[long: sorry] any ideas for how I can accept him as he is (cool, distant...)...?

[outinthecold]

i've namechanged as don't want to out self. I am a regular.

Had another massive row with DP. We have had the same row for the 15 years we've been together. We both love each other, but we simply cannot communicate. We are very different personalities, and that was one of the things I really loved about him when we first met.

I have always wanted to know his 'inner life' but it is almost as if he doesn't have one. He can't articulate feelings (except the angry or sexual ones) Most of the time, I am fine with this as I can be a bit cool sometimes too. However I also often feel things pretty strongly and get excitable and passionate and rabbity and so on.

We haven't had much sex lately, although it 'comes up' once a month or so! He is much more demonstrative with our kids than he is with me - he knows they need a hug and a cuddle, and he can sometimes (not always)read their feelings.

When I bring up the issue that I feel a bit isolated, as if there is little affection in the bank, he usually loses it. Can't cope, gets angry. Usually the argument goes like this: 'look, all i'm saying is I want you to notice that I look lovely and say so' or 'I want you to want to walk over and give me a hug or kiss sometimes, and not have to ask you...' and he says 'well, I told you when we went to Relate that I have some issues with not being able to separate out feeling pissed off in general with you from my feeling affectionate/sexy [or whatever]'

I then point out that we went to Relate YEARS ago [when he was in a state of terrible grief and I was going through some other shite].

My perception is that he can't bear any suggestion of need from others because he sees it as criticism; his perception is that I am demanding and often nasty to him [for which I think he means I am bossy, critical and stuff] and so he doesn't 'feel' nicely toward me.

I am beginning to think we are just completely mismatched. Do I just have to accept living with someone cooler than I need? Or that my 'needs' are false ones and I AM being critical and 'nasty'?

don't think Ive explained myself well. Sorry.

Was he into hand holding/kissing telling you he loved you at the beginning?

What if he does 'have' Aspergers? Do those of you with ASD partners have a way of managing things? Is there something I and he could do about it?

We both did some stupid online test that was circulating recently (I'm sure thats no real guide) and I cam out about as empathetic as you can be; and he came out NOT within the ASD scale but much closer to it than me (I think).

I don't have a particular sense of him being cool and distant with the kids though (although I've never really examined it and maybe that is impressions). He knows to cuddle them when they cry. How would we find out about Aspergers?

Handholding yes. But absolutely NOT in a ooh you must hold my hand all the time way. I don't ever remember him unable to contain his emotion for me (eg with a physical gesture or emotional statement). But I am now wondering if I have just forgotten, because we have been pissed off with each other for too long and we're too knackered.

Kissing. Hmm. That's more difficult. We had a very sexual relationship at the start. The kissing was almost always either part of that, or very 'peck on the cheek'. A lot of our being together was about conversations, humour, debate... And worked OK, as long as it wasn't about anything intimate or controversial.

I won't reply properly until I've re-read your thread and, hopefully, you have some more replies. Just wanted to say I thought you'd married X#2 until I saw your dates!

I am sure he is on the spectrum, but he was also abusive. The two aren't mutually exclusive. Even if they had been - and he was 'only' Asperger's - I now accept that I couldn't have lived with it long term. My mistake: I told him I "couldn't marry a stranger"; he said he "wanted to change"; that was enough for me because my fanny was leading my brain

I sympathise. Will catch up on you later. x

"I don't know how we would find hte time to go to Relate though we both work and have three kids."

Sorry you are having such a hard time, but this says an awful lot to me. If it's that important, then you will find time, somehow.

Pay a babysitter and get an evening appointment.

Sorry if it sounds blunt, but your kids' happiness is also at risk if you do no sort things out - they may grow up with a very skewed idea of what is 'normal' communication within a marriage.

If the only way he demonstrates feelings is via sex and anger, it's not a healthy thing for kids to grow up thinking is the norm.

yes, I agree with you. Time will have to be found. He seems so unbothered by it though, on a day to day level, although he recognises there is a problem in general.

The kids are certainly noticing we are unhappy I think. It is hard to show them good ways of sorting out disagreements when we cant even manage it. Weve been burying head in the sand, avoiding this really.

he's quite cheerful now. Almost as if nothing happened yesterday. yet nothing is resolved. If I bring it up, it will descend into rowing.

It feels like a double, unreal life.

I can't resist the urge to pass on some things wiser, better people told me when I started to feel involved with X#2.

One was: "Women tend to think the quiet types have hidden depths - still waters run deep, and all that. I'm afraid the truth is, men who don't say much don't think much" (Thanks, Ed, I should have listened.)

Another: "Marry a no-nonsense man and you must be a no-nonsense woman. Don't wonder where he is or what he's thinking. Just get on with your own life" (Thank you, gloriously posh & eccentric woman!)

MIL#2: "You think deeply. We don't worry about feelings and stuff, we just get things done" (She was nice enough, but should have been a warning to me.)

PIL#2: "I hope he'll learn what love is" (He died. I cried.)

Any bells ringing, OP?

I'm not sure. He does have depths - he's very smart and thoughtful and kind; he is incredibly interesting and funny. He does - even - DO feelings. But rarely. It is the inconsistency that is hard. That is the thing that makes me think it isn't ASD, or being shallow, or whatever. My fear is that he just doesn't love me enough.

I'll stop hogging your thread after this. I am only going to point out the obvious - what you already know. I think I've spotted issues which will get worse, however I might be projecting and you asked how you can accept your relationship as it is.

The answer is the obvious one, which you already know and others have highlighted. You must stop expecting two-way interchange with your husband. You must look eslewhere for your social & intellectual stimulation. This isn't hard to do.

On top of that, you must learn to really love yourself - like my posh friend, but in your own ways. I had moderate success, on my own terms, by upping the ante in my dance classes and taking more hands-on beauty treatments. I spent a tremendous amount of time with my girl friends and, if things hadn't gone as wrong as they did, was planning to do that philosophy course at the LSE.

The answer's always the same, if you're committed to a less-than-fulfilling relationship: fulfil yourself. Your DCs will benefit from this, too. If unsure about how, exactly, to fulfil yourself - find a counsellor. This is the one area where every qualified counsellor can help.

A side-effect of your new campaign to 'have an affair with yourself' is that your H will become more relaxed and open towards you. When he fell in love with you, you wee independent and self-fulfilled. That's all he can handle!

Wishing you well - much joy, many laughs and lots of fun :)

Dittany said what I was avoiding.

No. He wasn't very nice back then. But I believe in change: I wasn't very nice in various bits of my life either, including just before I met DP. I think I have changed. He was also going through a whole load of shit. We were both utterly fucked up. Since then we have done OK, but not wonderfully. Who does? We are both products of interesting and difficult backgrounds. The main difference between us on this is that I recognise this in me, and he won't discuss (or can't accept) it in himself.

But, yes, there is something controlling about him if I'm honest about it. I give pretty good 'controlling' also, but in a different way. I like to think we can have open discussion. Eexcept clearly, we can't.

I don't want this to be oversimplified. We are both part of the dynamic. I certainly don't think people are always coloured by one point in their lives. Or that people are all one thing or another. Its a matter of judgement. Maybe I don't see enough what needs to be judged. But I am not at all comfortable with the 'controlling', 'abusive' label as the defining characteristic. I think he is shit at emotions. That could, on its own, be it, surely?

Yes, it could. The question is: are you okay with this? How does the eccentric life of Lady X appeal to you? Can you manage, quite happily, without expecting anything on the 'deep feeling' level from your marriage (except during sex)? Plenty of people do.

If you reckon your answer to this is Yes, then go for it. Should Dittany's fears & mine prove founded, he'll try to increase his controls over you and DCs - and, failing, probably look for a more biddable target.

The one thing you can't do is change him. I'm sorry, because that's what you were hoping for isn't it?

Maybe. My mother is fairly difficult. And I am, in turn. I have explored this endlessly in years of my own therapy by the way, so I'm not unaware of the dynamics you're presenting.

But, again, my view of my mother is also my view: she would interpret her own actions differently. Because we can label someone, does not mean they ARE that. Relationships are just that: in relation. I think when there isnt a big difference in power between people it matters a lot less. my DP does not have more power in the relationship, except in this particular, admttedly distressing respect.

Your post of 22:17 is a lie. You say there is no power imbalance. Yet one of you is witholding affection, causing one of you to crave it. I call that a fundamental imbalance.

... I also suggest you address it by providing for your own needs. In the best possible reading of your scenario, this will remove the 'scales' (in both senses) leaving the pair of you to get on with what you're doing. In the worst possible, the scales are also removed and you'll be back here for a clearer picture of the emotional abuse that you will, at that point, have started to notice.

Why is he pissed off. Something like this: I don't give him enough of what HE needs (he often has a 'tit for tat' response like this, wihch drives me nuts) either. And constantly telling him he's not good enough - by which he means, I think, telling him I need him to be more responsive - makes him feel not good enough.

As you can imagine, this goes round in circles.

Yes, I suppose I am confused by him at times. Right now, I struggle to remember what the original slights were that he got pissed off about. He does, often, seem to be bearing a grudge if I am really honest. It certainly all seems very difficult to grasp.

I don't think I have been bullied in my family life as a child. I do think Ihave perhaps got used to - as dittany put it - some notion that drama and complication is exciting. I'm not sure what to do with that really.

You don't think you've been bullied, but you've been gaslighted.

All of that sounds so similar to how I felt outinthecold living with my exh!

Is this what you expected to hear posting about the issues outinthecold?

Maybe it was, MH. Sad but probable. The first few replies, including my carefully-written one, addressed outinthecold's OP. But, outinthecold ... you seem to feel there's more to it, and you seem to feel you somehow should 'learn to deal with it', no?

Would I be completely wrong in guessing that you'd finished a course of therapy just before you met your H? That, perhaps, you felt you'd done it, got a fix on it ... and along comes this fella who confirms that you're fixed?