Marriage and Autism

Are there any other married people here?

I have a lot of difficulty communicating with my husband. Even after 15 years, I cannot really tell him how I am feeling about things. It's strange.. I can arrange the words in my head, and plan what to say, but then when I open my mouth absolutely nothing comes out. I just freeze. It's like the words are either stuck or have disappeared. 

He of course gets very frustrated with this. My husband is excellent at communicating how he feels about things. He is really good at reading people and all that kind of stuff. So when it comes time for us to have a serious conversation about something, he gets very frustrated when I can't talk. In the past, he would just keep pushing me until I got angry enough to just explode. He pats himself on the back for this, claiming that he's finally gotten me to share my feelings / the truth. Except.. the things I eventually would blurt out were maybe not really accurate, or incomplete. Something I could never communicate to him.

I have gotten a bit better over the last few years, but this is still something we struggle with. I'm just wondering if there's anyone one there who has any "tricks" to get through this?

Parents
  • I'm married but for less time than you. 4 years married, 11 years together in total. 

    My husband gets angry at me because I cannot explain myself a lot of the time, and when I try he just does not understand it and gets even angrier. I'm sure you can understand that someone being angry at an autistic person doesn't help anything at all. It just makes me even worse. 

    I don't have any tricks to suggest but at least you arent alone.

Reply
  • I'm married but for less time than you. 4 years married, 11 years together in total. 

    My husband gets angry at me because I cannot explain myself a lot of the time, and when I try he just does not understand it and gets even angrier. I'm sure you can understand that someone being angry at an autistic person doesn't help anything at all. It just makes me even worse. 

    I don't have any tricks to suggest but at least you arent alone.

Children
  • You are so right. I really have a low tolerance for people getting angry with me, it causes me to shut down completely. Which only makes him more angry. I am hoping that if I am able to get a formal diagnosis, he will finally do some real research on autism. I'm afraid he won't take it seriously while I remain "self diagnosed" - whatever that means.