husband.
2. Your relationship with your daughter.

With your relationship with your husband, you can have a complete turnaround if you take the time to discuss things and find solutions to get both of your needs met in ways you both feel capable.

With your daughter, she needs to be more respectful in the way she speaks to you and more respectful of your accumulated life experience and wisdom. This requires two things.

1. You need more self-confidence - in your own wisdom, experience, knowledge and judgement.
2. You need better boundaries and to be clear in communicating them, especially with your daughter.

These things are all within your control, you don’t need to fix anyone to achieve them, and when you do, the other issues will resolve themselves.

This kind of family dynamic is really common in ND families, op. It's really hard, isn't it? My dh has adhd, so does my teenage ds. It all came to a head in our household yesterday because the two of them (dh mostly) find it hard to communicate constructively with one another.

My friend is NT, but her dh is on the spectrum, as is her youngest son. It was only through getting her son diagnosed that they both realised he was on the spectrum too. Suddenly, all the communication problems they'd had in their marriage made sense.

They ended up getting relationship counselling which has really helped. Would you consider the same?

I don't feel unsupported, dh is incredibly warm, loving and loyal etc. But many of his adhd symptoms (notably emotional dysregulation) make him very hard to live with. Ds doesn't have the emotional dysregulation, but he has noticeable executive function difficulties which affect his organisational skills and memory, which rubs dh up the wrong way. We're now looking at counselling. We'll start with the two of us and perhaps extend to the rest of the family depending on the advice we receive. Dh is my best friend, but ds is a child. I can't have his inability to communicate effectively ruin ds's childhood.

BTW I want to share that I have an ASD husband and an ASD DC.

I have been through some withering, despairing times, but now, couldn’t be happier.

I needed to understand the ‘quirks’ of DH, the mystifying requirements for his day to day ability to function, and he now withdraws less and communicates more, also, by understanding those, I understand the needs of my ASD DC and am a better mother as a result. Also, DH needed to understand that me communicating my needs is not motivated by me trying to make him feel bad about himself, but are my genuine needs. My ASD DC needs to be pulled up every now and again for over-stepping, presuming to have better judgement than me, despite the lack of life-experience, and doesn’t overstep as much any more.

It is amazing how harmonious everything is. I believe you can have this too OP.

Do u actually love yr husband it don’t sound like it.

To answer a few points on here :
I genuinely do love him but I don’t understand from.

i don’t understand how he can see a 12 year old become tearful after offering to him shopping with him and still bag on about the fact that he “ just wants to be in and out “ and “ he doesn’t have any extra money until payday “ instead of saying something like “ That would be lovely and next time we go I’ll get you a treat as I’ll have been paid by then “

Its very hard to know what is ASD and what is just plain selfishness as it’s the polar opposite to me.

i am over emotional apparently and if I’m honest I do react completely emotionally rather than logically to most things hence why I’m having myself assessed for ADHD as I see this trait in myself that our older DD had who is diagnosed with it

i don’t understand how he can see a 12 year old become tearful after offering to him shopping with him and still bag on about the fact that he “ just wants to be in and out “ and “ he doesn’t have any extra money until payday “ instead of saying something like “ That would be lovely and next time we go I’ll get you a treat as I’ll have been paid by then “

The thing is, he is processing stuff differently and it might be a few days later when he realises that he should have reacted differently at the time.

IME ASD people require 2 things 1. To be able to do tasks in a particular way in order to minimise overwhelm and stress. 2. To have the time and space to pursue what interests them. If these two needs are met, then everything else follows.

Something that people on the AS are often very sensitive about is the idea that they are morally wrong or unkind when they don’t intuitively do things that NT people would do. So if you say something like “I don’t understand your priorities- your daughter is crying and you only care about your own convenience” this will scramble their mind with thoughts that they are always chided for being a terrible person when they don’t know what they did wrong, and then they will probably become overwhelmed by this unresolvable issue.

You need to facilitate a discussion about what was really going on. It’s possible that your DH has it in his mind that if a shopping trip last more that 25 minutes he has a panic attack/meltdown or some such thing. His strange rules and priorities around shopping are there to protect him from overwhelm. If you can talk about it in a practical non-judgemental way, there could be a solution that he would be happy with.

If you work together and gradually make rules that suit you both then life can be lovely. Try not to think of his ASD peculiarities as things which make him a ‘bad person’ as they would if he was NT and did those things.

Then surely if you have the capacity to be understanding of your dd, then you should be of him too?