Trellekrona
New Member
** Long post ! **
Hi everyone, I am a self diagnosed Aspie and I have started sometime ago a relationship with a man who may potentially be an Aspie too and while everything at the beginning was great (lots ot abstracts topics to discuss together, lots of fun doing things that other people considered "boring"), we now reached a rocky patch and it is difficult to figure out what's going on.
I am here looking for some advice and to hear if anyone had similar stories.
I believe that one of reasons we fell in love with each other, is that we discovered that we had very similar "special interests", that is to say maths, anthropology, languages and philosophy (mostly asbtract stuff and "theory") and we found our discussions together very fullfilling. It was the first time (for both of us) that we had found someone with similar interests which would not get bored with our way of discussing... Aside from this we thought we were both sensitive and caring (in our ways) people, so we hit off.
Over time, for what I would call "extrinsec factors" to the relation, that is difficulties at work for me, difficulties adjusting to a new life for him (just divorced) and difficulties in having a long distance relation, problems started to show up all over the place.
Actually it's A problem.
At some point I was in need of being reassured about the solidity of the relation (I can become very clingy in relations and I get very scared about the fact that things can suddenly change. Since I notice even tiny changes in people's behaviour, I really need to know what do they mean, and where they can lead to, or I literally panic) and I could not get that from my partner.
First of all he would deny the small changes in his behaviour, but most importantly, when confronted more openly about his feelings he would shut down (mutism first, which would turn into anxiety, with some physical symptomos too). His behaviour (or even worse his random answers! He admitted later on to make things up just to stop me...) would trigger an even greater anxiety in me, with outburst of rage, which would obviously only scare him and it became impossible to discuss any "us" topic.
We are at a breaking point, but I am desperate to save things, because only very recently I have realised that I completely missed how painful his shutdowns were and I also understood that he had no idea about how painful my anxiety was. We could simply not overcome the: "Why doesn't he/she do/understand it?" (Talk/stop talking).
I guess we both wondered how two "clever" people (or this is how we are perceived by friends family etc.) could not get something so "obvious" or "simple" from the other's point of view.
Now my questions are:
1) Is anyone familiar with this situation, that is male with AS that shuts down and female with AS with rage outuburst (trying to predict what will happen) that presses him?
2) Any hope to fix it, now that we know that it's definitely our Achille's heel? (we did not even understand what was going on until very recently, everything just seemed out of control and now he is very very scared of the person he once loved...)
3) While I am quite sure about my AS (will get an official diagnosis maybe in a couple of weeks), I am still unsure about his, but I would like to hear the opinion of someone in the forum.
If he has AS, it's a mild form. Just like I did, he managed to compensate a lot for it and being both in the academic environment helped with our quirks.
When I met him, I noticed a complete absence of eye contact, a limited range of facial expressions, he finds it difficult to "smile" on request, e.g. for pictures. As a child he was quite lonely, sometimes bullied, interested mainly in planes and remote islands. Growing up his "special interests" became more academic, but I believe they still serve some soothing function. He needs time alone, enjoys nature and dislikes crowds. He likes to see things written down, needs sometimes instructions for simple things (I do too). He is not very "literal" (at least compared to me).
His previous relation was simple in the sense that his wife was a very practical person and would require him mainly to manage certain things in the house hold (although over time he suffered with the little time available for himself, having also kids to care for).
He's one of the few people who does not find my being so "logical" strange, except when it comes to feelings. He seems to function more normally then I do in that department, except for the shut downs.
In conclusion, I wonder if looking at THE problem in our relation as caused by the clash bewteen two strong features of a woman and a man both on the spctrum is reasonable or not.
Any comment/help/advice would be greatly appreciated!!
Hi everyone, I am a self diagnosed Aspie and I have started sometime ago a relationship with a man who may potentially be an Aspie too and while everything at the beginning was great (lots ot abstracts topics to discuss together, lots of fun doing things that other people considered "boring"), we now reached a rocky patch and it is difficult to figure out what's going on.
I am here looking for some advice and to hear if anyone had similar stories.
I believe that one of reasons we fell in love with each other, is that we discovered that we had very similar "special interests", that is to say maths, anthropology, languages and philosophy (mostly asbtract stuff and "theory") and we found our discussions together very fullfilling. It was the first time (for both of us) that we had found someone with similar interests which would not get bored with our way of discussing... Aside from this we thought we were both sensitive and caring (in our ways) people, so we hit off.
Over time, for what I would call "extrinsec factors" to the relation, that is difficulties at work for me, difficulties adjusting to a new life for him (just divorced) and difficulties in having a long distance relation, problems started to show up all over the place.
Actually it's A problem.
At some point I was in need of being reassured about the solidity of the relation (I can become very clingy in relations and I get very scared about the fact that things can suddenly change. Since I notice even tiny changes in people's behaviour, I really need to know what do they mean, and where they can lead to, or I literally panic) and I could not get that from my partner.
First of all he would deny the small changes in his behaviour, but most importantly, when confronted more openly about his feelings he would shut down (mutism first, which would turn into anxiety, with some physical symptomos too). His behaviour (or even worse his random answers! He admitted later on to make things up just to stop me...) would trigger an even greater anxiety in me, with outburst of rage, which would obviously only scare him and it became impossible to discuss any "us" topic.
We are at a breaking point, but I am desperate to save things, because only very recently I have realised that I completely missed how painful his shutdowns were and I also understood that he had no idea about how painful my anxiety was. We could simply not overcome the: "Why doesn't he/she do/understand it?" (Talk/stop talking).
I guess we both wondered how two "clever" people (or this is how we are perceived by friends family etc.) could not get something so "obvious" or "simple" from the other's point of view.
Now my questions are:
1) Is anyone familiar with this situation, that is male with AS that shuts down and female with AS with rage outuburst (trying to predict what will happen) that presses him?
2) Any hope to fix it, now that we know that it's definitely our Achille's heel? (we did not even understand what was going on until very recently, everything just seemed out of control and now he is very very scared of the person he once loved...)
3) While I am quite sure about my AS (will get an official diagnosis maybe in a couple of weeks), I am still unsure about his, but I would like to hear the opinion of someone in the forum.
If he has AS, it's a mild form. Just like I did, he managed to compensate a lot for it and being both in the academic environment helped with our quirks.
When I met him, I noticed a complete absence of eye contact, a limited range of facial expressions, he finds it difficult to "smile" on request, e.g. for pictures. As a child he was quite lonely, sometimes bullied, interested mainly in planes and remote islands. Growing up his "special interests" became more academic, but I believe they still serve some soothing function. He needs time alone, enjoys nature and dislikes crowds. He likes to see things written down, needs sometimes instructions for simple things (I do too). He is not very "literal" (at least compared to me).
His previous relation was simple in the sense that his wife was a very practical person and would require him mainly to manage certain things in the house hold (although over time he suffered with the little time available for himself, having also kids to care for).
He's one of the few people who does not find my being so "logical" strange, except when it comes to feelings. He seems to function more normally then I do in that department, except for the shut downs.
In conclusion, I wonder if looking at THE problem in our relation as caused by the clash bewteen two strong features of a woman and a man both on the spctrum is reasonable or not.
Any comment/help/advice would be greatly appreciated!!