Is it possible my wife has asperger syndrome?

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hello all.

the following is a list of behaviors that have emerged in the past year or so. they all sort of came to a head this past weekend and her reactions made me search the internet for some method to her mind. i ran across a detailed paper discussing asperger syndrome and it was almost as if i was reading something about my wife.

could some one take the time to read through the bullet points below and tell me if AS could be involved. i apologize for them not being in any particular order. i am just going to list them as they come.

- my wife is a workaholic and obsessed with success and the recognition thereof by her peers.
- she is very disorganized.
- she cannot read even a short article.
- she sometimes says there her mind is like a television with every channel turned on.
- she seems to be hypersensitive to certain smells and sounds. i sometimes joke about her having superhuman hearing and smell. it can sometimes be very annoying when she angrily exclaims to me that whatever it was i just heated up in the microwave, i can never have it again.
- she is obsessed with keeping lists. she has many notepads with every page used for some sort of list and she never will throw any of them away.
- she is a packrat and never throws anything away.
- her conversations with me are not like anyone i have ever known. her stories are very detailed and completely drawn out. she repeats those stories time and time again. i can talk to her on the phone in the morning and the afternoon and then again at night and it will be mostly the same conversation.
- it is very difficult for me to talk about what i want to talk about.
- she can watch movies over and over and over again. it's as if she is watching it for the first time.
- when she gets her mind set on a project she learns everything about it. example: we built a house in New York. she now knows more about bathroom and kitchen fixtures than the person we bought them from and she retains all of that information.
- she has a difficult time "getting" jokes. i have to explain even the simplest ones to her more than 2 or 3 times.
- i accidentally may have thrown away her favorite pair of bikini bottoms. she throws a wild almost violent tantrum when she thinks about it. she screamed at me the other night "you just do not understand what the thought of something of mine sitting in a dumpster somewhere does to my mind!! !" she threw things, hitting things; it was the wildest thing i think i have ever seen.
- something similar happened awhile back when i accidentally put something of hers in the dryer and it shrunk them. when i explained how i did not get upset when she ruined 2 of my shirts by doing the same thing, she seemed to not even understand her hypocrisy.
- she gets very, very upset when things to not go according to plan (even the slightest of plans). example: throwing a minor tantrum when we miss a shuttle bus to an airport terminal, even though we have plenty of time to catch the next one.
- she will never pick up after herself.
- she reacts in a way that i would expect a 5 year old to react to certain situations. from the tantrums she throws from time to time all the way to the way her PB and J sandwich is prepared.
- she has hardly any personal friends outside of work and family.
- her conversations with others are centered around her work most of the time.


let me know if any additional information is needed. your thoughts are appreciated. i will respond with more if i think of anything.

ok som eis very aspie....others could be attention defiscit...also she may have mild to moderate depression from coping with the aspiness.
i would ask her or discover what her parents were like, if she has it is is likelt from her fathrther.
also how does she cope with a death in he family...distant and aloof............aspie...or emotional distraught.........normal grief.?

Hi,

Sounds familiar --- let me ask you this -- are you happy?

I am the aspie half of a similar pair. If not happy -- as or no as will affect how you work things out.

If happy - there is less work and you can go with flow.

Might be good to read something about theory of mind (the major symptom of AS)

Yeah, and maybe some OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) or OCPD (Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder) as well.

Glad you could make the marriage work out anyway.

since we have been together, i have experienced 2 deaths in her family. one was her 80+ year old granfather who had been very very sick for many years and the other was her 16+ year old pet that was very very sick the last couple years.

in both instances she was extremely emotionally distraught. ironically, i found that suprising considering the full life and the end to a painful sickness for both. i would have expected at least some level of relief but there was not any, just emotional pain and depression on her part.

ok, im not convinced it is all aspie..mebe a mixture...but im a vet not a shrink..see someone who knows.
good luck dude.
se sounds liek she needs help you sound frustrated but like you still care.

Coolmel, men with your quantity of patience are hard to find.

As soon as possible, find a gentle way to get your wife to go with you to a doctor before things get totally out of hand.

Be strong, it takes two hands to clap.

I'm not a professional either, but my take on her is, much more OCD than aspie.

A suggestion - can you expose her to some literature describing Aspergers? Most of us recognize ourselves in that right off the bat. There are also a host of on-line tests that could be helpful.

Best of luck to you both.

I'm not a professional, but I am an Aspie, and I used to do all that stuff.......and believe me, it's not fun being the Aspie part of that couple.....I probably drive my wife nuts. But I've had it all my life (and I'm not young), and maybe she's just a perfectionist.

On the pets. Wait until you lose one (not trying to be cruel). On the 80+ relative.....that's a very hard one. Been there done that...twice..... and it'll never go away. But all in all, I manage my problems with some pretty good drugs, and a therapist, and it doesn't work for everyone, but it works for me.

Psychiatrists are not witch doctors.

Give it a try.
btdt

- My husband was a workaholic.
- Very disorganized.
- He wouldn't sit still to read things (with the exception of one favorite subject) especially true for instructions on anything....he would want me to read them and explain everything to him.
- He would keep notes on everything.
- Packrat.... probably, I would say.
- He would usually get on one subject and dwell there.
- Never sure if he would get the joke or think it was directed in some way at him.
- Reminded of things I threw away by mistake constantly...always accused me of doing it on purpose, even if he told me sometimes to throw something away, he would later sometimes say he didn't.
- I always shrunk his clothes in the wash...I couldn't wash clothes "right".
- "she gets very, very upset when things to not go according to plan"...he would get angry, furious...
- "she will never pick up after herself."....no, that was my job.
- "she reacts in a way that i would expect a 5 year old to react to certain situations."
- "she has hardly any personal friends outside of work and family."
- "her conversations with others are centered around her work most of the time."...his were centered around his one favorite interest.

All I can say is he is my ex...good luck to you...I hope you can find some answers, I couldn't and it just got worse.

The two thing that I noticed that seem contrary to AS DX is...you said that the behavior was recent?
Signs of AS start presenting in childhood(can you run this by her parents?)I do think that some people with AS "learn" how to cope in the world and may only exhibit "signs" under stress?

I cant relate to her workaholism unless it is in an area of her particular obsession.It seems like alot of the aspies how write about there work on this forum are very good and focused workers(as long as there aren't sensory overloads or to much socializing required).But they dont seem to be motivated to do so for financial reasons or to gain approval of their co-workers...seems to be more internal then external motivation.

Packrat...lots of reasons behind this.I could throw away my cloths but not my stuffed animals,art collection,objects of obsession(books,rocks)I also tend to hold on to somethings because I have been poor my whole life and I might need these items(depression era mentallity)Point being,a behavior is only important in the context of the internal dialogue that motivates the behavior.


Depression can be anger turned inwards...likewise....anger can be depression turned outwards...she may feel very stressed and sad and not be able to admit these feelings.

Death...I dont care how old my pet was I would be sad for "myself"...not being able to get comfort from the "friend"....of course "intellectually" I would not want some one I love to live in suffering but emotionaly ....I would still grieve for my own loss of their company...

If you think the DX fits her....do some more research....talk to her parents about thing they may have noticed as she was grwing up....it does seem like "something" is going on that she needs help with and its good that she has someone who wants to help and understand.

to all,

thanks so much for all of your responses. i have decided that some time in the near future i will introduce the topic of asperger syndrome to my wife.

i do have an issue though. my wife knows 'coolmel' is a nick i use (im stupid for using it, i realize that now). and, if our initial discussion peeks her interest even in the slightest she will scower the web for any mention of the topic and absorb every detail in very short order. i would hate to dissapoint her by her realizing i posted such a scpecifc account of her behavior.

does anyone know how i can go about getting this thread deleted?

thanks again.

Ask Alex.