Paranoia ruined our relationship

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Has anyone ever had this happen?

I started dating a friend that I had known online for about ten years. It started out fine. Actually, we both are Aspergers so I thought, hooray, finally someone who understands me! However, it quickly went sour, the biggest thing I can point to is his paranoia.

It was sort of like, he was nice and very supportive as a friend, but then once we got into the relationship it went downhill after we spent time together and then were apart because we live in different states. He got very depressed, and wouldn't really tell me what was going on with him, all the while constantly asking me what I was thinking re: the relationship, etc.

He started getting upset over things that I thought were trivial, such as my friends "liking" things on facebook, etc. He always thought the worst about anything and one time he even had a panic attack because he misunderstood a silly poem i wrote on facebook and thought it was about him. It wasnt, but his reaction to little things like that actually sort of became I guess what you call a self fullfilling prophecy because it did start to stiffle me and make me second guess all my communications with him.

At the end it got much worse than just freaking out over tiny things on facebook, he actually seemed to sort of get jealous of me having my brother visit. :/

I wish it would have worked out differently. I have compassion for his paranoia, but at the same time, I couldn't deal with it. I have anxiety and fears, too, but I have enough self esteem not to assume everyone is out to get me.

It left me feeling very confused and sad.

I was like him in my 1st relationship. I kept having panic-attacks worrying about things & I became very controlling with her as a result. After a while I wasn't entirely sure what was really going on & what wasn't & I fell into a bad psychotic depression as things ended. I grew a lot sense then & I'm on anxiety medication now to make sure history won't repeat itself with me because I know I'll never forgive myself or even get over it if I would ever hurt another partner like that. You did the rite thing for yourself by leaving him. The only other option I can think of would of been to get him to a psychiatrist but that would only work if he would acknowledge that he is having problems & would be willing to get help

I've actually given this very idea some thought: date an aspie? It's probably cliche - go with your own kind, birds of a feather, etc. True, we understand our own disabilities well, but it doesn't mean we're still compatible, does it? Knowing me I might still give it a try.

My ex had lot of paranoia. Worried too much what people thought of him and worried about what they may think of him and he always wanted to pray in on my conversations with my parents and wanted to know what we talked about. Plus I felt he didn't want me talking to them. It just made him act very controlling and it got in the way of our relationship and he also had low self esteem so it made him paranoid and always worried that people would think of him as a pedophile so he was embarrassed about me and acted like I was ret*d because he said he felt like he was with a child than with an adult. I also think it made him emotionally abusive and he has ticked some boxes for it but I don't know if I even want to say if I was in a abusive relationship because then I feel I am playing the victim here when I know I had flaws too. He was also an aspie.

Last edited by League_Girl on 17 May 2012, 11:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Trust in a relationship is one of the main parts of its foundation (this is what I've been told by many people who know more about relationships than I do) and a lack of trust you could liken to constructing a house on a weak and cracked foundation. Collapse will be inevitable and the destruction caused from it I guess would differ based on the circumstances. Fretting about the relationship failure won't get u anywhere but depressed but u might want to look at it from the point of view of "what did I learn from it?"

Thank you for all the thoughtful responses. I definitely don't think that his being an aspie was what contributed most to the relationship's end. But any person with insecurity that deeply problematic would be very hard to negotiate a healthy partnership with, in my opinion.

When I was younger I probably wouldn't have been able to see how his behaviours negatively affected me. I'm I have learned enough to listen to myself more and set boundaries. Controlling people dislike it when I set healthy boundaries. I guess that is something to be thankful for, I have made progress in that area.

It did hurt that I trusted him, and he didn't give me the same trust, or even a small amount of real trust, and this was not based on anything real I had done to unearn or lose his trust. I think there just wasn't any there to begin with because of his problems. He does have a shrink, I always encouraged him to work with her but he wouldn't take the recommended medicine because that was another thing he was paranoid about (taking medicine).

Im still working on what to do about hurt feelings, but I will definitely be okay. Thank you commenting.

My relationship of 12+ years was slowly eaten away and ultimately destroyed by paranoia.
My ex-wife lost her sister when her sis' husband gruesomely beat her to death and then killed himself to escape conviction. The event was traumatic enough but she also viewed the body and the forensic report... and from then on she simply didn't trust me - like she was next and I was now a murderer just waiting for my opportunity.
She instilled a "no anger allowed" policy - if I became the slightest amount upset (like at a bad driver, etc.) it would be met with her EXTREME hostility.
She refused all counseling, etc. and refused to listen when I told her what she was doing to me...
Eventually she just started leaving me when she felt life was anything less than perfect. There was no concern over our marriage or our children, only her ever-present fear that I was somehow destined to do something awful. It got to the point where she even stood at a church pulpit in front of hundreds of people, telling them how she had to "escape her murderous husband".


You know, it's weird... after all the crap she's put me through, I still miss so much of her and would be very tempted to take her back (though she never will - she's too stubborn and will never admit to making a mistake.)

I can only hope there's a good woman out there somewhere... one not bent on control and manipulation.

Different people are "wired" differently, relationally.
I don't become "paranoid" about things, I become flat-out jealous,
because given the choice, I'd totally lose myself in a romantic partner, with contact with others only occurring when absolutely necessary.
I'm talking doctor's visits and maybe a short response to a cashier.

Although rationally I can understand most people aren't this way, it doesn't change how much it hurts when people express a need for more than me.

Separately, some people have attachment disorders- if you're someone's only contact/friend/love not through wiring or natural preference, but happenstance, IE, they can't GET anyone else, then of course they're going to feel panicked when you interact with others-
their fear is that you could very well leave them all alone in favor of someone else.

Well done on acknowledging the issue, recognizing it as a problem and taking steps to change it. If only more people would do the same!
I've know many people who simply refuse to even admit there's a problem at all! I suspect my mother is an Aspie from her extreme lack of social skills and inability to have friendships but she's firmly convinced that she's a socialite and everyone loves her. [sigh]

Again, well done and keep up the good work - it's very refreshing to see!

I don't actually recognize what I described as a "problem", which is why I differentiated such preferences from attachment disorders.
I don't know how I might go about "changing it", either, and don't particularly want to.
It hasn't been problematic when I stick to relationships with people who have similar preferences.
Has it occurred to you that people "refuse to admit" certain "problems" you perceive them as having because their differences to them don't amount to problems?

You sound as if you might condemn my relational way of being altogether: I don't have an "inability" to have friendships as your mother does (I don't think....?) but I don't rationally understand the point of them and have never had them, and am not desirous of them. I'm guessing you have a pre-conceived notion of what constitutes healthy and unhealthy psychology, and people like me by virtue of being odd fall into the latter, regardless of if they're happy and whether their way of being causes harm to anyone.

Some things are just generally considered unhealthy by nature, including making a single person your entire world, then getting bitterly jealous if that person doesn't make your their whole world. I'm glad you recognize it at least, and at least work around the problem by trying to find someone who thinks on the same wavelength - like being turned on ONLY by chocolate pudding and finding someone with the same fetish.

"Generally", you're appealing to a popular sort of "normalcy", not one which is based on actual unhealth or harm. "By nature", most people, for instance, would become jealous if their partner spends "too much" time with others and not with them. How much is "too much" is a matter of individuality. As I said, uncommon relational preferences aren't ever an issue if people stick to dating those who are similar, or go into relationships with an understanding of the work involved if the two people are more different. That's true for any relationship.

As I said, preferences which don't result in harm are exactly that: preferences, not "problems", to me. And...interesting analogy.

glasstoria.. I know this.. from yer ex bf viewpoint..
it is so hard to figure out wth ppl mean with there words.. I try fit stuff together and make sense.. i make mistake and get paranoid cause the way I fit it looks its right to me at that time.. then look back later and see i was wrong..

it makes frustration and anger and sad.. sux..
now i now that its not real.. just in my head.. i make up stuff that isnt there... at same time it still feels hurt..
then I rage til all energy gone and i am free.. it is gone.. makes sense cos there never was anything rlly there

last night i remember thing from therapy.. try sumthing... relax... watch breathing.. think that paranoia has a color.. green
realize it is in u.. that was shock.. always tried to push it away.. thats not me... go away stoopid green beast..
so i accept it is in me.. look at it and dont push away just look... stare..
breath in and imagine u suck up some of the green.. like yer a vacuumcleaner.. each breath some of the green goes in the cleaner..
takes long long time.. keep doing... feel muscles change.. weird... keep doing.. stomach is hard and head.. so much stuck in head.. took so long
then yer all clean and bag is full.. important: keep going!! !

look at bag.. is all in yer head.. imagine.. put bag full of green on dispose somthing... mine is a rocket hehe
send rocket away... is rly difficult.... somehow dont wanna??? but i wanna get rid of this... weird weird.. focus.. AWAY..
then imagine watch it fly off.. it is leavin u.. ends in big exlopsion.. desctruction of the green
after dat feels sooo weird... CHANGED..

I've been at both ends of paranoid jealousy. Knowing exactly how it feels to be the paranoid one, I have a strong empathy with anybody similarly afflicted, but even I could barely handle one partner's paranoia. An ex-partner emailed me, I drafted a reply telling her gently but firmly that we needed to go our separate ways, but my partner couldn't cope with the slightest polite gesture like "thanks for your email" I did all I could, short of being downright nasty to people, to reassure her, but nothing helped. The Web advice for couples dealing with opposite-sex friendships was to keep them out in the open and share communications with the partner.........but it just made it worse - every time I shared, she just flew into a rage. I was always careful to assure her that I agreed with her about there being a danger of other women having some sexual interest in me, and that I wasn't about to go putting my head in lion's mouths, but she didn't seem to hear.

It was horrible......her anger displays made empathy more difficult at the time.......but it didn't itself kill the relationship, though had it lasted much longer, I really don't think I could have handled it for life. Ironically, one thing that helped me carry on was this:

After an early history of paranoid jealousy, I'd seen my mistake and become acutely embarrassed at having behaved like that, but instead of looking for the insecurity that fuelled it, I simply resolved to completely "stop being possessive" in relationships, and I did that too absolutely, and would feel lousy about myself if I so much as mentioned awareness of any sexual danger or complained about any aspect of emotional infidelity. Of course it would then burst out and I'd go into an emotional tailspin. Having realised all this, I resolved to take a balanced approach, but was shocked to find how difficult that was - I was blocked by anxiety, not just from the event that had caused my concern and provoked a bit of jealousy, but from the expectation of a conflict which would not get resolved but would just reduce my self-esteem and so make my anxieties worse.

So, with this lady who was more paranoid than I was, I felt I had permission to volunteer my anxieties about her relations with her ex, in a civilised manner.........I insisted on some kind of parity, but didn't need to label all men as evil sexual predators, or ask her to keep away from anybody who gave us a modicum of respect as a couple. In fact I believe I dealt competently with a rather more serious problem she brought me over her ex, which was very unfair of her, though there were mitigating circumstances. The thing was, I didn't feel all that bad about myself.......it was a tad difficult to admit "it scared me when you said that" etc., but I was able to do it, and there was very little conflict, just calm talking. It took a few weeks to sort out, and I was feeling shaky a lot of the time, but we still had a lot of fun together even when things didn't look 100% safe.

The paranoid feelings still happen - I felt a twinge of anxiety when her brother contacted her, and when she'd been talking to a guy I didn't know, but I knew my anxieties had been sensitized because of the problem with her ex, so I contained myself, and was more concerned about the sensitisation than about the guys.

I think it all depends on whether the paranoid one is truly delusional......if so, I doubt that anything a partner could say or do would change it. If they've ever had the idea that they have a problem with paranoid feelings, then with enough skill, patience and commitment, I think it might be fixable.

I agree with you Valentine. My girlfriend is extremely obsessed with me parlty due to OCD & our relationship is not having any problems. If I had to pick something as a "problem" it would be that she worries about how obsessed with me she is. Her being so obsessed & clingy & stuff helps me feel more secure(this being my 3rd relationship & being on a couple meds is helping to thou) & I'm trying my best to be supportive & help her avoid the problems I had from being extremely obsessed.

I think that was a line that was crossed a bit ago, the line of reality vs. delusional acusations. If our cell phone reception was terrible and the signal faded during a call, he thought I had hung up on him. It is not in my nature to hang up on someone unless they are being obscene, which was not the case. Or god forbid I accidently push the wrong button on the phone, he thought I was ignoring his call, even though he knew I am clumsy with my phone, etc. IE I am only human, and need to be given the benefit of the doubt in situations small and not so small.

And the jealousy over my brother visiting, was far too much for me. The final straw really was that he made a specific comparison of me being crazy like the crazy character played by Parker Posey in the movie House of Yes (I love the movie for its darkly twisted humor, but I don't think of it as something to aspire to). The character in the movie loves her brother, lets call it "inappropriately".

Maybe it isn't paranoid for him to flip out over little things on facebook or familial relationships, but it was nothing I wanted to continue any longer.