Married to someone with Asperger's/ASD: support thread 8

[Daftasabroom]

New thread.

This thread is for partners seeking to understand the dynamics of mixed NT/ND partnerships. 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)

Link to previous thread

Like others, I’ve spent quite a lot of time thinking, evaluating, putting myself under scrutiny etc… because of course, it had to me right? Esp as DH automatic answer is to clamp up and not say a word, which somehow makes him look reasonable and me the ‘hysteric’ one…

My take, from watching DH, dc and reading autistic people experiences as well as talking to a couple of autistic friends, is that autism is quite ‘neutral’ Different wiring of the brain etc…
However, autistic people experience trauma in a way NT people don’t. In part because they are seen as odd etc… DH was bullied too throughout secondary school. A lot of autistic people my generation (born around 1970) were not diagnosed and the attitude was very different then. DH certainly wasn’t then. All of that created pressures to conform and trauma. Cue for developing coping strategies, which is pretty normal.

The issue, at least for what i see with DH, is that those coping strategies are crap. It makes him behave like an arse and have actually been detrimental to him
eg staying silent is his default position. It feels like stonewalling to me and is hurtful. At the same time, he hasn’t learnt to negotiate - BECAUSE he has always stayed silent (and then just got on with things that way OR carried on doing things the way he wanted OR got resentful and frustrated) so hasn’t developed the tools to sort out issues with me. Yes even down to choosing what to eat for the evening.

On the top of it, struggling to identify his own emotions plus issue with theory of mind have both created the perfect environment for more trauma (total misunderstanding with people) and have it harder to adjust his coping mechanisms (eg realise that staying silent is hurtful).

Thats those coping mechanisms that make some autistic people like DH look like arseholes. And that’s also what makes dh act in a hurtful way towards others.

Or at least that’s my own interpretation.
I have shared that with a couple of my friends on the spectrum and have been surprised to see that trauma is a really key issue for them too re their behaviour in some circumstances.

What it told me though is that it’s extremely complex, not just about autism either. And I’m not equipped to sort it out. I can’t be his psychotherapist on the top of being his wife. And I’m not failing if I can’t adjust to those needs, let alone if I can’t sort them for him.

@SpecialMangeTout Incredibly well written, really rings true for me.

Who here has gone through with separating? How is life on the other side? I imagine I’d find it full of horrendous regret.

I did, @Questions99

It took me years. I should have left 8 years before. In fact I should have left 3 weeks after I moved in, but hindsight is great isn't it.

Separating was very very hard but dear God, dear sweet God, was it ever the right decision.

I'd wanted to stay because 1) I desperately wanted stability for the children growing up. I didn't have it and wanted it so badly for them. and 2) serious health issues.

Still don't quite know how I managed to say the words "it's over" and the following months until he moved out were absolutely horrendous, but my God, it was the right decision to separate.

Physical health , which was poor in the first place, will never get over the effect of those twelve years, but mental health is improved beyond ALL recognition and there's further to go. It took me 9 months before even the faintest spark of revival happened, but it's grown and life is infinitely better than without him.

The children are happier, I am infinitely less unhappy and relearning how to enjoy myself. Friendships have blossomed, unexpectedly.

Can't promise this would be the same for you, but this has been my experience.

The bitterest, deepest regret that I have is that I didn't leave much, much sooner. There were reasons not to at the time, but it was the wrong decision to stay.

@SpecialMangeTout really superb post.

@SpecialMangeTout & @Fidelius I obviously didn’t see what your original reply said (who on earth are these trolls lurking and nuking replies which are trying to HELP people in genuine anguish?!) but I want to thank you for replying and giving me a total stranger your time and perspective because no one in my real life could even begin to understand. I recognise my relationship is as unique as is everyone else’s but the comfort of reading these posts and not knowing I’m alone- or going mad- is absolutely vital to my mental wellbeing right now. No one can make decisions for another person and I for one benefit from hearing lots of different perspectives from people who get it. Part of my journey of trying to understand my ND DH is because I love him fundamentally and desperately want this relationship to work. But if controlling, rejecting, hurtful behaviours tear your partner to pieces, regardless of legitimate cause or difficulties communicating or trauma - it doesn’t mean the end result: me losing myself and my kids losing their mother, is justified. That blog (pushing boulders) has opened my eyes to where autism ends and arseholism may well begin but it’s not simple and it’s not a straight line. Sometimes my DH stonewalls because he’s overwhelmed. Sometimes he stonewalls because he is being arrogant or lazy and taken the relationship for granted. It’s still stonewalling - it still hurts like hell and corrodes trust which is obviously a cornerstone of any relationship.

Thank you @ReleaseTheDucksOfWar I am so sorry you had to experience that and the tinge of regret of not doing it sooner is a huge driver for me but I still just can’t find those words. It feels like a ‘Matrix’ moment of what happens if I take the red pill (or the blue one!)? Will I wake up separated and there is no going back and I will regret it and realise if I’d just held on, learned more about him, worked together to somehow create a marriage that might be less conventional but still work, or could he have decided to go back to therapy and changed again.. the fear of regret of getting it wrong, right now, is stronger than the fear of wasting any more years of my life (and my health declining too). It is ridiculously brave to finally say those words. Like jumping off a cliff and hoping these brittle wings will hold me up!

@ReleaseTheDucksOfWar Do you mind me asking a few questions about your experience?

• what ages were your DC (approx is fine)
• why was is a nightmare the months before he moved; did he not want to separate and try and persuade you to stay with him? Did he turn on you? This stage is terrifying for me as financially he’s have to stay OR agree to leave and I’d have to carry the bills on my own so that he could afford another place. Selling up, splitting the house 50/50 would leave us both trying to get new mortgages at a really bad time AND he probably wouldn’t get one at all on his self-emp income. I worry he would just flat refuse to separate - then what do you do? Stay under the same roof indefinitely?!
• were your DCs ok on the other side? Have they stayed on good terms with your XH?

If it’s all too much info just ignore me! These are the daft questions that stress me out in the small hours.

Not a problem at all :)

at the time, 11 and 6. It was hard for them, but we have actually worked hard to show reasonable civility to each other and that makes a great deal of difference for the kids. I have also tried not to badmouth him (I save a lot of anger for here, which is a great deal better than letting it out in real life).

My ex-MiL, who had not wanted us to separate, said 18 months after the divorce that we were better parents apart than together. I'm grateful for her kindness and that she said it; I hated the necessity for separation and her words feel a bit like a gracious blessing.

He was extremely passive aggressive, to the point that (as ive said before here) his best friend of 36 years got in contact with me to ask if I was alright. No overt fury and rage but under the surface it was there and it was extreme. For a time he seemed to be alienating the children from me, but that seems to have passed fortunately. There were some financial shenanigans but it was worth it.

Once you decide to separate it's essential to physically separate. If you're doing it the sensible way, you plan ahead of time because as with any separation, you just don't know how the other person is going to react once faced with divorce.

But staying in the same house is no good. Honestly, you can't start healing until you do physically separate. I was exceptionally lucky in that I hung onto the house just, but it would have been worth moving into a tiny flat tbh if it was in a reasonably safe area with a decent school.

The children see him regularly. He was absolutely awful to me but it was ... ineptitude ... rather than malice most of the time, and he loves them. In some areas he's a better parent than I am - he goes out with them more, that's difficult for me. However, I regularly have try to explain his behaviour to them or simply listen when they are struggling with certain elements - his inability to listen or to compromise at all. Or to comprehend their needs, which is very sad because he would if he could. He really does love them and they know it, which matters a great deal, even if he can't really 'see' them in many ways.

If only, as @SpecialMangeTout says, there had been more understanding when he was small. If only he hadn't learned silence as the only response to conversation, once he stopped masking, and the only response to disagreements. I am not proud that I ended up shouting at him at times, because talking reasonably didn't work.

In the end, had he been able to accept his autism and to accept, even if he didn't understand it intuitively, that I had emotional needs, then we would have had a much greater chance of the relationship working. Im still sorry that it didn't. But it never had a chance.

I also want to be clear that I'm not proud of how I behaved after the first few years. Being stonewalled drove me nuts ... we really should have separated sooner.

I have a good friend who has been diagnosed with autism in her 40s.
She also has struggled a lot with MH, like a lot autistic girls/women, and has gone down the road of counselling/CBT quite a few times. So some if her coping strategies really come from the work she did then.

I love the way she looks at me some times and just say ‘i didn’t quite get that’.
And I explain again in a different way.

I so wish DH could do that. It would solve many issues, so any misunderstandings.

I only have a few years before I’m 50. The thought of staying on this daily rollercoaster hoping one day it will just stop and come to a halt and turning 50 realising this is it for the rest of my married life, makes me burst with sadness. I’ve tried every which way to just be okay with the differences in us, but what was cute ‘chalk and cheese’ when we were young, is now ‘we literally have nothing in common, we’re living increasingly separate lives, and you’re happy but I am not’ moments in me.
Reading all your messages makes me realise this isn’t something that can be fixed, or counselled out or healed. He is who he is and has many wonderful characteristics but my issue is: the things that are so important to me - that at times he seems to have been able to give (though now looks like play acting on his part to keep it together) - he cannot seem to sustain. At least not consistently. I feel like a puppet master sometimes; having to dictate every part of our life together. Sometimes it’s like he’s genuinely content with no affection or connection and cannot understand why I feel lonely. He just says I need to go and find my own interests (I already have many, very other aspect of my life is full and generally fulfilling).
I know I don’t even need to list all the needs I have that aren’t being met because I have read most of you feel the same sense of grief and loss. I wish someone could show me a sliding doors moment; here is life if you stay and keep trying to adapt .. and here is life if you rip your family apart in an attempt to find whatever is missing.
Is there a way to learn to be okay with such separate lives?

A bit older than you op and my husband has taken early retirement. I am not working due to my own ill health but hope to take up some voluntary work shortly (hoping treatment for health issues will help a bit). It feels awful. Husband has a hobby which quite frankly, he would be content with doing most days. I don't share the same hobby. I have never felt lonelier weirdly, maybe because I'm not suppose to feel lonely because in theory I have company.

I am beginning to think I was the specialist interest too. Due to my difficult upbringing, I became besotted and lapped all this up. We have the chalk and cheese thing too - it works well on a functional basis and we have had children later so they are still relatively young and we sort of pull together here. I can't fault his support around the house and his values are not bad (though not entirely in-line with mine).

I think having relatively young children has swayed it for me and me having various health issues and now on top of all that the perimenopause. We are comfortable, not having to worry about much financially thanks to husband's career, we sort of get along 'fine' most of the time. Yet occasionally, it is brought home to me that actually, I do feel lonely in my relationship most of the time. However, I can't see much benefit in leaving. Yes, I could live on my own but I don't feel my life has come together enough to have enough other things in it to feel fulfilled and you only have to look at the relationships forum to see the alternatives. This doesn't mean to say I don't keep trying to improve other stuff outside the relationship. I don't want the children pinging between homes. For me, there are just too many factors keeping me here. But yes, the sliding doors thing would be very useful and very interesting. If only.

@Thecomedyoferrors I could have written your post - right down to the chronic illness too and that sense of ‘better the difficulties I know’ mindset of staying in the marriage. That was until the latest couple of blow ups (in the space of two weeks) and some really nasty comments from him which are somewhat out of character. But he has a history of periods of depression (undiagnosed, he won’t go near a doctor) and it leads him into a sort of caveman existence where all those autistic quirks which I am used to and can relatively well get along with by keeping busy myself and accepting his limitations (and mine!) suddenly are exaggerated ten fold. He’s snappy, then silent for days, cold as ice, disconnects from the kids, lazy, unmotivated, not willing to listen to any kind of approach or reason no matter how gentle and when he’s in this ‘phase’ the communication issues that we have all the time at a low level are suddenly huge brick walls. I can’t reach him.
I think something has finally snapped for me. It’s not that I have a clear vision of life without him, and it’s not that I want to end the marriage (far from it) but my health, wellbeing and this damn walking on eggshells is draining my joy. I look at him, our history and what I think he’s crying out for in terms of needs and I am truly starting to believe he would be happier on his own, with cordial access to me and the kids. He just doesn’t seem to enjoy family life.
There are always the hopes and frequent prayers he snaps out of his funk and we can have some kind of connection and warmth again (faltering as it is), but I’ve been through so many of HIS ups and downs now that the trust is eroded and honestly I just want a break. I’ve felt like this now and then after minor rows, but 90% of the time we make up within hours or at the most the next day.
Since he exploded at me and mocked me in front of the kids - this is Day 4.
We are cordial. We are functioning as parents, doing the dishes and taking the bins out - but it feels like silent war - waiting to see who cracks first.
It has nearly always been me. Until this week. I feel so bruised I can’t see the way ahead.

Trying with every sinew to hold the line. Told him today I can’t fix the marriage alone, the only power I do have is to end it. It sort of came out of me in response to him yelling, mocking, scathing at me, twisting everything I said - it was crazy making. He was then really offended.

We just went in circles so we’re back to where we were: cold, distant and I’m devastated. He insists I am hormonally imbalanced, deluded, insane ..

I don’t know if he even loves me right now. I asked outright and he said ‘when you’re like this I don’t know you so I can’t answer that’. He also complained that our routine after dinner is to sit in the back room together and watch tv. I explained I can’t sit there in awkward silence when there’s bad feeling so I take myself off to spend time with the DCs or read in my room. He got really mad shouting ‘but that’s not our routine!’.

He insists I am hormonally imbalanced, deluded, insane ..

@Questions99 this is profoundly abusive you know. Profoundly. The reason why he's saying it doesn't matter. What he's saying is negating you completely and attack you.

I have had two wonderful days when DH looked after the children, so I could go and meet up friends and have a normal life. I recognise this causes him a lot of stress... and now it feels like I am paying for it.

I asked DH, when going for a walk this morning with DC2, to post a letter and run a small errand for me, to drop off a gift for a close relative of him, who lives 10 mins' walk away. He refused to and got really angry. He said I said yesterday I would do this (I did, because I didn't know at the time he was going for a walk this morning), that I was being rude expecting him to do favours for him (I am the one who did the favour, as it is his relative and I chose and wrapped the present), and that I was lucky he was doing any errands for me and I shouldn't expect it. (He doesn't work outside the house, I rarely ask him for anything and still do most of the housework).

I feel so sad. He wasn't like this years ago, but family bereavements and stress have affected him over the last couple of years. If I want anything to happen, I have to push for it. I am the one taking over socialisation for DC2 as he won't do it. He will complain about all sorts of things e.g. if I hang the clothes up and they're not straight, or worry if the milk is opened in the fridge and ask him if I have opened him. He doesn't want to socialise with others or sit in a pavement cafe or sit at a table in a busy area of the cafe, only on our own or as a family unit.

Some days things are OK but then we get through periods when something (stress) triggers him and we have incidents like this. He refuses to speak to a therapist or get diagnosed, when I try to talk to him about things he tells me I am too sensitive or I take things too seriously, and that he cannot be walking on eggshells about me all the time.

Are any of your ASC partners similar to what I describe? Have you had a breakthrough and if so, how did it happen? He tells me things will get better but it's been over a year since the bereavement and we are stuck in this sad cycle.

Hi all, just a quick update as you've all been so supportive and understanding.
I'm coping fairly well with the chemo but the biggest positive, which you are not going to believe, is my hair starting to fall out. I decided it was really getting me down so decided to have it shaved really short, think crew cut. It's changed my mood completely, I've suddenly found a bit of the old independent ME!!! Bought scarfs and a baseball cap, not bad at 64 , but I thought, NO, I am going to be confident just going out as I am, I'm dressing better as well (well think I am 😂).
DH is very happy to do anything if I ask him too but cannot think for himself and has totally continued his daily routine as if there is nothing going on.
Still living in his bedroom and about 5 mins chat per day but actually it's not feeling so important I'm more ME than I have been in years!!!
@BlueTick your post the other day made so much sense to me and explained my feelings so much better than I could have expressed it, thank you.

Good for you @classicslove our thoughts are with you.

Well done @classicslove take the positives when and where you can 💐

Hi @classicslove well done, so glad you’ve found a bit of yourself amongst all of this. Love x

Great to hear that you’ve feeling more yourself and confident 👍