Good Morning all!
I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed and I've no one to talk to. I have two autistic kids and my husband usually leaves me to do everything with them. He works full time and it's a long day for him, when he gets home he just doesn't have the energy or patience to deal with them. I've had hardly a break from them in 7 years, my parents live about 20 mins away and occasionally take them out, or my mum will have one of them for a sleepover (my daughter has sleep issues so wouldn't sleep over). So, while we are grateful for the help we do get, I just don't have the emotional support.
When I've tried to explain to my husband how exhausted I am he just says something blunt and to the point (because he didn't really want to have children in the first place), "Well, you wanted kids. You got what you wanted." From seeing how the kids are and learning about autism, both me and my husband have started to see that my husband is also probably on the spectrum himself. The problem I'm now having is that his anxiety levels are so high sometimes that he can't, rather than won't, be around the children much as they stress him out. He has gone down to a 3 day working week, as his company have had to make people redundant and reduce production. This has really stressed him out, especially seeing as we were already struggling financially largely owing to a shopping addiction he has had almost his entire adult life (but that's another story!) He had a kind of meltdown on Sunday, where a seemingly small thing triggered him and then he was shouting at the children and me, because they had derailed his plans. He had a conversation with his friend all planned out in his head, and because our son was on the brink of a meltdown, I said we had to leave. This tipped him over the edge. He was shouting really bad things like the children should be put up for adoption because we can't cope with them.
It is testing our marriage to the limits, to be honest. I can see it from the point of view of him being on the spectrum, so what he blurts out might be emotionally honest, but he's not intentionally trying to push us away or hurt any of us. It's the fact that in that moment he can't control his emotions, he has always had very intense emotional outbursts, positive and negative. I know that often he can be a very loving husband and father, he's not a horrible person. In fact he is totally loyal, very generous when able to be, and has a great sense of humour. I'm trying to keep in mind all the things I love about him, and what attracted me to him in the first place, because ever since my first pregnancy, he has been really difficult to live with. I'm not trying to paint autism in a bad light, and I know lots of autistic people rightly advocate for fellow autists, but I have to say that my experience of living as a neurotypical with all 3 of my immediate family members, including my spouse, is at times incredibly difficult. And that's with them all being "high-functioning" (forgive me if that term offends).
Sorry for the long post, please show me love and kindness, I'm not out to have a go at the autistic community! I love my husband and kids as they are, I'm just struggling to get my head around my husband being wired this way. I don't know why, but I suppose if I thought my husband was NT, there would be hope for him to "change his ways" and grow to accept his children as they are. I have to accept that much of the behaviour that I find so difficult is a part of him and he's not able to change it, if that makes sense. I want him to be happy, and at times I feel as though I almost exhausted myself trying to make him happy, only to realise that it wasn't making him happy. In fact, he's only become more and more unhappy. I am worried about his mental health. He won't seek an autism diagnosis, he doesn't think there's much point at his age (54) . He also won't get help for his mental health, I've suggested it a few times but it makes him angry.
Thanks for reading.