Upset about AS boyfriend's online interaction with others

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Hi Everyone,

I am an NT woman in a long distance relationship with a man that I am certain has AS. Our relationship is very good when we are together, but can be difficult for me when we are apart because he often does not respond to my emails and texts. We never fight though.

We met online, it was not a dating website, and I was surprised when he contacted me. This was about a year and a half ago. There have been times where we have gone several months without talking to each other, but this has not happened in a long time.

I recently went to visit him and we had a wonderful time. However when I was on his computer I found out that he is a member of a dating website, match. I was not snooping, he asked for me to try to find something online for him and when I was on his computer I saw that he had signed up for the site. I was really shocked to see that he had signed up one week before my visit. When I asked him about it, he did not deny it and told me that a friend had asked him to try the site to see if it was a scam. He then informed me that he thought it was a scam. I asked him if he was trying to meet other women online and he said that he was not.

I have noticed that sometimes random women appear on the friends list of his facebook page. I am fairly certain he does not know these women, since they live in different states. It is not uncommon for them to disappear after a couple months.

Two months ago something bad did happen. He went out on a date with a women I saw on his facebook page. She lived close to him and she posted how excited she was about their date.

I was shocked for many reasons. I was hurt because I did not think he would do something like that and confused because our relationship is a sexual one. I do not personally engage in casual sex and from what he has told me, neither does he. I was also shocked, and I don’t mean to sound like a jealous woman just trying to be factual, this woman was very unattractive, 12 years older than me and is also a stripper. I don’t think he knew that she was a stripper though.

When I confronted him about this he was confused at first and actually could not figure out what I was talking about. Then he did say that he had gone out on a date, that it was just one date and that he did not have any intention of seeing her again and that he did not have sex with her. I told him that he could date me or he could date other women but not both. He said he would rather date me, and that he wished things were different and that I lived there. I reminded him that things can be different and that I have told him that I will move there if our relationship progresses, but that he has to put more effort into our relationship and communicate more with me. He said “deal,” and so I thought we were clear with what the rules of our relationship are.

He often refers to himself as single, I recently pointed out to him that he is not exactly single if he is in a relationship with me. He said, “I know what you mean.” I thought that he considered himself single because he is not married and maybe that he uses the word a little differently than I do, now I am not so sure.

What is so hard about this, is that when we are together our relationship is great. He is very attentive to me both in public and private. He holds my hand, hugs and kisses me and talks to me non stop. When we watch television, he likes for me to lay right on top of him and we snuggle the whole time. When we are sleeping he holds me so tightly that sometimes I think he will crush me, and often informs me that he is going to hold me all night long. He says that he likes me and everything about me, that I am sweet and he is very physically attracted to me. When I got off the plane last week I asked him how he was, he said "better now that you are here," and gave me a big hug. When we got in the car, I put my seatbelt on. He didn't realize this and reached over and grabbed me to pull me to him so quickly that the seatbelt locked up. That is always how he is, with me.

I have never thought he was a liar. That is one of the things that attracted me to him. Yet this behavior seems very deceitful. When I confronted about the date and now this dating website he did not try to deny either things. It seems very odd that he would sign up for that website just to see if it was a scam. Yet he was adamant that he is not trying to meet other women online to date.

I am afraid that he has some sort of online chat addiction or addiction to contacting strangers, having a brief exchange with them maybe even resulting in one date, the fact that his date was only one and that he did not intend to go on another seemed to matter to him. As if that justified it.

He has said before that he can talk to strangers or women that he is not really interested in very easily. Yet he has a near panic attack when he has to call me, and we do not talk on the phone. We used to chat on yahoo but we have not done that in a long time. We communicate mostly via text.

It has been hard for our relationship to progress because of his shutdowns, but I have been patient with that. However now I am hurt because I am beginning to think that while he is shutdown from me for a couple of days he is chatting online with these strangers.

At this point he clearly knows that in order to have me in his life, he cannot date other women. He has agreed to this. If he did not agree, I would not have freaked out on him or yelled. I just would have stopped contacting him. If he wants other women he can easily have that by just letting me know. Actually he could just stop contacting me and walk away. I thought we had an agreement and then I find his match profile. Yet he claims not to be trying to meet other women online to date. I told him that if he was, that would violate our deal and that I will not be in a relationship with someone who is actively seeking to date other women. He claims he is not.

At this point I am very confused and upset. His behavior seems even more bizarre than some of the other things I have had to get used to. I can adjust to the fact that we don’t talk on the phone. I have learned to not panic when I don’t hear from him for a couple of days. His job can be dangerous and I used to worry, but I have tried to stop that. I try to accept that it doesn’t mean he doesn’t care or miss me, but that this is just his way. I have learned to be as unemotional as possible when I am asking him about something that is upsetting and try to be as fact based as I can. It works best when we come to a deal that we can both agree to, almost like agreeing to the terms of a contract.

Can anyone help me understand what he is doing? It really seems to me that this is some kind of addiction for him or something. Like he thinks its ok, because he has no intention of moving forward and actually dating any of these women so he is not violating the terms of our relationship. On his dating profile he listed a city that is about 75 miles away from where he lives as where he is interested in meeting women. Yet he also set the guideline that he was looking for women in that city or 50 miles away. This means that no one who actually lives in the city where he lives would qualify and be matched with him.

Any insight that you could provide would be welcomed. Thank you for taking the time to read this really long post.

My only theory (and it's a wild one) that he is desperate for human companionship that he would be willing to see or communicate with anyone since he cannot always do that with you. It could be his way of coping with the loneliness of being in a long-distance relationship by seeking out human connections elsewhere when he needs it. His doing so through a dating website will not always indicate that he wants to date other people but rather that he just wants to communicate with people through a network that he's comfortable here.

Your long distance boyfriend is cheating on you. This has nothing to do with aspergers. He's using you. Every action and comment that you are interpreting as "sweet" is not sweet or thoughtful or caring. He's going through the standard motions to keep a girl on the hook. You have taken the bait and forgiven him all of his very obvious transgressions, even when he gives you the worst of lies as excuses. From your description of this relationship, it's not solid and should not be pursued further. You are apt to find someone better suited to you who can treat you with far greater respect and consideration. It is honestly better to be alone and have the potential to find someone worthwhile than it is to be disrespected and neglected in a long-distance relationship.

You will need to cut all contact with him. Take some time to evaluate why you stayed in a long-distance relationship with someone who you knew was cheating on you, lying to you, and was willfully using, neglecting and manipulating you. You're not the first women to ever fall for something like this and you won't be the last. This is a pretty big club, we've got jackets. But you have to invest time and effort into fixing whatever is inside you that made you believe this relationship was okay. You already know it's not because you're posting for help so dump the creep, fix your picker and move on to find a real man who deserves you.

Again, his problem has nothing to do with AS. He's a jerk. There's no treatment for that.

That says to me that he has an easier time talking to women than men, and those women online are his main social contact (entirely as friends). He also may not have known that the woman he went on a "date" with thought it was a date - we can be pretty clueless sometimes. The online dating, he doesn't seem to have anything sinister going on there (I've signed up to dating websites before, purely out of curiosity and had no intention of looking for anyone).

I think he doesn't see what the issue is, because in his mind these things are innocent - especially if he has anxiety about contacting you - that's a sign you're different to everyone else he speaks to. He only does innocent things so doesn't get that you see being there at all a problem.

Talk to him - in depth, with a lot of 'why' things are or aren't an issue. If he's sincere he will take that conversation seriously and try to learn from it. Try not to ban all his discussions with women though, they might be his main social outlet.

Thank you all for your comments and advice. There are times when I do wonder what is wrong with me for staying with him. I am really not the type of woman who has ever put up with this type of behavior before. I am pretty self confident and it has never been hard for me to meet guys. I also try to be logical about things. We are both attractive people and if my boyfriend wanted to have multiple women, he would not need to try to maintain a relationship with someone 800 miles away. I am pretty sure that if he wanted to he could walk into a bar and walk out with a woman. This is part of the reason I have always trusted him, there is no point in doing what we are doing if we didn't care about each other.

I have always felt that there were reasons for his odd behavior that I didn't understand. I have never had a guy be so nervous to call me that he pretty much sat there sending me texts every 20 minutes saying he was going to call, yet was unable to do so and was a nervous wreck when I finally just called him. I have also never known a guy who was doing something bad, readily admit what he was doing.

I had never heard of Asperger Syndrome before and I have done a lot of reading about it over the last year and a half. I try very hard to keep an open mind and to never assume that he is purposely causing problems for our relationship or that he is a jerk. I also don't want to be naive and assume that all of his behavior has to do with AS. I am quite sure that there are people with AS who are not nice and will take advantage of others, just like there are NTs who do these things.

I am fine with him having female friends, as long as there are no romantic activities involved.

I wish you the best of luck sorting it out, you're a good person for continuing to work at it.

Another reason he might have posted that he was looking for someone who lived far away in his profile and the reason he has a long distance relationship with you is that he might already know he would not be able to handle having to be with someone everyday? My x boyfriend lived in the office of his home with his x wife for 2 years before they divorced and I always suspected it was because he needed a lot of alone time.