What do you think of this description of AS + NT marriages?

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[quote="MKDP] No Exit, I am in a very severe depression right now, from something that happened last week .. just completely utterly devastated beyond devastated. I am having extreme problems communicating. It got me very spaced out (not taking any drugs), turned my artwork upsidedown, and I am not coping with any of this very well. I will have to respond when I have more ability to speak. Or I doubt I can make any sense. [/quote]

MDKP. No worries. At the risk of sounding NT, I completely understand. Please take care of yourself. If you want to try to talk to someone, strangely enough I'm pretty good at listening. And since the things NT people say when they are upset make no sense to me, there's nothing to be lost if what you say doesn't make sense... and possibly something to be gained... But, also realize there is absolutely no pressure. I offer because I know what it is like to be alone and in intense pain. If talking is too difficult or makes it worse, I get that too.

MDKP. No worries. At the risk of sounding NT, I completely understand. Please take care of yourself. If you want to try to talk to someone, strangely enough I'm pretty good at listening. And since the things NT people say when they are upset make no sense to me, there's nothing to be lost if what you say doesn't make sense... and possibly something to be gained... But, also realize there is absolutely no pressure. I offer because I know what it is like to be alone and in intense pain. If talking is too difficult or makes it worse, I get that too.[/quote]

No Exit, I am deeply severely depressed. I was seeing a neurologist for almost a year. I can now see he mishandled transference and counter-transference issues and made some boundary crossings. He transferred my deepest emotional feelings and connections from my personified horse where I buried all the pain I described to you, including my mother's suicide, to himself; he also called my life a "vast waste." I fell deeply in love with him. He is abandoning my medical care, because of this after all the mishandling issues (rather than continuing to help me), and I have never had any other doctor in my entire life I can communicate with or relate to like him. I am devastated. Really, really devastated. I have not even been able to talk to my husband verbally since last week. He is ready to divorce me. I could live with the boundary issues and the transference-counter-transferense issues if my neurologist did not abandon me after getting me into this state. But I have not heard one word from him since last week, and I have a Wed. appt, and I have no idea if I am allowed to have my appt., or am just being dumped in my extremely severe depression. I have autism and many significant issues, I think this was entirely foreseeable on is part. Calling my life a "vast waste" makes me just never want to wake up the next morning once I go to sleep at night.

corr: "is part" = his part

MDKP. No worries. At the risk of sounding NT, I completely understand. Please take care of yourself. If you want to try to talk to someone, strangely enough I'm pretty good at listening. And since the things NT people say when they are upset make no sense to me, there's nothing to be lost if what you say doesn't make sense... and possibly something to be gained... But, also realize there is absolutely no pressure. I offer because I know what it is like to be alone and in intense pain. If talking is too difficult or makes it worse, I get that too.[/quote]

I should also say, I am very quite certain it was my neurologist's wife with his daughter and friend in tow, who came to a Starbucks I stop at on the way home from my autism horse last Friday nite, parked right next to my car, and did so to encounter me and inquire about my autism, my doctor, where he worked, and about me. Her questions knew too much about my personal information not to have been his wife. She was very well-educated and the daughter was the right age. I know they play at the soccar-baseball fields up the road from where I wqas encountered, because I saw an article on the Internet mentioning it when I was doing some other research on somthing else. She asked me about my art, and because I was so uncommunicative from Tues. when he told me he was no longer going to be my doctor, I almost burst into tears and just said I was having trouble talking right then because I was beside myself for falling in love with my doctor, and telling me he was abandoning me as a patient because of this.

She knew he was a neurologist, where he worked, about my artwork, my Social Security problems, and seemed very upset at what I said -- how would I know my doctor's wife would follow me to the Starbucks to purposely encounter and meet me ? She said, "well maybe you really don't know what you feel or you don't feel it that way,' alluding to fact I have autism, I could not really have fallen in love with him. I am just devastated beyond devastated. I don't know what to say. This magnifies all my other problems with my relationships and trusting anyone and all of my pain beyond anything I have experienced to this point before in my life. I love him more than the person I didn't get to marry when I was much younger. I don't know what to say. I didn't go looking for this to happen. But it did happen, because that is how extraordinary he is, and this is how he made me feel about him -- nothing but the best things. That is, until he called my life with autism a "vast waste," right before he told me he was terminating our doctor-patient relationship.

Merle said

Maybe I'm the oddball here, but this sounds like an awesome arrangement. The hubby can go to work, and I'll take care of everything else, except the yard work. Alas, this kind of arrangement went out with the '50s.....

MDKP,

Some of your post was possibly lost. But I got the issue pretty clearly from what you wrote. That has got to be a very devastating experience. What do you need right now to help you get through it?

Longer term, what do you need to get through your bar exam and become independent? I say this beacuse I think you must attract men who are fulfilling your immediate needs in order to take advantage of you. Once you have financial independence, you can pay others (preferably women with professional certifications/references) to take care of issues that you need help with.

I know it sounds hard, but it can be done.

Also, you need not feel guilty about falling prey to these men. They also take advantage of NT women who are vulnerable for one reason or another. I do not understand these men (perhaps this is a benefit of being AS, because I would be enraged most likely if I could empahtize with them). But I do know how to spot them and what to do to avoid them. Actually they take advantage of young men/boys too. One of my only friends in high school and his mom and sister both had repeated experiences with these types because each had a vulnerability of their own. The mother was wealthy from a family inheritance but an alcoholic and drug addict who never left her bed, the son (my friend) had cerebal palsy, and the daughter had some issues though I was too young at the time to be able to observe enought to pinpoint what it was besides her speech impediment and social awkwardness. Any way, for better or worse, I learned by observation what these guys are like and how to thwart them ...

You know, I really don't care anymore about all that. What I need is my doctor to help me get thru this and not abandon me. But, I am pretty much done caring about anything in my life anymore. I really don't know why I ever tried so hard to be anything or do anything. My doctor is right -- my life due to my autism is just a vast waste. So is my marriage, so is my entire idea of being a lawyer. I really wish I was never born. I don't know why my parents ever bothered to bring such a horrible life into existence.

I always hoped that the woman I married would be too proud to let me go out to work.

MDKP,

You are scaring me. I know this must be very hard for you. Are you "venting" as my wife says when she gets upset sometimes. Or do you need help right now? Is there someone I could call for you to get you some help?

I don't need your help. You didn't cause the problems. The person who did can resolve them if he wishes. I have consulted with some lawyers and a couple of my other doctors, and they have advised me to take this to the Medical Board. It does not, however, mean I am not feeling this way or that I have not been significantly damaged. I had no psychiatric problems when I came to this neurologist for my brain injuries and to re-confirm my autism diagnosis. I was managing to cope then. I know what negligence is. There are many witnesses who have watched this unfold. Question is, why did the doctor do this ? Was he unhappy in his own marriage ? Did he fall in love with me and couldn't tell me ? Was I a research experiment to *get into the mind of a savant, and the reprecussions to me didn't matter ?* Did the doctor get his own involuntary Aspie diagnosis and have to take it out on other people with autism because he didn't want to be defined by his own diagnosis ? Does the doctor have his own psychiatric problems, and did not warn me ? I really cannot answer those questions, because you see the doctor knew I had a ToM deficit of my autism. He also had -- and still has -- significant fiduciary duties to me. Not to mention the respect one person should be according to another, especially one in whom he has cultivated emotional dependence on him. He has not even cancelled my Wed. appt. Only this doctor knows what is going on with him and why he did this with/to me. I cannot make his choices of what kind of character he has and person he is or how he feels about me, or what he intends to do about it -- only he can. But I can respond to what has occurred, and go to the Medical Board and find out the answers. I can also seek other psychiatric care and pursue a claim against the doctor's employer to pay for what is probably lifelong damage. I know I will never be able to trust another doctor, and probably never have another intimate relationship. The last thing I need is more intermeddlers.

Certainly not a male one, unless he was gay. I don't mean to be glib. Ever since I learned about transference, I've always seen it as very risky for anybody heterosexual to engage an opposite-sex analyst if the probing is likely to go very deep. I've got away with Relate sessions when the counsellor has been female, but then those sessions have never gone all that deep - probably because I've never really opened up to anybody except in a carefully-controlled, limited way. The nearest I've come to that is here on Wrong Planet, where it's open to the whole group, anonymous, and kind of spread around thinly in various topics.

Time heals everybody to some extent if they let it. It's amazing what it can do. Probably sounds like a load of crap right now, but if you just hold on, in the end it will start getting better.

See my post below.

No Exit, it is good you feel such concern for MKDP. What we have to remember is that the men in her life have not show such genuine concern -- or their love for her. This now appears to be including her doctor -- who has recently conducted himself like the biggest coward on the face of the Planet, and become no different than all the other men in her life who have hurt her. Does the Doctor really want to to do this, or does he love her ?

I am somewhat a fly on the wall in this situation, so maybe I know a little more than you about her situation and that of her doctor. So let me set the situation forth in a hypothetical, and perhaps we can learn why MKDP is justifiably very upset anf rightfully so, and why the doctor is a coward and about to lose the love of his entire life -- and is there something he can/should/wants to do about this ?

We can call MKDP in this hypothetical, Patient A. And the love of her life, her doctor, Doctor B (that is for brains). Just to get things clear.

It seems what has gone on is when Patient A and Doctor B met, they both fell in love at that moment, only he has been prevented by doctor rules from telling her. He, an Aspie savant with a diagnosis he didn't want, and her an autistic savant seeking his help for a brain injury from an accident. There is no doubt Patient A is an autistic savant, and a prodigious one, at that. And, as the doctor-patient relationship unfolded, Patient A and Doctor B fell deeply in love -- he, unable to tell her because he would cross boundaries that would jeopardize his license. And that's because the world is a dumb place.

In fact, so in love with her was Doctor B, that he e-mailed her daily, late evenings, very early mornings, over the weekends, and always they so thoroughly enjoyed each other he, like she, became a bit obsessed and longed for each moment of contact with each other. He is an avid blogger under anonymity, but she can usually tell his posts due to his Aspie writing style containing a far more weirdness bizarre sense of humor than her own, which she finds totally refreshing. Lately, he has posted things like the following (hypothetically speaking), in which he has (and is still) agonizing over his love for Patient A:

"1) Has your special interest ever been a person?

OMG, yes. A person I knew. To the point of obsession, meaning it went from pleasant to extremely unpleasant when I couldn't be around them. It was actually kind of frightening, because I knew it was inappropriate and I had to be very careful not to let on or cross boundaries."

Patient A, as you can see from posts such as the one you reacted to with MKDP's litany of her life, has had a horrendous life, never really loved by any man in her entire life, with unconditional love that is genuine, and moreover has been hurt deeply by every single man in her life -- until she fell deeply in love with Doctor B.

As such Patient A is also not in a happy marriage, or one in which she has a husband who would take care of her if she were to become very ill -- which Doctor B has very recently discovered is going to happen to her. Doctor B, also is in an unhappy marriage, because his neurotypical wife is very destructive to his emotional well-being, and tears down every part of the recognition that is part of him from his career, and he has blogged a lot about that and how he feels. Doctor B has only stayed in his marriage for the sake of his children, who would be just as well adjusted if he did what is his heart desires, divorced his wife, and married Patient A, whom is the delight and love of his life -- both really liking to cuddle and be touched. Patient A would divorce her husband, though she does care for him, for Doctor B in a heartbeat -- if only Doctor B would come to her, find her, and ask her to marry him -- and Doctor B does know how to find and seek out Patient A, knows her hangouts.

Doctor B has cross-ed boundaries, for sure, in his love for Patient A, as he indicates in his "obsession" post. And boundaries, moreover, that have put his license in jeopardy by the very fact he has had to dump Patient A as a Patient without telling her of her second devastating condition -- if Patient A acts on the boundary violations, or worse another doctor to whom she must now go for her medical care does so when he learns of Doctor B's neglect. In fact, Doctor B knows this is inevitable because Patient A must have further medical care; Doctor B cannot hide his neglect.

The problem for Doctor B is he is undergoing a crisis over Patient A, because she is the love is his life, and gives him all the delight, enjoyment, and building up his career that his wife does not. Patient A, being a savant with autism is so much like Doctor B, they are very inherently compatible, right down to her ability to understand he gets fatigued and needs his downtime after work -- after all he is an Aspie as she is an autie. However, as a result of during the course of this love affair Patient A and Doctor B could barely rein-in, Doctor B's discovery that in addition to her savant autism, Patient A has another medical issue, and one that is devastating, Doctor B knows Patient A will eventually lose her savant abilities. This second condtion Doctor B has not told Patient A about is a posterior cortical atrophy, or the type of brain condition that will, as it deteriorates, attack her vision and visuo-spatial abilities and by leaving her cortically blind, take away everything that is most precious to her, her artwork, her love for riding horses, her ability to drive a car, or even, possibly (if no accommodations can be determined) be a lawyer -- her lifelong dream. (Blind people, however, can be lawyers for however long they have).

When Doctor B learned of this, however, he was stunned. Doctor B, being a brain doctor, knows the progression of this *other* condition that Patient A has. Doctor B suddenly understood he had fallen in love within someone very special to him for which this discovery of the devastating news was, to him, like experiencing the death of someone he loved, because of the current knowledge of its progression -- resulting in Doctor B going into a total state of denial. Very hurtful to Patient A, who, after all, has done nothing wring, except love Doctor B.

In his state of denial, Doctor B began lying to Patient A about a lot of things -- writing literature about her, comprehesive accommodations reports to get her bar admission, testifying for her to convince bar examiners to give her her bar admission, getting grants to have an autism clinic for her and others like her with her autism condition, but worst of all, Doctor B lied to her by being far too cowardly to tell her about her second more devastating condition. And now, with the extent of the lies, Doctor B doesn't know how to face Patient A, and fears she will reject him when she finds it all out.

Believing Patient A would be devastated, and unable to cope with the person he was so in love with having such a condition, Doctor B set about hurting Patient A more than any of the other men in her life to protect his own grief -- trying to put off her next appointment so far in the future he might not have to deal with telling her, cutting off his daily highly uplifting e-mails with her that keep her from falling into the depression that hastens the progression of her condition, becoming cold and distant to her, uttering to her that her life was a "vast waste" (believing it cannot get better), and finally, engaging in an effort on the blogs to make her lose her cool and become distraught or violent so maybe she would be locked up and his having to tell her would go away -- for him. Such cowardice. And something Doctor B will never be able to live with doing to the love of his life, Patient A, in the years to come.

Unaware of Doctor B's discovery she has this second devastating condition, Patient A, confused over the blog attacks, turned to the person she most loves and trusts in this World, Doctor B, and told him she loves him more than anyone in her entire life, that he is the love of her life. Doctor B, knowing he would have to tell her of his discovery of her second devastating condition, and in grief over her misfortune (which also became his misfortune, because he loves her), and faced with having to explain to her he has allowed her blood pressure to remain in a destructively high state for almost a year, exacerbating the deterioration of her second condition (malpractice that has caused her harm and put his license in jeopardy), terminated her medical care as his Patient. This way, Doctor B, the coward that he is, could avoid ever having to tell her, prevent his fear she would reject him out of anger, and also try to walk away from her in his life because the discovery of her second condition hurt him so much, all of it leading to his decision to be the man who hurt her the most by letting her go down to the end of a life much as MKDP described it in the post to which you reacted with your "Wow."

Of course, Patient A is rightfully justified in being very upset -- first at the loss of her doctor, but second at the loss of the love of her life, Doctor B. This is because Patient A loves Doctor B so much, there is much for whcih she can forgive him and work thru. Doctor B further knows Patient A will rightfully and justifiably be very upset when she is told by her next doctor of her second devastating condition, and because of this he knows she will have no choice but to file a claim against his employer and his license (if her next doctor does not also do the same even without her). This is so, because Patient A has been abandoned by Doctor B after a year of Doctor B failing to properly treat her high blood pressure and second devastating condition to ensure her mental acuity is prolonged as long as possible, and now her medical care for which she has little medical coverage will be required to compensate for Doctor B's neglect. In sum, Doctor B's neglect and malpractice (and now denial and rejection of Patient A) has actually shortened the time she has. Doctor B is in such denial, he actually thinks Patient A won't find all this out, and really he underestimates her love for him in her ability to forgive him to keep his love.

While Patient A can cope with her second devastating condition, like everything else in her life, by taking all efforts to stall its progession with massive doses of ibuprophen, Omega 3 & 6, Vitamin E, other treatments, and even cutting edge experimental medications and therapies when they become available, and by continuing to force her brain to paint, read, and write, and while Patient A might even be able to deal with having a new doctor if Doctor B were to personally secure a very good one for her, what Patient A is having extreme difficulty dealing and coping with is Doctor B's own denial -- and rejection -- of their love for each other because Doctor B is such a coward he is running away from Patient A and their love when they both need it most. Patient A really needs Doctor B in her life, even if he is not her doctor.

Doctor B apparently (as evident by his unhappy marriage to his neurotypical wife), has never learned what unconditional love means, and this is why he is about to let go of the love of his life, Patient A, to her utter despair. If Doctor B cares as much as his "obsession" post indicates abotu Patient A, how can he let her go ? Apparently Doctor B has not watched movies like "Love Story," and learned that the kind of love Doctor B expressed in his "obsession" post can overcome even things like cancer -- conditions much worse and with shorter timelines than Patient A's second condition, because it is better to have known such love even though it might not be forever, than not to have it at all. Moreover, Doctor B, has failed to recognize that even if he was in love with a 25 year old able-bodied person, that person's fate could be walking across a street, being hit and killed by a car, with them only being together a month or a week -- a far shorter time than he has with Patient A. Further, there's nothing to say the medical approach to Patient A's second condition might not advance, and find discovery of a far longer way to prolong mental acuity or even cure the condition, and certainly Patient A would go to another Country for treatment if there was a better treatment available. Nor should Patient A's life necessarily be regarded as a waste, since there have been artists such as Willem de Kooning, and others, http://www.pbs.org/theforgetting/experi ... erson.html, who have continued to paint for years into their Alzheimer's and sold millions of dollars of exquisite artwork during their devastating conditions, to the point of living a very comfortable life setting off fights over who would manage all that money under the eventual guardianship. Even the artwork created by the extraordinary savant Richard Wawro was done while he was legally blind !

In sum, Doctor B is so caught up in feeling sorry for himself for falling in love with a person, Patient A, who has been dealt the fate of a devastating second condition, that he forgot she could still have a considerable amount of time left to be the love of his entire life to their mutual enjoyment, and really no one knows how long that how long might become with medical advances. It could be a long time. Doctor B is so caught up in his sorrow and denial, he is about to let the love of his life go -- despite the fact she is still at this point the same very funny savant he so head-over-heels fell in love with, and despite both of their knowledge they could make each other's lives very, very happy beyond happy and make their obsessions with each other come true in love.

As mentioned, Patient A has no choices but to claim and grieve against Doctor B's license and employer for his obvious derelictions leaving her in a non-survival plight to the ends of her eventually deteriorating life, if Doctor B completely walks away from her life altogether. But Doctor B has choices -- if he reflects and realizes he truly loves Patient A, and one of them is he can go to her, find her, and have the courage of a man who is not afraid of love, to ask her to have the relationship she wants with him, and even, if he wants, to marry. Not so easy, perhaps, but nothing that is impossible. Obviously, beyond the courage of them both to confront her second devastating condition, would be to protect his license with regard to their relationship, meaning thel need to keep the relationship secret while they seek an expedited injunction invoking this legal challenge so they can go forth with their relationship now before progressions of Patient A's second condition, not years from now. And there are plently of lawyers just waiting to bring such a challenge: http://www.uclalawreview.org/articles/c ... /4.2-1.pdf. Even divorces from present unhappy marriages can go forth rather quickly. Doctor B would also gain more than the love of his entire life and his happiness from this; he gains the ability to keep Patient A's next doctor from making a malpractice finding by locking up their relationship, marriage prevents a licensure problem by giving marital privileges preventing them from testifying against each other about Doctor B's mishandling of Patient A's second condition. But maybe Doctor B remains in denial.

But, does Doctor B truly love Patient A as he laments in his above "obsession" post ? And does he have the courage of a person who really knows what it means to love someone ? Or is he going to throw her entire life and her most significant wish in her life (a relationship with him) away, and bury her out of sight out of mind long before she has come even close to her final demise ? The ultimate of pain and hurt for them both.

Clearly, the ball is in Doctor B's court. Doctor B has already crossed the boundaries, and Patient A can prove it. Doctor B has abandoned Patient A as a doctor, with her autism and second devastating condition. Patient A does not want to, but is being forced to, claim and grieve Doctor B and his employer to access her new medical care, something Doctor B could prevent by helping facilliate her new doctor and by remaining in her life to bring her joy (even if not as her doctor). Doctor B does know how to communicate with Patient A and also the hangouts where to find her. Doctor B knows Patient A would be so happy to be with him, she would never talk about it and would do everything necessary to have their relationship without it affecting his license -- in fact, Patient A has the mental ability at this time to make this decision should they enjoin the rules that would otherwise (absent injunctive order) prevent such a relationship. Patient A is proud of Doctor B being a doctor and his work. She also wants him in her life.

Patient A really has only one wish in her life -- no matter how much art she paints for how long, or whether she ever becomes a lawyer for awhile, or how many horse rides she can still enjoy -- which is, she longs to spend the rest of her life in a deep loving relationship with Doctor B, the love of her entire life. That would be the most meaningful part of her life. If Doctor B loves her enough to grant her (and him) this last wish.

But who knows, No Exit -- maybe Doctor B wants to treat the love of his life, Patient A, like all the other men of her life ? And, if so, then he didn't really love her as he writes in his "obsession" post.

Because, if he loves her, if he has the courage to love her, then he will come to her and let her know her life means everything, because he is in it.

Peace.

That is either a very creative story, or you are a very observant fly...

I realized soon after my series of posts that I could not do anything for her. But I appreciate your story nonetheless as it helps to explain, either in truth or just hypotethetically, how such a situation can arise.

On another topic, you referred to an "aspie savant" condition. Is that part of an elaborate story, or is there such a thing as an aspie savant?

For years I joked about being a "finance savant" because of my special interest (a term I only recently learned) and unusual abilities in behavioral finance. Being a very recently diagnosed aspie, I have stopped using the term "finance savant" to descibe myself (in humor) for fear of insulting autie savants.

But, after reading your post, now I am beginning to wonder if I really am a "finance savant" of the aspie variety? Then again, it could all just be a creative story...

No Exit, the thing about very observant flies is, they are ultimately right. And in this observation, too: Your last statement is nothing but the superficial facade of denial of his love for her [/i]with which he is still obsessed and that [i]he still has to have and still will have because he is driven to go to her.

And that is the problem with observant flies -- they can see what's behind the words, the reality of the future may not be what has been spoken in the words you have stated. There is more ...

Interesting.

That isn't really my marriage, though. My husband has never been evaluated, but he does consider himself AS.

I do provide the social/emotional bridge for the family, although over the years we've each kind of developed our own, independent social lives outside of the family. The family unit remains the primary social outlet for both of us.

I handle all the things my husband isn't emotionally able to. But, he's a great housekeeper. He more than offsets what I do by doing most of the laundry, cleaning, paperwork, etc. If he wasn't doing that, which is a HUGE load, I might feel our relationship wasn't balanced, but he DOES do all that. And makes most of the money, too. I'm not complaining. While, sure, I get frustrated as I'm making every last plan for a family vacation, packing myself and both kids, .... well, he gets frustrated when he's doing the 10th load of laundry at midnight and I'm asleep. We both try to remember that it all happens in turns.

Every marriage, regardless of AS, involves it's own unique social contract. I do think my husband and I had a relatively decent idea of how that was going to fall out before we got married, and we both accepted it. Problems happen when you don't know each other well enough to realize what the reality might be, and it all falls too far off of expectations. Nothing is ever the way you thought it would be, and our marriage is certainly true to that formula, but the switches and turns do need to be something you can handle. For us, they have been.

Honeslty, so many people today have a competely unrealistic viewpoint of what marriage is. It isn't roses. It's a journey. And one that should, ultimately, allow both individuals to find their better selves. No one ever said that process would be easy. But it is worth it. And that is true for NT's, AS, and NT/AS. I don't know many who have the marriage that the article describes as being "expected." But I do know many in wonderful, life fulfilling, marriages. Perhaps, when one partner is AS, the AS becomes the easy scapegoat for what was unrealistic to start.

My husband is a wonderful and loving man. Few get to see the sides of him that I have. He's complex. He's insecure. And he's wickedly, wickedly, funny. He brings so much pure fun, in that way, to our life together.

I totally agree with the article. I find that it tells it like it is especially for me. I should have stayed alone as well. When the NT knows of the AS it makes things even harder and more confusing.