Married to someone with Asperger's/ASD: support thread 10

[Daftasabroom]

New thread.

This thread is for those of us seeking to explore the dynamics of long term relationships with our ND partners. It is a support thread, and a safe space, it does get emotional at times. Avoid sweeping generalisations if possible, try and keep it specific to you and your partner.

ND people are more than welcome, some of us are in ND:ND relationships.

It's complicated and it's emotional.

Something I notice re: hoarding (several hoarders in my family) is it’s often related to a very different and fluid experience of time. If you keep an invitation to a wedding from 20 years ago you can still attend, kinda thing. Maybe you’ll finally get around to replying to that letter your friend sent on their gap year in the 80s. Objects as a door to the past that you can keep open.

Also not understanding that no, your grandchildren won’t want the old sacks of reusable nappies in your loft in 30 years’ time when they have families of their own. Bit of a theory of mind thing: they were useful to me, so they are useful, full stop. I attach value to these things, therefore they are objectively and universally valuable. Why would anyone not want them?

Also a money thing: I paid good money for this in 1993. I’m not going to just chuck it away! (Even though it’s broken and I can’t get replacement parts and the technology is utterly obsolete).

Also a separation anxiety / fear of loss thing. A reflexive emotional threat response at no longer having something. Feels like a piece of self or a piece of life being discarded. A profound personal diminishment and the grief that comes with that. (This is what I think it is for my DC).

And a dollop of debilitating eco anxiety and guilt about landfill etc.

It’s a nightmare.

I feel a bit harsh sometimes. But when he moved from his house to mine I was very clear the hoard was not welcome. We built a shed and I said that is yours to fill with what you want but it’s not to come in the house. I throw away what comes into the house if it can’t be thrown in the shed. I was very clear about it and he can always move back to his house as it’s only rented if he wants. He still tries to collect random things and will
stand for forever trying to make a decision. I feel having learnt before to stick to boundaries as once crossed it’s almost impossible to go back. Same like shouting, he knows as we’ve discussed I won’t tolerate it. Luckily he is a gentle person and we like a lot of the same things (just not the physical amount of stuff).

I’ve been here since the very start, and have found these threads so supportive and informative, but although I read almost every day (and I learn so much) I don’t post often. So I thought I’d re-introduce myself.

I’m nearly 69, he’s nearly 68, he’s my 2nd husband, I’m his 3rd wife (yes I know I missed the red flags) and we’ve been married for 18 years.

I’ve known for a long time that he has ASD, I was a mental health nurse, he agrees but hasn’t pursued a formal diagnosis. There is family history. To him, it’s a badge of honour, “I can’t help it, I’m autistic “
I’m in no way saying that all of his behaviour is due to ASD, I think he’s also an entitled arse!

we’ve just moved house, 150 miles away. H didn’t want to move, (doesn’t like change) but after 11 years living in a very rural area (his choice) nearest hospitals over an hours drive in any direction, I insisted we either move together, or I would leave him and move on my own, after I had a horrendous day driving him to a 7am hospital appointment over an hour away, (so leaving home at 5.30) having to then drive to put the dog into daycare, drive back to the hospital and then to sit in the hospital cafe for 5 hours , drive him home, then drive back to pick up the dog. It was a long day, and there was no thanks from him, just the expectation that I’d step up. And If it was reversed , he’d moan and groan and whinge about what a burden I was, and I’d feel like shit.

so, finally after a lot of arguments, he agreed and we’ve sold, bought and moved. He hated this house when we viewed it, but I managed to persuade him that with a downstairs bedroom and bathroom, and an easy to maintain garden, it was future proof.

He’s since told everyone he’s spoken to, his sisters, his (one and only) friend, his adult children, how bloody marvellous it is living here, the fantastic views etc.
he’s completely re written the script. As he does all the time.

We’ve now moved nearer to my sons, 25 minutes drive as opposed to 3 hours. He has little contact with his own adult children, just a 2 minute tick box phone call every Sunday morning.

So, there we are, that’s me. We’ve bought a slightly bigger house, we have a bedroom and a bathroom each (bliss), 2 spare bedrooms, one of which is a room for me. He has a garden and a greenhouse to potter in.

2 years ago I was planning to leave him. Had houses lined up on Rightmove, but decided that staying together, moving nearer my supportive kids, and buying a house where I could have my own space was a financially better choice.

so here we are. Moved into the new house a few days ago. He thinks it absolutely marvellous, he’s actually glad he chose this house !,
He’s on a different planet. Completely

👋👋 @Bluebellforest1

The rewriting history sounds familiar.
dh did the same with moving the dcs to a new school. Got really angry at me pushing the idea until, in the end, I just did it.
A couple of months after the dcs started, he was waxing lyrical as to how much better the new school was and that we should have done it earlier. No shit 🤨🤨

Totally get the rewriting history thing. We moved a number of years ago to a house that is quite unique.
i saw the house, i fell in love with it, i have decorated, i have landscaped the garden.
Dh didn't have any 'feelings' for the house, no imput in any of the decor, no interest in the garden. BUT he loves anyone complimenting it and reacts as though he built it himself from the ground up🤨
Same with the kids, he takes any of their achievements as his too, even though he has had very little imput or interest in them getting there.
I find he uses 'we' a lot which translates to ' My wife did all the planning/organising/research etc but I'm taking the credit for the results' 🤨

I must say, I’d forgive my DH rewriting history if it meant he ever expressed any enthusiasm or pride about any aspect of our lives 😂. Everything’s all doom and gloom over here, and every decision we’ve ever made was a horrible mistake, and everyone else has it better / easier. It’s so wearing.

Sounds a lot like Narcissistic behaviour to me. When I spoke to a therapist after I left my ex she said re-writing history to make themselves look good or central to the story is narcissistic. When we moved into family home after the family member passed he wasn’t that happy. I did all the renovations and re decorating. But when I told him I wanted to leave him suddenly the house was amazing, the only reason we have it was because of him (ummmm my family house), he wouldn’t leave and it took almost two years for a judge to get him out. He only did that because he twisted it round somehow to it being his decision (that and he met another lady so needed to look good, poor lady). He didn’t care me and our child were sharing a bed for 2 years and he had a 3 bedroom house to himself. He claimed he was ND. He may have been but he was still a horrible selfish man.

You see that’s where the whole is it ASD or is he an arse comes in again.

I agree @Rainbow03 that rewriting history to make yourself good/central to the story is a 🚩🚩

But I don’t hink dh did it to make himself look good/he was the one driving the move.
Rather, I think he really struggled with the idea of using a school that wasn’t walking distance (because that’s what you do). That you could actually CHOSE the school (rather than just going to THE school).
He couldn’t see how the teacher (who was creating so many issues) had a negative impact on dc2 and how damaging it was (respect for the teacher. Inability to put himself in dc2 shoes etc…)
And he got completely tangled up in weighing the pros and cons and simply couldn’t take a decision.

His ‘we should have done that before’ just reflected that imo.
The issue of course is that he couldn’t say that I had taken the right decision and that he was wrong to say NO. But that’s not being a narcissist iyswim

My H has got lots of Narcissistic traits but I also think he's autistic as well as ADHD (both his nephews are and his sister plus probably late parents and brother). I was convinced he was/is? a typical covert narc but in fact he has tok much empathy to fit that so possibly 'just' ND with narcy traits. I actually found a lot of stuff on Narcissistic abuse and how to recover/survive quite helpful as it's so very similar. Melanie Tonia Evans for example and Dr Ramani.

@SpecialMangeTout not being able to put yourself in others shoes covers so many potential “labels”. Same outcome though. It is so complicated and it often doesn’t fit one label. I wouldn’t waste time trying to decide if it’s intentional or not. Most people don’t wake up wanting to hurt people. I’m pretty sure my ex didn’t but he still did. It feels really selfish putting your own feelings first even if you know the other person doesn’t mean to.

@LittleSwede I try not to label anymore and just look at them in terms of how I feel around them. If I don’t feel good I don’t spend time around them. It does feel odd because I’ve always been a people pleasing person. I’m no longer interested in intention and what could be underlying. I’ve wasted 41
years already.

I spent so much time analysing everything dh did or had done in the past, trying to differentiate between traits and personality.

I realised that, for me, it didn't really matter. All the 'damage' has already been done regardless of intent from dh.
He is the husband he is, regardless. He is the father he is, regardless.
Is he a selfish, unsupportive, neglectful, self-centered arse sometimes because of his diagnosis or his personality?
I have decided that it doesn't matter. He is being a selfish, unsupportive, neglectful, self-centered arse regardless.
That deliberate change in my perception has helped me enormously.

Hi, you all seem like lovely people who understand trauma so I wonder if you could offer me some advice. My partner has what was aspergers, so quite mild autism. It’s not the problem his parents are. I have come from an abusive marriage with one child. We’ve been together now a few years and have a child together. My in laws have never liked me despite me trying everything. They just see me as baggage and trouble for their son. He chased me and I was very open with him about my past, he is a sweet heart, accepting and loving and no issue really. We have our struggles as blending a family is hard especially when the oldest still sees her had as he is still abusive. But what’s making it hard is feeling rejected and ostracised by his family. It goes over his head so he doesn’t understand how low my esteem is to think they think I’m not worth it when I’m a good person. They tell the other DIL how much they love them and their kids but is nothing. I’m not sure what to do?

Good morning @Somethingstupiddone
It took me years before I realised that dh's family dynamic was already in place before I came on the scene.
I took everything personally, I always assumed it was me that was the problem.
I was always the host, always inviting, I bought the birthday cards and gifts for his family.
Never reciprocated = must be me.
I stopped, basically. Neither dh or his family dynamics has changed. It was never about me.
I let dh take the lead with his family now. Needless to say, there is very little contact now but I don't take any of it personally anymore.

@Ohdostopwafflinggeremy They probably have always been quite judgmental. I can tell by how they talk in general about people and issues. I obviously take it personally because they personally ostracising and making comments about me. You know when you’ve just had enough of toxicity and just want things to be simple and open and easy, I crave that.

It’s not even that, I crave connection and understanding. I’m sick to death of not connecting with people in my life, its so isolating, I just want to crawl in a hole.

@Somethingstupiddone do you live close to your in-laws? I think the best thing is just distancing yourself and telling yourself constantly- it’s not me, it’s them. It doesn’t matter who you are - you could be the world’s most amazing person and they’d still have a problem. Be bright and breezy when you see them, never get in an argument with them and basically let them play a very minimal role in your life. Maybe encourage him to go visit them on his own for example. At least your relationship with your DH is good but it’s definitely worth remembering that he will never see the family dynamic in the same way you do as an outsider.

@Feelsodrained yes we live extremely close, 10 mins. They are all very family oriented so want to be doing stuff with each other all the time. I would love this if I wasn’t the outsider, I’ve always wanted a close family dynamic. I just can’t keep pretending like I am and making myself feel awful.

Yeah I’d try to distance myself if I were you. Become a bit less family oriented and sit out some of the gatherings. My sister has had similar with her in laws in that she has bent over backwards to try to show her in-laws how nice she is and then finally she accepted that they will never see her as part of their family and that this is fine because she doesn’t want to be part of their family either. Basically if you keep thinking you could do something differently, it’s not going to work. You have to accept how it is, obviously draw a line with overt rudeness but basically detach, detach, detach

@Feelsodrained Ive tried to detach over the years but I’m finding it so hard living like this. My children are being left out also. I don’t want to live like this with a family I have to detach from. My mum is Autistic and I’ve grown up detached and I’ve had just about enough of detaching. Short of walking away I don’t know what else to do. I don’t want to break this family up over them, it’s so difficult.

Sadly, the family we envision or crave is so often not the family we get or have.
Dh's family are also much more active with each other. Dh doesn't seem to see or care that doesn't involve him, and by extention me and the kids.
It has taken me decades to get the point of not caring though.
It's still sad but I have accepted it for what it is.
The process of detaching yourself from unhealthy relationships is not at all easy, but, it is essential. No matter how long it takes I'm afraid.

@Ohdostopwafflinggeremy I know, it’s hard and uncomfortable. It’s not something I can talk to my partner about because of his ND he is blissfully unaware.

Yeah I do see why it’s really difficult but surely it won’t be much easier if you split as the problem is not with your relationship and your children will be left out even more if you split. You really need to get to a point where you don’t give a shit. Maybe say to your DH that you’re not up for any more family gatherings but that he’s welcome to attend on his own. I’d still do big ones like christenings and weddings but on a week to week basis, I’d be unavailable.
Basically you could be the messiah and they would still not like you or accept your children from a previous relationship. You can’t change that - you can only change how you react to them. They sound like twats so you can see not being liked by them as a compliment.

@Feelsodrained I know you are right. I’m trying really hard but I’ve got this trauma I carry and they seem to get right in there. I know I need to work on making it harder to get to. We share a child together and they ignore her also. They aren’t nice really, I just don’t seem to trust whether that’s on them or whether I’m doing something wrong.

You’re not doing anything wrong by the sounds of it. Maybe ask yourself - is your child doing something wrong? Of course she isn’t, she’s a child. Any half decent person would be nice to the child, even if they loathed the parent. These people don’t even do that, so that’s your proof that it’s not you, it’s them. Some people are just quite awful human beings. For your kids’ sake, I’d really start to limit interaction. Your oblivious DH can knock himself out going to family barbecues but you and your DC can hopefully spend time with friends who appreciate you instead.