What would be a sign?

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I posted a few days back about how I think my husband is AS and I am NT. You can check that thread out for more info so I won't go into all of it again. He says he needs some sort of sign that his loving feelings for me can come back. I have tried to give him examples of it happening for others which would normally appeal to him logical nature but with no luck. This is clearly a heart matter and my logical approach to this matter has upset him. To him it feels like I am telling him what he is feeling is wrong. My perspective is that what he feels is right but there are other ways to interpret those feelings. Anyway, I'm looking for some insight into what might constitute a sign. Affirming all his wonderful traits? Helping to make him feel accepted by me? He has said that he knows that I love him but he doesn't feel the love I have for him. I think I have been using NT ways of expressing love and he is having a hard time receiving them because they aren't in a language he knows well. I don't know, so any ideas would be appreciated.

Do you cuddle? I find that pretty loving.

We used to. I miss it a lot. Now he feels emotionally disconnected from me so he won't until he gets the sign. I think all I have is words at this point and he isn't home very much right now so I don't get a lot of chances to use those either.

I'd ask him how he "feels love".

Thanks. I tried that. The couples counselor we saw tired that. He said he doesn't know. I asked if he ever felt loved by his parents and he said he knew they loved him but he never felt it. I asked if he ever felt loved by me and he said yes so I asked when and he said he didn't know.

Does he know if when he "felt your love" it was instantaneous due to a specific action/set of actions, or because of something gradual that developed as your relationship progressed? I'd try talking to him about his feelings and possibly try helping him to learn to express his feeling through poetry/analogies. I found using poetry and unusual phrases/analogies helped me learn to compare the emotional & logical to an extent.

It was gradual as we got to know each other. Now he seems stuck thinking that it will instantaneously reappear. I tried to tell him but he won't listen.

I think I can sort of identify with your husband. I have trouble discerning types of love. I have a strained relationship with my father, and while I know he loves me, I do not feel it, and the same story with different specifics with my mother. I wouldn't be surprised if this is what has caused me to have trouble identifying love.

Because love is an abstract concept and because I try to be as logical as I can, when I think I see love, I want to pick it apart and figure out what emotion is actually being expressed, if any, and then I usually doubt my findings. This seems to have disenchanted me on a lot of things, but I still have that deep adolescent hope that I will find love and understand it when I do like I'd never had struggles with it before in my life.

I'm wondering if what your husband felt was an initial puppy love of sorts. I imagine that with NT's, the feeling would progress into actual love, but with him as an AS, it got lost somewhere in this lack of understanding what love is. Should this be the case, I'd recommend trying to find that puppy love again and try to find ways of making it a permanent feeling.

Then again, I'm struggling to understand my AS status at the moment and could be talking utter nonsense at the moment.

There ya go

On a serious note, though, it all depends on him as an individual. What kind of things have you done so far and what kind of things do you think he'll appreciate? You know him better than any of us.

Sorry if that isn't too helpful.

You can't promise they will come back. However I'm not sure his feelings that they won't are all that logical, based on the fact that he has fallen in love with you before.

But rather than trying to mend the relationship by trying to pretend something is there that isn't, maybe you can meet and get to know each other all over again. Just a suggestion.