My NT daughter is dating an Aspie guy and is very anxious

Post Reply New Topic

My NT daughter has been dating her Aspie boyfriend for over a year. He is not diagnosed and does not think he has a problem - his mother explains that he is just being male when he behaves in an insensitive manner.

Her father and I have been involved in their relationship from the beginning. Our families have been friends for a long time. She has known him casually for several years and was close friends with him for a year before they dated.
The problem is that he is the BEST boyfriend in the world - he is cuddly, kind, does many sweet gestures for her and brings her soup and other gifts when she is sick. She loves the attention he gives her, and she also loves the conversations and friendship they have. It is very sweet and many people have commented on it and what a lovely couple they are.

However, my daughter has problems with anxiety, and recently it became so bad she had to be medicated. The main reason for her anxiety is her boyfriend's tendency to pull away from her and become very indifferent to her when she is upset or anxious. He will ignore her for days on end and she is very emotional and upset trying to understand why he would suddenly behave like this. He will spend hours on the computer and tell her he does not have time to see her because he is too busy. He can shut down emotionally very quickly and need to go off and be alone leaving her completely confused.

She asked him to take a two week break from the relationship to allow them time to think. She missed him very much, but he didn't seem to mind the separation. After the two weeks were over, she asked him to see her and he told her repeatedly he was too busy. Every time he rejected her request, she was in complete distress. He suddenly showed up at the door unannounced with a small gift and sent her into a panic attack - and she said some things to him (such as "you don't care about me") in her state of panic. After he left, he was very angry at her and would not communicate with her for several days again. She attempted again to communicate with him, but he said again he was too busy to see her, and then told her he had just spent his entire day with a male friend going to a festival and out for dinner. When she said she was very sorry for saying what she said, his reply was "whatever."

This scenario has been repeated over and over in their relationship. She is ending the relationship tomorrow, but is devastated because she still loves him and wants to be his friend, if he agrees. She said he was the best boyfriend, but the worst relationship she has ever had.

Can anyone in the Aspie community explain how an Aspie thinks so we can understand what part is Aspergers and what part is him just being a jerk? Is it possible that it does not occur to him that indifference causes other people emotional pain? Usually after these meltdowns he comes back acting as if nothing has happened.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Respectfully, I don't think anyone can explain "how an Aspie thinks" anymore than someone can explain how a neurotypical person thinks. I'm pretty sure that I do not think the same way as you; though we are both neurotypical.
However, I refer you to Callista's post in the thread linked below. Although the thread she is posting on concerns cheating, not an inability to be supportive; her paragraph on empathy/compassion is beautiful in it's clarity as it concerns aspergers. The whole thread is worth reading as insightful into relationship choices.

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt222415.html

This guy sounds a lot like me. He isn't trying to be a jerk. Most likely what's going on when he won't respond to your daughter when she's in distress is that he knows something bad is going on in her mind that he has no idea how to deal with, and he doesn't want to accidentally make things worse. He also would never admit to this, if he's anything like me. He'll say "I'm too busy" instead of "I have no idea how to help you". If he's anything like me, he'll want to appear insensitive rather than weak, even when the latter is the case. If he's anything like me, he cares for your daughter more than anything in the world, but has no idea how to express that, and doesn't want to try for fear of looking like an idiot, or worse, a creep. If he's anything like me, he'll also be absolutely devastated tomorrow when she breaks it off, even though he may not show it in front of you or your daughter. He'll want to save face, again preferring to seem insensitive rather than weak.

Call me crazy, but I think your daughter is overreacting, or just being cheated on. Though, it sounds it's gotten much worse. I wouldn't call him an aspie, as with the details presented, he sounds fairly NT. Although there aren't enough details on his personality to actually make an clear decision whether he is NT or asp, some apie traits are incapability of reading body language clearly, incomprehension of small talk and tendency to be fairly blunt, which usually generates some fairly odd, one sided, interesting, or entertaining conversations to listen to. The eye contact thing always varies, as plenty of asps develop the ability to make eye contact to certain people when they want to. And you probably already know that we can tend to be socially awkward. That or just different in social situations. Also asps almost ALWAYS have something they obsess over. Whether it be a sport, tv show, productive or not, almost always. If he has no real obsession, or no hobby he's super duper dedicated to, then I would throw him way way way out of the aspie category.

I have no singular obsession, and I was diagnosed at age 3.

every aspie is different, right?
And yes,i do the same thing, i dont know how to deal with these emotional situations so i try to avoid them. I consider relationships a headache for the same reason.

Regardless of him being a aspie or not it is not hes job or responsibility to control you're daughters emotions for her. She's an adult and it sounds like she is the one that has problems she needs to work on, - not him.

I think breaking up is a good idea for your daughter. Some of this stuff is just normal teenager relationship stuff, but what it boils down to is inconsistency. If the young man is inconsistent in how he treats your daughter, that's a red flag that the relationship isn't working out too well -- no matter HOW nice he is sporadically. I fully realize that a guy can't ALWAYS be nice, but in a normal relationship, especially with young people -- if a guy really wants to be with a girl, HE WANTS TO BE WITH HER.

Having said that, it is different with guys on the spectrum, I would guess. They do get distracted by computer games, etc. and lose track of time, etc. This young man may have NO CLUE how to handle your daughter's anxiety attacks, and so staying away and concentrating on something else may be the only way he can handle it. Who knows? I do think that basically ignoring the problem is this young man's way of coping with a situation he doesn't understand. That's possibly why he comes back after an episode as if nothing has happened.

Your daughter sounds like a very sensitive girl, and so any relationship may be problematic. But this one just might not be a good fit, and until there's a little more maturity on both sides, maybe she should steer clear of this guy.

I've got to agree with this ^^^. It's one thing to expect some understanding, but it's not reasonable to expect him to disregard everything else and put everything into keeping her from getting anxious... especially if she's unusually prone to anxiety. That'd be like saying that she's the only one of them that matters, and it establishes an unhealthy power imbalance in the relationship. Does she spend as much time trying to make him feel confident and happy as she expects him to put in for her? Can she explain her problems to him calmly when she's less upset? If it's going to work out, the effort can't be all on one side... and they'll need to give each other the benefit of the doubt rather than expecting the other to constantly prove that there's nothing to worry about.

Anyway, it's pretty obvious he's making an effort even though he backs of when she's agitated... and backing away isn't necessarily an unreasonable thing to do in those situations.

To clarify, I'm not saying there aren't times that a person should put a lot of effort into comforting their partner... but it can't be just one of them expected to comfort the other all the time. It shouldn't be happening frequently, and it should be always working in the same direction.

I don't know, when do we take into account personal responsibility? Also.. wasn't she the one who decided to take a break in the relationship? She distances him, he distances her.. she attacks his character by saying he doesn't care about her (Even though she was hurting) he says "whatever.." probably because he was hurting.

I guess the thing is what was he so busy doing that he didn't have time for her? In a relationships its generally considered tactful if not respectful to inform the other person in the relationship as to why you're busy. Anyway.. she kinda needs to get a reason for these actions in the future (unless she's just not informed you), indifference to the person your in a relationship with isn't good. His mother explaining things is not good enough--if he's old enough to date he's old enough to take responsibility for how he acts.

I can tell you.. from the things you're saying... your daughters already decided what course of action to take and conjecture on why someone she's no longer with would be useless when it comes to helping her bounce back from this.

I'd also say.. its quite possible he doesn't have AS at all. I mean did he choose to not be formally diagnosed or has he just not seen anyone for a diagnosis; also are you getting this from your own personal experiences? If he thinks he has no "problems" AS or not, this is a sign they need to part ways. Not recognizing you have an issue isn't necessarily symptomatic of AS.

You guys as parents don't have to understand, the fact he caused her anxiety to be bad enough that she has to be medicated.. is definitely enough information. She shouldn't want to be friends with him anymore, or at best they need to be incredibly casual friends who talk every once in a blue moon. I'm not going to dispute your daughters feelings of wanting to be friends, but generally people who want to be friends after a relationship ends do so because they're not completely over the relationship; not good in this instance.

His behaviors only toxic to her and will do her more emotional harm than good--especially if he thinks he has no problems to fix.

I bet from his perspective he's the one being jerked around. I mean, her behavior sounds really unpredictable, so I'm not surprised he withdrew.

That said he's probably not capable of giving her the emotional support she wants. It sounds like isolating himself is the only way he can cope with stress.

The Aspie guy is an a**hole and I would advise your daughter to move on and find someone more worthy of her. This is a relationship that won't end up working. Time to cut your losses.

My first impression is that he's the kind of guy that really dislikes drama and conflict - and she causes it in spades.

She starts freaking out, screaming, ranting, saying mean things... he retreats. I get the feeling he's got the raw deal here, not her. He's the one getting his feelings hurt then doesn't want to come back until it's safe and she won't be planning to hurt him yet again.

Unfortunately, she's feeling hurt too because he doesn't come running back with open arms and tears in his eyes like she seems to expect.


...hard to say from just one post, but that's the impression I got.

It really sounds to me like this guy is not good for your daughter. It doesn't mean he's a bad guy, but I don't think he's the right guy for her at all based on his behavior. It might be related to AS, and it might just be that he's insensitive or withdraws rather than dealing with his partner having some trouble(anxiety) - thus making it worse. It sounds like the best thing she can do is break up with him, heal and learn from the experience.

I'm sorry your daughter is going through a rough patch in her love life.

How does he have the raw side of the deal? Many people ta breaks from relationships. In typical Aspie fashion, it seems like this guy is not capable of feeling empathy for her daughter and I think it would be best for the daughter to move on.