Think my wife is an undiagnosed Aspie

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Hello All,
I hope you don't mind me sharing my experiences here, but I really don't know where else to go for help/advice and I'd really value your opinions...I'll try and keep it brief.

Basically, I'm NT and have been married to J for 12 years. I love her and we have 2 fantastic kids but our relationship has always been difficult.

J would often say things that are emotionally hurtfull (although usually true), but would say them in a very logical detached way without any tact. I would often be amazed that she didn't seem to realise (or care) that she was doing this, and I would beat myself up wondering what I'd done for her to feel what I interpreted as hatered towards me.

She doesn't have any close friends, but this really doesn't seem to bother her.
She has always been very akward socially. A lot of my friends commented on this when we were dating...sometimes if we were out as a group she literally would ignore them the whole night and barely speak to me for absolutely no reason. Needless to say my friends viewed this as her being aloof and rude and I would be wracking my brain trying to think what I had done to upset her. The few times I mentioned this to her she said that she was just shy.

She does tend to have a particular thing that she obsesses over...at the minute its YouTube make-up videos, but i don't know if this is indicative.
It would more be J's inability to judge how her comments and/or actions can affect others emotionally and not being able to tell how others are feeling unless she is told, that makes me think she has AS. For exmaple when we were dating, my Father was dying in hospital in London. On the morning I was due to fly out to basically see him for the last time she called round to my house on her way to work to tell me she was breaking up with me (due to an unrelated issue). She did this in a very cold and logical way and genuinely didn't seem to know (or as I thought didn't care) that the timing was not the most tactfull.
This has basically been the pattern of our relationship to date. Please understand that I love my wife dearly and I know that she loves me. In addition she is a fantastic mother to our children. But this has only led to me being even more confused about the way she treats me.

I had heard something at work a few years ago about AS, but didn't really think too much about it then. But for some reason a couple of weeks ago I started thinking about it again and did a bit of research on the Internet (mostly on WrongPlanet). It was suddenly like someone had turned the lightswitch on in my head. Suddenly I understood everything that has been going on for the last 14 years.
I had thought she was like this because for some reason she hated me, or was having an affair etc... in fact at one stage I couldn't take it any more and had my bags packed ready to go. I'm glad to say I didn't go in the end. Also, she doesn't want our relationship to be in any way physical (averaging once or twice a year if you know what I mean...) which for a long time had me convinced she was having an affair. She did tell me once that she was asexual, but I didn't really understand what that meant at the time and I thought she was just stalling.
She displays a lot of other traits that through reading other posts I know are indicitve of AS.
The thing is, what do i do now? Do I tell her I think she has undiagnosed Aspergers. Or do I carry on as if nothings wrong and just try and cope with the way things are. I've got to say, its pretty tough going at times, but I do love her and i want to help or at least understand her.
I also feel guilty as hell for thinking all this time that she was treating me this way because she was just plain nasty, when in fact it could all be just due to AS.
I'm sorry if I've offended anyone, I don't mean to be disparaging or patronising in any of my remarks about AS symptoms. I know I've waffled on a bit, but i would really value your opinions.
Ritchie

I'm not offended.

Does your wife recognize that not all is well? If she is seeking answers then it is much easier to bring up potential solutions.

Asperger's sounds like a possibility. I would find a way to bring it up so that she doesn't perceive it as accusatory (this is your problem, look what it does to us). Approach it more like "here is knowledge that will make us stronger".

She deserves to know; and if you want to communicate with her better, then you'll need to know as well.

You mention "for no reason"--remember that she probably does have a reason; only it's not something you can easily detect because the vast majority of the people you interact with are not AS, so you're trying to read her as though she's NT. It's as though you speak English and she speaks Russian and you're trying to listen to the Russian as though it's badly-pronounced English when in reality, it's a different language and you need to translate.

Seems like you have a decent relationship--what you really need is better communication. You need to learn to speak her language and she needs to learn how to find out what you're saying. Whether she has AS or not, the sense of you and her speaking different languages is really strong--you're not connecting as well as you could be.

re. "cold and logical"--remember that expressed emotion doesn't always connect up with felt emotion. It is entirely possible for us to not express what we're feeling, or express the wrong thing, and have it thought that our feelings don't exist when really it's a problem communicating those feelings in ways people can understand.

Thanks wavefreak. I think she knows that all is not well, but she would have the attitude of why on earth would I get all emotional and worked up over something like this. I get the feeling the reaction would not be good if I suggested AS...

I hope that things go well, for you and your wife.

I can relate to her... LoL!! Also not offended.

If I had realized that I had AS when I was in a relationship, we could have made it work.

Personally, I spent my whole life thinking that my way of thinking was "correct" because it was logical.. Once I learned about ASD, I learned that while I may be "correct", I am NOT the majority. This led me to the conclusion that my EX was not being overly-sensitive all those times but rather that he was an NT.

Here in Portland there is actually a support group for NT people who are married (or in a relationship with) an AS person. Honestly, if I ever go the route of having a partner again, he (or she) will have to be in this group. I think there are a LOT of things that can go wrong without the "wiring" understanding.

So yeah... you need to let her know what you found. You may even send her to this thread as you wrote up very nicely (IMHO) what it is like to deal with a person with AS and how we oftentimes make "mistakes" when we fail to realize that there is another acceptable way of looking at stuff.

Callista, you've hit the nail on the head. You're absolutely right, I don't know how to communicate with her. It really is as if we are speaking completely different languages. I really dont want to be judgemental or appear in any way as if I'm blaming her. I get the feeling that she's had a pretty tough time in the past because of this and she doesn't understand the way NT's treat her sometimes. I think it makes her very frustrated which then builds up and then there's an outburst...

kfisherx, thanx for reply. i've read a lot of your posts on here and I can relate to what you're saying

wavefreak, I think that this is (and has) caused her a lot of distress probably since she was a child. A lot of the time she outwardly appears completely emotionless, but like you say I have no doubt that she is feeling emotion inside. She can be very tender and loving at times as well. I haven't noticed any signs in the children (9 and 6), but that may be a concern. Its not really that I want her to change, I just want to try and understand whats going on...some of her traits are her strengths e.g. I find her brutal honesty to be refreshing in a world where most people dont actually say what they mean

Not make light of your situation, but your description immediately reminded me of the central character of the American television series 'Bones', who has often been speculated about as having AS. In fact, if you can get it (its probably available online), I think its a good illustration of Callista's point about different languages, as you see some of the NT characters on that show struggle to try to comprehend her motivations, and she theirs. Though as usual, what's amusing to watch between characters on television can be very frustrating when you're trying to cope with it in real life.

Avengilante, I've seen that show mentioned in a few posts on here. I've haven't seen it before but i think it might be on one of the satellite channels here. I'll try and catch it when its next on. The stage I'm at is that I'm grateful for any information on AS.
Things have been pretty bad at times and to suddenly find out there might be an explanation for whats happening is an immense relief. I'm just annoyed at myself for not figuring it out sooner.

The fact is, now I finally have figured it out, it really does change everything....for a start there's now a bunch of really nice people on here who understand what I'm talking about (as before I felt confused and isolated). At times I felt angry and resentful at being 'trapped in (what I thought was) an abusive and celibate marriage'. I can now see why things are the way they are. I should add that I now do feel guilty as hell for thinking this.

Welcome to Wrong Planet Ritchie.

Check out this book. Might be a worthwhile read for you.

http://www.kmarshack.com/_blog/Press_Re ... _Syndrome/

She also has some good articles for you to explore.