aspergers, slow to get over an EX

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I have seen a lot of posts in this forum about people trying to get over their ex-bf/gf with aspergers, but have not seen anything about the inverse situation. Personally, I have been diagnosed with aspergers and find that I move very slowly in relationships compared to my peers. Girls are often frustrated with how little affection I show early on, but once I feel strongly about a girl it takes quite a long time for me to get over her. Right now I'm three years separated from my first love, and I can't stop thinking about her despite many concrete steps taken on my part including completely cutting off contact. Wondering if others have similar experiences, or how AS individuals deal with breakups in general.

i'm much more stubborn about trying to make a relationship work and getting a return on my emotional investment. plus i'm old-fashioned about not people resisting the urge to throw away other people just like yesterday's unwanted trash.

This actually touches on something ive been thinking about recently.

When things are over for me, they're over.

A coping mechanism i have for general life is this thing where i refuse to dwell and ruin my life thinking about the past or the future.

I deal with the things i have to deal with at the time.

It's like this compartmentalisation thing i have about me. I find that discipline is the best remedy for the problems autism leads me to.

I recognised early how i had problems with anxiety, worrying about things, problems moving on, and my answer is to be extremely short sighted and to keep my eye on things that are only within close reach.

I did struggle to end my last relationship for a while, and then the stress built up and one day it was like i'd flicked a switch and i went from thinking about her all the time to her being gone from my life like she never existed.

So no. I can struggle initially, but when its over its over.

It took me a while to get over an old boyfriend. I think what it was, though, that I wasn't really all that in love with him so much as i liked having a guy around, someone I was comfortable with. And I think it can be very easy to dwell on the one relationship if you have no other relationship experience to compare it with. It's very hard for me to connect with someone in the first place, and it takes me a long, long time to get going (I know I frustrate men in this regard; they can't tell on the surface if I'm interested in them or not).

For me it really depends on the circumstances of the break up.

1. If I broke up with her, it's extremely easy to move on. Chances are I was wanting to date someone else anyway which is probably why I broke up with her so I move on pretty quick.

2. If she broke up with me, then I stop talking to her altogether (because all the girls that have dumped me want nothing to do with me afterwards so I respect that). It can take anywhere from months to a little over a year for me to completely get over it.

I've dealt with someone dumping me in a couple of different ways to see how it helped me move on.

1) Hooked up/dated another girl a few days after - Didn't help. Plus on top of that I had new drama with these new females.

2) Stayed single for a year or more - Didn't help. Sat around all day, obsessing over what I did wrong, what I could've done better, what's she doing now blah blah blah.

3) Started dating a new girl no more or less than 2 months after - The best. I've given myself 2 months of singleness, got my head together, licked my wounds and ready to get back in the scene. I'm healthy and ready to give all my attention to this new woman, and the more I spend with her, the more the old one is forgotten.


Now the next thing is it depends on how long the relationship was and the quality of it which determines my reaction post break up.

If I've been in a relationship from 6 months to a year, I miss more of the ROUTINE of the relationship. Being used to sleeping next to her every night, having someone there to cuddle - just always having that reliable, stable, female romantic presence in my life. I'm more upset about the routine change, the empty hole that her absence causes.

I miss her too obviously, but most relationships I've been in that long, I begin to realize how we don't actually fit well at all. Things begin to come out that weren't issues in the beginning so I know in my mind it's going to end at some point, I just don't want to throw away the routine I've developed over the past few months so quick.


As for breaking up with someone after a short period of time, I don't have this same problem with routine issues. It kinda sucks but it's not a big deal to me. I more obsess over the idea of "what could have been" since the relationship wasn't given much time to mature.

the woulda/coulda/shoulda/ is futile torture.

I think it's part of this illusion of control we seem to have.

Maybe we ultimately have no control of anything beyond how we choose to feel about it.

Maybe. Maybe not

I'll tell you the answer to that in the next life. That is, if I remember or haven't been deluding myself

It takes me a very long time to get over someone, but the time gets shorter as I get older. I do NOT let people in. If I do, I'm all in. It is devastating when it doesn't work out. I can't function at all, I'm so sad. I don't think this is an AS thing. I think it is a result of childhood abuse.

I'm in a breakup situation right now. The possibility of us being together is nonexistent at this point. I don't like her as a person anymore. However, I still obsess about her and miss talking to her. I know I can't date anyone else until I get over her, and I mad because I can't control how long the process takes.

My last Girlfriend was 1992
I still think about her every day.
Worst than that though is the girl at school I had a crush on and the first girl I asked out, (she said no), She still pops up in dreams regularly, that was back in 1973/75.