If you lived with your father growing up...

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... how was your relationship with him?

Thinking about my (admittedly small) group of friends, hardly anyone had a good relationship with their father, whether they were autistic or not.

My own father was honest and hard-working and sober and he never abused me physically or sexually. I never wanted for clothes or food or pocket money.

I don't get the impression that he liked me at all though. He never encouraged me to do anything (he only encouraged me NOT to do things). He never, never praised my achievements. He never wanted to spend time with me. He laughed at everything I liked and all my fears and foibles. He laughed his head off whenever I got hurt. I wasn't the son he wanted. Maybe because I was an Aspie and was introverted and timid and bookish and wasn't the tough, sporty kind of guy he admired he just lost interest in me.

I get the feeling that he was really bitter at life - he was the less favoured and less fortunate of two sons. He was called up in WW2 instead of receiving an education. I feel that he kind of took his frustrations out on me- perhaps not intentionally but I still got damaged. He died when I was 20 years old so I never got to know him as an adult really.

I'm now middle aged aged and have pitifully low self-esteem. I can't believe in myself at all. I feel that a lot of the problems where caused by my early relationship with my father although I don't think it was deliberate. He just passed on his own hurt.

Can anybody else relate or did anyone's father really support them? Thanks.

Sounds normal for someone of your age.

Your Dad probably was bitter at life and he probably was unloved as a child himself.

He probably didn't connect with you.

Just be grateful that he didn't hurt you and he gave you what you needed materialistically.

I would think that he did love you somewhere deep down on some kind of level.

God bless you.

Oh soz, I didn't answer your question.

I didn't see my dad after I was about 10 and he's dead now so I never really got a chance to take him for granted.

He was my stepdad as my biological dad is also dead.

I loved him very much and I know that he loved me as well.

He used to call me his little sparrow.

Maybe he was an "aspie" also. There is a genetic component to Autism and you did write about some "inappropriate" communication styles. At that time there was no way for it to be diagnosed and living in a world you don't understand certainly can make one bitter towered life. I did not know him and might be totally wrong but it's a thought.

As for my dad I highly suspect he is on the spectrum. It was and is not a stereotypical father-son relationship with a lot more of each doing our own thing then usual but it is anything but hostile.

my dad and i get along fairly well, we have a lot of the same kind of interests in things, like computers, i've learned a good portion of my programming and technical knowledge from him, and we share a dislike for the extroverted, sporty things. he always treats me normally, very laid back, intelligent, kind.

i think i'm lucky in this respect, i see many of my friends' fathers who i would hate to be around growing up.

Kinda strained but peaceful at the same time, like a love-hate relationship. Lots of respect, but he tries to get under my skin a lot, and there seems to be an ego and personality clash.

I have a good relationship with my parents. They are both laid-back and caring.

My father and I are very different. He is non-autistic and out-going. I'm sure at some stage in my life he must have been rather disappointed at me. But he was never critical or negative about it. As weird as I am, he accepts me as I am.

My father had hyperfocus and when he was hyperfocused on me, it was the best!

He was warm, loving, tender, brilliant and funny.

When his laser focus was on me, it was like all the best things in life at once. But when that attention left, it left abruptly and utterly. It was if the sun was suddenly extinguished in the middle of a summer's day. It was like being cast into absolute darkness, desolation, and cold and being utterly alone.

And he could pursue something he was deeply into for days or weeks during which time I would barely see him and he sometimes forgot my name and all the details about me. That was crushing, suddenly being a nobody. But then he would come out of that place and be there again, and it was right back to the bright warm day.

I knew without doubt that he loved me, despite his erratic availability.

When he was about to die and knew it, he told me that he was worried that he hadn't adequately prepared me for life. I did not understand then what he meant and it's painful to see that conversation in hindsight. And it is true, there are things which a man needs to know that in an ideal world fathers would always teach sons. But few humans get a perfect start and everyone has to do the best they can with what they've got.

Self-esteem is not really a helpful concept, I think. Everyone should know that they have infinite worth simply as conscious beings. For most situations, the important thing is not how highly one thinks of oneself (high self regard is often more of a problem than a help) but how one goes about doing things. The best way to combat poor self esteem is to do the best that you can, live in the best way that you can and esteem yourself for the actual doing and way of being rather than worry about esteem as an independent thing or a gift that others might bestow on you.

I had a good relationship with my father. He was as close to an Andy Griffith type of father that you could ever expect to see. I could talk to him about anything and he would always give wise advice. He did have two flaws though. One was that he was always working at his job, even when at home relaxing. He would very rarely take time off to do things with the family when I was growing up. My family hardly ever took vacations, except to see relatives that lived about an hour away during the Thanksgiving/Christmas time season.

The other flaw was that he was a heavy cigarette smoker. This is what lead to his premature death from COPD that shaved 15 to 20 years off of his life. I tried my hardest as a kid to get him to quit, but he never could. I still miss him after more than a decade of him being gone...

I've been depending too much on both my parents, for far too long, to have any kind of healthy relationship with them.