How do you stay married to an ASD HFA Aspergers husband?
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Anonymous
There are real people like this though. Check out the other trending thread about the guy who finds the women he dates moving from attractive to unattractive within a 6 month period and wonders what's wrong with the women. |
Anonymous
There are military dudes like this, bragging about offer three hots and a cot. Do you really want to marry someone who says: well, it's better than being homeless and on the street? |
Anonymous
No you don’t. But he sounds up front about it, not hiding it so that helps 98% or the female population walk away fast. |
Anonymous
Thanks for this helpful post. I'm starting to move in this direction and think hard about whether or not I can stay married to this man who can be organized and successful at work, but can't heat up a can of soup at home without explicit instructions. I've spent years trying to explain to him how I need him to behave, to no avail. Learning that he has ASD has changed the way I see and interact with him. I used to yell at him when he forgot really simple, obvious things, but now I realize he's impaired, so I explain (again) where to put the can opener without getting too exasperated. It still baffles me that he can be successful at work and an idiot at home -- it still feels like this is a choice he's making. I don't want to divorce him, but I don't want to be resentful and frustrated and lonely for the rest of my life either. |
Anonymous
PP, are you on the autism spectrum yourself? What you are describing as "NT behavior" is bizarre. My happily married NT friends have NT partners/husbands who have interests and friends, who make plans and participate in each other's lives. They do things together, and they do things separately, but at the same time, they are partners and they are the prime emotional support for each other. Yes they each have supportive friends, and colleagues and family members, but what I see they all have in common is mutual respect and interest in making each other happy. I have an ASD partner who has no friends, has no interests (aside from work), who does almost nothing to do with child rearing, socializing, planning activities, holidays, etc. etc. etc. He is not a partner in the true sense of the word. It's exhausting for me to try to create a normal family life all by myself. If it were up to him, the children would be naked and starve to death, have no birthday parties, no vacations, probably not even a house to live in. All that and much much more is left to me. He puts all his energy into his job, and has none for me or our children. I'd like to have a husband, not a nice roommate who gives the kids rides and helps around then house when asked. |
Anonymous
You can have a warm, loving, mutually supportive relationship with a spouse who is any or all of these things. As long as you communicate well and have a strong, loving bond with each other. I know couples in the military who spend very long periods apart, yet they are extremely close, communicate daily, share everything with each other. I know a family where the mother is disabled, and the father's job requires that he spends months away from home. They also have a close, loving relationship. ASD is completely different. The close loving bond is missing. That's not something that you can adjust to. It's not a marriage. It's merely coexistence. |
Anonymous
That's not what I'm saying. You know how women love to come on here and get advice from anonymous strangers about their boyfriends and husbands and try to figure out what's wrong and why they're not bringing them the happiness they want or expect? Im saying that we, as female humans, used to have that in real life, and that we didn't rely on the husbands in our lives for nearly as much of our happiness as we do today. Hell, for the past 3,000 years or so (which is the blink of an eye) we even shared husbands for much of the time. Bc of who you are and where and when you were born, you are rigid in your own way bc you seem to have a tendency to view life strictly through a feminist lens. That's not wrong, but it's myopic if you are reluctant to expand your perspective. There are all sorts of ways to assess the womens liberation and sexual revolution. If you're a woman btwn the ages of 35-70 with a career that you enjoy, you probably see it as an unmitigated success. Others can acknowledge the benefits of the gains women made while being honest and nuanced about the drawbacks, many of which we are only beginning to come to terms with. Some people, including but not limited to ASD men, are less well off. Is the ASD husband who struggles to fulfill his expected role as husband and father today objectively less worthy than the 1950s housewife who struggled to find meaning in hers? Who might self-medicate (mask?) just to get through the life that was expected of her? Btw, I can't help but point out that ASD is not exclusive men. Women are autistic too, although I suspect no one is mentioning that here bc in the current moment, a woman who doesn't live up to female typical social norms is acceptable in a way that men who cant live up to female typical social norms isn't. I have sympathy for anyone who for whatever reason is experiencing domestic unhappiness, but whether you're talking about immigrants, religious groups or people with a particular neuro-profile, lumping people together to point out how they make everything worse is just typical human bigotry to make people feel better about themselves. |
Anonymous
Just dropping in to say that people with autism have feelings and yes, love their friends and family. |
Anonymous
Sigh. What you're describing is something different from autism. I've said this a million times, but my likely ASD dad did almost all the housework, and almost 50% of the childrearing. His behavior was difficult in other ways, but nothing like what you describe. And, he had two long and apparently happy marriages. The post I was responding to involved a woman miffed that her (supposedly) autistic inlaws did not enjoy her "fun little day trips" or converse in exactly the way she expected/demanded at dinner. THAT is where NTs get very rigid about their social norms. I know it's hard to grasp, but the very notion of people with autism acting "oddly" (ie differently than expected) IS at its heart a problem of NT people having trouble when others don't follow their rules. Now of course, we can say that people with autism ought to be able to learn how to play by the rules to the extent they can - and I think I agree with this - but there is a tremendous irony at the heart of characterizing autistic people as "rigid" and ignoring the rigidity of the NT world - and the utter cruelty it can show towards people who do not conform. |
Anonymous
Well said. Another default system that reveals the "rigidity of the NT world" is the traditional school day (public and most privates). My kids are not ASD but have severe ADHD. Even after putting them on meds it became clear that although they were no longer disruptive in class (and the teachers were now happy) they were quietly miserable and not learning anything. My then 8 yo son would get off the bus looking like a 60 yo coming home from his decades-long 9-5 job. My kids still take some meds but now we hybrid-homeschooling. The academic day is short and they have some autonomy to pursue personal interests during the day. This is not a neurodiverse need, it's a human need. Meanwhile, as we get older my friends with NT kids are starting to see some of the anxiety associated with the traditional school day and tensions btwn homework and pursuing personal interests/free time (especially the girls and dealing with sophisticated social maneuvering). This is all "typical" but it's still a dysfunctional way to raise humans for the majority of their youth (I'd say about 20% of kids have unusually flexible and go with the flow personalities and will do well enough in any environment -- a minority, but a large enough one that helps maintain that status quo). When the neurodiverse leave mainstream schooling it's comforting to label it as "special needs," something that can't be accommodated when you're sufficiently meeting the needs of 80%. But most of these kids are just bellwethers for the NT kids. They actually cant "mask" their frustrations with the typical school day as well as NT kids. That's the difference. But eventually a lot of the NT kids stop being able to mask and frustration with their social and academic lives emerge. Not always at school, but definitely when they get home. Meanwhile, what kind of world does 13 formative years of being managed in a classroom look like when the kids become adults? In a word, rigid. School is a 7 hr/day, 13 year intervention. It's massive, even though we take it for granted. Now, I can have my kids opt out of participating. But they still have to live in a world where most of their peers have been raised in an environment that expects everyone to exist in lock-step. That's another big example of how the current environment exacerbates neurodiverse tendencies and makes them even more challenging than they might otherwise naturally be. It's a great system for people who thrive as middle-management and HR personnel, but doesn't play to more autonomous personality traits. |
Anonymous
Your dad is not all autistics. you seem pretty rigid thinking yourself. |
Anonymous
I don't know about the PPs dad but HFA dad's can definitely be caretakers. I have a friend whose husband is diagnosed. He was the primary breadwinner while is wife sah when the kids were little. During covid he sort of fell apart mentally and now she works full time and he is a sah dad. He doesn't do things like she would, but he makes it work and I've seen it first hand. |
Anonymous
For sure. This person though was commenting that she didn't believe another person's example. |
Anonymous
This was an insightful post. I'm newly posting, but I have a neurodiverse husband and daughter and I've had the same thoughts. It is a little bit tragic that they spent so many hours and years of their life in misery, not actually learning much, as intelligent as they are. And you are right, the percentage of kids for whom the current school system is actually a good fit, is probably pretty small. |
Anonymous
My marriage is solid, but is it fulfilling in and of itself? Absolutely not. I've had to adjust my expectations, and spend periods of time shifting my mindset to that of a single mother so I didn't get resentful for having expectations of a loving husband. I'm not suggesting that for you, but I think that was a necessary transition period for me to survive. I've had a full year of therapy now, and while our marriage is unchanged, it has really helped me 100 percent. a) to be heard, seen, understood by someone, to be able to share all of myself and my thoughts with someone and have it be considered, and accepted b) to work on my own deficits, issues, and communication challenges, lack of self care, and self esteem. c) to have a partner to be able to talk about things like the challenges of parenting with reason and good will. d) to help me understand that I have the power to make our marriage better fit my needs if I choose - but that the effort will need to come from me, because my husband sees nothing wrong with our relationship I'm able to recognize what my husband brings that make up for my deficits. He is stable, loyal, unchanging, he will never leave or stray, he is good at his job, he helps people through his job, he financially supports the family, he does not hold grudges, he has taught himself useful skills like home repair and minor construction, is very good at completing very long projects that take hundreds of hours, he is intellectually interesting, non-conforming, and incredibly intelligent in areas of his interest. If I do a good job of communicating my needs in a way that is very sensitive to his feelings, he is open to making an effort. It takes repetition, patience, and love. And it requires understanding that he goes through life always getting the message from everyone that he's not doing it right, that something is off with him, that he needs to change who he is, and that he's not doing enough, so every ask and request of him is like rubbing salt into his open wounds and he will react defensively because of it. I have and need supportive friends that give me the kind of understanding, encouragement and support, that I will never get from my husband, unless I give him explicit instructions on how he should do so. I take care of myself. I draw some boundaries and try to teach him to take care of himself with at least the basic things - he needs to be able to prepare a few meals, to be able to do his own laundry, take care of his own stuff, and manage communication and planning with seeing his side of the family and his own friends. This part took time and clear expectations and boundaries. |
