21 Jul 2011, 10:07 am
When I say he is obsessed with money, I mean all he does is worry himself about retirement. He just landed a new job and is currently making 215,000 a year. I only give the amount so you can understand why 70 dollars per week is ridiculous. I have 3 young kids who stay home with me, a gas guzzling minivan and struggle to survive on so little. He isnt home during the day and cant fathom why I would need any more money than that. When he needs the money its always available, but when I do, he gives me a million questions about why i shouldnt be spending. It is like he can not understand that people have needs unlike his own. I get so frustrated.
I dont know if i can do this much longer. I try to tell him how im feeling and only get met with resistance. Last night we went to a San Francisco Giants game with the kids and the whole night he only said 3 words to me. "Hold my backpack". The entire outing was over 6 hours and thats all I got. I ran behind him to catch the train, since he never even thinks to walk next to me. I'm always chasing him, figuatively and literally. When I told him this morning that at wish we could talk more he got really angry and lashed out saying, "here we go again!" He slammed the door and told me Im so needy. I really try and let him in on my feelings and he doesnt seem to care. Its like if he had a diagnosis i could understand, but if he doesnt, then it makes him just a plain old A$$^$^*!
Im so frustratedA lot of this sounds very similar to me.
Money is an issue for me as far as trusting someone else with it! Now, I mihgt make some mistakes, but I'm not going to let somebody else screw it up for me or separate me from it in the name of love...(whatever that is). People also say I walk too fast. I prefer to walk alone. I keep telling people that I don't have the same desire for a relationship that others, like themselves, do. But nobody seems to believe me.
I'm not gonna' go into a dissertation on it, but I will tell you that you will gain some very useful insights from Rudy Simone! Go to List of Asperger's Traits! I think you will find this interesting; it was eye-opening for me
Also, she has a book titled, 22 Things A Woman Must Know If she Loves A Man With Asperger's Syndrome!
I really hope this helps you and your relationship with your husband.
21 Jul 2011, 12:53 pm
There are extremely successful people with Asperger's. Bill Gates and Steven Spielberg both have it. While it is common for AS to make it difficult to become employed, it is not at all impossible to have a highly-paid job. If your husband were a salesman or a politician, I might doubt AS; but having master's degrees is par for the course--we tend to be quite good at learning in our areas of interest, and if those areas of interest are academic, we can excel in them.
The Gates/Spielberg thing is assumed, not accepted fact, I believe, but the remainder of the paragraph is absolutely true. Some psychologists are either poorly educated on this subject, or are simply going to deny a diagnosis due to the fact they don't see any benefit to assigning one.
Many autistic people don't know that typical people constantly need their relationships reaffirmed. It took me a while to realize this, myself: After you tell someone you love them once, they know you love them. However, they still want to be told, constantly, as though they did not know.
His being undemonstrative, you interpreted as his not loving you because that is what it would mean coming from an NT. He may have interpreted your demands for conversation as being annoying because he sees conversation as a way of exchanging information rather than a way of affirming a relationship.
Read that again.
And again.
I only recently (at 35) have come to see this / to realize that I was failing to do this / that it was destroying the women I was with. I fully feel that if [woman] tell me once that [she] love me, It lasts until [she] say otherwise. Therefor it is not something that needs to be reaffirmed or reminded. Oops.
I do now understand (at least on a data specific level) that a typical woman needs updates and reminders on the state of the relationship on a very frequent basis. Also that she needs reminders and assurances of her ongoing beauty and appeal, etc. To me, these kinds of reminders feel like "overkill" but then again, I'm not society's "normal".
So don't let his lack of attention to these details allow you to feel "less of a woman" but do seek couples therapy and tell him, point blank (because we Aspies often miss "beating around the bush" attempts to communicate) that you need these things - and then have the therapist insist that these are NORMAL female/relationship needs... have the therapist sell him a book on the topic. Because boyo ain't gonna believe it coming from you alone (no offense intended by me or by him, it's just a part of being male?).
Ps - Bravo Callista. Well versed post.
21 Jul 2011, 1:09 pm
As for the rest of it...
Grab his hand when he walks too fast.
Provide bills and receipts to demonstrate costs. Put them in a nice neat data table.
Provide a cost list of what you would do if you DID manage to get 150$ out of him:
Demonstrate how it would benefit the family.
Mind you, at this point, you need to consider if he will change, or if the relationship has been in this rut for too long. Sometimes if you don't catch a thing early and fix it, it can't be fixed at all (due to someone getting too defensive/agressive about change).
You've already had one "fling" to get the "feeling a connection" - and you say you still need more of that feeling (how very normal of you! 
) so consider ways to get that. Consider that you need it to be happy. Test to see if it's possible.
Demand couples therapy. Have two or three therapists in mind, and on standby. Have a budget/cost/financial table ready for the discussion. Have it written down (even if only in a diary shoved in the matress at your sister's house in the arctic, and written in lemon juice ink) that your marriage needs fixing and that in order to do that, it's gotten to the point where if he stands in the way of that, he's asking for trouble.
And be ready for him to be defensive/objecting/etc. And don't take it too hard. And don't let him get away with it longterm - maybe short term. Maybe don't even make it a discussion, make it a note to him - a letter sealed and left on the table for him to find friday and you're gone to your sister's for the weekend by the time he finds it. Make SURE you include the finance costs of therapy, and the facts (write the words "indisputable fact" in your letter) that you believe neither of you is happy at the moment, but that you want to "save the marriage". Even the blindest man can't miss the implications of that one.)
-- Take as much or as little as you think is appropriate, please - I've often been told that my posts can sound like demands: they aren't intended to come across that way, but it may have. S'only suggestions/opinion - MJHL
21 Jul 2011, 5:27 pm
22 Jul 2011, 2:45 pm
22 Jul 2011, 6:41 pm
22 Jul 2011, 8:01 pm
Wow, thank you so very much for the message! It was great advice and very enlightening for me. When you said to provide receipts and demonstrate costs in a neat table, it made me laugh because that is precisely what I have to do. I always thought it was a control issue, needing to know where every penny went. Although I think it is a little still, you opened my eyes to how he "works". I finally demanded a certain amount of money each month that is mine to do what I please with, but everything else HAS to have receipts in carefully organized envelopes for him to "audit".
I honestly hope that it isnt too late. Sometimes I think it is. I do still really have that need for connection, which I try to find through friends. Yes, it is a struggle, as it is totally human of me to want to "feel" loved, appreciated, valued and beautiful. I keep myself busy with my three little boys, who love me dearly and shower me with lots of hugs and kisses! Sometimes i just sit in the bathroom and cry, knowing that I will never have the warmth of a man's affection. I know he loves me, he takes good care of his family, has more integrity than anyone else I know, which are all the traits I hold close to my heart to keep me from leaving.
I dont think your posts sounds like demands at all, I think they are extremely helpful and I really appreciate them!!
I think you might really benefit from Rudy Simone's book. And you have the support of people here
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