Do Aspies have a more difficult time breaking up than NT's?

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Like 5 years longer in my case.

Well see I interpret your question in two different ways.

"Do Aspies have a more difficult time breaking up than NT's?"

Now the two questions I see in this is:

1. Is it harder for Aspies to LITERALLY break up with someone

AND

2. Is it harder for Aspies to to GET OVER a break up


I am not sure which one the OP meant but I will answer both anyway.

1. In my experience it is MUCH easier for me to break up with someone than over half of the NT's I personally know. I can break up, block from social networking sites and delete their phone number in a matter of hours and begin to move on. If the woman I'm dating does something I do not like, something major that is an absolute dealbreaker for me, there's no contemplating, hesitating, hold ups or hang ons, it's over. That's it. Done. Zip. Game over, man. Block. Delete. Move on.

2. I can only speak from my experience that it seems that I hold on to the memories of someone after a break up MUCH longer than any of the NT's I know. I still bring up exes years later. I still think about them at least once a day (almost every single one of them). It took me a full year to forgive an ex for cheating on me, which wound up being therapeutic because after I was able to forgive I was able to move on (but not forget).

I can literally break up with someone and never talk to them again like THAT (snaps fingers), but I'll still think about the person I just blocked out of my life so much that friends may call me obsessive.

It's a weird mix.

It's very easy to break up with someone. I've done it accidentally by not remembering to call them and they eventually gave up.

Aspies usually want things a certain way -- that's rigidity. If having that relationship is that "certain way", then getting past the relationship after breaking up might be more difficult.


I finally got really emotionally involved with a girl this past summer in a way that was really different from any other relationship I had. When we got more into the relationship, we talked for several months online and on the phone. The relationship -- if you can call it that -- only lasted for two weeks. She said she wanted kids, whereas I did not; she wanted someone to pursue spirituality with, and I am not that kind of person. She also said I was controlling, which I don't really buy. We continued to talk for a long time after that. Finally she de-friended me on Facebook the weekend before the US Thanksgiving holiday, and finally cried over the whole loss for the first time.



I think I know that kind of feeling you are talking about spending time with. For me, it was mostly liking having time on the phone with her, since we did not get together very often.

Doesn't sound as though you were really close to a person if you just did not remember calling them.

I don't think it's harder after a breakup - for me, I'm so logical it was like, "Okay, this is logically not working."

However, actually *breaking up* is harder, I think. At least for me, it was.

A few girls/ladies moved away or we just drifted apart and left school and it was a logical end. But in one case, that 4-5 months of infatuation had passed, and her dad (who lived a coupe hours away) and i didn't get along due to different faiths. (He'd divorced her mom and moved away in fact.)

I didn't feel comfortable with the relationship, but I was like, "I don't know how to end this, I don't want to hurt her feelings, yet I know it's not working."

So, she invited me out once & said we would be jsut friends from then on, and I felt so much relief that I didn't have to be the one to say it. I really had no idea, in my mid-20s, how to actually end a relationship at that point, which i should have been doing with 1-2 "friends" who got really raunchy, rude, and so on after we graduated high school, and whereas, they used to enjoy my silliness and quirks these thigns bothered them once we got to like 20 or so. Also, I was always more mature for my age, and i've come to realize that they only wanted to be that way till they got out of the house.

But, what was I going to from "just friends" to? "Casual acquaintances?" Just "not hnging around them" was hard, though I was developing some very clsoe friendships in my church that would take the place of these others soon after. It became easier then.

So, I would say that it can be easy if you look at it logically, but 2 things compound it: 1. Knowing exactly how to break up; and, 2. Having something to replace it with.

I know, I drifted from romance to friendships there, I'm sorry. But, I think there is some comparison to be made.

Well in my case, as I stated elsewhere here, my relationship ended October of last year, and there are some elements I still need closure over.

She isn't responsible or mature in any way, and she keeps making bad decision after bad decision, but that's her problem.

No, what I need closure over is that I'm still not only a little mad at her, but disgusted with her family for hiding so much from me. They clearly didn't want me to be a part of their family. What hurts even more is that I recently realized while chatting with a relative that, my whole life, people have essentially kept me at arms length; they've never really made the attempt to connect with me, and get to know me. Apparently, I'm reading this is normal for Autistic folks.

Well, unfortunately, then why were they so surprised to find out I was dating a gal who was bad news in every possible way? What indication could I have possibly had that she didn't love me when her attempts to get close to me (other than sex) were essentially the same as everyone else's?

If nothing else, I know now what to look for, and what not to look for.


On top of that though, between then and now, I've also been dealing with a lot of other stuff non-relationship related that I needed serious closure over too.

IMO, the answer is "it depends"

If you're a total jerk, then breaking up is easy - as they do it for you.

If you're something that they like, but they're not something you like... Good luck. It's a royal PITA.

Well in my case, my ex was very clingy, but cheating on me from Day 1, and lying to me about everything.

When I broke up with her, she actually tried bribing me and guilt-tripping me to stay with her, and even used the cliche "I can change" line on me.

I was happy to be free from her, but she didn't make the fallout any easier.

Breaking up was always difficult for me because I hate hurting anyones feelings.

Being broken up with, beyond devastating.

When my late husband passed, considering that I was pregnant with multiple complications and our 2 teens were acting out, I handled it all surprisingly well. [almost scary welll. I became obsessed and fascinated with the entire grieving process and how To do it properly, how my experience compared to Joyce Brothers, and planning my new life as though it was an adventure] I was, happily in my heart, remarried less than 2 years later [we technically "shacked up" for 18 years. just made it legal last year] I have no idea why I was able to handle it well when I handle so little well.

^^^This

This!

While I haven't had to break up with someone in many years, since women usually broke up with me in one way or another, but I very much agree. I did, however, have to end a friendship of ten years, with a girl who turned emotionally abusive. One day, she did something I consider reprehensible. Terminating things was very quick, firm, and decisive: I told her to never contact me again, and next morning, drove to a police station, to tell them I fear for my car getting vandalized after I kicked a woman out of my life (which was 100% true). When I got there, I asked to speak to a male officer, and he was nothing short of professional and understanding. As he told me to do, I blocked the woman on all the communication channels that led to me. The police, in turn, sent squad cars to drive through my apartment complex to check on my car for the next ten days. I haven't spoken to that woman ever since, like she never existed. Her name is still in my police department's case files.

I'm wondering at this point if I mentally checked out of my friendship with her long before then, because she engaged in subtle bullying for months, if not years, prior to me ending the friendship. So telling her front and center to get out of my life was just making things official, so to speak. This brings me to a theory that many aspies stay in unenjoyable relationships for longer than necessary, out of guilt, due to fear of not finding a "replacement", for sex, or any combination of the above, and the break-up is just "making things official". Hence, it's easier for them to do than for most NTs, because they already broke up with the person in their minds.

The way it's phrased is ambiguous.
I am rarely the one to initiate a breakup, usually I'm the one who gets left.

Then again, I have not been subject to extreme behavior/mistreatment/abuse-
I don't believe I'd stand for that, but chances are I wouldn't get into a relationship with such a person in first place, if it were foreseeable.

If the question means, is it harder for an Aspie to get over the end of a relationship-
guess it depends on how accustomed one is to having that person in one's life, how integrated (and enjoyed) they were.
If the Aspie (or anyone) is treated poorly & chaotically, I'd guess they'd be more relieved at that sort of "loss",
but if the person is getting any (or much) enjoyment/stability from the relationship, then that loss is going to be tough to recover from.

And as noted by another poster, the prospects for another opportunity with a new person can be very hard to come by.

I like people best when I know them well, and they know me well-that familiarity is comforting,
and I dread the mess and disaster of trying to connect with strangers (hoping that I can sort the wheat from the chaff).