What sort of dads aspie guys are?

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Odessa
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27 Jul 2012, 4:37 am

Planning on having a baby with one.



Aharon
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27 Jul 2012, 4:42 am

Aren't you the dad?


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Odessa
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27 Jul 2012, 4:54 am

I wish I was, but no such luck since I'm female. And English is not my native language.



so_subtly_strange
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27 Jul 2012, 5:09 am

i am both those things, and i think im a pretty good dad. as far as what sorts you mean this could be pretty broad. there is plenty of diversity among aspergians. to me this is a bit like asking 'what sort of dads do Japanese men make?'. Surely there are many things japanese men have in common, many characteristics only japanese man could fully understand, which may possibly have effects on their parenting behavior, but to go so far as to ask what being japanese has to do with any particular japanese man's approach toward fatherhood . . . would be just silly. There are surely many different types of japanese father's, some generally 'better' or 'worse' than others, and with infinitude different combinations of different parenting styles in different aspects. I think there would be similar diversity among aspergian fathers, so you need to answer the question yourself based on your knowledge of the man you are considering creating a child with. If you are very unsure of the answer you are exploring, you should wait as long as it takes, until you are much more sure.


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ablomov
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27 Jul 2012, 6:21 am

i delliberately didn't have kids (54 now, married 35 yrs) as I'm self diag aspi, clever, talented but find the world 'tricky' .. I never wanted to introduce another human into this world ... particularly after what i went thro at school and early working life...



Aharon
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27 Jul 2012, 7:19 am

Odessa wrote:
I wish I was, but no such luck since I'm female. And English is not my native language.


Ok. It's says on your profile that you are male; I was confused. As to your question, I think it depends. Some may be fun and interactive, others may come across less engaged and somewhat aloof.


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Odessa
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27 Jul 2012, 7:50 am

That was kind of my concern. My husband is high function, clever and good fathermaterial. Except I'm a bit worrying about his concentration abilities.



one-A-N
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27 Jul 2012, 7:53 am

I am an Aspie dad with NT wife. My daughters are grown up and I think they have turned out fine.

I read to one or other of them every night until they were teenagers - introduced them to all sorts of good books. I certainly did my share of changing nappies (diapers) and putting children back to bed in the middle of the night. Reading to my daughters was a really good Aspie activity, I think: plenty of structured time with my daughters, and the books provided material for conversation and passing on information (e.g. "They didn't have electricity back then, they only had candles at night").

I am probably more of an observer than an emotional participant - my wife does more of the personal stuff (but then, with girls, that will happen anyway when they reach their teens). But I am very attached to my daughters and enjoy their company. I am aware that I am emotionally more suited to dealing with them when they were children - I feel more comfortable with children than with adults, and I am in my fifties! Intellectually advanced but emotionally delayed - probably a classic Aspie combination.



bnky
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27 Jul 2012, 9:07 am

I was married nearly 20 years before we decided to have a child. Our son is now 3. I'm his stay-at-home dad. Well, most of the time we're not at home. We're usually running around doing things his contemporaries haven't even been exposed to. Guess it's partly down to me not knowing what the normal boundaries are for what he should be doing. He cycles, walks over hills, grows his own food, paints (with real paint, real brushes, real canvas - not the crap quality stuff they market as being specially for children), plays with his lego and trains, bakes, feeds the cat, enjoys music (jazz, blues, classical, as well as children's and more contemporary), tries desparately to read(making good progress), and has more friends than I ever did.
Admittedly sometimes we get caught up in something and end up doing it all day and forget to do some "more important" thing like washing up or hanging the washing. 
I worry that he may pick up odd traits from me just by spending so much time with me but, except for a brief period of mimicking a stim :?, he hasn't and is, I'm told, benefitting from the time he spends with me doing things his friends don't get the chance to do. I'm not sure if that's because their parents are all NT and follow some socially accepted path to child-rearing (is there one?) or because they spend more time with their mothers.
Personally I don't think I'm doing too badly, but i do find the constant change a bit of a struggle :? 
Oh! And I have to constantly remember to suppress my perfectionism trait :oops: 
Oh yes, and then there's the annoying issue of there being NO support or advice for Aspie parents (as opposed to for parents OF aspies) except, it seems, here on WrongPlanet.
Of course, that's just me. Every Aspie is different. As they say: if you've seen one Aspie, you've seen one Aspie.



PTSmorrow
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27 Jul 2012, 10:25 am

You're planning to have a baby with him, then wouldn't it be a nice idea to communicate this topic with him and ask whether and, if applicable, how he would see himself in this role, if at all?

Second, people with As are very different, there is no cliche, some might love fatherhood and be great with it, others (like me) basically don't want children.



Ilka
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30 Jul 2012, 7:02 am

I am NT married to an Aspie, mother of a 12 years-old Aspie. My Aspie husband is a wonderful dad because he loves our daughter very much and he remains calmed when I am freaking out. He is also constantly aware of danger (I have learned, but I am not like that at all) and understands how she feels or why she does the things she does (which I do not).

But... at the begining he was terrible. He never helped. As Aspies do not handle changes very well and a child changes your life completely, he was always very stressed, he did not know what to do about our kid so he did not get involved at all, and it was very frustrating for me. He was also always complaining about the things not being the way they used to be and that I paid more attention to our daughter and that I had abandoned him. It maked me feel do mad, because there I was, with a baby I had to handle myself, on my own, scared because it was my first kid and I was not very cleared about what I had to do, and there he was complaining because I didnt pay to much attention to him. Really?

By the way, my husband did not want to have children, either, but I told him I did want to have children in the future. Our child was not planned, but we both decided to have her.



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04 Aug 2012, 6:48 pm

Odessa wrote:
Planning on having a baby with one.


All I can tell you is it will be a wild ride. My ten-year-old was diagnosed a little over two years ago. As I began to learn about Asperger's, I recognized more and more of the signs in my husband. One day at the end of my son's therapy session, I asked his therapist if my husband should be tested. She said there wasn't much need for a formal evaluation since he was functioning well and that the people closest to him (me and my son) already recognized it and were learning to be accepting of some of the behaviors than can mystify the unaware.
In some ways, my husband worries about the little guy more than I do. He wants to help Trey avoid some of the troubles he had, and he worries that Trey may not reach the same level of independence. He believes he achieved his independence because nobody knew what Asperger's was when he was a child, so he was punished until he learned to act neurotypically. I just don't want to put Trey through that kind of hardship. Home should be a haven.
Sometimes, my husband's belief that punishment helped him makes Trey's meltdowns worse. I feel a bit like a referree, reminding them both to use "inside voice" and "translating" intentions as best I can. Although I have learned to be pretty accurate reading the intentions of them both, they are blind to each other and have trouble determining if Daddy is being mean or is he trying to help.
Of course my husband is not intentionally being mean, but his sense of humor can go a little far.
It can be exasperating, and I worry a bit when I have to be away from the house and leave them alone with each other. (Not like crime scene worry, but how many meltdowns will there be worry.)
Do I need breaks? Yes, work is my break. My real work is at home.
Would I do it all over again? In a heartbeat. We are all in this together.


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