was my ex wife aspergers? need answers

Post Reply New Topic

hello,I need some help and advice on something that is bothering a lot. My ex wife and I never could communicate well or develop true intimacy. My therapist in discussing my history and marriage suggested my ex might have had Aspergers. For my part I was DX bipolar 2 to bipolar1 after reaction to antidepressants. I was a high functioning BP. Not a good combination for partners that had no DX or idea of what was going on.I just would like some insight so I can have another piece of the puzzle as to what was going on. Here is some information on her.She is a manager at a hospital and very good and successful at her work.Traits and possible symptoms:1. Very shy quiet and reserved.2. Very picky eater. Could pick out minced onions out of food literally.Food could not touch on plate. Food textures bothered her.3. Very very good at math.4. Very ritualistic, habitual, structured. Would freak out or very anxious if time or schedule was off.5. No friends or at least close ones.6. Her family and her described as strange, different, odd by many.7. Noticed license plates often, but not always, but seemed excited topoint them out occasionally.8. Very limited interests.9. Emotionally seemed like a machine, Spock or Vulcan like10. Fascinated how i could roll my eyes and she could not.11. Had some trouble with jokes or sarcasism.12. HAS ULCERLATED COLITUS!13. Some adversion to eye contact, noticed this alittle.14. Clothes always similar and simple.15. Campfire cigarette smoke drove her crazy.16. Light awkward hugs, rarley intiated them.17. Emotionally flat or subdued.18. Sex was very mechanical, little reciprocation or none. always wantedto hurry get it over with. Never touched me on her own for 15 years!Never spontanious or creative. Very awkward with her19. Very stubburn and rigid in beliefs and ideas.20. Ver very organized, seemed to get hyper when organizing.21. Almost never got excited.22. Cold and subtily condisending at times.23. Very logical flat in express often.24. Hard for her to laugh or laugh reserved or held back often.25. Back rubs from her very short, mechanical, reserved. Physical contact seemed awkward or held back.26. Authoritarian.27. Rarely apologized, seemed she had to be right or deflect if not right on something.28. Hated deep thought or discussions. Never showed much interest in my interests.29. Very detailed good memory like a computer. I could never win a arguement.30. Some people seemed not like her because of her odd strangeness.31. Seemingly not very nurturing to our children at times. sort of coldand matter of fact to them. Does not cuddle often, goes in spurts.Our daughters talk about this a lot. I am a cuddler and hugger.This is a description of many of her symptoms abd habbits. Some are more noticable than others but enough to see and notice. Some of these are subtle at times. Any help would be greatly appreciated. My therapist noted she my be aspergers. It distresses me greatly if this might be the case and I didn't know. But it also is some comfort that it is not my imagination and some comfort it was not all me like she made me feel at times. She is a good mother and person really. But something is odd and not right. Her father and mother is somewhat odd to.Thank you very much!Mindy1963

Ah, welcome
it sounds like she may be an aspie
also fits for schizoid, you may want to do some research on it.

The ulcerated-colitis bit is nonsense, a leftover from Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent MMR study. If your therapist believes there's a connection, that's a sign that he or she doesn't much keep up with research on AS/autism and is kind of flaky.

Beyond that...you know, does it matter? If the question is "why did she treat me that way, was it my fault or was it just her" -- I'm reminded of the time I asked my ex-husband's therapist whether my ex's behavior was a function of illness or jerkiness. "No way to know," he said. I think that's accurate. If you want to live peaceably, particularly if you don't have to deal with her now, I'd suggest ascribing her behavior to some benign agent along the "she couldn't help it, but it wasn't about me" lines, because that's probably the happiest story you can have, and you'll never know what really happened.

Hello again,
I sent a thank you on pm, not sure if it got thru, so I will try this.
website still a little confusing as I am new here.
Never thought of schzoid approach. Does sound a somewhat similar.
Wish I would have been aware of this before.
I have BP1 thanks to Zoloft that sent me on my 1st mania ride.
So I had my own issues of course. Thanks again dear for your prompt response.

Best wishes and thank you!

Let's say she very likely is on the spectrum, and you were unaware of this. If so, that's just how it was. You didn't know better then, nor did she. You are striving to replace your current distress with understanding. Good move. Good for you. You had your own issues to cope with. What happened happened.

When we know better, we do better.

Wow B19, thank you for your response. Well said and very true, I think I bled my emotions out a little too much on my myself. I just heard about aspergers connected to her recently. It is just that I have never been able to piece together some of her odd habits so now maybe I have a possible answer. Yes I need to get over it and you have made very valid good points and observations. Thank you for your advice and quick reply.

Thank you tarantella64. Actually my therapist didn't mention the GI issue.
I heard that somewhere and then researched it on internet. I know it is not researched officially or proven.
I just saw many references to it and you most likely know more about this than I do. Sorry if I seemed a little bold on this. As for your advice on just letting things be and let I go you are right. I know diagnoses tend to boxed in or catergorized behaviors on people too often and I agree to this a lot of times. Being BPI see and realize this.
Thanks for your input and advice:)

she seems to have some of the symptoms. she could have AS, in my humble opinion. I'm not a qualified mental health professional.

Are you intending on getting back together with her? If not, I wouldn't dwell on it because it doesn't matter. It's in the past and it has already happened, you didn't know, she didn't know. I sometimes wonder if my ex boyfriend's excuses were genuine but back then I didn't know either despite him having excuses for his excuses and back then I just thought they were excuses so he wouldn't have to do things and so I could be his mother and cab driver. But I will never know. Part of me still thinks he tried to get his way out of things just so he wouldn't have to do it and I always took away his excuses by giving him solutions and he always blew them off and didn't want help or to get better. What made me realize if his "excuses" may have been real? Reading posts online and some of them remind me of my ex. But it's ironic that someone with a disability would think another person is making stuff up about their problems because they have never met anyone with those issues or ever experienced them themselves. I am sure people have thought I was making my issues up when I would explain it to them because they remained ignorant. But yet me being in special ed and having an aid wasn't enough for them to know. Just something people with invisible disabilities deal with. But I tell my self it doesn't matter because I will never get back with my ex and we weren't right for each other anyway and things didn't work out.

No I have no plans of us getting back together. I don't think she was doing it to be mean, I just think she didn't know she was doing it....unaware. I know with bipolar how you don't realize at times your behavior changes or shifts. I was a high functioning bipolar and not dx'd till in my mid 40's. Zoloft and about 5 major life changing crises in the span of a 12 months toppled me..divorce, both parents ill at same time, caring for them, then finding my father dead in their house, and there was more than those events to. I was never out of control but had some hypomania that made me extremely productive. As a example my hypomania was my imagined baseline for my personality, just part of me and engrained in my personality. I was unaware and had no clue of this.
As for your partner and excuses, like I have been told and you know, it just didn't work and sometimes there are no answers. I guess I am too analytical for my own good and tend to blame myself too much. But it is funny that my daughters point out some of the things I noticed. In fact their innocent observations made me realize it wasn't just me noticing things about their mothers behavior. Of course I don't discuss this with them I just say she shows love in a different way, but loves you just the same. Strange world we live in! Good luck and thanks:)