NT needs help with her Aspie interest

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So avoid those threads, you won't be annoyed, and neither will we. Simple.

Ask him! you said you understand you need to be blunt.. Why not ask him, specifically, what certain things that he does mean to him, how he feels about things that you do, and if you are interpreting his behaviour correctly? Give him the chance to put that blunt honesty to use on someone who appreciates it. If you understand that you can't twist his words all over the place, he can actually just tell the answers to all the questions you're asking here. (I think..)

ithinkican: Needing time alone might be an Asperger's trait, but ignoring you completely like this guy seems to do, is a very certain sign that he's only interested in sex and not in you. If you're not ok with that, be open for alternative guys. What you need is a person that put you before anything else, even aspie interests. If he can't do that, he has already expressed his preferences.

It seems to me that it's really weird that some guy, especially an aspie guy, can completely disregard almost everything said in this thread, can respond in a manner that is obviously not interested in the opinions of pretty much everybody else, presents an extremely rigid point of view, obviously has no interest in what anyone except himself has to say and does not give the benefit of the doubt!
You are obviously a troll...

Well, that is your first clue. If he really is an Aspie, he isn't acting. If he welcomes your call, he really does. Why he isn't more proactive, well that can be complicated. One of the major problems that AS males have with females of any stripe is they have a set of rules they have made up to deal with others. He may have an invalid rule set. Let him know and inform him of what you need. Look, I often obsess over what my "proper" response should be. If I cannot decide, then inaction is the default. Which is usually the wrong response, but that is where I go...

Bottom line, if you want this to work, and that is your decision, you have to be proactive and not wait for him. If that doesn't work for you, then reevaluate your options. If not, you need to be blunt. There are rewards, he is not likely to need the degree of coddling a NT male does. And he will be very open to experimentation. What he won't do is gamble. Or cheat because that is a form of gambling.

So, place your bets and take your choices, Will he never lie to you? Can't say that. His goals will be to please you and not himself. If he lies, and he might, that will be to serve you.

I can't claim to speak for your two aspies, you have to decide yourself how far this applies: My reason for similar behaviour is that I met several people who kept in touch with me not so much because they wanted my company but mostly because they thought I needed theirs. Because I prefer solitude over that kind of charity, the result has been that when people are nice to me I have a far weaker emotional response than I used to, because somewhere in the background is always the possibility that this is again just charity. I have that reduced response even if I think someone's actions accurately reflect their intention and feelings. There is now a difference between believing someone's affections are real and them feeling real. If I think there is a real risk of someone merely feeling sorry for me or just being polite, I am deliberately cautious. I also don't contact people, even those I like, unless I have something to say. I don't just initiate contact in the hope we will think of something to share. I do respond to calls and to emails unless I am really stuck for an answer.


If it were me you could ask and get a straight answer. I make no promises for someone I don't know.


I would like it. I would also like to know whether the person I tell to back off can take it without feeling hurt or sees being told to back off as the lesser evil. Not sure why I would like to know that, but I would.


Not at all absurd. You see the other side of what I described before. You may believe the affection is real but it still doesn't feel real. You need the signals you normally expect. I am sorry that I have no practical suggestions.


Not sure whether there is a parallel, but I always resented anything like formal dress. Then I read about costly signalling. Once I saw the logic, I could go along with it. It might help your partner if you explained the logic of why it matters that he also calls you.

Last edited by Gromit on 12 Jun 2009, 4:53 am, edited 1 time in total.

Hey ithinkican and ditzy72...we need to start a support group for this : )

I'm in the same boat and thought I was reading some stuff out of my own head when I read your posts. I am not completely NT though...I have a bit of aspieness myself so I can relate to the alone time/special interests etc. I have an autistic/aspergers bf as well, and I have experienced many of the same things as you. I knew what I was getting into when I started the relationship, but I still feel pain from time to time when I get shut out of his world. I know it's not intentional, and he usually comes around. It just takes a little patience and not taking it personally. I've learned to appreciate more some of the small things that many normal relationships take for granted. Even though he can seem miles away at times, the good times still outweigh the lonely. My situation may be a little better, though, because my bf is a big movie buff, and seems to have picked up some lessons about relationships from watching many movies (although sometimes it feels like he's acting out a script rather than being natural, at least I know there is effort involved). One of the reasons I started dating him was because I picked up pretty quick that he was aspie, but at the same time, I noticed he had learned to adapt to some social situations. He has faced many challenges, but has learned to take them head-on and has strong character because of it.

I wanted to throw a different idea out there, about times when you feel completely shut out from his private world. My bf also suffers from depression, and it seems that the worst times for me are maybe related more to his depression than the aspie tendencies. Often aspies have additional difficulties and depression is not uncommon. He seems to find some comfort in having me around, even though he is completely ignoring me. He can come over and spend hours playing a video game while I sit there, and at first I wondered why he even came over, but every once in a while one of his hands will reach out and pat my leg or something, so I know I'm in there somewhere. He may not feel like dealing with the pressure of having to talk to me or entertain me directly, but he still wants me around, and I guess that's good enuf for me sometimes. He'll usually come around after a few days and make an effort to give me attention, and I recognize how hard the effort can be sometimes, so I appreciate it. To enjoy a relationship like this, you just have to redefine your own expectations a little and your definition of a relationship. The little things can mean a lot, especially if those little things take more effort for someone. If the unhappy times outweigh the happy ones for you, though, you might need to revisit the relationship. You have to look out for yourself, too in the end and not give up too much.

ugh your BF doesn't like to be touched? for me (I has condition!! !) it's always just a lot of fear over what would happen if i moved too fast for her interest... I wouldn't quite know how to recover from getting slapped...lol... timing is very important to me in relationships too (the alienation from the conditon itself makes me a bit distrusting about being naked or anything with anyone else... so as a general rule I kind of tend to want to be in love and know she is before we start you know...) but i don't really quite know how to figure out when my partners is in sync with my own... and i really don't want to ask the awkward blunt question of if she wants to sleep with me. Kind of better left said based on her nonverbal reactions which i'm STILL TRYING TO FIGURE OUT a lot of the time...

i try to respect the social context as much as possible but sometimes the willingness of aspies to talk about ANYTHING is awesome. A lot of us are very political. AS tends to solve big problems that affect a lot of people because that's just what we're better at than most people but... the proving we care about the people we're trying to help in a way that they're used to being shown is very hard.

myself even after years of therapy I have a problem with rambling on too long. I'm still trying to figure out how to sand my insigts down into the perfect 30 second soundbyte, i'd be deadly and AS would only be a gift for that.

i'm usually more than willing to make concessions and give the girls what they want especially sense i've figured out by now i'm better able to focus on the things i care about when I am loved.

But yeah a lot of my partners have said the same things, is like when the wires cross they cross perfectly and when they don't is a total miss.

a support group sounds great.... I'm getting allot of support right here. Until I met my bf I had never heard of Aspergers. We are both in our late 30's both have had serious relationships and children. I met him in social setting... I would have never known. He was very outgoing and social. He came on to me, called and made all the first moves. On one of our early dates he told me he was an aspie and I googled it and read about it but none of the info seemed to fit him. Other then high intellegence and going on and on about certain subjects. And the WHAM..... wow he does have aspergers.... he went into outer space. By this point I'm hooked and outside of his lack of initiating the communication, he's everything I've wanted in a man and more.

For me in past relationships just coming right out bluntly and telling a man how I felt as always been a really bad ideal. But I know that's what I have to do with him and it's so hard.
I have on one occasion told him how the lack of contact made me feel and for a time it improved. Now we are back in the same rut. I've often wanted to just sit still and not call and see how long it would take him to come around, but I don't have the patience because I miss him and I'm afraid he won't. So now I'm trying to come up with a way to bluntly but nicely tell him again without seeming like i'm unhappy or a nag.

anyway.