Help with getting AS husband to open up

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"Weirdness" is made worse by stress. Best thing you can do is to reduce it as best you can and wait for him to come out of it. I'll sometimes come home after work and go to bed to get some sleep. Though just puttering around by myself cleaning around the house also works.

This has been extremely helpful. Thank you everyone who replied.

I'm maybe late to the game, but here are a few things to consider.

When your husband is really upset, he is likely so overwhelmed by that feeling in the moment that he needs time to process before he can effectively communicate.

I recommend a two step approach.

Step one: When he is upset, initially the best thing to do is to help him feel comfortable. This is probably going to mean giving him some space, but he might also appreciate other forms of care, like bringing him something soothing like tea, a snack, etc. At some point when he is calm, ask him what makes him feel best when he is upset. He might want to be left alone, which may feel hurtful, but if he is ASD you can feel easy knowing that it is about him feeling overstimulated as opposed to him being closed off because he harbors negative feelings about you. I firmly believe that if you ask him how you can help(after he has calmed down), and follow through with his requests for when he is upset, he will feel cared about and be much more comfortable talking to you when things calm down.

Which brings us to Step Two: Once he has calmed down, you will have a much easier time getting him to talk to you. IDeally this would take place at a time when there isn't a lot else going on, like when you're relaxing on the weekend. Verbalizing emotions can be really hard for an ASD person. Some strategies that might help bridge the gap:

1. Engage the topic from a rational/investigative perspective. Instead of asking him how he feels, ask him what he thinks the mechanism/biological explanation for what is going on might be. It can be easier to talk about facts and order of operations than raw feelings. Approach it like you are a scientist trying to explain the behavior of an animal you are studying. He might have an easier time figuring out that he is sensitive to a certain sound, it is probably because he has heightened sensitivity to it neurologically, and that it makes his nervous system overload, but he might have great difficulty saying something like "I feel angry when this happens because it makes me feel like this person doesn't care about me".

2. Let him write you a letter. He can take his time, write things down, re-read what he wrote, rephrase things to make them sound more accurate, etc. This takes the pressure off.

3. Take things slow, and one at a time. I'm sure there is a long list of important things for you guys to talk about. He needs to admin that, even if it hard, he needs to find a way to communicate you. Maybe there are other things he does that hurt your feelings, and he needs to be able to make reasonable accommodations for you. Maybe you need to have a serious conversation about your future plans. Try to have these conversations separately, and in small chunks as opposed to one long conversation about all of the things on your mind. It can be like feeding vegetables and fruit into a juice machine; try to fit too much in at once and it will clog up the machine and cause it to shut down.

4. Try to keep how you feel about a situation as a separate topic form how he feels about a situation. He should do the same thing. A common pitfall in conversations, is when one person will say that they feel sad/mad/disappointed that the other person did/didn't do something, and then the other person will respond by voicing that they feel sad/mad/upset too because of something the first person did. It is important to hear someone, acknowledge what they say (even if you don't agree with it), and make sure they feel heard and considered even if your perspective is different. This is really true for all people, but I think setting up verbally-stated, clearly defined expectations and guidelines between you two can help when one ore more people has ASD. For example, maybe have a rule to limit conversations to one hour (or 30 minutes, or 20 minutes, etc). Make it known that for 1/4 of the time person A is going to talk about their point of view, the next 1/4 of the time person B should reiterate what person A said to make sure they understand, then the next 1/4 of the time person B gets to talk about how they feel, then the next /14 of the time person a should reiterate what person B said to make sure they got the message.

These are just examples, but the idea here is that setting up expectations that are clearly defined can make having a conversation less anxiety inducing.

He might not have identified exactly what it is that is upsetting him, you could try asking him about the minor stuff and that might lead to more.
I don't always know what's really getting to me but can list minor stuff that has happened and the root of the problem can emerge slowly.

My boyfriend sometimes experiences high levels of anxiety, such as lvl 10 out of 10. He tells me his general state is level 7, for me thats high. When he is in the 10 state he can no longer talk. I asked him about it since someone was talking about their autism related struggles and this person was saying when theyre overwhelmed they could not talk or do anything, and I actually asked him at the time he was overwhelmed [but we were typing, we have a LDR] and usually he wouldn't talk about the topic because he couldn't expkain but then he answered to my question that he cant talk and explain when hes that stressed. I used to worry that i did something wrong and that hed be scared to explain to make it worse and himself worse, sometimes that did happen and the more he explained the more questions i had cause i got confused, sometimes i misunderstood and it affected my trust.

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My Pepe Le Skunk. I have so much faith in our love for one another. Thanks for being an amazing partner. x

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