Married to someone with Asperger's? Support group here!

[picklemepopcorn]

This thread is for partners seeking to understand the dynamics of their relationship with someone with ASD. It is a support thread, and a safe space to have a bit of a rant. Avoid sweeping generalisations if possible, try and keep it specific to you and your partner.
(ASD partners welcome to lurk or pop in, but please don't argue with other posters and tell them they are wrong.)

Exagerate, conflate, misrepresent, misinterpret rather than lie. I think it's to with perception and rigid preconceived ideas.

Peach I know this well, it's one of the most frustrating things. In the rare event DH cooks, when we get passed what he's going to make, he fires questions at me about which pan/bowl/utensil/tub for leftovers he should use. He asks me what he should eat when he's in the house, he asks me to tell him what he should take for lunch. For years i have boxed up his lunch or else he won't take anything, since having my child i realised that i shouldn't be looking after him the same way as I do my toddler. I have to decide everything, from what people get for xmas, which tie he should where to work, to what brand of food the dog should eat, and what quantities per bowl...

I was shocked last month to find a little toy in our car, he bought it for our son, the first thing he has every chosen for him, i'm not sure how much input he had. He usually holds the belief that you can walk a 3 year old around a TOY SHOP just to look, with no intention of buying anything.

Hi, just found this new thread and read through.

Yes Peach yes. All the time.
“Shall I put the bins out? Shall I water the tomatoes in the greenhouse? Shall I get the washing in? Shall I put the washing in the tumble dryer?
Shall I take the washing upstairs? Shall I put the dishwasher on? Shall I close the window? Shall I close the blind? .......etc etc”.
All of these things were on my mental “to do” list......but he can’t just do them, he has to ask, then tell me he’s done them, so it’s all about increasing my mental load, and he takes no responsibility for any decision.

And it’s bloody exhausting

Shall I put the bins out? Shall I water the tomatoes in the greenhouse? Shall I get the washing in? Shall I put the washing in the tumble dryer? Shall I take the washing upstairs? Shall I put the dishwasher on? Shall I close the window? Shall I close the blind? .......etc etc”

Oh my God. All this. And the eternal 'what can we have for dinner?' If I'm out working all day and he's at home pottering and really doing nothing, it's still somehow my job to decide what we're going to have. There are times when I feel as though I'm being followed round by a five-year-old who expects me to make Every. Single. Decision. About everything.

Shall I put the bins out? Shall I water the tomatoes in the greenhouse? Shall I get the washing in? Shall I put the washing in the tumble dryer? Shall I take the washing upstairs? Shall I put the dishwasher on? Shall I close the window? Shall I close the blind? .......etc etc

Ah yes, and also the expectation of praise when he actually manages to carry out a basic household chore. It really is (was, since I'm now thankfully divorced) like having a five year old who needs both decisions made on his behalf but also a pat on the head and a sticker chart.

How do you all cope with knowing that the future will be more of the same? I feel like it's only just hit me that i can't remember what it's like to feel loved and i can't bare the thought of living the rest of my life this way. (33) A pp said something about being lively and enthusiastic when they met DH, and i too feel like i've had the spirit suck out of me. I can no longer relate to love in books, songs or films.

It's recently occurred to me that the very different man i fell in love with isn't going to return and there's nothing left of our marriage. He seems happy to plod along. I feel like i'm grieving for the person he used to be. It's not just the more obvious Asperger like traits, but physically and mentally he is so different he barely resembles who he was. We used to have a lot in common (even though we were opposite in lots of ways), music tastes, political views, films, ambitions and a want to travel and the shared sport that brought us together. Now, he has little interest in those things, the things he enjoys are very different and he will happily sit alone in another room in the evening.

I don't know if this will change again, if there will ever be a emotional connection, there was at one point and that made the other traits/ behaviours bearable, but now i look at him and his eyes are glazed over and he doesn't listen to most of what i say, it's like he's not really there. Is this it? Is there love to be had out there? I want to be loved/to love, to have a connection, for my existence to be recognised.

Can you really find that and appreciation and someone that will just 'get you' from a friendship?

I don't know i'm Its something I've mulled over (and still am) for much the same reasons as you.I look at where we are now, and can't find much to bind us together.

I've realised that I've actually stopped trying to make an emotional connection, and am so bitter / angry about a lot of where we are, that I am actively withholding any emotional support or caring towards DH which actually, is awful, and not who I am. I'm at the point (and this sounds terrible and I'm ashamed to admit it) where I think "why should I have to, as I never get anything back in return unless I basically have hysterics"

The issue with us is DH is living in a cloud and thinks everything is fine bar some communication issues - I have brought up multiple times how unhappy I am and that I don't want to carry on like this, including in couples therapy, but it seems to just slide off

Part of me knows I shouldn't rely on another person to make me happy / validate me and that if I'm happy in myself it should be enough. However the situation is making me utterly miserable

I cope by not relying on H at all, I have my adult children and their partners, my friends, my hobbies and a life, and they validate me. He doesn’t have these, he has one friend, has a very limited relationship with his sister ( hasn’t seen her for a couple of years) and has a very stilted relationship with his adult children.
He is not the man I met and married, he is now a negative, miserable old man.
I also have my ducks in a row and know that I could leave, which is a huge comfort. At the moment I’m happy to stay, I like where we live and I have a nice life. But I’m 63 now, and I can’t imagine this in 10 or 20 years.

little i can relate to most/all you said.
And yes I am still here. Coping the way blue is. By detaching myself.

I've learnt that H is actually happier and easier to live with like this (no pressure on him at all) and I am building up my own life, my own dreams, my own future.
I'm not leaving YET because it's not quite the right time for me. Brexit has a spanner in the wheels there. And it is a much more uncertain situation for me now, esp financially.
BUT this will pass. At most another 5 years till freedom. (Which then puts me totally at odds with other friends who are dreading their teens DCs to leave home!!)
So I will leave when it will safe to do so. H at least gives me some financial safety at the moment.

The very hard thing for me is the intimacy. Missing intimacy like mad. Not the (very) crap sex wo saying a word. But the closeness. The sharing that happens when you are close to someone. The ability to share emotions and hopes.

Hermione yes, the lack of intimacy is hard, like you I don’t miss the crap sex (he was technically quite good but it was all about him and his needs, and him telling me how lucky I was 😀 so I sort of lost interest) but the sharing of hopes and dreams. Sharing doesn’t happen here, so I have my own hopes and dreams; I have houses I could afford saved on Rightmove, I have a small secret stash of money, I know exactly what my financial situation is. I know what I would want to take from this house, I have lists of what to take.
I do a lot on my own, I stay with my adult kids, and with a couple of friends. I meet up with friends, I volunteer with a couple of projects. It’s not a perfect life but it’s not bad at the moment.

Hermione Brexit also keeping me in this situation. I have to wait for DH's nationality which will apparently take about two years. Some days it seems like no time, it'll pass quickly. Others, when I look back at how long I've wanted to leave and couldn't, i feel it's choking me. And the thought of no intimacy with a partner for that time is awful - makes me want to throw caution to the wind and hope our government will sort EU resident Brits out, but I have no hope if that in reality!

DP today told me he's fed up being around his (also HIGHLY likely Aspergers) father. He's tired. It's been 11days. Now I get it, I'm also tired, but...

One of his problems is that DFIL will say something that upsets someone else. They get annoyed. He sees they're annoyed. It seems he then gets annoyed that they're annoyed (essentially blaming them for being annoyed for no reason, because he couldn't have done something wrong, because the way he views things us a) the only way and b) therefore always right) and strops around.

DH noticed this enough that he was complaining.

As he's saying he feels bad his DF doesn't understand that he's upsetting people I'm Chanel king the most zen I can muster because
THIS IS A KEY REASON WE'RE DIVORCING! And I've only discussed it with him a lot over the past 10 years!! I mean really, there's nothing more I can say.

I did point out that his father talking to you continuing the second part of something that started as a conversation in his head is something he does.

And now when DFIL talks over me to someone I'm talking to I stop very abruptly, mid word.

I truly believe that there is a portion of his behaviour that is rude purely because everybody just lets him. If he talks over people in the family, they just let him, they turn their attention to him, like what he has to say takes precedence. I've noticed the past three days DMIL has started to say yo him "Hang on Changer was speaking." I've never heard that said to him before.

I'm not saying Aspergers is people behaving badly! At all! I do think that one of the problems we face with undiagnosed or late diagnosed partners is very often that the people who stay around them put up with certain behaviours, which then become ingrained and harder over time to work with/alter. I imagine (don't know) that had DFIL been a child and diagnosed today then there'd be some tips for his parents about how to help him learn what is rude, and importantly, in a way that isn't shaming (because that's another, opposite problem).

He's like DH, a really nice man with a good heart. It's so hard to juggle the two parts, because sometimes one part really makes you so angry, but displaying that anger (even minority) at best does nothing and at worst makes everything much worse. You have to learn how to breathe and swallow it/let it run off you because he knows not what he does. That's utterly exhausting!! I can't wait to go home and only have one set of Aspergers traits to deal with!

*CHANNELING not Chanel king! 😂

Oh changer, I’m so disappointed, I had a vision of you as Chanel King.........

Yep, DH thinks we're perfectly happy, though he'd like sex. We tried talking about it when he expressed his disappointment, but as he continued to not hear what I was saying (and have been saying for 20yrs) he decided 'I just don't like that sort of thing'.

If I ever meet someone who likes the overweight almost 50 me, and takes the trouble to woo me, I'll be in big trouble. However, it doesn't seem like a high risk!

pickle yes, H thinks we’re happy.

He says “we’re a team”. It’s a script, just words that he thinks should be said. He once told me that many years ago, he was working in quite a senior position in a bank, his manager was apparently a nice man, who phoned his wife twice a day to tell her he loved her. H has based his idea of a relationship on that.

He has no idea how I feel or think, no idea what I believe in, no idea of what I want from my life. I’ve told him but he doesn’t listen/ doesn’t process.

Sex stopped for me when I found, accidentally, that he’d accessed escort sites, although I don’t think he followed through. I didn’t confront him, because it would have been twisted to be my fault, so we have an impasse: I know, he probably knows I know, it’s not up for discussion. We mostly sleep in separate rooms now, unless we have guests.

It’s so so hard. He’s not a bad man, but he’s bloody hard to live with.

Pickle you’ve a better chance than me, 63, fat and wrinkly! Thank god the dog loves me!

Oh yes, Bluebell! Thank goodness for the dog! Funnily enough, DS1 and I smother the dog with affection and baby talk. He seems to like it!

The dog, a diva Labrador bitch, is really what keeps me here! I love her to bits.

Blue nope, sadly not
I got a cat and he was like my baby. All the affection I couldn't share with DH was showered on him (obviously appropriately, nothing dodgy going on!!).

Then he got ill and died about 1.5 years ago. Not having the reciprocation of warmth from a living creature (purring or softly clawing my legs, nuzzling etc) brought back into stark focus the situation of my marriage.

It also made me feel like an absolute fool for seeking warmth from an animal over my DH. I couldn't explain to people why I loved my cat so much and why I was devastated when he died.

Cat didn't die immediately - it was 7 years before that happened. That wasn't clear from my post!

Hello everyone! Absent for a few weeks, things went through a slightly better period, or so I thought.

Will catch up on this new thread now, thank you pickle!

Hope everyone is doing alright

We went out for dinner tonight. DMIL DFIL DH, kids and me.

DFIL, who has been getting harder to deal with as the days go on leans over to me, nods towards a man at the next table and says in a voice loud enough to be heard, "He's a difficult man."
I wasn't sure I'd heard correctly (we were talking about our meal). Said pardon.
"That man at the table next to us is a difficult man. I know these things. I have a nose for it from work [bank/finance manager] and I'm never wrong. He's a difficult man."

Yes, "difficult man" heard.

Exactly what DH used to do with overweight people in restaurants. Exactly the same. Same volume, same tone.

When these sorts of things happen it's stressful because if you say nothing it's like you agree/condone, yet if you say anything it can result in a stress and strop which also isn't good when eating out. And it's got nothing to do with you, you would never say such a thing in public, but suddenly you're drawn in to this behaviour.

I'm so exhausted by this holiday - "holiday".

And so terribly saddened.

Changer, Blue, Pickle This is all so familiar, I think its the gradual descent that is so depressing. As a PP has said it just sucks all the joy out of a relationship.

I'm pretty sure DW doesn't think our life is great but she blames everyone else. It's quite odd really - if she behaves badly it will be someone elses fault yet she cannot see how the way she behaves effects others.

Hello I'm new to this thread..I'm having counselling...dh came up quite a bit...she thinks I'm unhappy and has asked if I think he's controlling,I said it's the nature of the beast with autism.she said I'm not stuck with him...I said I can't leave him because he has autism....but I wasn't thinking of leaving him...but now...I just accepted his ways ...apparently I don't have to and I can leave....