Son was dumped by NT, but he's not getting over it

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PLEASE, don't do that to your son. That is not a relationship manual, but a manual on how to manipulate and then 'dump' women. You say your son has a good heart. Don't turn him into a calculating misogynist like this book is wont to do.

The best healer is time. In time he will likely become interested in a new young lady. It may take a while. Maybe just tell him eventually (if a year or more goes by) that she has made up her mind and it's best if he tries to accept that she just wants to be his friend (or whatever the case is).

Maybe if he had a male mentor who could teach him how to talk more seriously with girls, etc. You say he acts goofy and eventually girls get tired of that. They probably do like him and want something more from him eventually. That is a good sign.

Maybe get him a copy of Aspergers in Love or something like that. If you think he's old enough for that. If he does well with books to learn things like this, I'd rather see him read that, or John Gray's books on love and dating (NOT "Men are From Mars" but the dating books) than "The Game" which is horrible. Men love that book who have been burnt by love...it makes them feel in control.

If you saw the movie "Magnolia", the Tom Cruise character was based upon the principles in that book "The Game".

As his mother, don't pry too much into his love life etc., I mean I know you're not, but by that I meant don't say too much against this girl (it will only make him pine more for her). As his mother the best you can do is continue to build his self esteem in a realistic manner when you can. In time he will move on.

If he does not after a considerable time, perhaps therapy would be in order. Hope this helps.

Last week when I talked to him, my son seemed to be doing better, and using the experience as a good thing, trying to improve himself and all that so that he's ready for the right person.

Don't worry about me suggesting that he read The Game. No way that's happening! I had no idea about that book, and then I read a preview of it on Amazon.com, and was completely weirded out. That kind of behavior doesn't really sync with our religious outlook anyway. I do want to see young men feel like they are control of their own love life, but I'm no advocate of the "use them and lose them" lifestyle.

I've been focusing more on my son's self-confidence, but I think he's actually doing well in that area. He has lots of friends who are helping him out. He doesn't just have mommy worrying about him, he has lots of friends who are concerned for his welfare as well.

He'll be fine.

Kris

Real life girlfriends since age 15! Are you sure he is AS?

He'll be fine.

Out of curi, and I ask this cause I'm curious.

Did they ever have sex or anything in that nature? I don't know if he ever told you, but I'd like to know what their encounters were as far as kissing and making out and all that jazz.

not that I care, but it may have been why he was having such trouble earlier letting go.

now I am curious ...

you are Mormon, right?

there was this topic "Mormonisn might be good for aspies"
http://www.wrongplanet.net/modules.php? ... 83&start=0
would you agree Mormonism is very supportive of aspies? It seems like it is.

most members here would say they have few if any friends. Depending on what sort of mood I was in, I would say I have friends, other times just friendly acquaintances (at present, I say friends ).

Is your son doing mission work overseas? You strike me as a bit over protective on one hand, but on the other you have let him go for 2 years!

We get some American Mormons doing mission work here (Australia). I have a lot of respect for them (but politely get rid of them if they knock on the door )

I'm a Mormon too, and while it's no secret that when a missionary leaves a girlfriend behind, the relationship likely won't last the length of his mission, here are some other things your son may be more interested in hearing (and may even boost his ego a little)

All the young women and the younger adult girls adore the missionaries. In fact, there are probably several girls with crushes on him right now

Mormon girls *adore* returned missionaries...One thing I have noticed since I joined the church is...as soon as a single and eligible missionary comes back, he gets a lot of attention from the single girls. They don't stay single long

hmm.

lucky guys.

dang it.

Hey, hey, I had a boyfriend when I was 6 and another when I was 14 x3

So I experienced the dump twice, but now I am in a good healthy relationship. However, I never really pursued someone after they let me go. Doubt they would want me back(well, the first one was 6 so he probably got tired of doing kissy kissies, you know, the whole cootie myth) so I decided to move on.

However, I think it should be made clear that there are many people out there available. After my first real boyfriend at 14 dumped me(because I insisted on staying a virgin) I decided I would give up on love and stay single forever. However, I guess I broke that mental promise when I fell for the affectionate and loving charms of my current boyfriend. I wonder, what is your son looking for in a girl? It sounds like they were linked by their liberal interests and debating, so maybe he should try joining a debating team or club to get to know some other girls in the field? Not sure if there's ones aside from schools and college though x:

Of course, he doesn't need a new girlfriend but it seems that he's obsessed with forming a family. I think it's a rather romantic thought and quite normal in the youth but he also has to realize that life has many fine qualities to it~

That's hilarious! Yeah, I'm pretty sure he has AS -- he's always been inclined to just say whatever comes into his head, without a thought as to how his opinions would be received. He's great at academics, but not so good socially (as a child and young teenager).

As far as Mormonism being good for Aspies, I'm fairly convinced that is why both of my sons are doing as well as they are. This has not as much to do with the "faith" persay, as the fact that Mormons are CONSTANTLY doing stuff socially. Three hours of church on Sunday, choir, youth groups on Wednesday nights, socializing on Sunday nights, and scripture study every day before school when in high school. They are extremely involved in the Boy Scouts program. They go to church with people who have known them since they were babies, and so the people who know them at church tend to be more tolerant of their perceived "differences". Also, currently, my youngest son has a group of friends at church who are equally challenged, but in different ways -- ADHD, learning delays, etc. -- and so he, by comparison, doesn't look all that different.

Oldest son is doing his mission in Idaho and Oregon, and he is enjoying lots of support from members in the area, his companions, and just the fact that people seem to be really nice out there. It's ironic that he's there, and tolerating it well, since it's such a politically conservative area, but it's a great experience in learning how to tolerate differences in people, and really caring for others. I totally understand your "politely getting rid of" missionaries when they come to the door. I do the same thing with Jehovah's Witnesses! But basically, anybody who does this kind of work door to door is not doing it to purposely annoy people. They really believe that there may be the one person in a million who has a need for what they have to give.

I do believe that my son and his girlfriend were not sexually active, as missionaries cannot go on missions if they have been in a sexually active relationship. I do, however, think that they were as affectionate as would be the case with a couple who's been dating for a long time. I also know that they talked about life after marriage, which I'm sure included the physical aspect of life after marriage, and this definitely IS part of the problem with my son missing this relationship so much.

I'm also sure that I sound overprotective. I'm actually a very relaxed mother, and totally believe in my children finding their own way in life. But he has had strongly negative (i.e. almost suicidal) responses to being rejected by girls in the past, and so my concern is probably normal for a mother who has witnessed this. Plus, he's so far away, I don't feel like I can help him much.

The reality is, he will be fine, and I will be concerned anyway. He's fiercely independent, which is great, and he will find his way through this. I just really like hearing how others have dealt with their own experiences of rejection or loss of a loved one. It helps me understand what he is going through better.

Kris

Kris,


I'll talk about this from a more androgynous perspective of just AS and Mormonism. My brother is a Mormon (we're all Baptists) and he has gone through this twice with marriages that broke up. I don't know if he's AS or has something even more profound going on, but there is definitely something. Anyway, let's just go with the AS and I'll throw in some stuff my own brother went through that is similar to your son.


I believe Mordy said this: "When I meet someone and establish some kind of connection with them, it never diminishes in me like it does in other people. I have what might be called an "assumed rapport", even if I have not seen that person in months or a year. When I was young I assumed other people were just extended family members and tried to approach them in that way... after many years I've come to realize that some AS traits are positive but not in a world which is demographically challenged like the one we live in. A world of people that are very different and are always on the defensive mentally and emotionally, a result of their evolutionary programming or what might be termed "their nature". "


This can be very true of us. Indeed, Dr. Brasic who studies Autism and AS has said,

Individuals with Asperger disorder may have particular difficulty in dating and marriage. Boys and men with Asperger disorder may decide to marry suddenly without the dating and courtship that typically precede a union. Individuals with Asperger disorder may want to marry despite the lack of awareness of the many social interactions that usually lead up to matrimony. For example, in the movie Roger Dodger, an inexperienced youth with traits suggesting Asperger disorder encounters difficulty in relations with women (Chaisson and Kidd, 2002). Such problems may continue into adulthood.

Case vignette: A 50-year-old surgeon, who is an accomplished amateur musician with a PhD in mathematics and who has traits consistent with Asperger disorder, decides that it is time to marry and have children. He has always lived at home with his parents. Because he has trouble establishing relationships with women in his ethnic group locally, he goes overseas to marry a cousin less than half his age. He leaves his parents home for the first time to rent an apartment with his wife. They have no sexual relationship. She finds no career for herself in her new country, so she requests a divorce. Immediately after the divorce the patient wants to marry another woman. He complains that he is unable to find a suitable woman in his ethnic group.

People with Asperger disorder may benefit from counseling and social skills training. Attwood (1998) provides exercises for parents to use to foster social skills in their children. These activities can be modified for the needs of adults with Asperger disorder. Psychotherapy is often helpful for individuals to recognize their deficits in social skills.

People with Asperger disorder are vulnerable to depression, even suicide, after a perceived rejection in a social situation such as dating and marriage. Clinicians must be aware of the risk of depression and institute prompt interventions when major depression occurs.


It almost sounds like your son went through the extreme case the first time and a more mild case this time.


Here's what I find works with my brother who A) tends to not let go (a form of obsession in itself) B) builds a fantasy and C) does not want to see where things went wrong.


First off, we Aspies tend to obsess more about everything than regular people because of our brains. We also tend to view things as a puzzle. Trying to look at emotional things like a puzzle is almost an exercise in futility. First of all you are way too close to see it clearly, although many of us try. So, you will see a kind of dichotomy in which we try to analyze the relationship in a Scientific way, while we are shying away from some key truths about the situation because they are too painful for us to face. So, it may not be stalking obsession, but it's like intellectual obsession where we think it to death. Some of us, to ever feel comfortable about what happened will have to play out every scenario in our head visually and finally "see" that is just hopeless to be okay with it and move on. So, he is obsessing, but on a different level, not on a stalkerish plane. It's like he's trying to solve a Scientific problem - only this problem has so many emotional factors that it would be hard to accomplish that, so he gets stuck in the experiment so to speak. Does that make sense to you?


Add to that distance. Now he can fantasize all he wants. He's not confronted with empirical evidence to the contrary so his mind can easily toss out what it doesn't want to see. Again, the experiment is flawed, but he may still be too close to see it. It's Uncertainty Principle at its finest. The girlfriend is Shrodinger's cat. If I can't see the cat, I never know if the cat was actually exposed to radiation and died unless I open the door and look. In his case, the cat (relationship) has the potential to be alive because he has not yet seen that it is dead with his own eyes, or mind. It's the possibility that is alive and that he continues to play with in his mind. This is what he is playing out. The endless experiment. The mental obsession.


Now, as a sister to a mom, I'm going to tell you to stop immediately trying to point out what you felt was wrong with her to get through to him. He isn't ready to hear such things now and pointing them out will make him feel the need to protect her because "he" still feels in the relationship whether he is or not. You said he's very loyal, so stop setting off his loyalty triggers. Instead, you want to help him down the path to see what was wrong with the relationship instead of the person. Relationships are dynamics, so something in the dynamic was dysfunctional which caused the change. He can deal with that concept because it's not personal to either one. Get him into playing this out in third party scenarios. One way I do this with my brother is by "pretend friend situation." You're an NT so this will be easier for you. I have to really work at these, but I'm a writer, so I can do this by writing the story in my head and making pretend friend a character. So, pretend friend has this situation, make it just similar enough, but not too similar. This is what you do. "My friend's son is going through this and I don't know what to tell her. I need you to help me." Now lay it out. Here's the background, here's what happened, here was the result. Don't even mention AS or any of that other stuff. Just lay it out. Here's what happened to Sally's son, Michael. Then, you put it on your son to give you the answer. How can Sally's son let go. You can easily throw in the distance with college or anything. Set it up close enough to be relevant, but distant enough to keep it third person. Let your son logic his way through that scenario by coming up with advice for Sally's boy. When he comes back with that solution and he is very firm that this is the right solution (he's opinionated so he will), then let him know that the answer is the same for him, but never say you tricked him (we don't like that). Instead, say, Look! You solved your own problem and point out how this is so. He needs to see this from a distance from himself and his emotion. Putting it in the third person situation will allow him to do that. He can puzzle that out for someone else. It takes all of the personal qualities of the situation out of it and allows him to see it for what it is. It takes the cat out of the box.


I have to do this with my brother all the time. He gets stuck. It's like the old record players where you would go over and bump the needle. You need the right trick to bump the needle with a person. We aren't as simple as a record player.


And, when this is all done, never talk about the girl, talk about the situation, relationship, dynamic. Break it down into parts. That's how we think. "Let's look at this dynamic and try to figure out where it broke down." That removes the emotion and puts it back into observation of experiment. It isn't personal to old girlfriend or him. That removes the need for loyalty, but it also removes the potential to hurt self esteem. He has good self esteem, so let's keep that. You don't need to tear down anybody to analyze the relationship dynamics. You certainly don't want him going into another relationship where he feels mom is not an alcoholic, no similar family dysfunction, therefore this will work. Bad idea. Look at the behavior dynamic instead. Two people are involved in the dynamic and contribute. The dynamic happens. The dynamic had results I don't want. That is easier to deal with and much more concrete. It lends itself to the way we think. If he recognizes the dynamic, he will avoid it if it has results he does not desire. That is what you want. That allows him to say, I like this girl, but I can see where this is not going to work out over the long haul. It removes any need to see one as a hero and the other as a villian. It is simply a dynamic between two personalities that does not work out. And that, is not a big deal. That is not cause to feel huge rejection.


This will show you dynamic and forgive me, Mordy, for reusing your example in a different context, but it shows what I mean. Mordy said this:

Say someone is:
1) Obsessed with video games to an abnormal degree (consumes majority of the persons time)
2) Never goes out socially, prefers to stay in
3) Super intellectual, spends hours reading the internet/books and is never bored.
4) Depressed, unhappy, anxious, fearful around people.
5) Does not know how to communicate with other people and make friends, talks in an academic, emotionally remote, unemotional fashion.
6) Is not psychologically rewarded with happy feelings for socializing and engaging others


If you change some of this, say one is obsessed with Russian studies and literature and change 4 to the opposite and 5 to can communicate with others and make friends, but talks in academic terms, you have the perfect mate for me and the men I used to date before I was married. I married one of them. That's because my dynamic is the opposite of this.


1) Girls are emotional creatures first, logical creatures second... they make decisions based on how someone or something makes them feel.
2) Girls hate boring predictable guys who do have no passion for life and change (i.e. expanding your horizons, exploring things, doing things you've never done before, etc).
3) Girls fear most of all being with a guy who will suck the life (passion, happyness) out of them.
4) Girls hate anxious, needy guys, who are afraid of people and have been wussified by modern society.



For 1, I am logical, but since my Feeler score is zero and my thinker is 100, we can all safely assume I'm not real emotional. (Point in case, I once woke up on my anniversary, saw flowers and two hours later asked, did we buy flowers for someone?) Not real feeler here obviously. Very Aspie probably, but not much in the emotional category. In fact, I married my husband based solely on the fact that we got along, when I didn't love him (that happened two years later). Like I said, not much going on in the way of emotion.
For 2, love these guys. Dated and married OCD guys. Can't get much more boring and predictable than that. Their order makes me calm and comfortable. I see them as uber-mate material.
For 3, I never thought about because OCD guys tend to be kind of into their own thing. Doesn't leave much space for sucking my passion and happiness out and 1 and 3 under the guy is what makes me passionate and happy so not much chance of that happening. In other words, if we talk Astrophysics for hours, I'll be passionate and happy. If he sits doing his own thing for hours while I do mine, I'll be passionate and happy. As to 4, that is me, not him, although he is way more emotional than I am. Not with anyone else, but with me he is very much that way.


Okay, so there we go. We take Mordy's example, individualize the dynamics to fit the test subjects (my husband/past dates and me) and the dynamic works. Change that to Mordy's male example and NT potential females and ... disaster. The Dynamic fails. It ends up like two magnets that are the same. They get so close and then repulse each other. You get a different magnet, one that is opposite, get them close and bingo! We have contact! Both are still magnets, but the dynamic has changed. Do you see what I mean?


So, take out the personal, bring in the third person scenario, let him work it out, then talk to him about dynamics and not people. See if that helps. It works with my brother. I do have to repeat it sometimes, but you know what, that would also be true if he were perfectly normal and not a Mormon.


Good luck!

ZanneMarie,

I read your post, and the whole time I was thinking "this is it exactly!"

The part about viewing things as a puzzle or science experiment, and then obsessing over it, is totally my son! That is absolutely what is doing. He totally has been playing out every scenario over and over in his head, avoiding the pitfalls of the relationship. And the distance element -- you are exactly right! If he doesn't see the problems, then there is always the possibility that the breakup may not have occurred.

And you are SO RIGHT about not pointing out what is wrong with the girl, but rather pointing out what is wrong with the dynamic of the relationship. That's good advice for NT's, not just Aspies. I don't want to trash the girl anyway, really, and all that does is make him even more loyal to her.

But the best part of your post is the stuff about breaking the relationship down into parts. It's like the "chunking" that I do for information when I'm helping my youngest study for tests. If you "chunk" the info, he can retain it better. I never thought about "chunking" for emotional stuff, but it makes so much sense. When you talk about the "dynamic that had results I don't want" that's something I think he could grab and hold on to.

I talked with him today, and I do think he's adapting and coming to grips with this on his own. Time is a good thing.

Thanks SO MUCH for your post. It really, honestly put things into perspective for me.

Kris

No problem. Maybe the chunking is from Info Mapping. Or basic training. Never present more than 7 points. Present in three ways. Tell, show and reinforce. That's what I learned anyway.


Hope it helps! And actually, that was NT advice I used. The examples were Aspie.

(I snipped some of the other bits out)

I didn't think you'd likely give him "The Game" to read, but I also didn't want to take for granted that you knew what it was. You had thanked the poster who mentioned it, so I was being overly careful perhaps in case you mentioned it to your son and he went and read it. It isn't my business either way, but I had a hunch it went against your religion.

Glad to hear he will be fine.

For what it's worth by the by - I did not see you as an over protective or 'bad' mother. I'm not sure if the proviso in your later post that you are not over protective was in part to me or to all of us. I know that in a post one has to delineate the entire situation and describe everything. I know some can interpret that as over involvement or thinking about it too much. I don't. I just see it as the person trying to give the best, most detailed account of the story. This way others have more information from which to give the requested advice.

Just an update --

Since I last talked with my son, I'm under the distinct impression that he's doing really well in adjusting to life after the "breakup." He's putting himself "out there" (which he can't do much until he's off his mission in five months) by posting things on his Facebook acct. that basically say "well, if I'm going to be single, I may as well notify everyone that I'm going to be ready to date when I get off my mission!" To me, this is a major leap forward. He sounds very well adjusted to the situation. He still has a great desire to be kind and thoughtful about how he talks about the ex-girlfriend (which is wonderful -- I just don't want him to be so kind that it's to his detriment), but other than that, he seems to have a realistic idea about his future.

Thanks for all of your help.

Kris

That's great. Glad it worked out for him.