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My Aspie girlfriend

SwimmingAdrian

Hello, sorry this will be long but I've been looking everywhere for help and hope I can get it here. I'm not sure if I posted this in the right board, if not then my apologies.

I moved to the UK from another country to eventually study at a British university.

During that time I met my girlfriend, and I've been living with her and her family for almost 4 years now, while studying in college and working to eventually be able to go university. I knew about her having Asperger Syndrome, and accepted it. Her parents let me live with them as long as I helped out out and paid the rent. 

Living with her is usually quite easy, because we both have the same interests: Mostly art and games. We both hope to become professional artists one day. I generally did my own thing and let her be, though we also spend a lot of time together. Her parents left us in peace, happy that their daughter had someone to spend time with. She's an amazing artist, which is one of the main reasons that I'm attracted to her. She teached me how to draw and paint, which means the world to me.

In the beginning of our relationship her Aspergers syndrome wasn't a big problem. For example when we had visitors she would always go out of her room to meet them and spend a bit of time with the guests.

A year into the relationship my dad and brother came over to visit me in the UK. She was shy around them, but didn't mind meeting them and spending some time with my family. We even went out and had a good time. She usually felt a bit uncomfrotable with people taking photos of her  but after spending some time with them she let my dad take photos of us without any problems. 

Every year I would go back to my country for a bit to spend time with my family. I'd go alone, because she felt she'd be too uncomfortable being so far away. I understood it's too difficult for her and didn't mind going on my own, though my (extended) family would often question me about it. 

Unfortunatly she's been slowly regressing over the years. She now rarely wants to go out, and while shopping she became too scared to pay for her things (I have to do that now). When guests visit, she hides in her room (Even when her family visit), refusing to go downstairs. This year my mum and dad came over to visit us in the UK, but this visit didn't go as well as last time. She struggled with merely greeting them, and didn't want to spend time with them at all. When I did get her to finally go out with my family, she often complained and wouldn't let my parents take photos of us, making a big fuss about it. She also didn't really want to talk to my parents, even when they were being nice to her. My mum was understanding but I could see she felt hurt. 

I'm also getting tired of my extended family in my country constantly asking why she never comes with me when I visit. She's definetly not ready for that, especially after I saw what happened when my parents visited. 

I think one of the main reasons of her regression is because recently (few months before my mum and dad came over) her parents got divorced, with her mum leaving the house. Her mum always helped her coping with social situations and gave her overall support, but now she left my girlfriend really struggles with meeting people. 

After a long talk with my mum I came to the conclusion that this year I really need to decide whether I want to stay with her or not. She was a lot better a few years ago, and I hope she'll be able to go back to how she used to be: A lot more confident. I don't expect her to become a super social person, but at least be able to meet people without a big fuss, and be polite. And maybe one day be able to go with me and visit my family in my country (Something I felt she was almost ready to do before she started regressing).  

I'm really not sure whether I should stick around and wait 'till she hopefully becomes better. But she's without a doubt my best friend. Before our relationship we got along splendidly, and I really wouldn't want her completely out of my life. I could accept going back to just being friends. The only problem I can see with staying friends is that if we eventually find a new significant other, they might dislike the idea of staying friends with an ex.

I'll be able to move out of her family's house in a few months, if it would become necessary. However I do really love her, and thinking of a life without her makes me really sad. I'm going to university soon, and feel that with this new beginning I should make a decision. But I need help!

Should I still be in a relationship with my girlfriend? Or would it be a better idea to end it, because a future with her might be difficult? (Although I do really love her!). What are the chances of her getting better? Is there anything I can do to help her?

Parents

  • Speaking to someone who's english is shaky is a nightmare for Aspies, as one of the key problems is our inability to 'read' body language. Most people take it for granted that when someone acts or moves a certain way, they know how they're feeliing. Aspies, we don't have that. 80% of my personal issues with socialising comes from being unable to tell from someones behaviour or tone how they feel or if they were joking, which leads to me being frustrated or sometimes offended. Take away the element I can follow relatively well (the words) and I'm stuck with body language which I can barely decipher 99% of the time. This is the part of the 'social disability' that royally sucks and makes it hard to keep up with more than a few people at a time. Part of my bonding with other Aspies both online and at Uni is discussing NT (Neurotypical aka 'normal') behaviours and how weird it seems to us. Coincidently, as much as it confuses us, its also a source of fascination, how humans behave and interact, and its what draws us towards researching and drawing more horror based artwork that people find repulsive because its yet another thing we merely see as 'normal' (i.e. we observe it in the world on a regular basis) that the rest of humanity seems desperate to ignore.

    Being at Uni, there were quite a few interesting people I've met that I have to interact with who's english wasn't all that good, and I really struggled to be around them because short of them actually miming everything, I couldn't get what they were trying to say. However, I do interact with them ok online as I've got access to things like Google translate, even if it adds a bit of time onto the gap between replies, we were able to actually start communicating without 'running in circles'. It also relieved the stress of trying to pay attention to multiple things at once (their gestures, body movements, eyes, facial expressions) to gauge what they're on about, as well as the stress at myself for not understanding.

    Foundation degrees are available at both Uni's and colleges across the UK. From what I've been told, Student Finance are meant to treat Foundation as a year of higher education, so should be able to offer your girlfriend a student loan if she has to relocate to access the course for a few terms. Some Foundations have a segment on Art History, others, are dominated by it. But there are Foundation courses where you can literally experiment with different types of art, and while there probably is a unit where you have to learn about art history, I'm told that on these kinds of courses its usually pretty relevant to what you're doing, rather than an old teacher blabbering about a boring oil painting as if that's the only thing that can ever be considered art.

    At the moment Student Finance have been messing up my application for my next year at uni since the beginning of April, and they messed up my application last year too. I'm dreading the thought of looking to get funding for a Masters course (if it comes to it). Its gotten so bad I can no longer stand talking to anyone on the phone at the company, won't send in any 'evidence' as it goes missing, and generally have set my mum on them to sort out the mess.

    I think your girlfriend will be ok as long as you're talking to each other often, and on some kind of predictable schedule, its all too easy for Aspies to slowly lose communication with someone if they're not there to chase us and remind us to contact them (extended family often have to remind me to call if I haven't spoken to them in months, its nothing malevolent, purely the fact I get caught up in day to day routine to the point where I forget). Again the change problem is a daily struggle, but with forewarning and the chance to have a good rant about the lack of a forewarning (or just a rant in general about not liking whatever's changed) usually helps.

Reply

  • Speaking to someone who's english is shaky is a nightmare for Aspies, as one of the key problems is our inability to 'read' body language. Most people take it for granted that when someone acts or moves a certain way, they know how they're feeliing. Aspies, we don't have that. 80% of my personal issues with socialising comes from being unable to tell from someones behaviour or tone how they feel or if they were joking, which leads to me being frustrated or sometimes offended. Take away the element I can follow relatively well (the words) and I'm stuck with body language which I can barely decipher 99% of the time. This is the part of the 'social disability' that royally sucks and makes it hard to keep up with more than a few people at a time. Part of my bonding with other Aspies both online and at Uni is discussing NT (Neurotypical aka 'normal') behaviours and how weird it seems to us. Coincidently, as much as it confuses us, its also a source of fascination, how humans behave and interact, and its what draws us towards researching and drawing more horror based artwork that people find repulsive because its yet another thing we merely see as 'normal' (i.e. we observe it in the world on a regular basis) that the rest of humanity seems desperate to ignore.

    Being at Uni, there were quite a few interesting people I've met that I have to interact with who's english wasn't all that good, and I really struggled to be around them because short of them actually miming everything, I couldn't get what they were trying to say. However, I do interact with them ok online as I've got access to things like Google translate, even if it adds a bit of time onto the gap between replies, we were able to actually start communicating without 'running in circles'. It also relieved the stress of trying to pay attention to multiple things at once (their gestures, body movements, eyes, facial expressions) to gauge what they're on about, as well as the stress at myself for not understanding.

    Foundation degrees are available at both Uni's and colleges across the UK. From what I've been told, Student Finance are meant to treat Foundation as a year of higher education, so should be able to offer your girlfriend a student loan if she has to relocate to access the course for a few terms. Some Foundations have a segment on Art History, others, are dominated by it. But there are Foundation courses where you can literally experiment with different types of art, and while there probably is a unit where you have to learn about art history, I'm told that on these kinds of courses its usually pretty relevant to what you're doing, rather than an old teacher blabbering about a boring oil painting as if that's the only thing that can ever be considered art.

    At the moment Student Finance have been messing up my application for my next year at uni since the beginning of April, and they messed up my application last year too. I'm dreading the thought of looking to get funding for a Masters course (if it comes to it). Its gotten so bad I can no longer stand talking to anyone on the phone at the company, won't send in any 'evidence' as it goes missing, and generally have set my mum on them to sort out the mess.

    I think your girlfriend will be ok as long as you're talking to each other often, and on some kind of predictable schedule, its all too easy for Aspies to slowly lose communication with someone if they're not there to chase us and remind us to contact them (extended family often have to remind me to call if I haven't spoken to them in months, its nothing malevolent, purely the fact I get caught up in day to day routine to the point where I forget). Again the change problem is a daily struggle, but with forewarning and the chance to have a good rant about the lack of a forewarning (or just a rant in general about not liking whatever's changed) usually helps.

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