Dear ex-NT Partner
I'm truly sorry it didn't work out.
You asked me to be more communicative with you, but I really truly, honestly was communicating with you to the best of my ability. I tried all the exercises and tips and tricks given to me by the various councilors - but in your eyes nothing changed. My AS makes my mind a messy place and I realise just how little emotional intelligence I have to enable me to articulate the type of communicate you demand from me, Your resentment and anger towards me during the major recent upsets in my life coloured all your interactions with me - at a time I needed more than anything for you to be understanding and not hostile... and I needed to be touched and held by you... But you couldn't do that,
You needed me to have the same sexual libido as you, but I can't - just can't - live inside a sexless marriage where the rare instances of physical intimacy we share, you are only into it 1 in every 3 encounters. I need you to want to be with me, to need me as much as I need to be with you, I need to touch, I need you to enjoy the emotions as much as I do when we are together, I need to be close, I need you to be one who initiates occasionally, I need with you much more than that. I lost that essential connection to you that kept the love alive. You became a room mate. A friend without benefits. You told me it was totally up to me to woo you... but maybe it should have been more of a 2 way street.
I hated the bickering between us, and I hated my meltdowns due to many of those arguments. More than anything I hated our children seeing it. You would shout and show so much disrespect towards me... both in your tone of voice, your posturing and subject matter... so condescending, treating me like a child and talking down to me. In front of our children!?! I needed our children to experience a calm and happy family life, but they weren't seeing that. It was unfair to them. It's unfair for them to see their parents arguing and to see their father in the states he was reduced to. I tried so hard to hide my negative AS traits from our children, and you were making it harder and harder to do so.
I didn't feel welcome in my own home. I didn't feel like a good father. I didn't feel like a good husband. I didn't feel like a good person.
It didn't matter how much you tried to make it all pretty... the home... the outward image of our relationship... it felt like a facade, a mask... a mask I could no longer wear. Despite what I said, I do still love you - but I can't live with you anymore.
I hope one day our children will forgive me for leaving you. It was the hardest decision I have ever made. I didn't want this for them. And despite everything in relation to us, to the kids you are an amazing mother. I can't ever fault you for that. But you and the kids will be better off without me on a day to day basis.
There are times when I hate my AS. And right now I hate it more than anything. Perhaps, like so many other people with AS I know, I am just better on my own.