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How can I help him?

NAS67035

Does any one have any tips or advice on how I can help my boyfriend when he is struggling? 

When he faces any kind of problem he just shuts me out. I understand that due to his aspergers he likes to be alone and close off from the world to help him cope. He also mentioned before he doesn't like me to see him stressed because it embarrasses him.

But he has even stopped letting me know via text message what the issues are so I can help. He deals with things alone every time and shuts himself away until he has resolved things. If he does tell me a problem and I offer any kind of advice or help he then just ignores me (but if I dont respond offering help surely he will think I dont care?)

He has made comments in the past about not wanting to use up any of my time, and if I ever do help he always seems overly grateful. E.g his car broke once so I lent him mine for one journey and he brought me a gift just to say thank you and didnt stop telling me how much I helped him. When to me helping him with something so small was just a normal action. 

I'm just really worried as he is currently dealing with some major stress and things around him are falling apart. His car broke, he lost his job, he is being chased by debt collectors and he has an upcoming court case for something too (nothing bad he has done but he is still terrified). Things are getting worse and I hate just watching it all happen to him while he is sat alone depressed, when what I really want to do is just hug him and tell him it will be ok. And I could actually resolve a lot of things for him rather than them be getting worse while he ignores them. But I dont know how to help. Do I need to just leave him alone? 

Parents

  • I would guess that he sees himself in this situation as unfit as boyfriend material for you. 

    The pieces don't seem to fit. 

    People with asperger, like me, we don't take the emotional side of a relationship into the equation. It doesn't come as self-evident that being there to listen to your partner actually has real value. 

    What can also be an important factor is fear for being exposed as incompetent and then losing control over the things you planned to do. I had a situation with my brother-in-law where he snatched a rake out of my hands to show me how the gardening-job is really done. That hurt me, I started to think what signals I must send out to other people. Although the evidence always shows that I get the job done in the end. 

    You could communicate this to him: you need hugs, they have a value for you, you don't want hugs for free, you want to return the favour, you're in a relationship, that usually means task-divisions, a tip: usually phonecalls are like roadblocks for people with aspergers, that could be something you do for him, but make it very clear that you're not planning to take it all over and solve problems for him. 

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  • I would guess that he sees himself in this situation as unfit as boyfriend material for you. 

    The pieces don't seem to fit. 

    People with asperger, like me, we don't take the emotional side of a relationship into the equation. It doesn't come as self-evident that being there to listen to your partner actually has real value. 

    What can also be an important factor is fear for being exposed as incompetent and then losing control over the things you planned to do. I had a situation with my brother-in-law where he snatched a rake out of my hands to show me how the gardening-job is really done. That hurt me, I started to think what signals I must send out to other people. Although the evidence always shows that I get the job done in the end. 

    You could communicate this to him: you need hugs, they have a value for you, you don't want hugs for free, you want to return the favour, you're in a relationship, that usually means task-divisions, a tip: usually phonecalls are like roadblocks for people with aspergers, that could be something you do for him, but make it very clear that you're not planning to take it all over and solve problems for him. 

Children