Does He or Doesn't He? I'm a Confused Girlfriend.

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I tapped into this website after explaining my relationship with my boyfriend of two years to a psychologist friend who thought that AS may be a possible diagnosis for him. I wanted to hear your opinions and see if I am insane for feeling the way that I do.

My boyfriend is extremely intelligent, good looking and has a great sense of humor. He has lots of friends and is known for his childish, humdrum, low key personality. He graduated from college with honors and has a wonderful job in Finance. I love him very much, but early on in our relationship I quickly started to catch on to ways in which we were different--mainly in the way we showed affection and how we expressed how we cared and loved each other. I was very verbal with how I felt about him, and I realized after several months that I was doing ALL of the talking in our relationship and about our relationship. Our conversations would end up so frustrating, mainly with me complaining about how he didn't do this or that. He rarely is able to speak about his emotions and if anything he says "you know I love you, that is why I am with you". I ask him if he knows what love is and he doesn't know how to answer. He assures me that he just loves me in a "different" way but how am I supposed to affirm that without any display of emotion? I am extremely passionate and often feel like I am expressing my feelings to a wall. After tons of nagging, he typically says things like "I'm sorry, I will try to get better" and "I feel like everything is my fault and you are blaming me", and things continue to stay the same.

He gets really upset if our plans change to the slightest. He hates when other people change their plan and we have to follow. As 20-somethings our plans are always changing and this infuriates him! I try to insist that people change plans all the time but he doesn't seem to want to understand that notion.

Something that I'm not sure connects with aspergers or autism is that I feel like he does not know how to touch me. He likes to be touched, scratched on the back, and massaged. I can count on my fingers the times that he has offered to rub my shoulders, play with my hair, or touch my face. I clearly asked him and he is making a better effort as of late, but it definitely does not come naturally. That may just be a selfish aspect of his personality--i'm not sure.

He loathes when I ask him to dance with me at weddings and uses alcohol as a tool to interact in those situations. He seems to be caught up in technology almost obsessively. He always needs his cell phone, i-touch and computer at his side and I am constantly getting the "I'm listening but I can do two things at once excuse". I have to fight for his attention in these situations and we normally have discussions while he is staring at his computer or typing on his cell phone. I have to tell him countless times to do something before he does it, and then I end up doing it since he ignores it. Also something that I don't know if this is common, and he doesn't like to admit, but he has small 'tics' that mimic tourettes syndrome when he is in a high stress situation or without sleep. Mainly this is just around me but a couple of my family members have seen it (in this case he said he had a chill). Many times when I point it out he completely denies what I had just seen and makes an excuse for it.

But right now I feel like I am in an emotionless relationship, and that is the hardest thing. I have gotten to the point where I am verbally pointing out all of these flaws in him and feel like a horrible horrible person. The frustration has made me resentful of him and has made me feel that I give and he takes. I have tried to be patient and he is not diagnosed with anything right now, and I don't want to peg him with something he isn't. But I feel like if I can't figure it out now then how do I know what to do in my future.

I sound like a witch, I know. If he actually does have AS then this is something that he cannot help but I want to know if this sounds familiar or if there is anything else you can get from what I have written (other than me completely over-analyzing).

lilpup9 wrote:

"He has lots of friends"

Aspies usually do not have lots of friends. That doesn’t mean that he is not an Aspie especially since there are different types of Aspies but I would suggest that you observe how he interacts with his friends and take notes. How is he at making small talk for instance? It would be even better if you can observe him without him knowing that you are there. There are some people who are not comfortable being intimate due to traumatic experiences during childhood which may give the impression that they are Aspies when they are not.

http://www.amazon.com/Loving-Mr-Spock-B ... 0718146425

Loving Mr. Spock by Barbara Jacobs.

You didn't really think you were the only one to love an Aspie Man, did you?

Lots of friends or lots of friendly acquaintances? If you are having trouble feeling closeness from him, I suspect others might feel the same way: "A great guy, but we never really know/knew him."

Others here know far more than I, but the ways he interacts or not with you are nearly identical to how I am around my own wife ... and she and I are presently being very patient with each other as I try to better understand her and begin to do at least the simple things I can so she does not have to feel so left out of our relationship.

He sounds like he may have AS. Whether he does or does not is really irrelevant however; you deserve to be with someone who makes you happy.

A diagnosis of AS will not change your boyfriend or allow you to fix him. It may help you understand where he's coming from and how his mind works, but not a lot else will change.

Thank you for your quick input! My boyfriend makes me feel happy in many situations, that is why we have stuck together through all of this. The more that I read the forum and see the huge variation of AS, I feel that he may have HFA.

Many times, he will tell me that inside he feels uncomfortable in social situations (I'm the talker, he's just there to listen). But I find that he interacts well with people he doesn't know very well, so it is hard for me to determine what he's actually feeling. He has a tight knit group of friends that he has kept from high school and they continue to be close.

I will try to focus on how he interacts with others but sincerely think that his problem lies with his seemingly lack of emotion. Asking him to describe how he is feeling about something I am upset about is like pulling teeth. I don't know if anyone else has felt like this, but I sincerely feel like he doesn't love me or think about how I feel although he reassures me that it is not true.

I am just sick of talking to the side of a face while he focuses on the computer, TV, e-mail, etc. That is when I react negatively since he can't be fully attentive. More importantly--he does not want to face the fact that he may have a problem, either with AS, OCD, or Tourettes. He decides to ignore the issue much to my dismay. I want to find the issue and begin to work on what I can do to help the situation. I would hope that if he actually doesn't love me that he would move on and let me move on as well. Unfortunately, I don't know if he is willing to figure this out.

glad you are reading the forum, it is a wealth of information about the whole Autism spectrum. As they say, if you have met one Autistic, you have met one Autistic, as each one of our set of symptoms make us unique.



He is close with people that know him well. That shows he has the capacity for closeness, always a good sign for more closeness with others.



Interesting way of describing it, lilpup9. Isn't it your problem that he is not reacting in a way you believe he should? It is not like he used to do it and now he doesn't, is it? His behaviour might not have been as important in the rush of beginning a relationship, but now that you are settling in it becomes an issue?



He loves you to the best of his ability. He has only words to let you know, as body language, facial expressions might be beyond his ability to read from you, or beyond his ability to show to you. It is called 'mindblindness' and means we can't read body or facial language, something that most non autistic people can't even wrap their heads around because it is instinctive. Think of it like someone being colorblind, and sees in black or white rather than all the colors of the rainbow. You wouldn't expect someone colorblind to describe a sunset to you, but you are asking him to describe his feelings in ways you can detect as 'true' by body language and facial expressions when all he has is his very honest words to let you know of his love for you.

Think of his patience with you, that he realizes he isn't giving you what you want and need because he is not designed that way.



Or if he CAN figure it out. Being in hyper focus is difficult to control because we don't usually know when we are in hyper focus. It is not a choice, no more than blue eyes or curly hair is a choice. I notice you keep saying that he has a problem when (no offence meant to you, I am just trying to point this out to you) that it is a problem you have with him. He loves you and this is as best as he can show you. He might realize he can't be what you want him to be and it must be heartbreaking for him. But no, there is no way to 'read' his body language or facial expressions or 'feel' his emotions, but that doesn't mean the emotions aren't there.

If we could adapt completely and become like non autistics, then we wouldn't be autistic.

Merle

Can you ask him about his childhood. His first couple of years in school will tell you more than anything you know now. That will show any autism in the raw.

When he pictures his 1st year at school does he remember an empty classroom and a teacher with legs and a crotch (like nanny in muppet babies)

Thats what my early chilhood memories were like and I was always punished for things I didn't understand.

Gee that sounds like me and my Wife. For people on the spectrum, as in autistic spectrum disorders, the connection from the emotional part of the brain to the expressive part of the brain is like a bumpy dirt road with lot's of detours unlike your super-highway so it will seem like he's emotionally unresponsive, but he's not. Many of us have been punished for displaying inappropriate emotional responses so it will take a long time for you build the trust and one slip can set you back years. The brains of people on the spectrum develop in some areas much faster than normal and in others much slower, The site Inside Perspectives has a lot of good info for your the page on Emotions should be particularly helpfull.

The first thing to realize is that what makes a person feel loved and romantically in love varies from person to person, by quite a lot. If you can figure out what makes you feel loved, ask for it, and he does these things you ask for, things will probably work out.

If he is unable or unwilling, the relationship probably won't work in the long run. The same is true if you are unable or unwilling to do the things that make him feel loved, or if he doesn't tell you what they are.

If he can't provide behaviors that make you feel loved, that's not a failure on his part or on your part. It just means a fundamental mismatch.

Sounds like an Aspie to me. A lot of that stuff sounds like me. Also with the touching I believe it's not so much not knowing how as not knowing when to do it and the right way. Some Aspies (like me) tend to avoid touching people unless they ask, stops them getting uncomfortable

AS or not, you can't force him to change. He isn't a fixer-upper. You will have to accept him for who he is eventually (and vice versa), call it quits, or maintain an unhealthy and unhappy relationship.

He will change over time and you will change over time, but not necessarilly into the ideals either of you might be hoping to have. If you can't accept each other as-is from the outset, things won't get better as you change and grow in my experience.

There's a difference between having friends and saying you have lots of friends.

There's a bloke at work I believe is as aspie as me - he has lots of friends too. Well, he says he has, he spends all day bullying them over the phone, locking them into lunch dates they'd probably rather avoid. Stuff like that.

Be gentle with your one - he's probably lived with the assumption that everyone else is like him at heart all his life. If you can't take the isolation, of course, you'll have to move on from him. My partner often bemoans the loss of her social life, although she's a grandmother now and that makes up for a lot. If you can work with him up to the point where he starts to get it, though, there may be hope.

[quote="sindboldly']
He loves you to the best of his ability. He has only words to let you know, as body language, facial expressions might be beyond his ability to read from you, or beyond his ability to show to you. It is called 'mindblindness' and means we can't read body or facial language, something that most non autistic people can't even wrap their heads around because it is instinctive. Think of it like someone being colorblind, and sees in black or white rather than all the colors of the rainbow. You wouldn't expect someone colorblind to describe a sunset to you, but you are asking him to describe his feelings in ways you can detect as 'true' by body language and facial expressions when all he has is his very honest words to let you know of his love for you.

Think of his patience with you, that he realizes he isn't giving you what you want and need because he is not designed that way. [/quote]

I wanted to add to this that sinsboldly is very right. I happen to have both AS and a type of colorblindness and what she said is something that its incomprehensible for non-AS, non-color blind people to understand.

The worst thing to me, as a guy with AS, is to be asked to describe my emotions or show them in real-time...aka, verbally. That's because three things get in the way:

1- im a guy. even non-AS guys have trouble opening up.

2- real-time verbal interaction about a subject I have no pre-set answer for just blanks me out. My 'emotions' are something that I rarely consider on a moment-to-moment basis hence if you catch me off guard i'm toast. i wont have an answer for you. If you keep pressing me for one i'd revert to my only back: logic and truth. 'i love you' could be the best youll get out of me in those situations.

3- inability to read body or facial language and even tone of voice makes it very hard to catch those moments when you are emotional and need an emotional response. aka, those 'he's cold and emotionless' moments you speak of. Its not cold shoulder, its just we don't notice your moods as well as a non-AS person would.

Here's what I'd suggest you try: Notes / Letters.

Write him a letter or a note. Ask him to reply to it (and give him time dont ask him to write it then and there). you could even try a letter game where both of you remain silent and reply to each other via post it notes. Its not a solution but its a step towards it. The notes/letters will bypass the verbal block, engage him on something he can focus on (writing) and give you the feedback you need to move forward.


Lack of emotion:

We have them.. just dont show them. Its eerie how the 'mr spock' label applies to us in this regard. unlike the tv character, we dont supress them.. they just seem to be time delayed.

Friendships:

As many have mentioned.. are his friends close friends or just long-term acquintances? I can tell you right off the bat that I have but 1 close friend ... in my entire life. But I have about 40+ people that others usually see me hang out with (coworkers, classmates, etc) but not one of them can tell you much about me. I rarely talk around them and I guess they accept me because im quiet and I get things done or help them when they need anything done. from my end im like a good neighbor to them.

(btw, my only friend became my close friend because our schedules were so different we rarely saw each other so e-mails and instant messanger chat was like our lifeline..and she and I when we do meet in person get along very well.. never had that happen with anyone else).


Finally, I don't think you're in an emotionless relationship. I'd say you're more like a couple who speak different versions of english (think a scotsman with an alabama girl.. lol) and somehow, in the middle, things get lost in translation. Once you two sort out each other's patterns you'll be alright.

He is with you so he probably does love you to the best of his ability. He sounds like he doens't feel much though. It seems like your intuition is telling you that he is not as passionate about you as you would like for him to be. He probably doesn't want passion and maybe he is unable to feel that way. Lots of aspies have schizophrenic tendencies toward love. By that I mean, they put on a facade and become like robots. They are lost inside themselves. If you want to bring him out, be prepared for a psychological can of worms.

If he does come out, he may leave you after realizing that his true self doesn't connect with you. Are you prepared to handle that? Don't delude yourself or believe what he says if your gut is warning you that something is amiss. Be aware of what is going on and protect yourself. Aspie males can be much more callous than NT's because they are unaware of others emotions.

I've noticed that aspie males like talkative girls who are very sociable because it disguises their own awkwardness. Plus, girls who are attention seekers detract attention away from their uneasiness in the social lights. Shallow relationships are easy to maintain because you don't have to really get to know one another. You said that he gets along great with people he knows little about? How much does he understand about you?

I like your effort posting here but actually as I said to all my previous girl-friends (and also to my wife sometimes). If you need emotional show-up is your problem not his problem because you want something from him or your relation that he can't give you. If you want him to listen to you when he is at the computer, well, you know is frustrating. What I want to say is that if you really love him, you must accept him for what he is. This doesn't mean that you must accept everything, but there are things that can't be changed, simply because they are the same that probably make him special.