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

Ugh watched the first ten minutes and I was in tears, touched some nerves, there’s a woman speaking the language of loving someone who is ND and everyone is trying but it’s still so difficult at times. Will go back and watch more, probably, if I’m feeling brave.

Hello everyone

Very interesting reading these threads.

A question for you all...my DH of many, many years never uses my name, not even ( heaven forbid) an affectionate nickname, just nothing. Anyone else?

This was very sad to watch. That poor woman. I want her to leave him. She’ll burn out and she’ll never ever get her needs met. Horrific. It’s all about him and her making adjustments for him. Yes he’s disabled but at no point does he try to find any solutions nor consider what would happen if she disappeared to a hotel for a few days because she was burnt out. It’s unbearable to watch. I just see a poor woman trying her hardest in horrendous pain. I’m so glad this has been filmed and aired because finally this subject is going to get more light as it should do, This relationship is very damaging to one person’s nervous system which causes deep long term damage. I really don’t know what the answer is because all I see is pain.

I could only watch a tiny bit of it.
Arrrgh…
When she said she was frustrated that he would travel for work or come back from a meeting, be in shutdown and just …. go away.
And him saying ‘yay but it’s a shutdown. I don’t even realise I’m doing it and you saying that could be interpreted as ‘you don’t care and you don’t love me’’

Seriously I wanted to scream ‘what would you do if your wife died and you had no space to handle your shutdowns the way you want? How would you look after your DCs? Why did you have children if you knew you couldn’t be there for them?’ Let alone her.

I totally get the a disability is a disability. Heck I am disabled myself.
But There’s a limit. There needs to be an acknowledgement of his privilege - he gets to go away when in shutdown. No ND mother would be able to that.
Instead, he is turning it around as a her problem for not accommodating enough.

Arrrgggh…

Actually it’s very unusual that dh uses my name. It always takes me by surprise when does.
But I don’t it much either?

So sad. I feel (and share) her exhaustion and exasperation.

How's everyone doing?

DH moved onto the upper dose of his meds - he's wondering if it's maybe too much, as he's been sooo hyperfocused on his programming (but I notice, though I haven't said it yet, he's also neglecting domestic stuff!)

He had a 2nd stage job interview which was a coding exercise, where he usually sits very well but apparently everything just went poorly with his one including his laptop having to be restarted , then booting really slowly, then not logging on properly to the platform he had to use. So that probably didn't help. He wasn't very keen on the job, at least - the salary was below most other stuff and the work was very prosaic, but I guess that's the last chance gone of good news on that front before Christmas.

I was posting under another name on here for a bit on previous threads, So, hi. I hope you’re all doing as well as you can be. I’m part of the chronic illness group that this thread seems to include, also have DC with SEND who need a lot of support. Things have a bit improved as my health symptoms are receding a bit, DC a bit older now, I am still in therapy but talk there more about my parents than my relationship really. I have some friendly moments with DH when I feel quite hopeful but then find there’s this wierd hostility that comes back at me from DH if he’s getting overwhelmed or things aren’t going his envisaged way. I try to pull him up on that because there’s no need for the response and he will always try to justify it usually with something historical or irrelevant I once did wrong. My DC tell me to not make a fuss as they hate conflict so DH feels like he’s right. Actually he’s just modelled something quite damaging in front of them.

I can’t work out what our future is.together so its easier to take it one day at a time at the moment. Therapist’s advice. I just worry about that becoming more years without a plan if my health gets worse. I wonder if I’m even 51% the confident person I once was. Definitely relate to the shrinking self idea. Maybe I worry about my parents dying off because they are the other refuge at the back of my mind if things go urgently wrong in my relationship. But that’s wishful thinking. They’re old and ill. I have next to no confidence left to start my own path and am limited in what I can do realistically. It’s strange to think how much things might change or might stay the same in the future. I don’t like the ongoing uncertainty of living like this.

DH doesn’t often need to use my name. I’m usually already paying attention. I feel as though use his a lot. I think that’s because he has to be flagged down from his intended path by me, if I need him to pay attention.

That sounds pretty rough @Cicadasounds - do you just have 'hopeful' moments or any actually good ones?

I have two disappointed boys now. DS got his first piece of coursework back and only got a low pass even though he feels like he worked on it 'harder than anything else in my life' I told him sometimes one does work really hard but puts the effort in to the wrong place. It happens in my job when sometimes we put loads of work into a submission but we've not quite understood it right or answered with wrong emphasis and we lose out.

DH is in the worst frame of mind to deal with his tonight of course, but he's not been too bad about it when DS told him. He did his thing of immediately demanding why DS hadn't got precise feedback straight away, but no worse than that at least. I want to tell him that DS feels we worked really hard at it so DH must absolutely not shit on DS's effort levels unless he wants him never to make any effort again.

@Cicadasounds it was when my DM died, around 2 years after, that I collapsed. My getaway place to restart - my Mum's house and presence, my refuge to go to when things were awful, with it gone, I had nowhere to run to. And that was the beginning of the end of mental health. I went downhill and eventually crashed very badly.

If this is your pattern too, to run to your parents, I'm not sure it's safe to let things just keep running.

Divorce is stressful, no doubt about it but you only have one life. Chronic illness is the result of all the emotional shutdowns we've had to do. It affects our whole body and immune system and it only gets worse with time.

Don't wait around to become more disabled. I discovered thank God that my DH would never be there for me in an emergency. Fortunately I'm 50 and found this out now. I cannot imagine having something seriously wrong and hoping for assistance or help. He'd give me a blank cheque - but who wants money, when love is presence and kindness, care and attention? I can't talk to money, it can't hold me and tell me everything will be OK. It can't sit in a chair next to my hospital bed. DH won't do any of these things I found out.

So it's over. If someone shows you who they are, believe them. Don't be a fool and wait around for 23 years like me and become seriously ill in the process. I don't know if I'll ever get off these anti depressants now. My eyes are so dry from both meds, some days its sore just to blink. Other side effects too which I won't go into. I'm changed forever. And it's all because I hoped one day he'd change. If they've not changed now, they're never going to change. Please all of you reading this, do something. I wish I'd read the messages on here and got my sorry arse off itself and got on with it. Instead I'm horribly weakened but I'm doing it any way. I was scared. But of what? Being free? Being me? Now I've made the decision I'm 100% certain its the right decision and I ask myself why I didn't do it earlier. I've wasted so much time - which I can never get back.

Hiya - regular poster but NC’d. Do your partners all hate Christmas? DH often sinks into a depression. A while back I identified Christmas as a trigger even though each year he is distressed about something in particular. I’m having a bit of a wallow today that nobody in my family wants to do any Christmas activities. No school fair, no jumper day, no panto, no Christmas lights, definitely no joy. It’s such a tiny, confining life lived im the house. Not sure how I ended up here. Hurt and confused by DH’s behaviour which seems PDA in seeing Christmas as a big demand. We’re off to in laws who hate Christmas also. 😫

Yes my DH hated Christmas, not immediately but as the stress of work and children ground him down and he retreated further into his routines and work he did absolutely nothing. He hated spending any time with family. Anyone’s family his or mine. He never helped with anything. The only thing he did was the clear up after the meal. He’d go on a run on Christmas morning and then try and find something else to do. Complain the gym and shops weren’t open. Anything to avoid emotional or domestic help. For that reason I learnt to hate Christmas too as the burden of making it all exciting fell to me. When you’ve done it year in, year out with no help and no emotional connection too, well…

It won’t get any better… sadly. So either you carry on in pain and minimise your needs or consider other options… which do exist.

@WindyW I’d be tempted to send him off to be miserable with the in-laws, do the children like it? If they do celebrate without him! Honestly I don’t see the point in forcing people to endure stuff that makes them miserable (for you your in-laws, for him Xmas!). To be honest I’m pretty sure nothing would happen here if I didn’t make an effort, DS has learnt that I like it when he does the tree with me, but there would be zero decorating done if I didn’t push it all.

Hi I had another thread where I talked about my mum. It’s been talked that she is narcissistic but I really suspect something else. I am undiagnosed but I’m probably going to start a diagnosis as my oldest is diagnosed ASD. I know it’s a partner thread but I just wondered if anyone could explain this to me in a way I’d understand.

My mum seems oblivious to us, I mean she knows we exist but she doesn’t respond to any of the needs we have. She will know for example one of us is ill but she doesn’t respond to this in anyway. She’d happily go on holiday and be her jolly self well the rest of us are falling apart. It’s literally bypassing her that she needs to respond. This doesn’t come across as intentional or nasty. She has always been like this. I struggled no doubt to being undiagnosed and she didn’t notice at all, always had the same happy face and went about her things. The other day I yawed and she asked me very seriously not to yawn because she doesn’t want to get tired.

Is this what being ASD can do?

No that is how a narcissist behaves. She is at the centre of her universe and the rest of you are bit part players. ASD is not what is being described here re your mother.

Thanks. A lot of that resonates with me and how my now very recent ex partner is. She’s still awaiting a formal diagnosis of AuDHD.

Decided to go our separate ways as I was just getting more and more run down. Over compensating for them and financially supporting her whilst also being attacked mentally, emotionally and sometimes physically by her.
Couldn’t face prospect of many more years of that.

But my eldest is like this and diagnosed ASD and ADHD. She has no comprehension of others, doesn’t know how to make and keep friends because she wants it all to go her way. She is too young I’m guessing to have a disorder, she has always been challenging. As soon as she could talk she used to say I wish I had another mum as other mums are nicer to me. She can’t understand that’s because they aren’t her mum so they behaving differently and she isn’t being rude to them or making her do homework etc. I feel I’m surrounded by people who view me as a robot.

@Theydontwantme please first of all, you are more than welcome here.Some of don’t have an ND partner but a parent on the spectrum. Unusually undiagnosed because era. Theyd never have been diagnosed then.

Second @AttilaTheMeerkat is seeing your question from an entirely NT pov, with no knowledge of ND or ASD. It’s the answer you got before and clearly it doesn’t sit well with you. You don’t have to accept it now.

Now to your question re your mum, I’m going to say my experience of ASD is very much the one I’ve had with dh. Not everyone will have had the same.
But from your description I see

• difficulty in putting herself in someone else shoes
• struggle with situations that are unplanned (like a health problem needing input from different people)- struggle with executive function
• struggle with any situations linked to emotions. Leading to panic therefore avoidance

I feel it’s fair to ask yourself if your mum might be ND.

But to be fair too, it could also be explained through the lens of avoidance for example

• feeling like you dint exist if you’re not right there - I’d say is more of an avoidant behaviour.
• Continuation of routine no matter what
• reaction to illness.

Some of it looks like alexithymia too (which might not be related to ASD)

But I’d like to remind you that a diagnosis (even if it’s you diagnosing her iyswim) is just a reason, not an excuse. It’s ok to acknowledge the reason why she has behaved that way AND to also recognise you’ve been hurt. And you have. You were a child. You deserved to feel seen and feel like you mattered.

My own experience with dh is that he cannot do illness.
He panics, doesn’t know how to respond even though he knows he should.
It’s not malice. It’s not wanting to hurt someone.its his own inability to react (appropriately).

I feel you also need to remember that many parents of autistic children resist the label. Not because of the label. But because ‘There’s nothing wrong with my dc. I do the same. Where’s the issue?’ This could explain why your mum saw you struggle but never did anything. Plus, I’m not sure how old you are, but was autism as well ‘known’ then?

Again, only my own experience, but I feel that understanding what’s going on can be helpful because it gives context.
Just remember it doesn’t mean you then need to carry the whole load, as you’re doing with your dd. It makes sense to do all the ‘caring work’ with your DD. She is a child. You want to support her.
Your mum is an adult. I feel it’s different.

What do you think having a better understanding of your mum will help you with?

"Second ATM is seeing your question from an entirely NT pov, with no knowledge of ND or ASD"

Unfortunately you are wrong re no knowledge of ASD but that is by the by.

Regardless indeed of why she is the ways she is it is not the OPs fault. She did not make her mother that way.

Sorry in my head narcissistic people are attention seekers and drama and doing things to make people look at them. My mum is just completely in her own world, one where she is literally allergic to emotion. She avoids me like the plague. Any interaction needs to be positive, no mention of anything remotely emotional, smiles on face, its just so fake. If anyone has a problem it becomes a problem. No one in the family discloses information, if they need help they shut doors. She wants to turn up, do the things she’s turned up for and go home.

The thing that bothers me is instead of saying I don’t really understand, I’m not good at this. She says that people are too emotional, they are stupid, they should just get on with it. Which is great for her but we aren’t all able to to feel little and be so logical. It’s been very dangerous to hear this all the time. I feel like a failure because some times I’m knocked by emotions and I can’t just ignore them. Being emotional in my family is like being the needle in the haystack. I don’t think she knows what to do with me.

I feel like those who are higher up the emotional intelligence seem to do less well off then those with lower emotional intelligence. My mum is not deviated by life and people and things, she is straight focused and actually achieves many things but in her path she neglects…..if that makes sense.

Wow that Hidden 20% podcast was illuminating. I really valued hearing someone talk about shutdowns, since the focus is usually on meltdowns.

On the Christmas front, I did manage to talk with DH about it. Counting that as a win.

I sometimes feel weird because I can’t deal with things on my own like I’ve been taught. My sibling is much better than me, he doesn’t need any emotional support and has no friends and doesn’t see the need either. He like my mum doesn’t see for example visiting on your birthday as something to do, he doesn’t expect it in return either. They don’t view people as having use emotionally, but they will do a hobby together and enjoy it.

I can’t have a relationship with my mum especially this way. Yes we can do a hobby that she enjoys together but then completely ignore you the rest of the time. I get offended and she has no idea why. It is hard to have a relationship with some one like this. It’s not her fault I can understand but I’d like a relationship but I can’t if that makes sense.

She does seem to have some empathy, she will know someone dies that she needs to respond and she can do empathy on her terms, when she wants but it’s not spontaneous and you can see she’s just not interested. It gets in the way of her unless that day she has decided to do something for someone. It’s too planned to feel authentic.