Two Aspies In Love & Marriage

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I'm married to an intelligent, good-looking, hard-working, educated, caring aspie who is a wonderful father to our two children. He is the only man who has ever accepted my need for personal space and my somewhat aloof attitude. He's the same way. More so, actually. And so most of the time, 90%, it's great.

Then come the down swings. AS/NT communication is painful, but at least you know one of them has a clue. AS/AS communication can be tricky. We've actually had nasty verbal arguments for HOURS, only to find out hours or days later that we were both arguing the very same point! It's happened more than once! Equally unfortunate are our polar opposite needs when it comes to an argument. I need to be heard, to resolve and move on. He needs to be left alone or he tends to get a little, err, explosive? Clearly, that's not a super match for arguing. If I press my point, things get mean and my feelings end up crushed. If I stalk away and let him be, I'm still hurt, and I also have the internal pain and frustration of unresolved conflict and feeling a bit ignored. I understand that he is feeling overwhelmed, but so am I, if differently.

And then affection. While mostly I'm okay with occasional hugging/kissing (read: not the cuddly type here), sometimes I want him closer. Once in a while (read: once every 1-2 months, maybe less, I typically value my space) I'd love for him to put his arm around me in bed, but I feel like a dork asking. One, it isn't typical of me, two, I know what it's like to need to want to make physical contact and how it feels when you feel obligated or don't want to. Our affection days don't often coincide. That gets me to feeling lonely. And sad.

But then I go back to the beginning. He's great. He gets me. I get him. I wouldn't trade him. I love him. But if anyone has any ideas how to better handle our arguments or line up affection days, please let me know

Heh, I enjoyed your post, i currently have an NT GF and things are not going so good, she sees me as distant and often I think she feels I dont love her cause I dont show it, when I see her I feel ignored sometimes because she often does not think about me or consider my side of things and miss understanding cause she still wants me to go out and meet all these people and do all this stuff. I think me and her really need to sit down and talk things out.

Someday I too want to have a family, but I want to do the right thing to enshure all of our futures will be good, for her she likes to rush and not plan ahead (and that is why she has a 2 year old daughter with no father apparently). I cant have kids and commit until their is a game plan, things need to be put in place, their needs to be order so when the time comes and I am ready financial resources (like a bigger house, car, fiscal plans) are in place and ready to be disposed of. I simply cannot live check to check and accumulate debt or not have the things we need because we were not prepaired, this has been a hot button issue for us, we dont argue, we aviod the situation so their is no argument.

I want to be happy like you and your family are, I want things to work between me and my GF, but if they dont work my contingency plan is to live alone and possibly adopt, I can be happy even if I am incapible of maintaining a relationship, tho I feel we both bring our issues into our relationship that was good for a while but is fading, I think lack of communication is a big thing.

I enjoy reading your posts because someday I hope to be where you are, especally because you too deal with someone who is the opposite of you, i feel I can learn much from you.

Heh, sorry for the ramble... i have much on my mind and just wanted to write it on here since it does pertain to your topic a bit.

Keep posting, i need all the help I can get so in a few years I can do things right.

I don't think I have any suggestions which would be applicable. Neither of us have any sensory issues, and we spend much more of our time snuggling than the average couple does, e.g., if we have to wait in line or something, we will usually cuddle to pass the time. So... can't help with that part. We're also peculiar as far as misunderstandings go. We may not be able to read anyone else's mind well, but we think so much alike that reading the other's mind is very easy. And this is the only aspie-aspie relationship I've ever been in, so I have no other examples I can look to.

Sorry.

woodsman: ha, it's funny to think that others aspire to have what I do. I do have a lot, don't get me wrong. I love my little family. It's just, there are a heck of a lot of challenges too. I do hope that one day you find all the things you are looking for.

geek: seriously? That's pretty cool. It sounds like you have a wonderful relationship.

being a self-dx aspie... i can attest to some nasty arguments (with NT) boyfriends... and they always won either cause i could never interject properly... or chose not to because it was too hard to talk and hold in ll my inexplicable inclinations.

Very much so. 4384 days without an argument, and counting.

His reaction cannot be gotten back to in a calmer time to make him feel better, but yours can. Therefore for both of your sakes you need to just walk off until he's had his time, then calmly present your points to him later on.

I know with my bf I just get quiet and have a tendency to not tell him whats bothering me even if I decide to leave because of it. in better times his dad has given me some "rules" for our relationship like never saying the relationship is over unless its 4 or 5 days past the time that I decided I want it to be over and to talk about everything because thats how relationships survive. I'm still working on the latter but I'm getting better at it. And I've explained to bf why I don't always speak when I'm upset, why I react in a certain way, and asked him to not get upset if I ever say certain things like I don't want him in my life when I'm upset.

I guess you're right. I can back off. It's extremely difficult though. The only option he has is to walk away or explode. To his credit, he tries to walk away. I guess the main reason I find difficulty letting him stalk off is because I feel like it will just result the same way later, so it's best to just get it all out. I suppose that's a wrong way of thinking. I'm used to arguing with NTs, not aspies. Combine my difficulties communicating with his difficulties understanding communication, and you have a giant pile of frustration.

Sounds like bf's dad gave some good advice to you. I ought to take it, as I can get kinda mean and fatalistic during arguments.

Try writing down what you are feeling while he's getting his "alone time." Though I do advise going back and reading over it once you've calmed down a bit before you hand it over to him to read if you choose to do that.

We actually had this policy at one time to go to our corners and write. Maybe it's time we reinstate that policy

I was actually going to suggest this, also. The other option is to try and avoid having arguments at all - I don't know the dynamic of your relationship, but sometimes it's possible to just set aside any disagreement before discussing it 'til you've really thought out what you want to say and you can do it calmly. Don't start the discussion if you think it'll lead to an argument (I hear a lot of people saying arguments are needed to clear the air in relationships - I hate them, they just make me want to cry and I don't believe they resolve anything, although YMMV).
For the physical touch, I'd just ask. I'm a particularly touchy aspie, and my inability to read my NT wife's body language means that often, my reaction to any sort of strife, affection, anything is to want to put my arms around her - she had to learn to say "no, that's not what I need right now." In the case of physical contact, I think in a marriage both partners have an obligation to at least try to accommodate each others needs, but even NTs aren't psychic and have to ask sometimes. I think that's what you have to do. The difficulty, I expect, will arise if he's uncomfortable accommodating you. Were you NTs, I'd say that he had to suck it up, deal, and put his arm around you, but not knowing his sensory issues I can't say whether that's practical. I'd suggest that he at least try, though.

Thats a great idea! My aspie boyfriend and I tend to fight a lot. He says its no more than ordinary couples and thus nothing to worry about, but it upsets me so much!! ! I get very very sad and mentally exhausted after a fight.

Sometimes I wish we had a personal refferee who just knew everything and could always tell us who was right and why and who was wrong and why. Either we both think the other person is wrong, or then we start to get some insight into each other's view and we get so confused that we can't tell!! ! Plus we often can't properly remember what we said and who is supposed to apologize for what, etc.

I wonder if you're really rich if you can hire a professional aspie relationship referee coach who is summoned by the call of a bell.

I bet that person would say that you are both wrong and need to work on your communication skills and to be more patient with each other. Personally, I don't understand why people stay in relationships with someone when they argue all the time? I guess if you have kids, then I could understand it, but otherwise, if I were you I would simply leave the guy. I'd rather live alone than argue with someone all the time and feel sad.

You know how things are in my household. Lol! Same here! We argue and argue and argue....and on and on! We LOVE discussions! We LOVE arguing. Our sticky parts are bills and phone calls. Man, parent teacher conferences can be hilarious.

I love being married to someone like me!

lol, come to think of it, in some ways thats what my bf's dad is for me . "he may not even know that is wrong." "That's playing mind games, you have to talk about that." etc.. Though bf and I have only had two fights in the year we've known each other, well three if you count when we were both trying to take the blame for the first argument. I don't call his dad to tell him we fight, but I had other reasons that made mentioning the fight relevent and his dad always asks for specifics.