Reply to How do you stay married to an ASD HFA Aspergers husband?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Hope someone sees my question and can answer.

If you have been in a long term marriage with someone with HFASD, I realize that labels weren't as ubiquitous or clear decades ago. There were only limited descriptors of autism,  codes,  therapy, symptoms. In fact, men who were in math and science,  engineering,  were completely lumped into a behavioral category of their own- completely accepted as normal- but not at all for women, interestingly enough. It's still that way somewhat. That, I believed helped define what autism could look like when we realized women presented neurodivergence differently.  Why? Women were not accepted in the same way as men.

So, if you, though, are married to a man who would be or is dxed with an ASD descriptor, what was his relationship with his parents? What kinds of things did they do for their son, or was it more of a codependency  where it was what it was and he was thought of  just as quirky? Was one of the parents also ASD?

How did it look going forward after your marriage with his parents?[/quote]

My husband's father clearly had ASD but was never diagnosed. He was a brilliant professor but had a hard time getting along with people. Always thought he was the best/smartest and everyone else was less so hence he never became chair of his dept even though he published a lot and brought a lot of grant money. He spent a lot of time doing solitary things at home like woodworking, writing books, etc.. My husband was either ignored by his dad or if they did something it was what his Dad wanted to do like help type up his rough drafts for manuscripts. He was also frequently teased by his Dad which bothered him a lot. His mom worked and basically adjusted her life to accomodate her husband. She did everything including cooking, mowing the lawn so he could tinker around doing his own things. She didn't really have time beyond providing the basic needs for him since she was so busy. Also, they never had company over which looking back should have been a red flag of being odd. I would say neither parent sought help for their kids (several have ASD features) and did not want to deal with any emotional/complicated issues. Buried their heads in the sand. This led to problems later on with their children including drugs, alcohol, depression/anxiety, and even suicide for one. I realize my husband wanted a wife like his mom who made money/took care of everything but also provided his emotional needs. Problem is when you don't have much help at home and your own kid has ASD there's only so much energy to go around. Thankfully, we have financial resources to get help but the day-to-day task of coordinating care for an ASD child is like being a CEO of their corporation. There's a lot of time involved. At least he recognizes the way his family handled things with their kids was wrong. I only hope that our kid has a better outcome because of all the intensive work being done now while they are young. Breaking the cycle from the past.[/quote]

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