Pushing people away

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The Aspie I fell in love with explained to me that the closer he gets to people the more he pushes them away. Its a defense mechanism. Little did he know that the harder he pushed, the tighter I held on! Have you ever pushed someone away? And do you think there is a way for someone(the NT partner) to hold on, be persistent and get past this stage?

I think you would be best qualified to tell how you pushed back

I push people away all the time and yes, it's sort of a defense mechanism because i need to defend myself and my space from being invaded. Maintaining a relationship or close friendship is too demanding, it consumes more of my time and energy than i am willing to invest.

Only up to a point in my experience. The times i do the most pushing are when im unsure of the feelings of the other person and i'm worrying that im more interested in them than they are in me. I don't think i like to be in situations where my feeling are exposed and the other persons aren't, not when i suspect that im just waiting for them to say how they're not really interested. Preemptive strike really.

If things get past a certain point and i know the feelings are returned i don't think pushing would be an issue.

Hello I'm new here and happy I found this forum. I also love an aspie(sounds weird when I say that, but it seems acceptable here) and he does the same thing. I am a NT. He also says it is a defense mechanism. It gets real frustrating for me when he pushes me away or shuts down. Communication between he and I has been...well, sometimes a complete failure. I have noticed that the pushing and shutting down comes more so when he is stressed out. I also just hold on tight and wait for him to come around. He can go a week without even a hello. Again, frustrating for me, as am not that way. It takes a lot of patience on my part to hold on through it; even then, there are times that my patience runs thin. My problem at times is not knowing what to do and how to communicate with him when he hits these moments. I want so much to be there for him and I feel helpless/useless when all I can do is sit there and wait

Do it by default now. I do have friends that I know won't be ******** and that I try my best to treat with the same respect. Over the past decade, however, people have only given me more and more reasons not to trust them with anything that goes deeper than that. I only ever seem to attract people who want to use or pity me and who don't view me as another human being.

I've already mentioned patience and persistence,but one other word comes to mind:adaptation. In the beginning stages our communication was awesome. Long winded informative emails, texts and constant communication. This all before I knew about his AS. Post AS confession:things changed. Getting a response sometimes was like "pulling teeth" and the text messages slowed. I would text him in the evening and I could expect one at a certain time. Not any more. He became less and less predictable. That was hard for me because I'm one who looks for patters when dealing with people. It helps me know what to expect. I have a hard time not knowing what's coming next.
Every morning I either text or email him a "Good Morning" message. He ALWAYS responds. I have learned that depending on when it is read (I can tell when he reads an email) that determines how he is feeling. Sometimes he's very busy and just gets to it late, but then if that is the case he will tell me. So the one constant is that he will always tell me Good Morning in return. As long as I have that one constant I know everything is okay. What happens the rest of the day is always a mystery. I have learned to "go with the flow" or "play it by ear". Sometimes our conversation is constant all day and sometimes it isn't. We work together so I have set scheduled times to go see him at his desk. Since he's not always predictable, I try to be. In all of the chaos that is him, I am constantly adapting, finding new patterns all the time. It's getting easier every day.

This is interesting to hear, as this seems to ring true to myself. I have never really been able to maintain good friendships. The closer the friendship I have had with my best friend, the more I seem to do stupid stuff to put strain on our friendship. For example when we were first friends we would chill out, spend time out clubbing, play Xbox together, hangout between lectures, watching football etc. But in recent months we have not been close at all. I have been texting him in the small hours when I am drunk or upset. The one time I hospitalised myself through self harm I told him I was trying to commit suicide.

When I have been in relationships with girlfriends, they have all said that I change. I am fun etc when we first get together, yet after a few months, I pick them up on small things, cause arguments etc and have no reason why I do it. My most recent girlfriend was a good friend of 7 years prior to our relationship. To quote "(she wasn't) able to say or do anything for the past few weeks without (me) sticking my nose in and making an issue out of it". I miss her greatly and even now months after love her dearly, and looking back do massively regret many of my actions and since this happened prior to my diagnosis would just love to apologise to her for everything that happened and explain why. But I may never have that opportunity.

Inconsistent behavior in NT's signals that some this is amiss. Not always the case with folks with AS. Having/loving someone with AS means that the NT has to apply a different set of rules when dealing with them. Some people don't know how to do this. Some don't want to. I have friends with issues unique unto them. I'm used to applying different rules all the time. However applying the AS rules takes more consciousness.

I think in your case the lack of diagnosis was a factor. Before I knew about my guy having AS, there were things about him that puzzled me but I still hung on. I don't know how long I would have done that not knowing about his AS. But before telling me about it he was trying extremely hard with me. Once he told me about it things changed. Maybe he thought he didn't have to try as hard. He could now relax. Once I told him it wasn't an issue he changed or rather relaxed. He was used to people treating him differently after finding out so he doesn't tell anyone. But he told me and I treat him no differently post AS knowledge than pre AS knowledge. But it has made a big difference. I'm glad I know. It may have made a difference for your friend.....

I have many times, most times unintentionally. I've done this ever since I was a child. People would try to befriend me and I push them away assuming they didn't like me. Pushing people away has followed me into adulthood and it still hasn't changed. I've pushed people away because I could not read their emotions and simply thought they didn't want to talk to me anymore. I've also recently done this with women I liked but did not act on enough. I assumed they weren't interested in me because they wouldn't start the conversations(which of course I'm the one who is suppose to do it and if I did it, I wouldn't be in this mess) and low and behold they are with someone who is worse than I am. I probably did have a chance this whole time but because I can not read those woman's emotions and simply assumed they didn't like me, I'd alienate my chances of dating them.

You've touched on something important. I thought that the pushing away may be be cause he was uncertain of my feelings for him. I try every day to let him know how I feel about him. He can never say I didn't tell him. Sometimes I'll text him-knowing he won't text back, but I'll tell him that I just wanted him to know I was thinking about him on that day at that exact moment.

This echo's true to my experience. She kept asking/telling me to stop trying so hard all the time, just to let things roll and see what happens. I had a night where we had the slightest argument and I broke down emotionally in her car, smashed the dashboard and everything. She was a smart caring girl and had a lot of time for me over the years when many did not. If I had a single regret in my life to date, it would be ruining our friendship by having a relationship.

A massive shame really.

More than once. The way they kept me around was to keep reassuring me they cared and eventually I got over it.

Well then it seems like I'm on the right track.

I hope it works out for you. Mine had to do with a lot of insecurities from previous relationships/friendships.

Sometimes I wonder if the holding on and pushing back becomes an irritant.