Married to someone with Asperger’s/ASD/ND: support thread 17

[SpecialMangeTout3]

New thread.
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This thread is for those of us seeking to explore the dynamics of long term relationships with our ND partners. Some of us are ND ourselves, very many of us have ND children. 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.
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It's complicated and it's emotional.
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The old thread is here.
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/5355546-married-to-someone-with-aspergersasdnd-support-thread-16?page=10&reply=148665446

@BustyLaRoux i’m so sorry you’ve had to experience such a brutal confrontation of his limitations. Ultimately I hope your look back on this moment and feel strangely grateful for it, that it was the moment that he crossed a line that you couldn’t recover from because it will mean that it truly now ends, and that actually is the beginning of your freedom and the end of your suffering in the long term.

These individuals don’t have the capacity to love in the way that we do and therefore we’re always going to feel short changed and like we’re pushing a big boulder up a hill that never gives us any relief or sense of completion. These relationships are hard hard work and if you end up in therapy or coming away with some sort of trauma from a relationship then what you experienced wasn’t love, it was something very different and sadly damaging.

Many of us I think on here are in love with the idea of being in love when what is forthcoming in the relationships that we have been in or are in, are not close to love, not true love in the way that we know and feel it. We sacrifice ourselves, physically, mentally, emotionally giving everything to try and make things right. I I also wonder how many of us didn’t have loving role models as parents ourselves? Because this is where I have found that things went so wrong for me. Lines were crossed that if I had known from a parental experience of love between my mum and dad, I would probably hopefully I’d like to think, not have endured or tolerated what went on. But I never got to see that example. Instead, I was set up for endurance and tolerance and pain and suffering. So when I experienced these feelings in my relationship with DH, I thought this was normal because it felt familiar. But just because something is familiar, doesn’t mean to say it’s good for you.

Busty, it will get better, so much better I promise you. You deserve so much more than this man, and I hope you can see that in the coming days and weeks. It’s better to be alone than in pain constantly.

I see many women in here in pain and suffering and that was me not long ago. I’m still in pain and suffering but I’m slowly remembering who I was between the tears and sadness and anger.

If you stay, you’ll be in pain. If you leave, you’ll be in pain. Choose your hard. Both choices are hard but one gives you your life back. So choose wisely, we only have one life.

For me now I want to model to my children that life can be very good on my own. Maybe one day I’ll get to model to them what a loving relationship looks like so they don’t make the same mistakes I did. More than anything I live with the guilt that I didn’t give them this template. I really wish I could turn back the clock and start again.

When the bubble bursts and you actually realise that what you loved was an illusion it’s just bloody awful. I think people just subconsciously mirror as a defense mechanism grown from childhood and I don’t think it’s intentional, it’s just all they know. It’s easy to be very angry and I am guilty of this….then guilty of why don’t they love me, but I think many relationships are built like this. We don’t really know the ways people love us and what they love us for but they can do a good job of mirroring back what we think. There’s me thinking it’s my sparkling personality but with my ex it was just my use as a p.a. It’s just one of those things I think sometimes it’s bad luck or we pick when we are vulnerable or before we are aware of our own trauma or just young. Relationships don’t have to be forever.

@Mini2025 I share my oldest and I feel the guilt. But then as I said in the comment above relationships don’t have to last forever. I think it’s a good lesson to teach our kids. Life doesn’t have to end and many lessons are learned and that’s a good thing. One day they may be in the same situation and they will learn from you that life goes on and it can be great.

It’s funny as I had a similar conversation with my daughter the other day about similar things. Her father has not changed and is the same shouty awful man as when I met him decades ago now. She asked me why I left and it was because I changed. He always used to shout at me that I was happy with him when I met and he hasn’t changed so why now do I suddenly have a problem. He took me leaving as an attack, which it wasn’t, I just couldn’t live with him anymore, I grew up.

@Theydontwantme thank you for witnessing my experience and pain. I’m also very sorry you have experienced this too. You sound stronger and fully resolved now having come out the other side which I find comforting.

The bubble truly has burst and I see him for who he truly is. How hyper independence was dressed up as being confident and strong when all he could really look after was himself. He had no spare capacity for anything other than surface easy relationships that made no demands on him to grow as a person. This has been the biggest insight. He’s unable to grow. He’s limited and always will be. He’s not able to cope with the messiness of life and be a real partner. Being in a relationship, benefitting from the set up that we create but never ever fully giving back as an equal becomes chronically exhausting and debilitating. I now know why I accepted it for so long. It will eventually make you sick I’ve discovered. I’m not sure my nervous system will ever fully recover and I may be on drugs for life. So be it. It will be a reasonable price to pay to get my freedom and identity back. As you say, many relationships aren’t set up in the best way. All we can do is learn from our experiences and move on. My therapist says nothing is wasted if you learn from it. I’m holding onto that.

My soon to be ex husband is also a shouter, an aggressor, an authoritarian, an inflexible, rule bound, transactional utilitarian. I can’t stand to be around him anymore. I’m sorry you had to cope with an angry man too. They’re awful. So very tiring to be around.

i think on here some years ago there was a poster who had the username GoAwayAngryMan.

Used to make me smile briefly! How appropriate I thought.

I just need to action on my own mother now, the reason I accepted such crap behaviour from a man. We learn, unfortunately my teacher was so shit! But we are better teachers to our children because of this lesson! My girls will hopefully never ever put up with this kind of behaviour and if they do they will come to me and they won’t stay. Not all ND men are bad, mine is most definitely ASD, he has his struggles as we all do but he is gentle, he has never shouted. I don’t think an NT man would cope with me. I am hyper sensitive with ADHD and he is ASD and not sensitive so it works. (Or should I say he doesn’t luckily recognise my OTT) lol

Shit @Mini2025 I hadn’t really thought of the hyper independent being a guise for I don’t really care (or should I say don’t have those tools to care). There’s me trying to soften the blow on myself that it must be trauma or something but when it could simply be I can’t care. That’s very matter of fact when it’s put like that. Takes the emotional out I suppose.

Yes my therapist says most of our anger should be directed at our parents for setting us up to fail. Of course eventually to forgive them but to understand how we came to be in such unloving relationships, it comes from them.

It does but it’s also just a mistake. We go into it with the best intentions and we don’t know others hearts. I think forgiveness to ourselves is where lots needs to go. I have never been given the skills to recognise a mistake and to integrate it without becoming it. The trick is and one I don’t have is to not become it and to let it pass and still remain strong with self.

Yes I think it’s limited emotional capacity. They can’t orient around anyone but themselves. As you say it takes the emotion out of it as you see they aren’t built for relationships that are truly relational.

It’s tragic and sad but it’s no one’s fault. Just is what it is. Hard to stomach for those of us that actually feel.

I can see how it’s a double ended problem. To me these relationships feel situational not relational. Thanks for that explanation. It feels like a complete answer to my own situation. My mum can do a situationship and I can do a relationship.

Hi everyone
Im finding writing this post quite uncomfortable but I’m hoping you’ll get where I’m coming from.

These threads have been running for years and years. And over time, we’ve ‘come under attack’ from some autistic people that felt we are attacking them, that the problems we are describing have nothing to do with autism/ND. MNHQ ends been involved, posts are deleted etc etc…. It’s stressful but more to the point, it stops us from supporting each other.

Thats where the opening post is coming from - a reminder to us all to discuss our difficulties in a way that is respectful to all people with ND whilst stil allowing us to vent and rant.

So I want to remind you again
Avoid sweeping generalisations if possible, try and keep it specific to you and your partner.
Recently, posts have moved more towards ‘they’, ‘people like them’ etc… and I feel we need to be more careful about that.

And please CARRY ON SHARING
This thread has been a lifeline for many of us. I wish nothing more than for it to stay that way.

I apologise for anything I’ve wrote that could have contributed. Many of us are ND ourselves so it’s coming from a place of frustration rather than finger pointing.

I’ve learned that not all ASD people are the same. I thought it was something that affected people similarly. But I’ve met some very empathetic ASD people so I guess it just depends as it does with everyone. I am highly empathetic, to the point of having to avoid whereas my person has very little empathy and runs on logic, both ND. I met a man at a toddler group and he is Asperger’s (how he labeled himself) he said he can’t have relationships with women as he treats them as a business deals which I thought was interesting.

Oh I’m very aware on how raw things are and frustrating the whole situation is.

I suppose I remember the very very early days of those threads. That’s about 15+ years ago maybe? It was impossible to have any discussion in autism without a pile on. So much so that those early threads were hidden in a special corner of MN (off the beaten track if I remember well. I’m not even sure that still exists!) that wasn’t searchable and deleted after 30 days. Some of the people on these threads went on to create some support groups and forums for people in NT/ASD marriages.

I so so much dint want to go back to that!

On the other side, I’m very aware that, if we’re not careful, some of the things we say can be very ableist indeed.
As you say @Theydontwantme autism and ND present in many ways and what is true for one ND person might not be true for another. And some ND people are just twats (like I suspect @BustyLaRoux ex…). Autistic twats but still twats iyswim.

So yes… let’s keep talking about our partners/parents/friends etc….

I agree @SpecialMangeTout3 and I’m sorry if I’ve inadvertently slipped into using “they”. If I have then it wasn’t my intention. I do try to caveat things with “not all autistic….” Etc. But give forgotten to or been flippant then apologies from me. 😔

Thanks @SpecialMangeTout3, I’ve been here since the very 1st thread (and remember the 30 day threads) and also remember the frequent pile-ons. We do have to be careful not to generalise, thank you for reminding us!

I feel bad because a lot of the time it is just the disparity of needs. There just seems to be a higher gap and more issues when ND involved as I find we are more concentrated as a person and less adaptable. It’s hard all round.

Waves to @Bluebellforest1
I didn’t realise you were on those early threads! I feel they’ve changed a lot in content. I remember it as being centred on how to best accommodate our partners and the difference between AS (Asperger Syndrome as it was then) and ArSe. That hasn’t change though. Is it autism or is that person being an arse…..

Also thank you all so much for your posts.
I was really worried some people would take it badly. So it’s a relief to see I haven’t all scared you away. 😁😁

Waves back to @SpecialMangeTout3

Do you remember Different Together? It was an online forum for spouses/ partners of people with autism, I was quite active there for a while about 12 years ago I think, until it closed. I definitely remember the AS/ArSe thing, and yes, it’s still relevant. There was a lot of advice from “professionals” at that time of the NT partner adapting to the needs of the ND partner.

I found “here” at about the same time but didn’t post often then and don’t now, but really value the wisdom I’ve gained from fellow posters. I’ve sort of come to accept that he is what he is and I can’t change him, nor can he change. We're both 70 now and basically live as housemates, I have hobbies and friends and get out a lot, he stays at home and watches tv. I have, in many ways, changed myself in order to accommodate him. He is difficult to live with, and becoming more difficult with cognitive decline, but I’m too old to separate now (although I’ve seriously considered it over the years!) so we limp on.

I think some of the difficulties here have arisen from the raw emotions that these relationships bring, posters needing to vent and not thinking about their language (understandably at times). As you say, don’t generalise, and as they used to say on Different Together “when you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve met one person with autism”.

sorry for long post!

Guilty as charged. I’ll try not to @SpecialMangeTout3

its a great support thread we’ve got here and I feel I have traits of neurodiversity myself, both autism and ADHD but it’s mild.

It’s hard to know where the boundaries of NT and ND lie at times.

with regards to language and being understanding I do see the benefit of that, but I still feel like female partners of ND men most often experience difficulties. It was seen in that video of two autistic partners talking on YouTube where he kept disappearing due to meltdowns and she just had to keep the show running, manage the house, look after the kids etc. She was obviously under immense stress.

It’s something we see in the NT world too, men not helping with the care giving of children. 50% of marriages end in divorce.

If we don’t call a spade a spade, what should we call it?

I guess the difference is, we do all of the care giving but never experience relational support. Perhaps in the NT world irs often similar. I don’t really know what I’m saying. Probably that both neurotypes have difficulties but there are some differences too and that not all of our issues are to do with ND but perhaps just societal/historical expectations and narratives.

ill stop burbling. I’ve probably offended enough people already with what I’ve written here!

And I guess I’ve had a breakdown. My husband hasn’t. I adapted and changed to orient around him. He didn’t change and doesn’t want to and is still healthy and well.

Our being agreeable and palatable comes at a cost. We’ve had to fight to be allowed this small corner of Mumsnet and I’ve felt suicidal at times. So I’ll have a discussion about it but I won’t be silenced about the devastating impact that a ND person had on me. And he does strongly exhibit classic ASD traits…

And sorry for being provocative. I guess I’m raw right now and feel aggrieved. Over and out for tonight. Thank you again for hosting this conversation.

@SpecialMangeTout3 under functioning is going well, thanks! Some of it makes life easier, like stopping consulting DH about things.

A lot of the time it’s not doing those kind things for someone that make their life easier, like helping get the kids out the door in the morning, which feels tragic to me, personally. But I have to accept that those things aren’t experienced by DH as help and if I’m honest with myself it can be those things that I get resentful over too (as they are not reciprocated) so I’m hoping it will break that cycle.

I suspect that by further taking away opportunities for collaboration and reciprocation it entrenches our separate lives. But what can I do? I’ve been clear I want to work on our relationship and DH hasn’t prioritised that. If that’s the way it goes, it will be easier to separate once the kids are a bit older.

I’ve realised quite how much I think of others. It’s made me understand how much I use them to avoid thinking about myself. Trying to think about myself deliberately outside of any of these dynamics is weird. I’m seeing my part in all of these dynamics and trying to change that with a therapist. Do wish me luck! It’s all a lot of effort atm.