Desire Acknowledgment of my Accomplishments

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I am a wife of somewhat sketchy neruopathy (non-NT) who has been married to an Aspie for 3 years. I was somewhat severely socially disabled as a child and have made gigantic leaps and bounds within the past 6 years toward being a highly-functioning normal-enough-to-get-by human being. I'm very proud of how far I have come and how hard I have worked but it seems like no one (other than my mom) knows how difficult it has been for me.

Currently, I work full time and completely support my husband who is aspie enough to be unable to find or keep a job. I'm in charge of all the finances and I have set up a strict savings plan that has allowed us to finally purchase our first house. This is a huge accomplishment and was brought about by 100% my own effort. My husband has been emotionally damaged by mistreatment at the hands of NTs his whole life and is presently not able to handle any amount of stress at all. The only thing he has to deal with is playing video games which he takes very seriously and causes him to become upset and stressed out. He's on medication for anxiety and depression but these only work for a couple of weeks before they have to "up" the dose. We have not yet found something able to give him long-term stability. He doesn't drive so I take him to his doctor's appointments every few weeks and this causes me to miss work on many occasions. My my boss is extremely understanding and they are still very happy with my work but my personal sense of responsibility is stung by these frequent departures. On top of that, I am also responsible for cooking meals and the housework. I ask my husband to do things sometimes but that makes me feel guilty too because I know that his life is really difficult for him and I try my best to make his life as easy as possible. For that reason I do not like to add extra responsibility and stress to him. But, the past 3 weeks in particular, I am feeling really burned out and I just don't feel like I can continue to handle all of these things on my own. I never wanted children. I want an equal partner who will share responsibility with me and work equally hard. I don't blame my husband for any of his issues, I know that it is all beyond his control but still it feels more like I have a child than a partner. To be fair, he does walk the dogs once a day and cooks a simple supper (ramen, mac'n cheese, spaghetti) perhaps a couple of times a week and recently he has started tutoring a highschool student 1 hour a week for a small amount of income, which is great! But, to the contrary, I get up at 6-7 a.m. and am usually not finished with the things I need to do until 12-1 a.m. Most of the time I try to be very supportive of my husband and when he says he is upset, I take care of everything for him and deliver his supper and a drink to his desk and perform "other" actions (hint, hint) in an attempt to make him happy. I am not resentful of this at all. But what DOES bother me is that when I come home stressed out from work I am rarely given the same treatment.. last week he told me to "Stop yapping at him" when I was trying to ask him what he wanted for supper and I had already told him I was pretty stressed out..

Regardless, this post is not with the intention of complaining about my husband. The examples above are just to illustrate some of the things that I feel difficulty in handling. The things that I have accomplished would have been difficult enough for me to do on my own, much more so with supporting an entire second person. When I was a child (actually right up until I turned 20) I could not even carry on a conversation with anyone or look anyone in the eye. My mother thought that I was so much in "lala land," as she put it, that I would never even be able to drive a car. Now here I am with a good job and my very own house, not to mention that I had to move cross-continent and handle immigration to a new country (and a HUGE climate change) to even be with my husband in the first place. I've accomplished a lot for even a regular person! Nevermind a person with severe anxiety toward change, a difficulty starting new projects and identifying steps, and numerous social difficulies. Compared to everyone I know, we are dirt poor. And yet, we have accomplished more financial milestones than many of them and we are completely debt-free other than the mortgage. This leads me to conclude that most people would be unable to handle living on what we do since they can barely handle living on twice what we do.

Honestly, what I want is validation. I just want someone to pat me on the shoulder and say "Wow, you sure have a lot to deal with. You are doing so well at handling all of this!" I just want some acknowledgement of my accomplishments. I don't think very many people would have put themselves through the things I've done. No one in my new life has any idea of what I was like as a child, what I've had to overcome, or how much I have changed. Or maybe I am just being arrogant and my life is not that hard at all. Who knows?

Hey Myth,

It's great that you've looked after your husband for so long but by doing so much he'll never improve, if he's feeling depressed maybe he wants to become more independent yet is struggling to do so?

I know how much you have accomplished, because I have accomplished much too (not the debt-free thing, unfortunately). To the rest of the world, we may seem like failures since we are financially poor, but amongst ourselves, we are amazing.

I am also the main breadwinner of my household. My husband has some kind of mental thing the matter with him but he won't seek professional help so I don't know for sure what.

Congratulations on buying a home. And especially, congrats on being able to provide stability.

Thank you

Nushidorei - yes, he is not happy with the way things are and expresses feelings of "uselessness" to me frequently. He used to handle more sorts of things a few years ago so it is either that the struggle to do those things has left him completely burnt out for many years or it is this battle with depression that is leeching all of his motivation. He does seem a lot better for a couple of weeks when he is on the newest dose of medication so I hope that we will find something that will help him long term and he can start to put his life back together, maybe. But regardless of what he does or doesn't do, I feel that it is my job to do as much as I can to help him and our little family. It just gets tiring sometimes.

Wow, you are really amazing!! !

I learned in high school how to act "normal" (ironic as that may seem--is anyone "normal" in high school?), but I have a really hard time multitasking, and so I can't imagine being able to manage a full-time job / housekeeping / caregiving / money management etc. in the way that you have done. When I am working more, the housekeeping gets neglected etc., and I am a terrible cook--can't even seem to follow a recipe without getting lost! I really admire you for putting in the effort. You will reap enormous benefits down the road, having gotten such a conscientious start. You are also really lucky to have a very understanding employer--it makes a huge difference. I wish more employers understood how far a little flexibility goes toward building employee loyalty.

Now that you have some degree of stability, you might consider easing up on yourself a bit. I realized very recently that my efforts to be "normal" and keep everything together were actually exacerbating my level of stress, and leading to increasingly worse meltdowns. Stress can also lead to depression, and if it seems as if everything starts to feel a bit too much, you're at risk for depression yourself, especially if you don't feel supported or validated. Try to talk with someone you trust who might be able to give you a sense of which jobs / activities are really necessary on a daily basis, and try to pare down your responsibilities to allow yourself time to relax.

Also, a word about meds--especially antidepressants. Many years before my current therapist mentioned Asperger's, I was diagnosed bipolar and put on several successive medications for that--all of which had side effects which affected massively my personality, my ability to act rationally, and my awareness of reality (one even gave me hallucinations). A few years later a counselor tested me for ADD and prescribed something for that--it increased my general focus but made me feel very angry for no good reason. If you suspect that your husband's behavior isn't natural or healthy even considering his difficulties, it might be time to question the meds. From what I've read, it seems that many Aspies can't handle even half the typical dose of a medication, much less continually increased dosages. I've certainly found that to be true in my own case.

Be certain, too, that you are also praising your husband when he has made an effort to help--this is something that I find I do not do enough of, even though I often long for reassurance / recognition myself. Saying something encouraging does two things: a) it gives your husband the example about how praise operates, which he may never have had a chance to learn; and b) he may find he really likes that acknowledgement, and may become increasingly eager to do more whenever he is able. Funnily enough, I hear even NTs complaining that their husband seems more like one of their children than an actual partner much of the time, and I know that I have felt that way about mine, although I must admit he has more cause to feel that way about me much of the time!

Everyone here will agree I am sure, that you have indeed made tremendous strides and many of us will envy you the progress you have made! Congratulate yourself for all of us, and take a little time to treat yourself now and again. You are doing very well and you deserve it!

PS--I hate that expression, "la-la land." I heard it a lot from my mother, too. What does it mean anyway? What is a "la-la"?

Thanks for the input, I appreciate all the comments

I do try to thank him and tell him I really appreciate it any time he does anything around the house, like you said it can be hard sometimes.

In regards to medication, he's always been one of those that is highly resistant to everything, even ibuprophen. The depression, feelings of worthlessness, nightmares, outbursts of anger.. etc were occuring before the medication and were actually our motivation for even getting him to try them and they do seem to help for a little while. He is definately more well-adjusted while on them.. until they wear off that is. But, then again, so far his Dr. has only tried the mild non-addicting kind. He starts his first dose of anti-psychotics today and I hope it will have more positive effects than negative.

P.S. I don't mean to imply that I actually SUCCEED in keeping my house clean XD I do what I can but it is difficult to do it all, as has been mentioned. I said that I am RESPONSIBLE for the house cleaning, not that I actually do it I'm certainly not faultless or even all that hard-working of a person. I am actually quite lazy and I just want to sit and do nothing. Which is part of the reason I'm so stressed by all my responsibility! I just feel like I've done pretty darn well for what life (and my own choices) has dealt me.

Here is an electronic pat on the back.

You have done awesome and it is super-wonderful to get well deserved praise for what you have done. I hope that you do not allow people to diminish the wonderful accomplishments you have.

I think you need this validation from him and others who are close to you.

I think you know you have done a lot - but I think for this to really sink in for you, that it needs to come from him and others.