Emotional Response

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My wife tells me that one of the most frustrating things about our relationship is my apparent lack of emotional response in certain situations. She says that sometimes she would rather that I yell at her in anger than appear not to respond at all.

At other times, I have found that she is feeling a great deal of pain, and while I can sympathize and even empathize with her emotions, I have to think through a system of appropriate responses. I know that this comes across stilted, and even fake-seeming to her at the time. We have spoken intellectually about these issues at some length, and I think that helps her to at least understand how I react, and why, but I can still see that my behavior distresses her at times.

Have any of you dealt with the same kinds of experiences, and if so, do you have any advice about how to cope with them?

I have often dealt with women complaining that I don't yell at them or argue or fight. They often feel that it's because I don't care. And the other response that occasionally comes up is that they want to release stress and tension by arguing. But I don't have that need. To me there are much more constructive ways to do so.

I've pseudo-run into this problem as well with family, mostly my mother. Although in my case part of the problem is that I'm not sure I have emotion for them. I've found the best thing to reassure my mother was a simple hug and "Love ya Mom." And I hate hugging ><

Still though, that's not an easy situation. Seeming to be emotionless, or actually being that way doesn't make to much of a difference to an NT because it's difficult for them to believe that you're having emotions while showing absolutely no sign of it. I suppose it's just hard for them to see it as the vast majority of them wear their emotions on their sleeves.

Yeah, definitely.
If some kind of a sympathetic response seems called for, either:
1) hold her close and tight, or
2) make it so dark she can't see you
This way she won't be able to look at you, and she won't not see whatever it is she's looking for.
Instead she'll have to rely on listening to what you say and feeling you close by.
Which means she'll have close to the same limitations you do. 8 )

If an angry response is all you've got, then leave.
Go somewhere else for a while, and when you come back things will have "cooled down" and it'll be talking that's expected instead of shouting.

Has worked really well for me.
YMMV. 8 )

I ran into this problem with my ex-partner of 8 years. I'm an Aspie female, but didn't know this at the time of the relationship. Until recently, I lived with the belief that the way I am is all due to the bizarre and f*cked up childhood I had. I also never completely put it together - until recently - that my ex (a man) also harbors the some AS traits (not sure he is actually an Aspie himself, but it is highly possible) and is definitely in the spectrum, if you ask me. We have tried to maintain a friendship, but he tends to be quite a bit slower on the draw intellectually, and I have always found that one of the most frustrating aspects of the relationship. I was talking to him online yesterday and he REALLY pissed me off with this...again.

I found it extremely difficult to deal with that my partner seemed to completely lack any sort of passion or fire at all (yes, especially in bed - I can get VERY VERY passionate in this context, but not want to engage emotionally in most other situations, and even not be touched at all at some times). I have always been the kind of Aspie prone to nuclear meltdowns (I can comfortably admit this now that I know my "condition" has a name - I have spent many years until recently deeply disturbed by my own lack of control at times), and K (ex-partner) is completely at the other end of the spectrum, so to speak, in terms of his reactions.

Over time I started to notice that my blow-ups at K were being received with very calculated and scripted responses or non-responses. There were numerous occasions throughout the relationship where I found myself deliberately trying to provoke him into joining me in a shouting match when he had done something that upset me (nobody can get more scathing and calculated about insults than an Aspie, methinks), but this only worked once, and as the house expert in screaming, insulting and throwing things, I was always the undisputed winner (or loser) of any argument. It was extremely frustrating.

Needless to say, I did not like myself as I was in that relationship. I realized over time that it wasn't really fair to him that I attack him in this way. The truth is, he's a super nice person and he has *some* intelligence in limited areas, but overall, I can't handle a man who cannot keep up with me intellectually. He just missed far too many details - things quite obvious to me - in the world around him, and I just couldn't stand it.

It took far longer than it should have for me to end the relationship. Whenever I would bring up our splitting up as the best course of action, he would generally not talk about it with me beyond disagreeing that it was for the best. Strangely, in some ways, I found him to be a bit clingy, and there is nothing that is a bigger turn off to me than a clingy man. Let me breathe!