NT 51yo Female with undiagnosed Aspie

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Hi All,
I joined this site because I wanted to learn more and hopefully help my significant other and myself. He and I have been an item for abt 8 years now. He lives and works abt 80 miles away so only comes home on the weekends because of work. I have thought he might be aspie for a long time, but now I am sure of it. I have tried to speak to him about it, to see someone but it seems to hurt his feelings and he doesn't want to hear any part of it. Time will tell I guess. He works full time and never misses work but I can tell he has problems with social interactions at work.

I am not asking for a diagnosis here I am just mentioning the symptoms I see.

Echolalia (this might drive us apart as it drive me crazy when he forces me to participate) -he will answer the phone talk to the person who he knows on the phone then hand me the phone and after I sit in front of him talking to that person and hang up he will ask me who it was!! !! Just an example) Even the kids get tired of his ecolalia, no more high fives for him
Super fast eating (everyone mentions it)
Slumped over his plate, I constantly remind him to sit up as he has a esophageal problem
Constantly sniffing his fingers (I have a old chinese joke here somewhere)
OCD (once pulled over the car to hunt under the seat for a clipped fingernail that fell)
Music and theatre trivia is his speciality
Has a hard time reading emotions (For example will laugh inappropriately when I have to look at him as I am struggling and say "does it look like I am laughing", then he seems to get it)
He likes to gamble (nothing over the top

We aren't very sexual but OK with me because I take a med the pretty much diminishes the drive.
He is handsome, gives great great back and foot rubs (several times a day if I want)
We go on great vacations

From my reading this sounds like he might have it. My main question is there anyway to help him? What would diagnosing him officially do for him? Can I help him curtail his echolalia? (Once in Vegas he read a poster of Don Rickles coming to perform that said something like "Mr Personality" and I got so tired of him repeating that all day, begging him to stop that we had a big argument until I started repeating it back to him and he hated it but he did stop) He has said his co-workers have called him a parrot. He has worked there about 8 or 9 years.

Yoli, I read somewhere that women marry men hoping they will change, and that men marry women hoping they won't. So, I don't think that him possibly being an aspie has anything to do with you dilemma, as in if you were with an NT, only the problems you experience would be different. My advice would be to accept him for who and what he is, and to expect no less from him.

Hi, well I do accept him and love him but I can't deny the echolalia <sp> drives me really crazy esp when I am required by him to play along. I need to be accepted for who and how I am also I guess. I am not planning on leaving him but I know he could get along better for himself if he could learn some things but without admitting any "issue" he has no incentive.

We just recently went on vacation with my extended family (no one knows, suspects any asp) but he said "What's goin on" SOOOOO many times my adult niece offered him 20.00 if he would go the rest of the day without saying it. He was driving everyone nuts. Now remember they have no reason to understand why he is doing this because no diagnosis so he doesn't get a "pass" or understanding.

All I can suggest you do is to talk to him about it. If the echolalia bothers you, it bothers you with or without a formal diagnosis.

Good luck.

I had to look up echolalia because I haven't seen it mentioned much on WP.

Echolalia - The immediate and involuntary repetition of words or phrases just spoken by others, often a symptom of autism or some types of schizophrenia.

Echolalia - the tendency to repeat mechanically words just spoken by another person: can occur in cases of brain damage, mental retardation, and schizophrenia.

I looked closely at what you wrote and it doesn't seem like echolalia. Maybe I'm missing something.

Also, you wrote that you can tell he has problems with social interaction at work but didn't give examples. How would you know, BTW?

If I was to guess, I'd say his issue is really OCD. Then again, I could be wrong. Won't be the first time.

I'm also not convinced that what you are describing here is echolalia. Perhaps it's more of a verbal stim - in other words a practice or habit which provides a degree of satisfaction in some way to him. I stim verbally, but only when I'm alone or with my son. I'm not autistic, but my son is. He went through a period of echolalia when he was younger and it is quite different from what I do. He also has verbal stims, mostly squeaking.

I'm not sure either what you mean by being required to "play along".

Really, what it comes down is - do you wish to continue this relationship? Whether or not he is autistic, or can have any other diagnosis or label attached to him is pretty much irrelevant if this is simply the way he is.

If he doesn't want to be diagnosed, then don't push it. That is the worst possible use of a label IMO.

Diagnosis what does it offer? It helps people who want a name for something they have been experiencing much of their life. It can help people who are looking for answers, in that case it can be a relief for a time. If he is not looking for answers then pushing for a DX isn't such a good idea.

Other than that labels can be pretty overrated, I certainly don't live by my labels. A label doesn't the person make. I went through that stage and come out the other end. In fact I honestly believe that people with these labels can be limited by them. In that it becomes a stereotype that they stick to.

DX like this don't exist in absolute, it is set of trait arbitrarily picked by one particular discipline. This is what people need to grasp it is a classification or modeling, it is not the whole person, if at all.

What I gather from you description is a bunch of different traits, and that is fine, DX or not we are all different.

Btw your assessment of echolalia is not at all accurate. I have a fair bit of experience with neurodeveopmental conditions and mental health. You really have to be careful of looking up thing on the internet, and making tenuous connections. I know someone who always talks about the same thing, and repeats these topic that we know over and over. This is very different from echolalia, I call it verbal diarrhea. The technical term for the echolalia behavior is perseveration.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perseveration

In echolalia, I could say 'spoon', and they could involuntarily say 'spoon' and perseverate on that word. Where as he wants to talk about these topics.

I would treat the situation 'as is', rather than trying to take everything about him, an lump it all together.

It seem to me that the most grating thing for you is the obsessive compulsive behaviors. You should work together to see how you can accommodate each other better. If that is what you want of course.

I looked it up too. I got the impression that echolalia is an automatic thing kind of like a verbal tick or stim. If that is the case & he does have it there likely isn't much that can be done for it other than him trying to maintain constant awareness of it & watching it which would tire him out & frustrate him very fast.

A formal diagnoses won't help unless he's willing to accept it & then he'd have to do something with it like getting treatment or asking for work accommodations. If he has major problems functioning he could also see about trying to get on disability if work is really difficult for him or requesting help from social &/or government services. He does not need a formal diagnoses to try learning about things & using that to work on himself.
If he's fairly high functioning & is well adjusted/used to being the way he is (especially if he's older) he may have the attitude of that's how he is & things are for him & he doesn't see a reason to try getting help. You pushing him to get a digonsoes may come off to him as you not accepting him the way he's always been & that he needs to suddenly change how he is.