Found out! Will it change anything?

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I'm not diagnosed, but I seem to have alot of Aspie traits, including occasional stimming.

I tend to stim by either rocking back and forth in the chair or looking at bright lights, and very occasionally spinning. I have always tried to keep my stimming totally private.

But the other day my wife came into the living room very quietly and caught me rocking in the chair. She looked embarrassed and quickly disappeared into the bedroom 'to read her book'.

She knows I have 'eccentricities', meaning my problems socialising, but I don't think she'd known about the stimming before. She has worked with mentally handicapped adults in the past, and is aware of stimming, but I wonder how, if anything, finding her own husband doing it might change her view of me.

I had a sleepless night worrying about it all, and, even though it's not really the time for that sort of discussion, I tried to sound her out when we got up. She said it didn't matter, but in a sort of annoyed "of course" voice.

Right now I just feel like giving up trying to be 'normal' around her and let myself go. But we've worked very hard to get where we are now, and I obviously don't want to lose her. I am just so afraid that she might be thinking "what the hell have I married here?", that she's married some weirdo.

Has anyone else been in this position? How did you feel being found out? Did your partner's attitude or view of you change or did they learn to live with it?

There's two sides to the reaction: the one that goes "Poor bastard, he never had a chance..." and the one that goes "God, how embarassing. Are you sure he's not doing it on purpose?"

In my observation, even NTs stim in a variety of situations. Watch an unpracticed (or nervous) NT giving a speech. They rock back and forth. So your wife may not have even noticed your behavior.

Psychology describes the "spotlight phenomenon", which is the assumption we as individuals make regarding how intently others are observing us. It turns out NTs (and possibly Aspies) significantly overestimate the depth and detail people observe and recall. In other words, people aren't paying nearly as much attention to you as you might think.

That said, I have been in a couple of relationships in my life, all ended by my Asperger's and related neurological and psychiatric issues (I am not especially high functioning, except with math and machines). But discovery is highly probable, but I'm uncertain about the optimal time for disclosure, assuming there is one.

Last, a possibility: Might you be stimming because you are working so hard to appear typical in front of your wife?

No thing will change without the interaction of life.

Everything can not change at once,

It just feels that way.

Avoid the nuclear moments of change.

Let it be a part of your life, not the definition of it.

Hey johnners

I have this thing happen to me that I'm not generally aware of. I'll be sitting and my leg will be giggling up and down. My wife and daughters use to tell me about it often. Now, at least, we all know what it was. So, don't get too stressed about it in front of family. Maybe you need to discuss the possibility of you being AS with your wife. That would make it easier to be 'odd' when she is around which would relieve your own stress. Just and idea.

I'm an NT wife. I don't know what kind of woman your wife is, but I can tell you what I would have thought. Almost nothing. Rocking, shaking a leg, circling, etc in the living room alone in the evening is so so so far down on my list of things that I care about that it would be like walking in to find you getting a glass of wine or taking some aspirin. OK, so maybe something is bugging you. It isn't the end of the world.

I'd be far more concerned by your desire to hide it from me and your not being direct in your conversation about it. That would be a real deal breaker for me. If it bothers you, say something. What's that song? Send a pigeon, send a fax... Don't keep silent.

"I had a hard day at work and am not coping very well with it. The boss was rude, the co-worker's music was loud, people were coming and going, and this stupid light kept flickering on and off like I was working during a rave. I know that it would frustrate most people, but it seems to frustrate me more than most and that's been bothering me, too. I think I might have some sensory issues and I've been reading up on some possible reasons. I feel embarrassed and worried and I'm scared to pursue it because I have this fear that getting a label of something might worry you or make you not love me. I don't want to be a burden to you and I want to spend the rest of my life making you happy. I think that finding out what's going on inside me might help me to do that. What do you think?"

Then your wife is an equal. The way it is now, she's in the guessing, arm-chair diagnosing, working around your eccentricies stage without your input. She's far more likely to wonder what she's gotten into right now and to feel hopeless and to therefore leave you because she won't know what else can be done. Talk to her about it and she'll know what she has and you two will be able to develop a plan on how to work with it together. That's what I'd hope someone would tell my husband.

Eliza

I got caught tonight, when my flatmate walked in and caught me flapping my hands. It's not even a usual brief shake out of tension that an overstressed demonstrative NT would do, it's a repetitive stimming that looks quite odd. I don't think I've ever allowed anybody to see that since I was old enough to be aware it wasn't 'normal', and I felt a jolt of alarm and embarrassment.

My flatmate doesn't know I'm Aspergers(/Autistic, whichever) or what it even is, so I changed it fast to a drumming movement on the bench and joked that I was hyper tonight.

I still wince thinking about it. I wish I didn't stim but I can't help it.

Well, that's right. You can't help it. You can add another layer of repression and nail it down, but if there's a way to make it go away I haven't found it yet.

And the rest of the world, no matter how much they say they're OK with that, will discriminate against you on account of it.

Hmm, yeah, I've been caught out a few times rocking in my chair at work, trying to relax. People ask me what music I'm listening to! Sitting still is just so uncomfortable. Sometimes I just don't realise I'm doing it.

Sam x

Hi Johnners-

I am a woman that use to hide my stimming from my husband but a few years ago things got really stressful for me and I felt I couldn't hide it anymore. It was weird because I thought my husband would divorce me and think I was a total nut but he didn't. He was completely accepting. Yes, he thinks it's weird but he doesn't care. If anything it has straigthened the love between us because I don't feel that I am holding something back from.

Yeah, there's no point being secretive about it with people who are close to you. It's different at work and stuff like that. My mum and sis just find it kinda amusing. It's just part of how we are.

Sam x

Thanks for your replies, guys. I'm not all that sure about confronting my wife with my stimming (the rocking, anyway) but she is a very understanding person, so perhaps I could if I tried.

@Marsian - hehe, I was caught out at work many years ago. It was a quiet afternoon, and I was rocking stiffly in the chair. It was a bit too quiet, and I had that feeling that someone was watching me, and sure enough, the teenage girl who worked in the office was standing in the doorway watching me. When I looked at her, she ran off giggling to the next door office where she had a good laugh with all the girls in there. I was mortified. It didn't really affect our relationship afterwards, though - she was just as obstinate and stroppy as before!

@fiveeggsin - very interesting to hear your perspective. I would say my stimming is more habitual than stress-relieving, I'll do it any time I know I'm on my own. I am learning more every day, despite being married for almost 2 years now, what marriage really is. If the media were anything to go by, you just had to cough the wrong way and your spouse would be asking for a divorce. But I'm discovering that marriage in the real word can be alot more robust, your spouse more forgiving, and, like you and others have said, that there are frankly better things to worry about than whether your partner rocks to and fro in the chair.

Heh. The gal I've been seeing the past couple weeks had me figured-out on our first date!

To give her credit, we had hung-out twice before, and she had spent a year teaching 8th grade and knew how to "pick us out". It didn't seem to make a difference. If anything, it's helped!

- I'm not self-conscious around her, wondering when she's going to find out...
- She knows she has to spell certain things out at times...
- She saw me going toward a meltdown due to overstimulation in a loud bar and pulled me out...
- She appreciates my "take" on things...
- My stimming doesn't weird her out...

She knows I'm not going to pick up on things. If I'm not giving her the type of emotional feedback she needs, she knows it's not because I'm insensitive. I just don't pick up on her emotions all the time and don't instinctively know her needs, and she knows she has to verbalize this kinda stuff. Once I know, I am RIGHT there. It's a good thing she has no problem communicating these things!


To sum-up, being "found out" isn't always a bad thing. If someone's accustomed to others like us, it makes things a HELL of a lot easier.

I had another embarrassing incident yesterday. My wife came home early (where have you heard that before!) and caught me spinning. I was just gobsmacked. She went back to work, and for the rest of the day I just didn't want to do anything, just sat in the chair (rocking!).

In the evening we had a little chat, she said some of us find it earlier to hide our secrets than other, which I thought was a very subtle way of putting it. She didn't seem to care at all about the spinning, what seemed to bother her more was the fact I was acting suspiciously, not talking to her, as if, as she put it, I'd done something really terrible.

I had to find out just how weird spinning might look to someone else, it's become an obsession, and so I videoed myself doing it for a few seconds. It didn't look quite as 'ret*d' as I thought it would, to me it looked like I was pacing about on the spot. Luckily I don't hand-flap or tip my head about. I thought back over the years and years I've been doing it, to all the measures I've taken to prevent discovery: keeping the curtains closed on a nice sunny day, going outside to see if anyone could see into my window, etc. Now I've been discovered by the person I'm closest to, I still wouldn't do it in her company.

I never had a good filter, and so it never crossed my mind to hide anything I do from the people around me. So, I talk to myself sometimes, and make weird noises, movements, etc. in front of other people, if they know me. They don't have to be old friends, just know me on a daily basis -- like the ladies who work with me, my husband, my family, his family.

I didn't tell my husband about me being an Aspie for a long time. Then one night he was in his office and I was researching on the computer, and he came into the living room and looked over my shoulder before I could change pages.

The dialogue went more or less like this...

"You're researching Autism? "
"u-huh," I answer, thinking "crap. busted."
"Ok..........................................Do you know someone with autism?"
"..............u-huh. (awkward smile) Not the traditional kind, actually autism is a spectrum --> insert your short monologue about autism here"
"Huh! Who do you know with autism?"
"....me?"
"YOU? (sitting on the sofa next to me, almost excited) Let me see the symptoms!"
(several minutes later)
"WOW! That's awesome! It explains so much about you! It's you, baby! It's you!"

He was actually excited about having an explanation for me being different.

SO NOT the reaction I was expecting. But it has really helped us a lot as a couple, and he helps me in all kinds of social situations now, which before I had to figure out myself. He is also much more understanding when I "lose" it and need time off.

I am so happy I got outed...

^Funny how your husband didn't pick up on your traits because you said in the Parents board you have a child with AS^