Viral wife meltdown video=undiagnosed autistic?

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I've still not looked at it.

"Jim says he knew it was truly over when his wife defriended him on Facebook."

At least he can take a hint.

You know he's stalking her through some friend's FB account.

You post made me giggle.

Sounds like he needs just as much help as she does.

Actually, it's possible. Many people put on an act in order to impress their prospective partner, and then when they feel that the person is not going to leave them, they relax and show their true selves. Marriage can be a common time for this to occur, because being married means a commitment to a permanent relationship, and also because the legal aspects of marriage make getting divorced a lot more work than breaking up with a boyfriend/girlfriend. It's actually extremely common for a spousal abuser to act great while dating and then become abusive once they're married, because of the permanency effect.

I don't know these people. I can't judge. The woman claims the man was deliberately provoking her to make her have a meltdown. The man says the woman was having meltdowns to manipulate him. Either story could be true. Either way, I'm glad they're divorcing, and I hope they can find their way to emotionally healthy relationships in the future.

Well apparently the wife in the video made posts on facebook painting him the bad guy, gotta say if someone was bashing me on facebook and calling me the bad guy every time we disagreed on something, I wouldn't take that for long. If the roles were reversed I don't think any woman would stand for that either - probably it'd result in a huge argument or break-up.

From the context of the video, wasn't the point of making it that she was telling people how horrible he is but in the meantime she has these tantrums instead of negotiating things and being inflexible? But I wonder why it went viral instead of just to make people (those who think he's the bad guy) "understand once they see this video" as at the end. Lot of missing context there for the previous part of the day and what followed and why. This is for a couple to solve or to seek out a therapist to help imho, not to post on facebook or youtube.

shrink4men.com homepage has the take that the tantrum is typical of a personality disorder eventhough it doesn't say it's actually a personality disorder. Surely though there is no way for anyone to decide if it's something to do with autism or personality disorder just from that video?

I agree. It was also completely degrading that they were laughing at her for it after they showed the video clip. Complete lack of empathy. She could have been going through an incredibly stressful time with no breaks, and just wanted to have some time to herself. (She said in the video that she just wanted to have one day to do what she wanted to do). It's possible that she's autistic and was never diagnosed. It's also possible that she was raised as a spoiled brat, but judging from her "meltdown", I doubt that's the reason. I think it's much more likely that she was either incredibly stressed, or autistic and having a meltdown. Either way, he's a dick for recording it and posting it online, and The Young Turks are dicks for laughing at her.

I agree. For all anybody knows, he's been mentally abusing her throughout their entire relationship, playing mind games with her and deliberately making her stressed. For all we know, he does things like this to her all the time, and this time was the last straw. Guys who act calm like that while they're playing mind games and manipulating their partner are dicks. I know, I dated one once.

When I was in an abusive relationship, I said a lot of rather mean things about my abusive ex to people in my social circle. Such posts are not specifically evidence of her doing "wrong."

It is, however, a common tactic for abusers to gaslight and try to make it look like their target is the unreasonable one.



And what if she is telling the truth? That he egged her on until she lost her temper?



That's an MRA site and seems to be fixated on "women are always wrong in disputes with men." Plus dismissing other perspectives as "the guys are always wrong media machine." I don't think it is remotely possible for me to take it seriously as a source. Great website for guys who want to play the victim all the time, though. That's what MRAs are best at.

I realise all this but I think you misunderstand me. My view here is not "she's wrong" or "he's right" and yeah maybe he did encourage it, my point is there is no context to support "who is right", and I simply don't agree with putting things out publicly like this - for either of them and perhaps they ought to have tried some help. It's also a common tactic to reverse the roles through becomming the victim. I didn't say he wasn't abusive, or she was the one who did it or vice versa - I don't think there is enough evidence there for that from a single video. Actually I said it seems to be his point (not mine) in making the video - that is, it wasn't his point to tell the whole world according to him in the video, yet he let it go viral (and I wonder why). Note that I said the context is missing in every possible way.

Are you implying I play the victim "all the time" (or at all) just for visiting that site? Are you slating me for having an objective view?

Just wondering btw, not saying that's your intent.

Last edited by savvyidentity on 10 Aug 2013, 9:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Are you even allowed to post video of someone else without their permissions ?.

I'm not sure, I know the copyright is supposed to go to the person who made the "work", but I'm not sure what the other persons rights may be. Public places I think have different rules though and pretty sure not allowed in a public place.

One question. My wife has often blamed me for not controlling her meltdowns. Of the women who posted who have had similar meltdowns, is there really anything to do but walk away?

Dunno. Tantrums are evidence of -something-. I never saw the video (pulled AFAIK). But, personality disorders and autistic meltdowns can look like that. So can being a nasty, spoiled drama queen.

On one hand, the guy did something pretty nasty in response to her behavior. On the other, she wasn't behaving well at all, either in the video or on social media.

From my own experience with my wife (BPD, highly likely also autistic)...

(a) From the outside, tantrums like that look like nasty, manipulative behavior. And will, over surprisingly short amounts of time, result in complete alienation from even relatively sympathetic people who are paid to listen to you. (5 MCs, several therapists, broke down into yelling fits and/or started refusing to see her.) 'Normal' people tend to have no tolerance for that sort of behavior. (check out comments for outside blogs) My guess is that certain forms of entitlement and blame-shifting are incredibly repellent to most people because almost everyone trains themselves out of doing those particular sorts of crazy. Many people will put up with 'Yes, I messed up. Very few tolerate, 'He made me mess up.'

(b) Living with that sort of behavior over extended periods is difficult. Particularly since I suspect his wife blamed him for her tantrums and probably projected her own failings onto him. I sympathize with the guy. But that's pure projection. Anyways, my experience that the tantrum on tape is almost certainly the mild one.* It can be very tempting to try to validate your experiences with emotionally abusive people. Reality is that they're both problematic people, but I sometimes wonder if the world would be better off if the default was to record and post emotional and physical abuse. It probably would be. Sure, cruel, betrayal, blah, blah, but...just don't do it.

--Argyle
*You're always too busy to pull out a camera when a woman is ranting, weaving at 90 mph, and threatening to impact an offramp.

I still say it's pretty awful behaviour to keep slating someone on facebook if they are not actually being abusive. Far as I know she hasn't made that claim about him publicly. I can understand someone just venting about their issues to a friend too, but yeah it's not great to have to log on to facebook and see someone completely blaming you for everything. I would rather see how it plays out before completely making up my mind as she hasn't said much about it yet.

Good point, it's just plain dangerous to distract someone whilst they're driving.

It depends on the person.

I have PTSD and PDD NOS, and when I'm having a meltdown, walking away is a very bad idea. I will usually try to stop the person from walking away, and if I don't, I typically end up self-injuring.

What works for me (and I know it's hard for others to do) is for them to ignore the hurtful things I'm saying and just keep telling me that they care about me, love me, etc, and some of the things they like about me. And ask me if I want a hug, and if I don't respond, assume the answer is 'yes' (I find it easier to say no than yes).

But this is highly individual. Best thing, if you can, is to ask the person (when they're calm) what is likely to help them during a meltdown.