Published on 12, July, 2020
I have been married to my partner for 18 years and we have 3 children. My partner has always been interested in gaming more so than me and we went on holiday and he bought a new camera and spent hours staring at it, playing with it and even took it to the dinner table with him. He gets extremely stressed in certain situations to the point he takes it out on me. We only figures out he was autistic after having an autistic child. He has got worse as our relationship has gone on...mainly though realising he is autistic. He is kind, never goes out, always at home, but he lacks natural affection, somedays I feel very alone as he fails to talk more than 10 sentences in a day. I wonder what it is like to be with someone that shows interest in me and chats to me.
NAS64352 said:I wonder what it is like to be with someone that shows interest in me and chats to me.
If you're talking about 'small talk' you're likely to be disappointed... it's just not something aspies/auties 'do' - I've previously described it as being:
'nothing-chat'... like breathing, only noisier and less useful.
Conversations need to have a point, if they don't they are hard work because "why am I bothering?"
You may need to adjust your expectations of what 'being interested in you' looks like... I've been with my wife for 17 years, I DO things because I love her I don't SAY things e.g.
- I always serve her meals first
- if I think she's made bad choice in a restaurant (something she won't like) I'll order something she will like, even if it's not my first choice, so I can offer o swap with her when she realises she made a bad choice
- I bring her a cup of tea and bowl of cereal in bed every day
I'm not good as asking about her day and then not trying to 'fix' any issues she mentions, but I do try.
Your partner can learn what's important to you but you may need to set some 'rules' around it.
One thing we found good was taking a bath together - no distractions like tv or games or phones so you can relax and talk.
Good luck!