Published on 12, July, 2020
I have just been hit by the biggest curve ball ever!
I knew my husband was different from the day I met him, at first I thought he was "slow" but he showed huge intelligence in other areas of his life. I now know that he displayed classic symptoms of Aspergers ie, no eye contact, limited to no emotion, and seperating himself in social situations.
Roll on 25 years and one child later....this man has driven me to distraction but I have learned to adapt to my own detriment and my self esteem being at a all time low. I made allowances for him as he had a shitty upbringing and I thought this was why he behaved the way he did.
This is what happened and how I stepped into the world of Aspergers. Last weekend he took it upon himself to dust, and hoover the bedroom (it had only just been done) and to wash the en-suite bathroom floor. When he had finished he came downstairs and started to read the paper however he had pulled everything out and left stuff all over the place. I asked him what he was going to do with it as I didn't want him to throw any of my stuff out but he ignored me, so I asked him again, again he ignored me, I asked a total of 5 times but it was like he couldn't hear me and could only focus on the job in hand. I confronted him when he came downstairs as to why he wouldn't listen to me, he used every avoidance answer in the book and again no eye contact, this quickly escalated into another row (I use this term loosley as Its me that shouts and he just sits there in a world of his own). There was something about this incident that didn't quite sit right with me as the evening before I was telling him something that happened at work he made no comment and was looking everywhere but at me, I ended the conversation abruptly mid sentance and he said is that it and walked away.
Later that day I googled what could be wrong with him, OMG OMG OMG why had I not seen this? why had I never questioned his behaviour before?
I feel like I have been living a lie for the last 25 years.
I have reached out to my children and their response has been "well he was always different" to "you knew he was odd so this has confirmed it", "nothing has changed just that you now have the information to deal with it".
My husband has given me a good life, hes a hard worker, but it's been like living with a naughty brother. I have no intention of abandoning him or ending the marraige but I am out of my depth and on the brink over being overwhelmed.
I don't know what to do next, I am now hyper vigilant and when he does something he has done a hundred times before I am like "how did I miss that" but in the same token I want to scream at him to stop fxxxing doing it.
He once told me that there was something wrong with him as a kid and had to go to a special school...did he know? I have so many questions but I don't know how to talk to him.
Help me!
Hi
Please forgive my blunt questions. Do you know what's going on in his life? Has something changed at work? Is he under pressure at work?
A classic trait of Aspegers is the need for calm. Noise and chaos will tend to make him withdraw.
If you're 'normal', you might be trying to live to society's expectations that may be very different to his 'deduced' conventions. He is likely to have worked out the 'correct' (to him) way to do things and he may see your actions as difficult to understand. (for example, my (NT) wife will load a dishwasher randomly where as I (Asperger's) will see there is an optimum way to load it for maximum efficiency).
He's likely to just want a sensible, quiet life so you may be overloading his ability to deal with you - especially if there's a load of pressure for him at work too.
What do you do for fun together? Do you have shared interests? It probably seems crazy, but you might just want to indulge his hobby with him for a while to get him to drop down from a high-stress position so you'll be able to chat to him when he'll be receptive.
He might be resistant to your Asperger's suggestion or, like me, I just saw it as information for me to use to understand my own thought processes.
Hi,
He is no more busier now than before however we went on a really long holiday to India in January where he was relaxed and we had a great time, since hes been back hes been really restless saying things like he doesn't care if no work comes in (he has his own small building company) and he wants to go back to India for extended periods of time. When I try to explain that I can't get that amount of A/L in one hit he sulks.
I have for years been saying that the only time we connect is on holiday but I can now see this is his "quiet time" another realisation.
He has no hobbies but he's obsessed with his football team/money and can recall every score since the year dot. If we do go out socially its to the cinema to watch a film of his choosing (no fiction) and to the pub, even though hes not a massive drinker he seems to need this stimuation to help him through the evening. I don't mind the drinking but I refuse to indulge in his football monologues.
I will do anything I can to help him but I am in so much shock at the moment I can't begin to help him till I have sorted out my feelings, at the moment I want to scream, shout and ask him why he hasn't told me how he felt...but I have a feeling someone is going to tell me he's incapable of doing this.
Well that's annoying - my long answer just got ate by the website gods when I pressed reply. I'll try again.
Then communication is the key.
As for your running - I can understand that - you feel you're stuck with a dud. You may find he's very upset right now and unable to show it so he's retreating into himself and his football (it makes no demands of his resources). All a sign of no communication.
Routine is something Aspies like as it creates stability and reduces chaos. The more things in his life that are fixed and stable, the more energy he has left to put into the chaotic things. Fatigue is common as we get older too so lots of chaos is draining.
The camper van thing is probably terrifying for him - zero measurable stability. You would need to fully flesh it out for him with costs and plans for him to make the mental leap to do it. He would need in-depth details. If he had confidence in the plan, he'd probably go for it.
Have you asked him what he'd love to do if he didn't have to work?
We've had a long discussion about what we're actually doing and come to the conclusion that we're going to just stop and downsize, move to the country and step off the treadmill.
We've done the numbers and we can live a gentle, comfortable life.
As for grandkids - my daughter growing up and changing so fast is what prompted me to get diagnosed as I couldn't work out what she required of me week on week. I was diagnosed 10 years ago.
You need to analyse the way you both function and see where you can reduce the chaos to make life more simple and predictable.
If you can talk to him about your Aspie suspicions and explain to him you sort of understand about stress and chaos, you can probably make some headway into understanding his needs - which will make your life a lot easier without the constant stress and arguements.
Us Aspies are quite simple folk - we have a very young outlook and don't need all the unnecessary grief that comes with being a grown-up. If we're with people who understand our strengths and limitations, we're good to go.
Your right he doesn't have to pretend in India and we made friends, not life long friends but things are different there, he didn't have to make chit chat either or work to a schedule....I am sitting here at work and this is making me so sad as I want that man in India.
Your comment about being a 16yr old in a mans body is my husband, he can relate to the grand children (for short bursts of time) but he doesn't have to pretend and they love him. He will only play old fashioned games with them though.
He does have friends but they are drinking buddies, he only sees them once a week but that is a routine for him that he rarely breaks.
My husband is 62 and we have no retirement plans as I am slightly younger than him, I have said lets take early retirement but he's obsessed with money and saving it, where I am lets buy a camper van and bugger off.
What do I wan't from life....at this very minute I want to do a Forest Gump and run and keep running. I want him to be honest with me and see if we can work this out (we were on the brink of splitting up). He makes me feel so guilty.
It sounds like he's really stressed and the peace he found in India is addictive. That may be because of dealing with a completely different culture means Western social norms go out the window and you have to find your own way to interact with the locals.
We go to Florida for the same reason as Disney does not allow problems so it's nice to know everything will be perfect.
He may measure his feelings simply as levels of stress so going somewhere with no stress makes him feel good. Having stress loaded on him makes him feel bad.
I'm still a 16-year old insode a 53-year old body and I'm very aware of this in social situations. I can see that everyone around me is sooooo old and that they've lost the ability to have fun. I'm also aware of NT's complicated way of interacting whereas I prefer direct, honest people so I know where I am with them. I dislike vague conversations.
It's quite common for Aspies to have be heavily into their hobby - I'm into loads of things.
As a thought, does he have many friends?
Do you have a retiremnent plan / life destination or the reason for working?
What do you / he want from life?